Indian Democracy (Political Science, Volume 2)

309 Pages·2013·5.807 MB·English

by  K C Suri and Achin Vanaik (eds.)

Title Pages
Political Science: Volume 2: Indian Democracy
K.C. Suri and Achin Vanaik
Print publication date: 2013
Print ISBN-13: 9780198084952
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2013
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198084952.001.0001
Title Pages
Volume 2
Indian Democracy (p.ii)
(p.i) Political Science
Political Science
(p.iv)
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Title Pages
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Foreword
Political Science: Volume 2: Indian Democracy
K.C. Suri and Achin Vanaik
Print publication date: 2013
Print ISBN-13: 9780198084952
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2013
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198084952.001.0001
(p.vi) Foreword
The Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) is pleased to bring out
this four-volume series of ‘Research Surveys and Explorations’ in political
science. There is a long tradition of such periodic surveys which have
established a recognized benchmark for assessing scholarly work and
achievements in the respective social science disciplines. As such they have
been a valuable source of intellectual support for researchers and teachers
aiming to conduct their own studies or even more generally wishing to know the
‘state of the art’ as it were in their respective areas of interest.
These four volumes cover a variety of themes under the main rubrics of ‘The
Indian State’ (editor: Samir Kumar Das), ‘Indian Democracy’ (editor: K.C. Suri),
‘Indian Political Thought’ (editors: Pradip Kumar Datta and Sanjay Palshikar),
and ‘India Engages the World’ (editor: Navnita Chadha Behera). With regard to
the time period, the focus is broadly on works between 2003 and 2009. But since
studies in the different themes and sub-themes cannot and do not obey the same
temporal rhythms regarding possible innovations in methodological approaches,
or in the uncovering of significantly newer insights, or in the pursuit of
unexplored dimensions even within the subject areas chosen, each individual
survey must and does have flexibility with respect to covering and incorporating
works deemed necessary even if they fall in the period before or after 2003–9.
In one important respect, this is also a break from earlier ICSSR surveys in
political science. Even as the main focus on making (p.vii) surveys of the
existing literature is retained, the addition of the term ‘explorations’ to the
overall title of the project also means that greater freedom has been given to the
contributors of these volumes to bring in their own subjective evaluations as to
the nature of existing work done, as well as for them to suggest what they think
would be more fruitful and desirable lines of inquiry for researchers in the
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Foreword
future. This way the series can be a guide to readers not only of what has been
done but also as to what might or should be done from now on.
On behalf of the ICSSR, I wish to thank Achin Vanaik, the General Editor of this
series, as well as the theme editors of each volume and all the contributors to
the four volumes. I also wish to express my gratitude to all the experts who
reviewed these volumes and for their suggestions for improvements to the
authors before the final drafts were concluded. Finally, a special thanks to all the
staff at the ICSSR involved in carrying out the behind-the-scenes work without
which these volumes could not have taken shape.
JAVEED ALAM
Chairman
Indian Council of Social Science Research
(2008–11) (p.viii)
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General Introduction
Political Science: Volume 2: Indian Democracy
K.C. Suri and Achin Vanaik
Print publication date: 2013
Print ISBN-13: 9780198084952
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: September 2013
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198084952.001.0001
(p.ix) General Introduction
The latest round of ‘ICSSR Research Surveys and Explorations’ in the
disciplinary domain of political science studies in and on India has come after a
significant gap. In 1995, Political Theories and Social Reconstruction (edited by
Thomas Pantham) comprising certain writings that were part of a broader ICSSR
Research Survey over 1971–92, was brought out by Sage Publications. A short,
39-page monograph, Politics of Urbanization and Industrialised Development
(edited by Rakhahari Chatterji) which covered the period 1970–9, was released
in 1996. That this lacuna has now come to an end is welcome news in itself. This
project of preparing select, theme-based volumes in Indian political science
began in late 2009 under the chairmanship of Javeed Alam of the Indian Council
of Social Science Research (ICSSR). Had he not taken the initiative to bring this
hiatus to an end, it would have continued further. It is also to the credit of all the
theme editors and contributors of the four volumes that they were able—in such
a short span of time, in around a year-and-a-half—to put together these volumes
of genuine quality. This was all the more praiseworthy because there is also an
important break with such similar ICSSR surveys in the past, which thereby
demanded additional and new orientations even as the essential responsibility of
providing a survey of existing literature in the relevant fields and sub-fields was
retained.
As the changed nomenclature indicates, this time around the volumes would not
simply be comprehensive surveys of the studies in the chosen themes/sub-
themes meeting certain minimum quality standards and written by scholars
situated in India or abroad, whether by nationals or foreign citizens (of Indian or
other origins), who are (p.x) nonetheless dedicated India-watchers. The
addition of ‘Explorations’ to the formal title of the surveys meant that each
contributor to a sub-theme as well as the editor(s) of each of the four volumes
would be doing something more. Apart from elucidating the broad areas and
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General Introduction
issues that past research had covered, or even the approaches adopted by
scholars in their works, they would go on to exercise a more subjective
judgement in three important respects.
First, they were not simply to provide summaries of the contents of major texts
in their respective chapters (followed by a more exhaustive bibliography of
works dealing with that particular sub-theme/theme) but to try and contextualize
them as well. That is to say, link the preoccupations of, and directions taken by,
the texts and authors highlighted to the broader context of developments and
changes—the trend lines—taking place on the ground in India and, where
thought necessary, in the international arena as well. Each contributor was
expected to ‘front-load’, as it were, their studies. The second responsibility then
was for them to spell out what they think would be the likely directions taken
over the not too distant future by further research in that particular field they
were covering. Finally, each contributor to these volumes was to also leave their
own personal stamp, namely, not hesitate to point out their own preferences as
to where they would desire future research work to head towards and why.
Of course, the fact of such a long gap between the last such ICSSR surveys and
this project when combined with the relative speed and urgency with which
these volumes have been prepared has left an unavoidable mark which needs to
be acknowledged. There was no way that one could hope to combine quantity
with quality. That is to say, it was consciously decided not to try and somehow
make up at all costs the gap between the early 1970s and the present. Instead,
the broad guideline was to have these surveys cover the period 2003 to 2009
while leaving it flexible for each contributor to each sub-theme/theme to decide
their own earlier cut-off date from which they could begin their survey. This way,
important periods of previous research and important earlier texts in that area
would not be omitted.
There are other limitations to this series of surveys which also need to be
pointed out. The surveys have been confined to studies in English or those that
have been translated into English and made readily available. It is far from the
case that there are not many worthy studies in Indian languages other than
English. This also means that research work and publications in other official
Indian languages (p.xi) emanating from many central, state-level, and local
sites of learning and research could not be covered here. But until such time as
a wider-ranging project cross-cutting these linguistic boundaries is inaugurated,
this will have to do. But this omission is a limitation that must at least be
acknowledged here even as efforts to change this situation are pressed. It
follows that beneficiaries from this series of surveys and explorations would
necessarily have to have the requisite degree of proficiency in English.
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General Introduction
Nor has it been possible to cover all major sub-themes and themes that one
would have liked. Inevitably there are glaring gaps, not so much in subjects
being completely omitted or untouched, but in them not getting their sufficient
due in space and depth of treatment. Constraints of time and unforeseen
circumstances prevented the project from taking up or fulfilling wider ambitions
in this regard. Themes like women, caste, and environment could easily lay claim
to deserving volume length, let alone chapter length, treatment, which too has
not always been the case. In short, given all that can fall under the rubric of
‘Indian political science’ as well as its inherently interdisciplinary character,
survey volumes running into double-digit figures would have been required to do
proper justice to the whole gamut of issues, problems, and subjects that come
within its sphere of concerns. The reader is asked, however, to recognize and
hopefully appreciate what has been done rather than merely deprecate what has
not been done.
This series has been aimed at two kinds of audiences. One is the serious
research scholar who may or may not be formally affiliated to some institution of
learning and research at the central, state, or more local level, as well as
students and scholars abroad who are interested in what is happening here in
India and in its relationship with the world beyond its national boundaries. For
this first category, these volumes serve the role of providing summary
evaluations of the ‘state of the art’ concerning existing studies in a particular
field or sub-field as well as providing a valuable bibliographical guide for where
and what to look for amidst the existing literature. It also suggests future lines
of possible and desirable inquiry. The second kind of audience is the general,
informed, and curious reader who may or may not wish to pursue research but
does wish to know the important works, ideas, and advances in thinking and
understanding that have emanated from an essentially academic milieu about
political science and which can thereby serve as a powerful complement and
corrective to (p.xii) what comes from the public print and electronic media or
from more popular non-fiction writings.
It should be noted that the bibliographies presented here refer to useful studies
in English (for respectively chosen time-scales) by all scholars (Indian and
foreign) writing on India. Moreover, while the overwhelming emphasis is
obviously on academic books and articles in quality journals (refereed and non-
refereed), pieces appearing in the popular print media have also been cited if
considered of serious merit. Given that the borders between serious journalism
and academically acceptable writing are now crossed more frequently (in both
directions) by various practitioners, this is only to be expected. While it is
expected that the exploratory part of the chapters will reflect to some degree or
the other the intellectual and political biases of the author, the bibliography is
designed to cover all useful work inclusive of all political orientations. In this
way the sources of dominant or mainstream academic discourses will be
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General Introduction
provided even as the commentaries will give greater leeway to personal
predilections.
The Broad Themes
The broad themes for the four volumes are as follows:
(1) The Indian State
(2) Indian Democracy
(3) Indian Political Thought
(4) India Engages the World
In each volume, the theme editor(s) provides an assessment of the current state
of the art with respect to the studies appearing under that overarching theme,
their own sense of likely and desirable future research trends as well as brief
summaries of the various chapters dealing with chosen sub-themes in that
particular volume. No attempt therefore will be made in this general
introduction to replicate those exercises in summarization. Rather, it will confine
itself to more general observations and judgements aiming in part to discern
what might be the points of originality in existing research, and also to discern
whether there are any uniform assumptions, orientations, substantive or
methodological preoccupations that exist in each volume across their own
chapter-encapsulated sub-themes, or even whether some such loose uniformities
might not exist across all four volumes.
(p.xiii) One such ‘uniformity’ across the four volumes seems clear—the search
for an Indian distinctiveness. This has taken two roads. There is the safer,
cautious, less problematic or controversial ‘low road’ of study and exploration.
This course aims to describe, highlight, and explain the distinctiveness of the
Indian experience (where the ‘Indian’ is not always to be seen as a mere
synonym for the ‘national’); of its society and polity; of its culture and thought
frames. Then there is the more controversial, though more daring, ‘high road’
where it is not simply a case of providing synthetic analyses showing how
different or distinctive the Indian state, democracy, and political thought is or
how its insertion in the world order creates a distinctive dialectic of the internal
and the external, whether mediated by the state or non-state actors. Here, the
contribution of Indian political science that is sought to be highlighted is the
more theoretical break from the conceptual categories of a dominant (Western)
discourse—a conceptual innovativeness that is undertaken and deemed
necessary in order to better grasp the true distinctiveness of the Indian
experience and experiment.
In all the four volumes, there is some combination of these two roads as it were.
But the length of passage on one or the other road varies. To put it another way,
on the one hand, concepts, theoretical constructs, and analytical frameworks
taken from elsewhere—mainly the West—are used in perceptive ways to show
Indian distinctiveness. For three decades or more after independence this has
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General Introduction
perhaps been the dominant form taken by Indian political science and the
intellectual outcome has been of undeniable merit and value. From that time on,
Indian political science practitioners or, more precisely, practitioners of political
science concerning India have become more theoretically ambitious, more
willing to travel on the ‘high road’, which in itself is neither good nor bad. It is
always the results in terms of whether or not in the longer run the newer
research tools and agendas inspired and provoked will exhibit greater
insightfulness, show greater explanatory power, or raise more fruitful questions
to explore than is the case with what might be called the pre-existing more
conventional and established theoretical understandings.
The basic form taken by such theoretical innovativeness has not been the
creation or origination of altogether new concepts. Rather, it seems to have
taken the form of redefining, of giving newer and different meanings and
different interpretations of ‘older’ Western-derived concepts so as to make them
more capable of grasping the (p.xiv) Indian experience. This very
reinterpretation can then also enable these very concepts to be used in
presumably more creative ways to understand not just other parts of the non-
West but the West itself. From what the contributors to and theme editors of
each of the four volumes write, this particular direction or trend seems to have
gone furthest in ‘Indian Political Thought,’ followed by the volumes—‘The Indian
State’, ‘Indian Democracy’, and least of all in ‘India Engages the World’, where
conventional Realist and Realist-inspired approaches continue to shape most
such studies. Nonetheless, even here, more interest than in the past is being
shown in other non-Realist theoretical approaches to better comprehend India,
the world, and India’s place in it, past, present, and future. Moreover, although
as yet only a small current, the effort has begun to develop an ‘Indianized’ (not
to be confused with seeking an Indian or indigenous) theory of international
relations.
What are some of the reworked concepts? These by and large belong to the
social science disciplines taken as a whole and not specifically to political
science taken as a separate discipline. Methodological advances or changes in
approach do not always or simply result from intra-disciplinary theoretical
advances. They also take place through conceptual borrowings from other
disciplines. Once again, the mere fact of being borrowed is not in itself a
measure or indication of their worth. Insofar as conventional economics is
considered the most ‘scientific’ (in a positivist sense) of the social science
disciplines (and basking in the prestige thereof), borrowings from it in the form
of rational choice approaches in international relations or political science have
not been seen as an unmixed blessing. Indeed, if in the academies of the
Anglophone world, rational choice approaches in the discipline of political
science have become increasingly popular, this is not yet the case in Indian
political science. Here, it is post-positivist approaches from their milder to the
far stronger postmodernist forms that are gaining ground at the expense of their
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General Introduction
positivist rivals, at least as far as the more methodologically self-conscious
studies are concerned. It should be noted, however, that the bulk of studies
carry on along well-worn positivist paths.
A representative sample of this redefined theoretical toolkit for investigating
Indian reality would encompass such notions as communalism,
communitarianism, secularism, subaltern, passive revolution, governmentality,
political society, civil society, postcoloniality, critical traditionality, polycentrism,
and postnationalism. Such shifts (p.xv) in theoretical apparatuses signal
dissatisfaction with pre-existing concepts and their meanings and this in turn is
provoked by changes on the ground—in social, economic, political, cultural, and
ideological realities which presumably newer conceptual equipment would be
better able to handle. Such presumptions are themselves of course invariably
challenged by other scholars.
These material upheavals have not been confined to any particular region or
nation or part of the world. They have been global in scope but then refracted
through regional, national, and local specificities of all kinds. There was the end
of the post-World War II ‘long boom’ by the mid-1970s followed by a new
conjuncture witnessing the rise of the political right; the retreat of social
democracy; the exhaustion of revolutionary nationalism, and (with very few
exceptions) the end of the decolonization process. State-led developmentalist
strategies became a casualty in most of the developing world (barring East Asia)
which paved the way ideologically for what critics call neo-liberalism and what
advocates call sensible, market-friendly policies. Of course, economic shifts to
the right or left will necessarily be accompanied by political and ideological
shifts to the right or left. The rise of feminism in the 1960s and 1970s had a
more lasting effect through the decades that followed and in doing so stimulated
a critique of patriarchy-blind notions of progress.
From roughly the beginning of the last quarter of the twentieth century, there
arose a politics of cultural exclusiveness of variant forms, most notably of
ethnicity, religion, nation, either separately or in some combination—irredentist
nationalisms in ex-USSR and ex-Yugoslavia; religious revanchisms in the ‘Third
World’ and outside; racist and anti-immigrant xenophobia in the ‘First World’,
current expressions of which include a rising discourse and practice of
demonizing Islam and Muslims. The collapse of the Communist Bloc, the
transition to capitalism in China, the end of the Cold War with victory to the
West are changes that are, in both spatial and temporal terms, truly profound.
Add to this the ever-expanding awareness of looming ecological catastrophes if
the runaway train of contemporary forms of industrial and high-energy intensive
growth is not slowed down or even stopped.
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