These papers represent a series of important contributions on the history of urbanization. As well as offering a clear and instructive discussion of fundamental concepts, processes, and measurement problems, the introduction summarizes findings in the latest research and proposes new topics. The papers focus on four principal areas of contemporary research on urbanization: urban networks, town-country economic links, migration, and demographic patterns. New areas of analysis, such as the study of migration flows by age, gender, or social group, and the comparative east/west approach of several of these papers will serve to broaden the international scope of research and stimulate further work in this field.