When the most recent generation of community building initiatives (CCIs) was launched in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the field wanted to invest in and learn about the effectiveness of a kind of initiative that was meant to bring together the best of what had been learned during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s about how to go about promoting change in distressed communities. The premise was that if these new initiatives could concentrate resources and apply best practices from social services, economic development, education reform, and physical revitalization in targeted neighborhoods, people would get a whole that was more than the sum of the parts. As these initiatives have unfolded, they have looked different from place to place, but they have had several critical features in common. First, these initiatives have had goals that go beyond the individual level, which distinguishes them from most social programs. Second, they have been guided by two main principles: they are comprehensive in their analysis of their community, the problems they are addressing, and the solutions they are pursuing, and they operate according to community building principles. In terms of how the field has evolved in the past 10 to 12 years, the author offers some highlights from two books that she and her colleagues have published about CCIs: one in 1997 and one in 2002. Both are titled "Voices from the Field," and both describe key accomplishments and challenges in the field. She discusses the lessons they learned from the CCI experience, particularly on the principles guiding the work. (Contains 1 note.)