Self-limited empowerment: democracy, economic development and rural India
Varshney, A.
Journal of Development Studies 29(4): 177-215
1993
ISSN/ISBN: 0022-0388 DOI: 10.1080/00220389308422299Document Number: 263373
This paper examines two issues: firstly, it looks at factors that have led to the rise of the countryside in the political consciousness of India; and, secondly, it considers the effects of this new emphasis on economic policy and the peasantry. It contends that universal franchise and a competitive democracy in a primarily agrarian India have led to the empowerment of the countryside. The power of the rural sector is not, however, unconstrained. It is constrained initially by the size of the sector itself in relation to other sectors of the economy, as well as the size of the rural population; however, the latter has both positive and negative effects. Another constraint on rural power comes from the cross-cutting nature of rural identities and interests. Farmers are also members of caste, ethnic and religious communities. Politics based on economic interests can potentially unite rural India and push the state even more: politics based on caste, ethnicity and religion cuts across rural and urban India, and divides the countryside. Both kinds of politics are vibrant, neither fully displacing the other. It is this feature that leads to the major criticism of 'urban bias' theory because it fails to take account of individuals having more than one set of interests and identities, thus political empowerment of farmers is not a panacea to irradicate all ills.