Between the reigns of King Louis XIV/Emperor Leopold I and King Louis XV/Empress Maria Theresa, the French Bourbon and Austrian Habsburg monarchies constituted continental Europe’s two leading powers. As long-time rivals and later allies, their development exhibited a comparable mix of striking parallels, but also marked differences. Whereas a tendency to contrast the two states is fairly common, structural similarities have rarely been noted and have scarcely stimulated any comparative examination. The continuing work of reassessment of how the Bourbon and Habsburg rulers asserted their authority over provincial elites of their vast monarchies and how these elites adapted to the new pressures has inspired the idea of an English-language workshop to draw initial comparisons and point up contrasts between the domestic foundations of international power in the French and Austrian monarchies – with the focus on Estates. The workshop is intended to offer an opportunity for a general discussion of the part that the intermediary powers played in the development of the French and the Austrian monarchies towards fiscal-military states and an initial debate about approaches employed in the research thus far.