In the first volume of this sweeping analysis of contemporary India, Raju Das offers a much needed class-based perspective on the economic situation in what has become one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Offering invaluable insights along the way, Das examines the specificities of Indian capitalism and neoliberalism, the country’s geographically uneven development, the impact of technological change, and the consequences of its export-oriented, nature-dependent production.
Critical Reflections on Economy and Politics in India applies abstract theoretical ideas to the concrete situation in India, which, in turn, inspires a rethinking of theory. Das unabashedly shows the relevance of a class theory that takes seriously matters of oppression/domination of religious minorities and lower castes. A must read for anyone looking to not only interpret the world, but to change it.
Publication date: August 31, 2021
Acknowledgements
List of Illustrations
Preface to Paperback Editions
1 Introduction
1 Why Class?
2 Why Not Class – Why Not a Class-Based Analytical Framework?
3 Components of a Class-Based Framework for Understanding Contemporary India
4 The Chapter Outline
2 Class in India
1 Existing Criticisms against Class Analysis of India
2 Existing Approaches to Class in India
3 A Critique of Existing Approaches to Class in India
4 Constructing a Class-Based Framework
5 Conclusion
3 The Capitalist Character of Class Society in Post-colonial India: Moving Beyond the Mode of Production Debate
1 The Development of Capitalist Relations, and the Barriers to This: A Brief Discussion on the Indian Mode of Production Debate
2 A Critique of Some Influential Ideas in the Indian Mode of Production Debate
3 Examining India’s Capitalist Character on the Basis of Marx’s Distinction between Formal and Real Subsumptions of Labor
4 Class Struggle and the (Slow and Uneven) Transition to Real Subsumption of Labor
5 Class Struggle and the ‘Blocked’ Transition to Real Subsumption of Labor
6 Possibilities of, and Limits to, Real Subsumption of Labor
7 Jairus Banaji’s (and Others’) Mistaken Subsumption of Labor Perspective
8 Conclusion
4 Neoliberal Capitalism with Indian Characteristics
1 Neoliberalism: Its General Traits
2 Neoliberalism in India: The Context
3 Neoliberalism with Indian Characteristics: Eight Theses
4 Concluding Comments: What Is to Be Done?
5 Capitalism and Technological Change: Reflections on the Technology-Poverty Relation
1 The Literature on the Green Revolution and Poverty: The Thesis and the Anti-thesis
2 The Literature on the Green Revolution and Poverty: A Critique of Neo-Malthusianism
3 Technology, Population and Poverty: A Contingent Relation
4 The Green Revolution and Poverty in India: An Empirical Analysis
5 Conclusion
6 Low-Wage Neoliberal Capitalism, Social-Cultural Difference, and Nature-Dependent Production
1 Shrimp Aquaculture and the Missing Laborer
2 A Labor-Based Approach to Nature-Dependent Commodity Production
3 The Local, National and the Global Contexts
4 Working for Less and in Poor Conditions: ‘Capital’ Negated
5 Making Sense of Low-Wage Capitalism: From the General to the Locally Specific
6 Conclusion
7 Class Relations, Class Struggle, and the State in India
1 Existing Views on the Indian State: A Critical Review
2 The Indian State and Its Class Base
3 A Coalition/Alliance of Proprietary Classes
4 The Indian State, Lower Classes, and Lower-Class Struggle
5 State Form, State Policy, and Class Struggle
6 The Indian State and the Class Contradictions of Economic Development
7 Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
"This book is a magisterial examination by Raju J Das of the current political and economic dynamics in India, and confirms his place as one of the leading social scientists contributing to our understanding of what is really happening on the subcontinent. After the hiatus of the cultural turn, this volume returns the focus once more to where it should be: a materialist approach based on political economy and class analysis. As such, it is situated firmly within the intellectual tradition of the best scholarship about India, as exemplified in the earlier mode of production debate. It will surely define how the Indian development path is studied and argued over for the foreseeable future."
—Tom Brass, formerly of SPS, Cambridge University, and Editor of The Journal of Peasant Studies.
Edited by Raju J. Das, David Fasenfest, et al.
Edited by Tom Brass and Raju J. Das
Edited by Raju J. Das and Deepak K. Mishra
