Sense and Solidarity: Jholawala Economics for Everyone
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Sense and Solidarity PRAISE FOR THE BOOK ‘Jean Drèze is one of the world’s finest development economists. He works in a space that is widely but incorrectly ignored by most. The practical implications of evidence-based economics cannot be worked through with- out engaging all of society in democratic discussion, including (especially) those who are working for change. Economics itself fails without that engagement. In this collection of beautiful essays, some previously unpub- lished, Drèze uses economics, philosophy, and his extensive practical experi- ence to illuminate the whole range of social policy in India. Read on!’ Angus Deaton, Nobel Laureate, Economic Sciences, 2015 ‘Anyone with any interest in the fate of democracy and development in India should buy the book at once.’ Ramachandra Guha, The Telegraph ‘It is this combination of passion and humour, of sincerity and argumenta- tiveness, that makes Jean Drèze’s book such a compelling read. You may not always agree with the happy warrior, but you have to engage with him. Besides, he is good company!’ Maitreesh Ghatak, NDTV ‘Economist Jean Drèze’s new book makes an increasingly necessary argu- ment that creating a morally good, progressive society is as important as improving traditional development indexes.’ Nilanjana Roy, BBC ‘I have learned a lot from reading the articles in this book as they came out over the years and really enjoyed reading the introduction on social devel- opment, democracy, research, and action as Jean was working on it. It has some very important words of wisdom and experience for aspiring jhola- wala economists.’ Diane Coffey, Executive Director, Research Institute for Compassionate Economics ‘Beautifully produced, with a catchy and moving introduction . this col- lection is a pleasure to read. Drèze writes elegantly and passionately, shorn of rhetoric, arguing that we see India from the lens of the marginalized.’ Ashiwini Desphande, Indian Express ‘This collection of Drèze’s essays, originally published in the opinion pages of news publications between 2000 and 2017, offers a remarkable view of these tumultuous years.’ Supriya Sharma, Scroll ‘When an objective economic history of modern India is written, jholawa- las will rub shoulders with post-independence socialism of Nehru and the Fund-Bank nudged reforms of 1990s. The right-based schemes, the debates regarding universal basic income and formulation of public policy through a democratic process owe a huge intellectual debt to the jholawalas, of which Jean Drèze is a giant.’ Sunil Bahri, Outlook ‘Dreze offers a sombre but insightful window into the failure and promise of social and economic policy in tackling tenacious problems of hunger, poverty, illiteracy, corruption and violence . ’ Rakesh Kalshian, Down to Earth ‘. a wonderful writer who reminds me of George Orwell . But Drèze is Orwell Plus, because he is also an economist and has been an important participant in some of the most interesting social change episodes in recent Indian history . All in all a wonderful book and an indispensable man.’ Duncan Green, Oxfam Blogs ‘Drèze writes lucidly with a lot of passion on issues that really impact India.’ Vivek Kaul ‘The book may be seen as a bridge between the more standard economics texts and the more lucid narratives of the struggles of marginalized people, such as Arundhati Roy’s Broken Republic, which also deals with topics such as poverty, tribal rights, and government policy.’ Tadit Kundu, Livemint ‘This book is admirable in many ways and deserves its popularity in India.’ Keith Hart, Economic and Political Weekly ‘The scholarly contributions of Jean Drèze over the last two decades have significantly shaped our understanding of the extent and nature of poverty and social vulnerability across India.’ Prithviraj Guha, The Telegraph Sense and Solidarity jholawala economics for everyone jean drèze 1 1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Jean Drèze 2017 The moral rights of the author have been asserted First published by Permanent Black in 2017 This edition published in 2019 Impression: 1 Some rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, for commercial purposes, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. This is an open access publication, available online and distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution – Non Commercial – No Derivatives 4.0 International licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), a copy of which is available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of this licence should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2018964547 ISBN 978–0–19–883346–8 Printed in Great Britain by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work. CONTENTS Acknowledgements xi introduction Economics among the Road Scholars 1 1. drought and hunger 22 Starving the Poor 24 Fragile Lifelines, Robust Oppression 28 The Right to Food and Public Accountability 32 Memories of Kusumatand (with Bela Bhatia) 36 The Dark Well of Hunger 41 2. poverty 46 The Poverty Trap 49 On the Poverty Line 54 Beyond Small Mercies 58 Squaring the Poverty Circle (with Angus Deaton) 63 3. school meals 69 Hunger in the Classroom (with Vivek S.) 72 Food for Equality 76 Midday Meals and the Joy of Learning 81 Caste, Class, and Eggs 85 4. health care 90 Health Checkup 93 India Leapfrogged 97 vii viii contents Health at Sixty-six 100 Small Leap Forward in Child Health 104 Kerala Tops, Gujarat Flops, Bihar Hops (with Reetika Khera) 108 5. child development and elementary education 114 Class Struggle (with the PROBE Team) 117 The Welfare tateS in Tamil Nadu 123 Children Under Six: Out of Focus 126 Struggling to Learn (with Anuradha De, Meera Samson, and A.K. Shiva Kumar) 131 Progress of Children Under Six 136 6. employment guarantee 142 Employment as a Social Responsibility 146 Employment Guarantee and Its Discontents 151 Myths and Reality of Corruption (with Reetika Khera and Siddhartha) 157 Employment Guarantee or Slave Labour? 162 Guaranteeing Productive Work 167 7. food security and the public distribution system 175 Food Security Act: Indecent Proposal? 178 The PDS Turnaround in Chhattisgarh (with Reetika Khera) 183 Rural Poverty and the Public Distribution System (with Reetika Khera) 188 The Food Security Debate in ndiaI 193 Poor States Catch Up 198 8. corporate power and technocracy 204 Glucose for the Lok Sabha? (with Reetika Khera) 207 Nehruvian Budget in the Corporate Age 211 contents ix Unique Identity Dilemma 215 The Aadhaar Coup 219 Dark Clouds over the PDS 224 9. war and peace 230 Nuclear Deterrence: From MAD to Worse 233 The Future of War in Retrospect 238 Kashmir: Manufacturing Ethnic Conflict 242 The Warped Logic of Nuclear Gambles 246 India and the Deal: Partner or Pawn? 250 Kashmir’s Hidden Uprising 253 10. top-up 261 Rang de Basti (with Bela Bhatia) 264 Voting in Maoist Land 268 The Bribing Game 272 The Quiet Grip of Caste 276 The Gujarat Muddle 280 On the Mythology of Social Policy 286 The Bullet Train Syndrome 291 The Mother of All Disruptions 294 Decoding Universal Basic Income 300 Development and Public-Spiritedness 306 References 314 Source Acknowledgements 323 Name Index 327 Subject Index 332 acknowledgements en essays in this collection are co-authored with people who are not only valued colleagues but also dear friends: Bela T Bhatia, Angus Deaton, Reetika Khera, Siddhartha, Vivek S., and the PROBE Team (Anuradha De, Pushpendra, Claire Noronha, Anita Rampal, Meera Samson, Amarjeet Sinha, and A.K. Shiva Kumar). Their good advice and influence, in fact, extend well beyond the co-authored articles. Many essays, as well as the Introduction, have also benefited from comments or suggestions from Sabina Alkire, Diane Coffey, Nikhil Dey, Haris Gazdar, Ramachandra Guha, Aashish Gupta, Mustafa Haji, Aparna John, Sneha Menon, Sudha Narayanan, Christian Oldiges, Isabel Pimenta, Vandana Prasad, Kumar Rana, C. Rammanohar Reddy, Amartya Sen, and Dean Spears, among others. Last but not least, I received very helpful editorial advice from Naman Garg, Nazar Khalid, and Jessica Pudussery. Most of the essays in this book were initially published in The Hindu, one of India’s leading dailies. I am grateful to those of its edit ors and staff members that I worked with over the years, includ- ing Shalini Arun, P. Jacob, Mini Kapoor, Murali N. Krishnaswamy, Nirmala Lakshman, Suresh Nambath, N. Ram, Srinivasan Ramani, N. Ravi, Radhika Santhanam, Sid dharth Varadarajan, and R. Vijaya Shankar. This book would not have seen the light of day without the valuable advice and overwhelming generosity of Rukun Advani and Anuradha Roy. Aside from working on the design of this book as if it were their own, they helped me to clarify my thoughts on many issues. The days I spent with them in their lovely cottage in Ranikhet xi xii acknowledgements (Uttarakhand), where Permanent Black’s editorial work happens, are among the happiest in recent memory.