Present research
I am presently working on my doctoral thesis at the University Oxford, titled ‘Decentralization, Participatory
Governance and Human Capabilities: Exploring the Role of Contentious Politics’. Herein, I delve into the
connections between decentralized governance, inclusion and the expansion of human capabilities by making both
conceptual and empirical enquiries in the context of the neo-liberal regime instituted in India. In this project, my
overall objective is to understand how politically equal, but socially and ‘capability-unequal’ people engage
with decentralized institutions of governance.
On a conceptual plane, I seek to constructively engage with Amartya Sen’s Capability Approach, especially what I
believe to be its anemic treatment of power and questions of ‘the political’. I base my proposal on Chantal Mouffe’s
exposition of ‘agonistic democracy’, which she develops against the deliberative models of democracy proposed by
John Rawls and Jurgen Habermas, and against the ‘reflexive modernization’ project of Ultrich Beck and Anthony
Giddens. I argue that, at least at the local level, the practice of ‘contentious politics’ in ‘political society’ directly
enhances human capabilities. ‘Contentious politics’ refers to the variety of political practices that renders ‘the
political’ space not only as one where actors compete for resources, but rather as one where the dominant politicoeconomic and socio-cultural structures are contested. Political society in turn refers to the ensemble- formal and
informal- of actors, norms and institutions that influence decisions.
My doctoral thesis aims to contribute to an understanding of how politically equal, but socially and ‘capabilityunequal’ people engage with decentralized institutions of governance. Through fieldwork in two Indian States
(Bihar and West Bengal), I attempt to develop a more politicized account of the Capability Approach. I argue that,
at least at the local level, the practice of ‘contentious politics’ in ‘political society’ directly enhances human
capabilities. ‘Contentious politics’ refers to the variety of political practices that renders ‘the political’ space not
only as one where actors compete for resources, but rather as one where the dominant politico-economic and sociocultural structures are contested. Political society in turn refers to the ensemble- formal and informal- of actors,
norms and institutions that influence decisions.
Empirically, I tease out what the practice of ‘contentious politics’ in ‘political society’ might mean, and how such
practices might ‘produce’ pro-poor outcomes. Based on quantitative and qualitative data, I chart the way in which
local-level decisions in select localities of two States, West Bengal and Bihar, are taken. In my study of the way
‘poverty’ is understood and beneficiaries of social protection programs targeted to the poor so defined, I find that
populations and politicians actively connived to sabotage the officially prescribed instruments of counting the poor.
In the localities where the poor or their representatives (party leaders, caste organizations) stormed into these
negotiations by flouting publicly accepted norms of decency, there many more poor people managed to have their
names registered for (and eventually received) social protection assistance than where they did not. Similarly, in
localities where political party and caste leaders were aggressive, threatening, and violated the boundaries of respect
and deference, they managed to secure approval for the construction of public works under the Indian Government’s
flagship National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. My research showed that workers connived in all the study
localities with politicians in their corrupt practices. But it was only where and when they and those who claimed to
speak for them deployed the language of threat and abuse, they extracted more payments than where they did not.
I pursued specific cases in the localities where pro-poor outcomes were often demonstrated. I saw that here the
repeated attempts to manage the ‘cacophony’ of demands by politicians, leaders, influential persons and institutions
such as the political parties were largely ineffectual. Formal and informal rules pertaining to local discursive
practices were openly disregarded. Further exploration of decision-making processes in one of the study sites, in
Bihar, revealed how the cultural self-construction by the numerically most significant ‘scheduled caste’ group,
namely the Musahars, building off the template hitherto deployed by the ‘dominant’ castes, proved to be an
important arsenal in their quest for both social dignity and material benefits.
The arena I describe as ‘political society’ is not always legible to ‘rational’ lenses. In India, the following
dimensions are central to an understanding of the prospects for political society. One, negotiations based on ascribed
identities of caste, ethnicity and religion. Two, conceptions of justice that emphasize on reducing injustice rather
than establishing perfectly just institutions, thereby privileging nyaya over neeti. Three, legitimation of ‘politics’ on
the basis of, on the one hand, the ability of politicians to get things done for the poor, and, on the other, securing the
‘dignity’ of those who claim to be historically marginalized. These dimensions significantly shape popular responses
to governmental categories such as ‘decentralization’, ‘participatory governance’ and ‘deliberative assemblies’.
My research, thus, broadly spans the way ‘the everyday state’ in India works or is seen to work, and with the manner
in which ‘micro-politics’ is conducted. Both primary and secondary data inform the findings of my project. Primary
data includes ethnographic data, survey data from 4,500 households and in-depth interviews with 500 households,
and life histories of local politicians and ‘ordinary’ people. Secondary data includes data on financial resources
available to local governments in the study localities, lists of households classified as ‘poor’, and data on the rural
employment guarantee program. Additionally, secondary data also includes relevant newspaper clippings from
vernacular newspapers, a strategy inspired by the views of political sociologists who see it as a unique method of
gaining insights into meso-level developments which might be missed by ethnographic work. I extensively engage
with the work of Nikolas Rose, Stuart Corbridge, Partha Chatterjee and James Scott.
Taking a positive view of contentious politics challenges several existing hypotheses about what contributes to
positive outcomes of decentralized governance. Contentious politics contrasts with the ‘technocratic view’ for which
effective decentralized governance is a function of institutional design and effective administrative supervision. It
also differs from the ‘polity view’ which holds that effective participatory governance is only possible when propoor polities assume power. It also challenges the ‘social capital’ view, according to which decentralized
governance shows better results where community organizations, such as federations, associations and solidarity
groups are robust and active. It further problemtizes, but does not completely disregard, the arguments of ‘political
space’ theorists, who propose that political contests, which are rarely confined within the institutional domains
provided by liberal democracy, determine the institutional response of governments, including local governments.