The article investigates the problems of conceiving of illegal networks as beyond the reach of the state, and the related tendency to associate illegal networks with activities deemed by the state to be morally, ethically, economically, or politically unacceptable; and the degree to which state and society can be considered conceptual categories adequate to the social complexities of turn-of-the-century Peru. The article seeks to identify a social context in which illegal political networks, far from indicating the external boundaries of the state, were creations of state power, and acted as key mechanisms by means of which state organization was brought into being and reproduced. Furthermore, it suggests that the political processes of turn-of-the-century Peru cannot be captured by the state-society distinction. It approaches the apparent unity and integrity of the state, and the separation of state from society as problems to be unraveled rather than to be given the features of social order. Notes, references