Dalit Women


Book Description

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Notes on contributors -- Preface -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction: We ask you to rethink: Different Dalit women and their subaltern politics -- Part I Imagining a new Dalit women's politics -- 1 Foreword: Dalits, Dalit women and the Indian State -- 2 For another difference: Agency, representation and Dalit women in contemporary India -- Part II Dalit women's conceptualizations of caste difference and their means of collectivization -- 3 Gendered negotiations of caste identity: Dalit women's activism in rural Tamil Nadu -- 4 Liberation panthers and pantheresses? Gender and Dalit party politics in South India -- 5 Microcredit self-help groups and Dalit women: Overcoming or essentializing caste difference? -- Part III A broken empowerment? Are women still trapped by caste and patriarchy? -- 6 Dalit women, rape and the revitalisation of patriarchy? -- 7 Different Dalit women speak differently: Unravelling, through an intersectional lens, narratives of agency and activism from everyday life in rural Uttar Pradesh -- 8 Subsidising capitalism and male labour: The scandal of unfree Dalit female labour relations -- Part IV Religion as Dalit political practice -- 9 Transformation and the suffering subject: Caste-class and gender in slum Pentecostal discourse -- 10 Improper politics: The praxis of subalterns in Chennai -- Afterword: The burden of caste: Scholarship, democratic movements and activism




Political Representation In India


Book Description

Political Representation in India: Ideas and Contestations, 1908–1952 maps extensive and wide-ranging debates, marked by contestations and strident demands on political representation in colonial India. Further, it explores these themes during the Constitution-framing process. These debates, previously overlooked, are significant for they helped shape the institutional structures of political representation in the form of the electoral system of Indian democracy. It assists in providing an answer to why and how independent India came to adopt its current electoral system characterised by the First-Past-The-Post (FPTP) system. It also analyses how and why the alternatives to FPTP, primarily any form of proportional representation, were rejected. Moreover, the book simultaneously provides a rich and detailed description of how communities, and religious, caste and ethnic categories came to be defined as their demands for political representation were conceded. It also briefly deals with the issue of delimitation of constituencies during the colonial and the immediate post-independence period.




Women, Power, and Property


Book Description

Quotas for women in government have swept the globe. Yet we know little about their capacity to upend entrenched social, political, and economic hierarchies. Women, Power, and Property explores this question within the context of India, the world's largest democracy. Brulé employs a research design that maximizes causal inference alongside extensive field research to explain the relationship between political representation, backlash, and economic empowerment. Her findings show that women in government – gatekeepers – catalyze access to fundamental economic rights to property. Women in politics have the power to support constituent rights at critical junctures, such as marriage negotiations, when they can strike integrative solutions to intrahousehold bargaining. Yet there is a paradox: quotas are essential for enforcement of rights, but they generate backlash against women who gain rights without bargaining leverage. In this groundbreaking study, Brulé shows how well-designed quotas can operate as a crucial tool to foster equality and benefit the women they are meant to empower.




Performing Representation


Book Description

Seven decades after India’s independence women members occupy 1 in 10 seats in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament. In analysing women’s limited presence in the Indian Parliament, Performing Representation breaks new ground in scholarship on gender and politics. It explores the possibilities and limits of parliamentary democracy and the participation of women in its institutional performances. This book offers new insights into the gendered nature of the performance, aesthetics, and norms of parliamentary life through an examination of electoral data, legislative debates, and life stories of women MPs. The authors avoid both the framing of women MPs either simply as challengers of masculinized institutional politics or only as docile actors in a gendered institution. Making a strong case for taking parliamentary politics seriously in these times of populism, the book raises critical questions about the politics of difference, claim-making, representation, and intersectionality and addresses these as part of global feminist debates on the importance of the women’s representation in political institutions.




Clients and Constituents


Book Description

Scholars of distributive politics often emphasize partisanship and clientelism. However, as Jennifer Bussell demonstrates in Clients and Constituents, legislators in "patronage democracies" also provide substantial constituency service: non-contingent, direct assistance to individual citizens. Bussell shows how the uneven character of access to services at the local level-often due to biased allocation on the part of local intermediaries-generates demand for help from higher-level officials. The nature of these appeals in turn provides incentives for politicians to help their constituents obtain public benefits. Drawing on a new cross-national dataset and extensive evidence from India-including sustained qualitative shadowing of politicians, novel elite and citizen surveys, and an experimental audit study with a near census of Indian state and national legislators-this book provides a theoretical and empirical examination of political responsiveness in developing countries. It highlights the potential for an under-appreciated form of democratic accountability, one that is however rooted in the character of patronage-based politics.




Women, Power, and Political Representation


Book Description

Delving into the pressing topic of gender and politics, this volume provides fresh comparative perspectives on "what works" to promote women in politics today. Inspiring and informative, Women, Power, and Political Representation offers a comprehensive overview of the role women play in contemporary politics, and pinpoints the reasons behind their underrepresentation. Discussing the challenges and opportunities women face when running for office, as well as their experiences as political leaders, this book offers a broad and thoughtful overview of the pitfalls encountered by women, from gender biases to sexual harassment, in the notoriously male dominated political arena. Featuring a range of voices that articulate a path towards women’s political advancement and equality, Women, Power, and Political Representation is an important and timely resource for scholars, students, and women working professionally in Canadian and international politics.




Development, Governance and Gender in South Asia


Book Description

This book offers a multidisciplinary and comprehensive approach to understand the trends and issues of development, governance, and dynamics of gender in the South Asian region. It familiarizes the reader with the quantitative as well as qualitative aspects of governance and development. Contributing authors pay close attention to the socio-political and economic developments in South Asia in their respective chapters. The book is divided into four parts. The first part analyzes the social and economic development of South Asia in the context of human development, state apparatus, and migration. The second part focuses on issues of good governance and human rights. Issues related to minorities and corporate governance are also discussed specifically. The third part deals with the role of media and literature in the development narratives of South Asia. The last part highlights the inter-linkages between gender narratives and development. It is a must-read for those interested in understanding the socio-economic fabrics, political dynamics, and trajectory of development in South Asia.




Language, Emotion, and Politics in South India


Book Description

The charged emotional politics of language and identity in India




Computerization and Controversy


Book Description

The Second Edition of Computerization and Controversy: Value Conflicts and Social Choices is a collection of 78 articles that examine the social aspects of computerization from a variety of perspectives, many presenting important viewpoints not often discussed in the conventional literature. A number of paired articles comprise thought-provoking head-on debate. Fields represented include computer science, information systems, management, journalism, psychology, law, library science, and sociology. This volume introduces some of the major controversies surrounding the computerization of society and helps readers recognize the social processes that drive and shape computerization. Division into eight provocatively titled sections facilitates course planning for classroom or seminar use. A lead article for each section frames the major controversies, locates the selections within the debates, and points to other relevant literature. - A fully revised and updated version of the first anthological treatment of the subject - Organized to facilitate course planning for classroom or seminar use - Provides coverage of the influence of computers on a wide variety of fields including computer science, information systems, management, journalism, psychology, law, library science, and sociology




The End of Representative Politics


Book Description

Representative politics is in crisis. Trust in politicians is at an all-time low. Fewer people are voting or joining political parties, and our interest in parliamentary politics is declining fast. Even oppositional and radical parties that should be benefitting from public disenchantment with politics are suffering. But different forms of political activity are emerging to replace representative politics: instant politics, direct action, insurgent politics. We are leaving behind traditional representation, and moving towards a politics without representatives. In this provocative new book, Simon Tormey explores the changes that are underway, drawing on a rich range of examples from the Arab Spring to the Indignados uprising in Spain, street protests in Brazil and Turkey to the emergence of new initiatives such as Anonymous and Occupy. Tormey argues that the easy assumptions that informed our thinking about the nature and role of parties, and ‘party based democracy’ have to be rethought. We are entering a period of fast politics, evanescent politics, a politics of the street, of the squares, of micro-parties, pop-up parties, and demonstrations. This may well be the end of representative politics as we know it, but an exciting new era of political engagement is just beginning.