HIS 2417 - Politics, Poverty and Water in Post-colonial India
This course explores reasons for the persistence of high proportions of poor and very poor communities and groups in modern India. Most of the discussion will focus on post-colonial India. A guiding question for the course is why electoral politics have been slow in promoting processes of what some observors call the “deepening of democracy” in India. In terms of both political processes and poverty, the course focuses on rural society, with south Indian states providing cases studies. The largest proportion of the rural poor in India live in semi-arid areas of water scarcity so the politics of access to water is also a major theme in the course.
*- in compendium
State:
Brass, Paul R., The Politics of India since Independence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 1-66. 67 pp.
*Edward Luce, In Spite of the Gods (London: Abacus, 2006), pp. 64-105. 41 pp.
Politics:
*Sunil Khilnani, “Politics and National Identity”, Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, eds, The Oxford Companion to Politics in India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 192-204, pp. 12.
Brass, Paul R., The Politics of India since Independence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 67-147. 81 pp.
*Christophe Jaffrelot, “The Hindu Nationalists and Power”, in Niraja Gopal Jayal and Pratap Bhanu Mehta, eds, The Oxford Companion to Politics in India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 205-218, pp. 13.
Pamela Price, “Kingly Models in Indian Political Behavior: Culture as a Medium of History,” in Asian Survey, 1989, Vol. 14, No. 6, pp. 559-572. 14 pp.
Tamil Nadu:
*Arun R. Swamy, “Parties, Political Identities and the Absence of Mass Political Violence in South India”, in Amrita Basu and Atul Kohli, eds., Community Conflicts and the State in India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 108-148. 40 pp.
*Narendra Subramanian, “The Efflorescence of Paternalist Populism: The ADMK”, in his Ethnicity and Populist Mobilization: Political Parties, Citizens and Democracy in South India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 246-301, 309-310. 56 pp.
*Andrew Wyatt, “The Enduring Appeal of Populist Leadership in Contemporary Tamil Nadu”, in Pamela Price and Arild Engelsen Ruud, Power and Influence in India: Bosses, Lords and Captains (Delhi: Routledge, 2010), pp. 144-168, pp. 24 pp.
*Loraine Kennedy, “The Political Determinants of Reform Packaging: Contrasting Responses to Economic Liberalization in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu”, in Roy Jenkins, ed., Regional Reflections: Comparing Politics Across India's States (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 29-65. 37 pp
Andhra Pradesh:
*K.C. Suri, “Democratic Process and Electoral Politics in Andhra Pradesh, India”, Working Paper 180 online, Overseas Development Institute, pp. 37-45. 9 pp
Atul Kohli, “The NTR Phenomenon in Andhra Pradesh: Political Change in a South Indian State”, in Asian Survey, Vol. 28, No. 10, 1988, pp. 991-1017. 28 pp.
*Mark Tully & Gillian Wright, India in Slow Motion (New Delhi: Viking, 2002), “Creating Cyberabad”, pp. 123-153. 34 pp.
*Pamela Price, “Development, Drought and Campaign Rhetoric in South India: Chandrababu Naidu and the Telugu Desam Party, 2003-2004”, 34 pp.
*Pamela Price, “A Political Breakthrough for Irrigation Development: The Congress Assembly Campaign in Andhra Pradesh in 2003-2004”, 31 pp.
*K. Balagopal, “Andhra Pradesh: Beyond Media Images”, Economic and Political Weekly online, June 12, 2004, 9 pp.
Political Economy:
Brass, Paul R., The Politics of India since Independence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), Part III, pp. 269-335. 76 pp.
*Bruno Dorin & Frédéric Landy, Agriculture and Food in India (New Delhi: Manohar, 2009), pp. 171-197, 26 pp.
*Katar Singh and Vishwa Ballabh, “Incidence, Impacts, and Management of Droughts in India; An Overview”, in Jasveen Jairath and Vishwa Ballabh, eds, Droughts and Integrated Water Resource Management in South Asia: Issues, Alternatives and Futures (New Delhi: Sage, 2008), pp. 156-182, 26 pp.
*K.J. Joy and Suhas Paranjape, “Water Use: Legal and Institutional Framework”, in Ramaswamy R. Iyer, Water and the Laws in India (New Delhi: Sage, 2009), 213-250. 37 pp.
Agrarian society, state, politics, and water:
*Paul G. Hiebert, Konduru: Structure and Integration in a South Indian Village (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1971), pp. 13-30, 54-80, 101-105, 118-130, 58 pp.
*Marguerite S. Robinson, Local Politics: The Law of the Fishes. Development through Political Change in Medak District, Andhra Pradesh (South India) (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988), 19-46, 251-280, 56 pp.
"Pamela Price, "Changing Meanings of Authority in Contemporary Rural India, Special Issue: Political Ethnography, Qualitative Sociology, Vol. 29, No. 3, 2006, pp. 301-316. 17 pp.
*Pamela Price and Dusi Srinivas, “’Vernacularisation’, Voter Autonomy, and Tensions in Politician Conceptions”, pp. 22.
*David Mosse, “Ecological Zones and the Culture of Collective Action: The History and Social Organisation of a Tank Irrigation System in Tamil Nadu”, in South Indian Studies, Vol. 3, January-June, 1997, 1-88, 88 pp.
*David Mosse, The Rule of Water: Statecraft, Ecology and Collective Action in South India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 265-297, 32 pp.
*S. Janakarajan, “Conflict Over the Use of Groundwater: Some Evidence from Tamil Nadu”, in A. Vaidyanathan and H.M. Oudshoom, eds, Managing water scarcity: Experiences and Prospects (New Delhi: Manohar, 2004), pp. 119-144, 25 pp.