Drawing on papers presented in a workshop held in Calcutta in January 1995, this article reports on debates over the nature of the relationships between agrarian structure, agricultural growth and the state in West Bengal and Bangladesh. It scrutinises reports of rapid agricultural growth in West Bengal (and less spectacular but still significant agricultural growth in Bangladesh) since the early 1980s and expands the concept of structure to include structures of commerce, of bureaucracies, of exchange arrangements in land water and labour, as well as changing ideologies of gender, caste and ethnicity, The local impact of the West Bengal Left Front government's agrarian reforms (including Panchayati Raj) are also analysed and trends in poverty in the two Bengals since 1980 are examined.
