There has been a steady advance of the atomic and molecular many-body methodology over the last few years, with a concomitant development of versatile computer codes. Understanding and interpretation of electronic structural features and the associated spectroscopic properties via many-body techniques are becoming competitive with those obtained with the traditional formalisms. Since the many-body techniques are not yet a part of the repertoire of the "black-box tools" of electronic structure and spectroscopy, it seems worthwhile to take stock now of the recent progress in certain selected areas. The present volume is more in the nature of proceedings of a "Paper Symposium," rather than of one which actually took place. We did organize in Calcutta, between December 10 and 12, 1990, a small meeting on Applied Many-Body Methods to Spectroscopy and Electronic Structure, jointly organized by the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science and the S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences. Several leading practitioners were invited, among which some could not come for various reasons.