Journal of South Asian Development recent issues

Ethnographic Insights into Enduring Inequalities

Gorringe, H., Jeffery, R., Sariola, S. — 2009-04-24

This is a country where the poor fear tuberculosis, which kills 1,000 Indians a day, but people like me—middle-class people with access to health services that are probably better than England's—don't fear it at all. It's an unglamorous disease, like so much of the things that the poor of India endure (Adiga in Jefferies 2008).

From Militant Rejection to Pragmatic Consensus: Caste among Madigas in Andhra Pradesh

Still, C. — 2009-04-24

This article examines gender and age differences in Dalit attitudes towards caste inequality, using interviews and ethnographic fieldwork conducted among Madigas in Andhra Pradesh (AP). Madigas express a range of views about their position in society. Some oppose ideas of untouchability and espouse ideologies of equality. They deny the existence of caste and have no respect for what they see as the dying remnants of the old order. Others (especially elderly women) accept patronage and subordination in return for cash and security and exploit the old forms of subservience and deference. The paper argues that Madigas reject ‘caste–as–hierarchy’ and make use of ‘caste–as–identity’ and attempt to use their caste status as a resource which can be invoked when it is beneficial, and downplayed when it is not.

Adivasi Mobilisation: 'Identity' versus 'Class' after the Kerala Model of Development?

Steur, L. — 2009-04-24

In August 2001 there was widespread protest in Kerala, a state otherwise known for its remarkable achievements in ‘human’ development, at the starvation deaths that had occurred in a number of adivasi colonies. This prompted a continuing debate on the meaning of the Kerala ‘model’ of development for adivasis, in which a consensus seems to have risen that adivasis are the victims of Kerala's development experience and in which their current mobilisation is seen as the first time in history that their interests are being politically articulated. This article argues that such an interpretation is unwarranted and dangerous in that it ignores the present limitations of neo-liberalism on initiatives for the emancipation of subaltern groups and prevents them from using their historical political experience to dynamise their present political initiatives.

In the Name of 'Poor and Marginalised'? Politics of NGO Activism with Dalit Women in Rural North India

Govinda, R. — 2009-04-24

Assertion by the Dalits or ex-untouchables is one of the most significant developments in contemporary India. Dalit women have actively participated in Dalit movements and in women's and development NGOs activism. However, their voices and perspectives are said to have been marginalised by movements and NGOs alike. This article unpacks the complexities, contradictions and challenges that are produced, reproduced and subverted in NGO activism with Dalit women by examining a women's NGO and its relations with Dalit women, the state and international donors in rural Uttar Pradesh in north India. Which factors contribute to an NGO choosing to work with Dalit women? Specifically, what implications does having roots in a state-sponsored initiative have for the NGO under study? Does external funding necessarily change the character of activism with Dalit women? CanDalit women take on leadership roles in NGO activism with other Dalit women? The article explores these questions using interviews, observations and documentation collected and analysed in my doctoral research.

Performing Global HIV Prevention: Incentives, Identities and Inequality amongst Sex Workers in Chennai

Sariola, S. — 2009-04-24

Sex workers in India are central to HIV prevention programmes, yet the relationships of sex workers with those who conduct HIV prevention have not been studied. In this article I describe and analyse the relationships between four sets of very different social actors: global funding bodies; the Indian government; non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and; sex workers who are involved in HIV prevention in Chennai, India. Using ethnographic data derived from fieldwork conducted in 2004–5, I show that HIV prevention is a performance, rhetoric and a resource available to sex workers as well as to the NGOs. HIV prevention programmes create opportunities for sex workers for social mobilisation and offer them ways of subverting stigma, but these programmes are insufficient because they produce and reproduce existing power hierarchies. Thus when analysing inequality in sex workers’ lives, the influences of local power asymmetries as well as the global dimensions of international HIV prevention policies need to be considered.

Dis-embedding Health Care: Marketisation and the Rising Cost of Medicine in Kerala, South India

Wilson, C. — 2009-04-24

From the early 1990s, so-called ‘five-star’ hospitals have sprouted up in small towns and cities across the state of Kerala, South India. Equipped with expensive diagnostic technologies and super-specialist consultants, these institutions are now leading players in the vibrant local health care economy. Markets in health are often understood to increase inequalities by creating a two-tier system of provision for the rich and the poor (for example, Johnson 1995). This paper examines how the processes of marketisation have significantly increased the cost of treatment across the public and private health care systems. It contrasts earlier approaches to corruption in medicine that emphasised the over-use or misuse of technologies (Yesudian 1994) to contemporary Kerala, in which technology has become an important value in everyday medical practice. As a result of growing competition and income aspirations, the health care system is gradually being decoupled from local cost considerations, while doctors and private hospitals are increasingly viewed as exploitative and lacking in moral legitimacy.

'There is Peace Here': Managing Communal Relations in a Town in Central Gujarat

Heitmeyer, C. — 2009-04-24

This article describes the relations between Hindus and Muslims in a small town in central Gujarat following the massive violence against the Muslim minority community throughout many parts of the state between February and May 2002. While the ‘communal divide’ has become more pronounced following the 2002 attacks in many parts of the state as well as in the town in which the research was conducted, concerted efforts are made by members of both communities as a means of re-imposing a sense of ‘everyday peace’. As such, normative discourses presenting the 2002 violence as an aberration with respect to the state of local communal relations in the town represent a collective strategy of containing the tension and mutual suspicion which remain constant undercurrents in daily life. This article, moreover, explores the ongoing caste– and class-based social networks and interactions underlying public declarations of ‘everyday peace’ which have played a central role in, if not averting violence altogether, discouraging the development of further communal segregation and division in the aftermath of the 2002 attacks in the town.

Book Reviews

2009-04-24

Between National Security and Ethno-nationalism: The Regional Politics of Development in Northeast India

McDuie-RA, D. — 2009-02-19

Although scholarly interest in Northeast India is growing there is still relatively little discussion of the high levels of poverty in the region and the failures of development. When mentioned they are viewed instrumentally as causes and/or symptoms of ongoing insurgency and counter-insurgency. However this does not fully explain how a region that receives an extraordinarily large amount of development funding from the Indian Government, has its own development ministry, has some of India’s highest human development indicators, and has an array of institutional layers assuring autonomy and decentralisation has poverty levels well above the Indian national average. Using the state of Meghalaya, this article examines the factors underpinning the development agenda in the region and the political space for contesting this agenda. The argument presented is three-fold; the regional development agenda is underpinned by national security imperatives which characterise relations between the various levels of governance ensuring minimal deviation, contestation of the development agenda is limited by national security from above and ethno-nationalism from below narrowing the political space for negotiating development alternatives, and this situation is the result of material and ideational factors embedding development in the politics of state-formation and ethnic identity.

From Sea to Shrimp Processing Factories in Bangladesh: Gender and Employment at the Bottom of a Global Commodity Chain

Islam, M. S. — 2009-02-19

Shrimp aquaculture in Bangladesh linking the European Union, the USA, and Japan exhibits several characteristics of a buyer-driven global commodity chain (GCC). The study shows that, along with the effects of local conditions, buyers’ pressures transmitted through the GCC affect gender and employment relations in the lower segments of the chain. It has been found that the feminisation of the workforce in aquaculture is accompanied by the marginality of females, who receive lower wages and social prestige than their male counterparts, and who are mostly concentrated at the beginning and end of the local supply chain, with very limited access to other important nodes of the GCC. In addition to being flexible (part-time, temporary, casual), much of the employment in Bangladesh shrimp aquaculture is also informal, without an employment contract or its associated rights. As there is an apparent gap between labour standards in private regulatory regimes and actual labour practices in the production and processing segments of the chain, the pressing question concerns how the structure of the commodity chain can allow companies to maintain the flexibility and low labour costs required for international competitiveness while ensuring more equitable and empowering labour market outcomes for workers.

Ownership and Performance of the Indian Banking Industry: Revisited

Bhaduri, S. N, Shanmugam, K. — 2009-02-19

This study contributes to the ownership–performance literature by analysing the issue for the Indian banking sector during the post reform period (1992–2007). Results indicate that both foreign and domestic private banks are superior to their public counterparts with respect to four performance indicators namely, Return on Asset, Operating Profit Ratio, Operating Cost Ratio and Staff Expense Ratio. The one indicator in which the private banks are less efficient than their counterpart is Net Interest Margin. Furthermore, the foreign banks seem to be superior among the private banks, while the State bank group shows better performance among the public banks. The results also highlight a convergence in the performances across various ownership groups over the reform period. The competitiveness due to reform measures seems to help the poor performing banks in reducing the performance gap. Since publicly owned banks still perform poorly, privatisation seems to be an effective policy in improving the performance of Indian banks.

Do Microfinance Programmes Really Serve the Poor? Evidence from Rural Southeast Nepal

Dulal, H. B., Gingrich, C. D, Stough, R. R — 2009-02-19

During the past 25 years development organisations worldwide have increasingly relied on microfinance programmes to help alleviate poverty and achieve various development objectives. These programmes typically aim to provide financial services to poor households that otherwise cannot access formal financial markets. One such example programme is the Grameen Bikas Bank (GBB) in rural southeast Nepal. While GBB targets poor households, the evidence reveals that the vast majority of GBB clients are relatively wealthy, as measured by land ownership and other socioeconomic indicators. In addition, GBB’s poor clients also feel less satisfied with its services than do wealthy clients, suggesting that GBB has not adequately tailored its products to the needs of the poor. Possible reasons for GBB’s shortcomings include Nepal’s caste system, rigid loan repayment schedules, and below-market interest rates on loans. Remedies to improve GBB’s outreach to the poor include flexible repayment schedules, higher interest rates, and increased staffing to recruit poor households and monitor their loans.

Whose Extension Matters? Role of Governmental and Non-Governmental Agricultural Extension on the Technical Efficiency of Rural Nepalese Farms

Bhatta, K. P., Ishida, A., Taniguchi, K., Sharma, R. — 2009-02-19

South Asian economies are characterised by agrarian dominancy. Despite this agriculture is unable to meet even the domestic demands. Low levels of productivity and inefficiency of the farms are among the main causes. Hence, finding appropriate ways to increase productivity and efficiency is important to improve individual household welfare as well as to feed the ever increasing population. In this context, the objective of this research is to explore characteristics that significantly affect technical efficiency of the crop producing farms. 124 samples were purposively selected from the Far Western Region of Nepal. Household heads were interviewed with the help of a semi-structured questionnaire to collect data on farming systems. Stochastic Frontier Production Function was used to estimate the effect of different variables on the farm’s technical efficiency. Results showed significantly positive effect of agricultural extension provided by non-governmental organisations but negative although insignificant effect of agricultural extension provided by the governmental organisations on the technical efficiency of the crop producing farms. Results implied the need of policy reconsideration to increase the role of non-governmental organisations in providing agricultural extension services, especially for the developing agrarian economies like Nepal in the South Asian region.

Book Reviews

2009-02-19

The Story of an Aborted Revolution: Communist Insurgency in Post-independence West Bengal, 1948-50

Bandyopadhyay, S. — 2008-06-30

In the early days of independence the province of West Bengal witnessed a violent communist upsurge in 1948–50. In many ways the events of this period foreshadowed what happened in this province during the Naxalite experiment of the late 1960s and the early 1970s. This paper, using recently declassified IB records, seeks to reconstruct this less-known episode in the history of the communist movement in India. It was apparently an attempt to revive the Tebhaga movement, which was left half way in 1946. But in areas it touched on a variety of issues affecting marginal peasants and industrial workers in the early years of independence. In the end it appeared that the mass support for this attempted ‘people's democratic revolution’ was sporadic, localised and issue-based. In 1950, following an intense internal ideological debate within the party, the Communist Party of India (CPI) decided to abandon its revolutionary line and decided to participate in the forthcoming general elections. This paper unravels this process of transformation of the communist movement in India from a revolutionary to a constitutional movement operating within the perimeters of mass electoral politics.

A Tale of Three Villages: Power, Difference and Locality in Rural Bangladesh

Lewis, D., Hossain, A. — 2008-06-30

This article discusses a set of qualitative data collected in 2004 on changes in formal and informal aspects of local institutions and power in Bangladesh, drawn from three contrasting villages of Greater Faridpur district. It explores the idea that the rural power structure, previously conceived as relatively rigid ‘net’, is in certain ways becoming more open and less constraining to poor people. This loosening of the net takes different forms across the three contexts depending on locality. Each of the three villages is seen to experience a common set of wider institutional pressures from outside, such as increased levels of party politicisation within decentralising politics, different forms of intervention by non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and the attempted reform of mechanisms for local dispute settlement. However, the local trajectories of change in each village arising from such interventions is found to vary depending on local circumstances and conditions, as do the implications of change for addressing rural poverty.

The Breakdown in North-East India: Identity Wars or Crises of Legitimacy?

Hassan, M. S. — 2008-06-30

This article tries to unravel the drivers of the protracted ethnic and secessionist conflicts, and the resultant disorder that have marred the north-eastern region of India. These conflicts have mostly been explained using the grievance narrative. But such explanations fail to account for the large variance in violence levels within the region. A rather more fruitful line of inquiry is provided by a state-society reading of the political history of the north-east that highlights the fact that conflicts there are accompanied by a contested and weak authority of governmental agencies and the fragmentation of society. Unpacking this causal connection demands that one delve into the region's history to study the process of state-making—how state leaders in colonial and post-colonial times established bureaucratic apparatuses, and constructed and mobilised collective identities in an effort at legitimacy. By focusing on the cases of Mizoram and Manipur, and their very divergent success with mitigating conflicts, and using qualitative sources of data, the paper demonstrates that in Mizoram the process of state-making was such that it consolidated the public legitimacy and authority of reigning institutions among all sections of society, resulting in the strengthened capability of government agencies to provide services, manage group contestations and avoid breakdown. In Manipur it was localised and traditional centres of power—tribal and ethnic associations—that gained in authority, in effect compromising the legitimacy of the government and the institutional capability of its agencies.

Contested Claims: Public Perceptions and the Decision to Join NGOs in Pakistan

Bano, M. — 2008-06-30

While international development institutions continue to employ the notions of ‘social capital’ and ‘civil society’ to support their policy of channelling development aid through Southern NGOs, a growing number of studies record NGOs' inability to mobilise members. A countrywide survey of public perceptions of the term ‘NGO’ in Pakistan reveals two striking results: one, dependence on development aid is posing serious challenges to NGOs' public legitimacy; two, strong ideological commitment on the part of the leader of the organisation plays a critical role in shaping an individual's decision to support an organisation, and high monetary compensations made available to the leaders of the NGOs through development aid are interpreted as lack of commitment and negatively impact organisational membership. These findings have important implications for the development agencies' ambition to push the ‘good governance’ agenda through the NGOs in the South.

Contradictions and Confusions in Development Work: Exploring the Realities of Bangladeshi NGOs

Arvidson, M. — 2008-06-30

Ambiguous practices and identities of NGOs have become a source of increasing concern for all involved in development intervention. But apart from pointing at dishonest marketing and unfortunate unintended consequences of donors' support, how can we under-stand these ambiguities? Based on an ethnographic study of local Bangladeshi NGOs, the article explores actions and behaviour of grassroots NGO staff. The article shows how, equipped with an ideal image of the altruistic development worker, the staff's encounter with reality provides them with contradictory and confusing messages as to who they should be and how they should act, resulting in disillusion and moral discord. The analysis examines concepts such as altruism, alienation, goal ambiguity, moral selving and moral discord, with an aim to expand our understanding of some moral dilemmas of development practice, its sources and unpredictable outcomes.

The South Asian Free Trade Agreement: Which Way Forward?

Weerakoon, D., Thennakoon, J. — 2008-06-30

The South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA), due to have been implemented starting July 2006, has adopted a negative list approach permitting member countries to potentially exclude a substantial share of intraregional trade from the tariff liberalisation process. This study finds that the excluded trade amounts to nearly 53 per cent of current import trade amongst South Asian countries, bringing into question the future prospects for meaningful economic cooperation under a regional framework. At the very least, if the SAFTA treaty had built on the existing bilateral FTAs in the region, it would eventually have come to supersede such agreements. Unfortunately, the regional initiative has lagged well behind the bilateral process, and is likely to be overtaken by alternative strategic trade policy initiatives cropping up in the region. It seems likely that attempts at economic integration of the South Asian region under the SAARC framework is liable to fragment.

Book Reviews

2008-06-30

Hindu Muslim Brotherhood: Exploring the Dynamics of Communal Relations in Varanasi, North India

Williams, P. — 2007-12-10

The rise of Hindu nationalism in India in recent decades has stimulated a body of academic interest emphasising the irreconcilable differences between Hindus and Muslims on the subcontinent. This article shifts the focus on Hindu–Muslim relations away from conflict to that of everyday peace, where peace is perceived as an active process towards the non-violent resolution of communal conflict. The terrorist attacks in Varanasi, north India, in March 2006 created an atmosphere of anticipated communal tension. Despite expectations that communal violence would result, peace was maintained in the city. This article draws on ethnographic research conducted in Varanasi during April and May 2006 to explore the role of the ‘state’, ‘civil society’ and ‘agency’, and examines the mechanisms that enabled communal peace to prevail in light of existing theoretical literature on communal violence. These findings confirm the centrality of ‘civil society’ in minimising the potential for communal violence, but most importantly emphasise the vital role of human agency in understanding the processes by which peace is maintained.

Out of School and (Probably) in Work: Child Labour and Capability Deprivation in India

Jayaraj, D., Subramanian, S. — 2007-12-10

This article explores the hypothesis that the phenomenon of child labour is explicable in terms of poverty that compels a household to keep its children out of school and put them to work in the cause of the household's survival. In exploring the link between child labour and poverty in the Indian context, the article advances the view that the nature of the connection is more readily apprehended if both the variables under study are defined more expansively and inclusively than is customarily the case. Specifically, the suggestion is that it may be realistic to include those children who are conventionally categorised as ‘non-workers not attending school’ within the count of child labourers. It is also suggested that poverty is meaning fully measured in terms of a multidimensional approach to the problem, wherein the aim is to assess generalised capability failure—arising from want of access to elementary infrastructural facilities and essential amenities—with respect to a number of basic human functionings. The core of the article's argument is presented by means of a simple analytical model of child labour and deprivation, and the issues emerging from it are studied in the Indian context with the support of both primary and secondary data.

'Some People Drink as the Body Should Feel a Little Ease': Understanding Body Management amongst Manual Labourers in Western India

Waite, L. — 2007-12-10

Despite development studies’ core concern with vulnerable bodies, the discipline has been somewhat sluggish in embracing the expansive and fruitful literature around embodiment. One aspect of this terrain is ‘body management’; a topic often discussed in contexts of Western consumerism where the body is perceived as a malleable entity subject to transformation. This article discusses a group of manual labourers in India who are not reflexively reconstituting themselves through post-modern playfulness, but whose fleshy bodies are nevertheless of pivotal importance in their labour-intensive livelihoods. It is this understanding of bodies as primary assets in the lives of the working poor that begs a deeper understanding of how bodies are managed within realms that ostensibly appear to harm the embodied condition of labourers. This article explores subtle and embedded body management strategies, and also asks if there are limits to the notion of a self-directed project of benevolent body management.

Changing Patron Client Relations Favourable to New Opportunities for Landless Labourers in Rural Bangladesh

Makita, R. — 2007-12-10

Recent agrarian changes such as the casualisation of employment, an overall decrease in agricultural employment, the lack of agricultural labourers in the peak seasons, and increasing non-farm activities by landowners have resulted in declining patron–client relationships between landless labourers and landowning employers. Drawing on a local NGO's income-generating programme, this article explores how landless labourers avail themselves of an opportunity given under changing labour buyer–seller relationships, and how the NGO's intervention influences the relationships between landed and landless groups. The case study shows that, combined with proper intervention, the outcome of such agrarian changes can be transformed from increased vulnerability into an enabling environment for landless labourers to diversify their livelihoods and so achieve upward economic mobility through the new opportunity. Furthermore, when the intervention for the landless also stimulates the livelihood diversification of landowners, a new equal relationship emerges between the two groups.

Operation Barga, 'Efficiency' and (De)interlinkage in a Differentiated Structure of Tenancy in Rural West Bengal

Bhattacharyya, S. — 2007-12-10

Operation Barga in West Bengal caused a decline in the institution of tenancy over a period of two decades. Contrary to conventional wisdom, the field-level data shows that the tenant households are placed in a highly heterogeneous and differentiated manner in society, which is similar to that of the pattern of distribution of general (tenant plus non-tenant) households. We find that tenant households are less productive than the general category of households and, therefore, less efficient. The yield level of recorded tenant households is also distinctly higher than unrecorded tenant households. Recorded tenants are enjoying lower rental rate than unrecorded tenants. The possibility of interlinked transactions has been remote among tenant households.

Book Reviews

2007-12-10