This introductory paper argues that, for most of the period since 1914, paternalism has been the most enduring influence over labour management in large‐scale agriculture in Africa and South‐East Asia. On the other hand, paternalism appears in a number of variants, with considerable differences in terms of protagonists, degrees of comprehensiveness, emphases and relations to alternative approaches to labour management. After a brief preliminary section, the paper falls into three sections. The first argues for a specific definition of paternalism, against an account of the term's intellectual history. The second provides a sketch of paternalism's lines of development in African and South‐East Asian agriculture. The third introduces the other papers in this collection by identifying their contributions to three central questions that arise from these discussions: how paternalism has been contested and by whom, whether paternalism will persist and if so in what form, and the implications of paternalism for citizenship.