Methods and apparatus to control power state transitions in embedded systems are disclosed. In a disclosed method, power state transitions of agents in the system are managed by a central authority. The agents register themselves with the central authority. When a request to transition the system to a requested power state is received, the central authority issues callback instructions to the agents in the system that support the requested power state. The callback instructions are issued in a temporal order indicated by the power state dependencies of the agents. Thus, the central authority arbitrates the order in which the agents transition to the requested power state. The power state dependencies of the agents are registered with the central authority by the agents either at power-up of the system or when the agents are plugged into the system.