DOCSLIB.ORG

Toxic Famine Research and How It Suppresses Its Critics

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Toxic Famine Research and How It Suppresses Its Critics Munich Personal RePEc Archive Toxic famine research and how it suppresses its critics Bowbrick, Peter 21 July 2020 Online at https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/101970/ MPRA Paper No. 101970, posted 23 Jul 2020 02:05 UTC TOXIC FAMINE RESEARCH And how it suppresses its critics Peter Bowbrick1 ABSTRACT Bad economic theory can cause famines or stop governments from taking appropriate action to prevent famines. This can kill millions. Amartya Sen’s theory of the cause of the Bengal Famine, which is the inspiration for his ‘entitlement approach’, has been refuted again and again, in different ways, by economists of different theoretical persuasions and by statisticians expert in this area. Sen has been shown to systematically misrepresent the evidence, to make repeated, elementary, theoretical mistakes, and to use and misuse ‘meaningless’ statistics. No attempt has been made by anyone to challenge these refutations: they are incontrovertible. Sen has not retracted his theory, or any of it, which implies fraud. Yet Sen’s work is widely believed and used in famine situations. His ‘entitlement approach’, based largely on his theory of the Bengal famine, is the basis of a research programme. This paper examines how the research programme suppressed the criticisms, ignoring the normal requirements of academic and professional research and integrity. It also produced new falsehoods. Q11, Q13, Q18, O12, N5, H56, H84 1 [email protected] www.bowbrick.org.uk Edinburgh, 2020 TOXIC FAMINE RESEARCH And how it suppresses its critics2 INTRODUCTION ‘But what a weak barrier is truth when it stands in the way of an hypothesis.’ (Mary Wollstoncroft, 1792, p. 10) Applying bad economics to food crises or to famines can kill millions. This paper examines how a widely quoted famine research programme has been manipulated to suppress criticisms and propagate bad economics, ignoring the standard approaches of scientific method, economic method and integrity, as used by professional and academics. Researchers have repeatedly shown that Amartya Sen’s theory of the cause of the Bengal famine of 1943 is based on false evidence, false statistics and wrong or non- existent theory, that, in fact it is refuted on many grounds – and a refutation is not just a routine difference of opinion between academics: it is on another plane altogether. Any one of these refutations is fatal to the research programme as a whole, discrediting it. Neither Sen nor anyone else has attempted to contest these refutations. None of his work has been retracted. Sen and his followers continue to quote the refuted theory decades later. There is a flourishing research programme on ‘Sen and famine’ which suppresses the refutations. It may be argued that researchers who choose to ignore unchallenged refutations are acting fraudulently. This paper shows some ways in which a large number of well-meaning people who are passionate about tackling famine are manipulated into adhering to a research programme is fraudulent. The academic analysis of famine has become so value-loaded, and so political, that I start by setting out my values and beliefs and the economic tradition I work in. I have spent most of my life working in 38 countries, trying to make the system work 2 I would like to thank Mark Tauger and Tim Dyson for their helpful comments. I should also like to thank Denis Segal for his help over the years, providing me with the fruits of years of research in the British Library, finding key documents that were unknown to academia, and his vivid descriptions of delivering food to the starving when working with the Gurkhas in 1943. better, to benefit producers and consumers – and in many of these countries, both producers and consumers are close to starvation even in normal times. I am constantly aware that if I do bad work, it is likely to cause destitution, hunger and death. And I am squeamish. I work in agricultural economics, which is the oldest economic tradition, and which has concentrated on hunger and famine from the beginning. It covers all stages of the food market from production, including the sociology of production, to consumption, including the sociology of consumption, and it includes subsistence production and consumption. It has produced a vast amount of theory, based on experience, to tackle real world problems. Even as late as the 1980s or 1990s, one tenth of the world’s economists were agricultural economists, and the first professors of marketing, in Britain and Europe at least, were agricultural economists. Agricultural economics treats famine as a normal market under extreme conditions: markets still operate, but more people struggle to buy food, and more people die because they cannot buy enough food. The label ‘famine’ is irrelevant to analysis: a situation where people starve may be labelled ‘a famine’, ‘a food crisis’, or ‘food riots’ by the press, by governments or by international organizations: often it is ignored or concealed. I am one of the very few economists who combine practical experience with a record of publishing in academic journals – for some years I was a top academic publisher in my field. As a professional economist working on agricultural policy and marketing in poor countries, I have expected that my reports would be reviewed by perhaps a dozen economists, including local economists and economists from the international agencies and bilaterals, as well as by local agriculturists and administrators and politicians, any of whom may have information or analysis that refutes the report and leads to its rejection, while academics only have to get their work past the referees of one journal. I have worked at all levels from national food and agricultural policy to small local markets and firms, I have worked in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal, in the sub- continent, but also in countries in Africa with similar climates and crops, and a similar level of development to 1943 Bengal. My book, The Economist’s Tale (which was written under the nom de guerre Peter Griffiths, as I was whistleblowing against the World Bank) gives the only insider’s report of an economist tackling a famine situation, and the international, national and institutional politics involved. SEN’S THEORY The orthodox view on famines up to Sen was that famines can be caused by sudden falls in supply, increases in demand or other changes in demand. Supply may fall because of crop failures, due to drought, flood, locusts, disease etc. Wartime blockades and transport failures have a similar effect. Exporting, perhaps to get a higher price, perhaps as an act of war (e.g. Greece in 1942 or Vietnam in 1944) can reduce the supply. Governments, speculators, or hoarders could remove food from the market, reducing supply. Demand changes could be as devastating: occupation by an army, friend or foe, was one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. A sudden influx of refugees could strain existing supplies. A boom industry might have a similar effect. Countries which had relied on imports sometimes find that they no longer have the money to do so. The collapse of an industry may mean that its employees can no longer buy food. Macroeconomic policies often mean that some groups of people or the country as a whole cannot buy food. A wave of famines and food crises hit Africa as a result of IMF/World Bank structural adjustment programmes, which had effects on supply and demand. It was recognized that the shock of a crop failure, for instance, had knock-on effects on supply and demand throughout the sector – economists always analyse supply and demand at the same time. The accepted ways of dealing with a famine, of either sort, included that of the Indian Famine Code from the 1870s, which was, first, for the government to ensure that there was enough food available in the affected area, and then to make food available to people who could not buy it, giving it as relief or supplying it through food-for-work programmes. Rationing was also effective. All these might include government controlling stocks. It was expected that, regardless of the facts, much of the populace would not interpret high prices as being the result of a shortage, but as evidence that greedy grain traders had chosen to put up the prices when there was plenty of food available. Again, some would believe that the only reason that they could not get food was because a group of people – perhaps the rich, perhaps people of another religion or caste – were eating far more than usual. It was understood that governments sometimes acted on such beliefs, with disastrous effects. Accordingly, the consensus was that, in practice, a famine was more likely to be triggered by a reduction in supply than by a reallocation of demand, or, at least, that it was wise to start with this premise. The post-famine consensus was that the Bengal Famine of 1943 was triggered by the failure of the December 1942 rice crop, which was some 40% less than normal because of drought, then a cyclone, then a major fungus outbreak. Burma, which had supplied most of the rice for Bengal’s urban population, was captured by the Japanese in early 1942. Large rice exports in 1942 were significant. Demand factors included population increases, army requirements, and the influx of perhaps 300,000 refugees from Burma. The crisis was handled very badly by the governments, notably the Government of India, the Government of Bengal, the governments of surplus provinces and the Government of the United Kingdom. Corruption was a problem. The Report of the Famine Inquiry Commission (1945) gives details. Sen’s theory of the cause of the 1943 Bengal famine is very different.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Hungry Bengal: War, Famine, Riots, and the End of Empire 1939-1946
    Hungry Bengal: War, Famine, Riots, and the End of Empire 1939-1946 By Janam Mukherjee A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Anthropology and History) In the University of Michigan 2011 Doctoral Committee: Professor Barbara D. Metcalf, Chair Emeritus Professor David W. Cohen Associate Professor Stuart Kirsch Associate Professor Christi Merrill 1 "Unknown to me the wounds of the famine of 1943, the barbarities of war, the horror of the communal riots of 1946 were impinging on my style and engraving themselves on it, till there came a time when whatever I did, whether it was chiseling a piece of wood, or burning metal with acid to create a gaping hole, or cutting and tearing with no premeditated design, it would throw up innumerable wounds, bodying forth a single theme - the figures of the deprived, the destitute and the abandoned converging on us from all directions. The first chalk marks of famine that had passed from the fingers to engrave themselves on the heart persist indelibly." 2 Somnath Hore 1 Somnath Hore. "The Holocaust." Sculpture. Indian Writing, October 3, 2006. Web (http://indianwriting.blogsome.com/2006/10/03/somnath-hore/) accessed 04/19/2011. 2 Quoted in N. Sarkar, p. 32 © Janam S. Mukherjee 2011 To my father ii Acknowledgements I would like to thank first and foremost my father, Dr. Kalinath Mukherjee, without whom this work would not have been written. This project began, in fact, as a collaborative effort, which is how it also comes to conclusion. His always gentle, thoughtful and brilliant spirit has been guiding this work since his death in May of 2002 - and this is still our work.
    [Show full text]
  • An Exceptional Famine; Not Nature but Churchill's War Effort and British
    Mukt Shabd Journal ISSN NO : 2347-3150 An exceptional famine; Not nature but Churchill’s war effort and British policies that contributed to the Bengal famine of 1943. Bappajit chatterjee (M.A in History) W.B SET 2018, ASSSITANT TEACHER MALDA, WEST BENGAL, INDIA. ‘Famine or no famine, Indians are breeding like rabbits’ - Winston Churchill. AbstractAbstract- -D roughtsFrom time and faminesimmemorial are integral Droughts part andof human famines civilization. are integral Like thepart other of countrieshuman incivilization. the world IndiaLike other have countrieswitnessed in some the worldserious India famines have fromwitnessed ancient some times. serious During famines the time from of theancient British times. India During there thehave time the of Bengal the ‘British famine India of 1770,’ there the has Chalisa the Bengal famine famine in 1783, of 1770, the Dojithe BaraChalisa famine famine of 1791in 1783, etc. theEvery Doji famine Bara hadfamine its ofclose 1791 connection, etc. Every with famine crop hadfailure, its closseveree droughtsconnection due with to croplack failure,of rainfall severe etc, droughts which means due to nature lack of was rainfall main etc, factor which behind means all nature those famines.was the Butmain ther factore have behind another all thoseexample famines. like the But 1943 there great have Bengalanother famine example which like completelythe 1943 camegreat as Bengal a result famine of British which policy completely Failure. came This as famine a result came of Britishduring thepoli timecy Failure. of the Second This famine World War.came In during this paper the time I tried of the to Secondexplain Worldthe British War. policyIn this failure paper ,that I have actually tried takento explain about the 3.5 millionBritish ofpolicy lives.
    [Show full text]
  • Print This Article [ PDF ]
    Orality, Inscription, and the Creation of a New Lore Orality, Inscription …[The] peculiar temporality of folk- and the Creation of a New Lore lore as a disciplinary subject, whether coded in the terminology of survival, archaism, antiquity, and tradition, or Roma Chatterji in the definition of folkloristics as a University of Delhi historical science, has contributed to India the discipline's inability to imagine a truly contemporary, as opposed to a contemporaneous, subject… Folklore is by many (though not all) definitions out of step with the time and the con- Abstract text in which it is found. This essay examines the process by which Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, the discourse of folklore is used to "Folklore's Crisis" 1998, 283 entextualize and recontextualize the oral tra- dition in West Bengal through a discussion of two contemporary Bangla novels. Motifs from folk tales, myths, and popular epic po- n an essay that critically reviews ems are being re-appropriated by urban cul- folklore's disciplinary position vis-à- tural forms– both popular as well as elite – Ivis history and culture, Kirshenblatt- to articulate new identities and subject posi- Gimblett (1998) says that temporal dis- tions. I selected these novels by considering location between the site of origin and the mode in which orality is inscribed and the present location of particular cultural the time period. One of the novels attempts forms signals the presence of folklore. to re-constitute oral lore from a popular epic Kirshenblatt-Gimblett thus conceptual- composed in the medieval period, and the izes culture as heterogeneous, layered other re-inscribes an origin myth that is part and composed of multiple strands that of folk ritual into a new genre via the media- are interconnected in rather haphazard tion of folklore discourse that is responsible and contingent ways.
    [Show full text]
  • Download the Paper by Clicking Here
    THE 1943 BENGAL FAMINE 1 The 1943 Bengal Famine: A Brief History of Political Developments at Play Mohua Bhowmik Independent researcher THE 1943 BENGAL FAMINE 2 Abstract This paper briefly surveys the political developments at the beginning of the twentieth century and examines how those developments played a part in the Bengal Famine of 1943. The Bengal Famine of 1943 is arguably one of the worst man-made famines recorded in human history. There were a multitude of reasons behind it, each of which had contributed to the severity of the famine and its irreversible effects on the Bengali society. However, this paper largely focuses on examining the assertions made by the Churchill Project of Hillsdale College and certain sections of the British academia, who have been attempting to emphasise that Sir Winston Churchill and, by extension, the British government had provided humanitarian aid during the Bengal Famine. At the same time, there have been multiple efforts to shift the narrative of the Bengal Famine of 1943 and point fingers specifically at the Hindu society, especially by these aforementioned institutions. All this is taking place at a time when the decolonial narrative is gaining more traction in mainstream discourses. The purpose of this paper is to take a closer look at the policies and motivations of the colonial era British administration, not only to understand how each of their decisions led to the enormity of the Bengal Famine but also how certain institutions are encouraging the colonial narrative that is often distorted. Keywords: Bengal Famine, Churchill Project, 1943, Hindu, colonial, British administration, decolonial THE 1943 BENGAL FAMINE 3 The 1943 Bengal Famine: A Brief History of Political Developments at Play In 2020, a petition titled “Change the Curriculum to Include Information on Churchill and the Bengal Famine” was submitted to the UK Parliament.
    [Show full text]
  • Implication of British Economic Policies on Indian Famine
    University of Mississippi eGrove Honors College (Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors Theses Honors College) Spring 5-2-2021 Implication of British Economic Policies on Indian Famine Soujanya Niroula Follow this and additional works at: https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis Part of the Economic History Commons Recommended Citation Niroula, Soujanya, "Implication of British Economic Policies on Indian Famine" (2021). Honors Theses. 1886. https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/1886 This Undergraduate Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Honors College (Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College) at eGrove. It has been accepted for inclusion in Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of eGrove. For more information, please contact [email protected]. IMPLICATION OF BRITISH ECONOMIC POLICIES ON INDIAN FAMINE By Soujanya Pratap Niroula A thesis submitted to the faculty of The University of Mississippi in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College. Oxford, MS May 2021 Approved By ______________________________ Advisor: Dr. Jon Moen ______________________________ Reader: Dr. John Gardner ______________________________ Reader: Dr. David Gonzalez © 2021 Soujanya Pratap Niroula ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I cannot begin to express my thanks to Dr. Jon Moen, for his dedicated support and guidance throughout the journey. I owe a special debt of gratitude to Dr. John Gardner for his uplifting encouragement and insights since the beginning of the project. Special thanks to Dr. David Gonzalez for accepting to be a member of the Thesis Committee. I am deeply indebted to Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College and the University of Mississippi for facilitating the independent study program. ABSTRACT During the British rule, India was engulfed by multiple devastating famines.
    [Show full text]
  • The Bengal Famine of 1943: Amartyasen and Satayajit Ray
    The Bengal Famine of 1943: AmartyaSen and Satayajit Ray 14.73 Challenges of World Poverty Distant Thunder • A movie made by Satayajit Ray • A young priest and his family move into a new village. He has the good life of a brahmin: neither of them works, he does a puja for a cholera epidemics (and tell people to avoid drinking from the river) then he sets up a school. People feed them. Then prices start to increase • Chapters 8, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21 The Facts of the Famine • How many deaths? – There is some controversy – 1.5 million according to a commission convened just after the report – Most people believe the figure is much higher: the movie says 5 million – Recent estimates: 6-7 million including neighboring states – Even according to the report own calculations, at least 3 million Bengali died The chronology • Phase I : 1942-march 1943 • Phase II: March 1943-November 1943 • Phase III: November 1943-1944 Some reasons for the decline in Food availability • Burma was taken by the Japanese in 42 • There was a cyclone in October 42 • There was a panic among administrators, that the Japanese would take over the Bay of Bengal. • “scorched earth policy” destroy foodstocks in case the Japanese took over Sen: A “man-made famine” • The rice availability was higher in 1943 than 1941, despite the cyclone and the drop in imports. • A “boom” famine: – War time inflation+ increase in income for those related to war time production: increased in demand for food and price increases for rice – Wage in rural areas did not follow the price trend: the “entitlement” of farm laborer in term of food decreased drastically: they became destitutes or “paddy huskers" • Governement’s mis-management: – Government at the center had prevented trade between States – Population of Calcutta must be covered: rice must increase at all prices A Man-made famine • Hoarding: – You see that in the movie: farmers see the price increase continuously – Rational reaction in the part of growers: given that the price was expected to continue to increase was to hoard the rice.
    [Show full text]
  • Revisiting the Bengal Famine of 1943-441
    ‘SUFFICIENCY AND SUFFICIENCY AND SUFFICIENCY’: REVISITING THE BENGAL FAMINE OF 1943-441 Mindful or our difficulties about food I told [Fazlul Huq] that he simply must produce more rice out of Bengal for Ceylon even if Bengal itself went short! Linlithgow to Amery, January 26th 1943 The doctrine of sufficiency and sufficiency and sufficiency must be preached ad nauseam. H.S. Suhrawardy, May 1943 1. INTRODUCTION Although the broad chronological and demographic contours of the Bengal famine of 1943-44 are well known,2 its underlying causes are still debated. The authorities at the time blamed the unfolding crisis on a combination of undue hoarding by merchants, producers, and consumers. This interpretation was repeated in the officially-appointed Famine Inquiry Commission’s Report on Bengal, which also accused local politicians and bureaucrats of incompetence. The view that the famine was mainly due to war-induced market failure rather than to adverse food supply shocks was popularized in the 1970s and 1980s by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen. Sen’s now-classic account not only began an academic 1 debate about the Bengal famine; it also switched the analysis of famines generally away from food availability decline (FAD) per se to the distribution of, or entitlements to, what food was available. Bengal, Sen argued, contained enough food to feed everybody in 1943 but massive speculation, prompted in large part by wartime conditions, converted a minor shortfall in food production into a disastrous reduction in marketed supply. Sen’s analysis has been enormously influential. As his interpretation of the Bengali evidence continues to be focus of specialist discussion, for specialist and non-specialist alike the Bengal famine has become a near-paradigmatic famine.3 Crucially, the famine was a war-famine.
    [Show full text]
  • Famine in Colonial Period: Its Nature and Impact in a Bengal District: Murshidabad
    IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS) Volume 24, Issue 2, Ser. 9 (Feb. 2019) 11-14 e-ISSN: 2279-0837, p-ISSN: 2279-0845. www.iosrjournals.org Famine in Colonial Period: Its nature and Impact in a Bengal District: Murshidabad Ganesh Kr.Mandal Assistant Professor of History, Berhampore Girls’ College Corresponding Author: Ganesh Kr.Mandal Abstract: The word “Famine”, derived from the Latin word, famines affected more severely different regions of India during the British rule. We are aware that natural calamities including drought, crop failure, flood etc. cause famines. Thus the aim of our present study is, therefore, to give a complete and analytical picture of famines in Murshidabad during the British rule. Before the establishment of the East India Company's rule in Bengal, Murshidabad had been one of the prosperous and richest places of India. The famine of 1770 was an appalling spectre on the threshold of British rule in Bengal. The permanent settlement was introduced by Cornwallis in 1793. The imperialist policy made peoples endless sorrows, sufferings, poverty, exploitation and permanent oppression. During famine of 1866 in India Murshidabad district was not so affected like Nadia and Burdwan. In the famine year of 1866.Famine of 1874 affected most of the districts of Bengal. But the people of Murshidabad were not so heavily affected by the famine of 1874. The Bengal famine of 1943 stuck entire Bengal province. Murshidabad was one of the most severely affected districts by this famine. Each and every Subdivision of Murshidabad district was affected. Key words: Famine, Battle of plassey, rehabilitation, committee report.
    [Show full text]
  • Development with Democracy for the Post Colonial South: from Dependancy to Globalisation
    Development with Democracy for the Post Colonial South: From Dependancy to Globalisation Aditya Mukherjee Jawaharlal Nehru University Paper read at Institute of Advanced Study, University of Sao Paulo, Brazil 25-26 June 2012 The revisionist view of colonialism which seeks to portray colonialism in a positive light has now become once again fashionable. This is particularly true for countries which in recent years have been doing very well, countries in East, South East and South Asia such as China, South Korea, Indonesia and India. Surprisingly, the view that is now being argued is that the current success of this region is closely connected with the colonial experience. It is suggested that it is the colonial opening up, which created the conditions for the economic take off in these countries. A peculiar argument has emerged which tries to claim the credit for the current success of this region to their colonial past. By a virtual sleight of hand, the two processes of globalization one under colonialism, between the 16th and the 19th century, and the other after the Second World War adopted by independent nation states are conflated. The fact that in the colonial period there was an enormous movement of labour and capital, and an enormous expansion of trade is being conflated with a similar expansion, in fact in some ways even a larger expansion, of trade and movement of capital that was witnessed in the 20th century especially since the 1960s. No mention, of course, is made of the fact that in the later phase labour did not move as easily as it used to move in the early colonial phase or of the fact that the earlier process occurred under colonial hegemony for colonial purposes while the latter process was essentially mediated through independent nation states in a vastly changed global capitalist system.1 In this colonial understanding, the “bad” phase in the post-colonial countries like India was the nationalist, ‘protectionist’ phase which attempted to un-structure colonialism and promote national development.
    [Show full text]
  • 3 Bangladesh Nahida Faridy
    3 Bangladesh Nahida Faridy I. Introduction Bangladesh, officially The People’s Republic of Bangladesh is a country in South Asia. It is bordered by India on all sides except for a small border with Myanmar to the far southeast and by the Bay of Bengal to the south. Together with the Indian state West Bengal, it makes up the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal and the name Bangladesh means The Country of Bengal. The border of present Bangladesh was established with the partition of Bengal and India in 1947, when the region became the eastern wing of the newly formed Pakistan. However, it was separated from the western wing by 1,600 kilometers (1,000miles) across India. Political and linguistic discrimination as well as economic neglect led to popular agitations against West Pakistan, which led to the war for independence in 1971 and after that nine months bloodshed war the country made her position in the world map as an independent and sovereign country. History The country has a history of four thousands year old. The civilization in the greater Bengal was settled by Dravidian, Tibeto-Burman and Austro Asiatic people. It is believed that the word Bangla and Bengal derived from Bang, the Dravidian speaking tribe that settled in the area around the year 1000 BC. The religion, Islam, was introduced to Bengal in the twelfth century by Sufi missionaries, and subsequent Muslim conquests helped spread Islam throughout the region. Bakhtiar Khilgi, a Turkish General, defeated Lakshman Sen of the Sen Dynasty and conquered large parts of Bengal. The region was ruled by dynasties of Sultans and federal feudal lords for the next few hundred years.
    [Show full text]
  • Refugee?: Bengal Partition in Literature and Cinema
    Western University Scholarship@Western Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository 8-24-2015 12:00 AM "More or Less" Refugee?: Bengal Partition in Literature and Cinema Sarbani Banerjee The University of Western Ontario Supervisor Prof. Nandi Bhatia The University of Western Ontario Graduate Program in Comparative Literature A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the equirr ements for the degree in Doctor of Philosophy © Sarbani Banerjee 2015 Follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd Part of the Comparative Literature Commons, Film and Media Studies Commons, Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons, South and Southeast Asian Languages and Societies Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Banerjee, Sarbani, ""More or Less" Refugee?: Bengal Partition in Literature and Cinema" (2015). Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository. 3125. https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/3125 This Dissertation/Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship@Western. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository by an authorized administrator of Scholarship@Western. For more information, please contact [email protected]. i “MORE OR LESS” REFUGEE? : BENGAL PARTITION IN LITERATURE AND CINEMA (Thesis format: Monograph) by Sarbani Banerjee Graduate Program in Comparative Literature A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies The University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, Canada © Sarbani Banerjee 2015 ii ABSTRACT In this thesis, I problematize the dominance of East Bengali bhadralok immigrant’s memory in the context of literary-cultural discourses on the Partition of Bengal (1947).
    [Show full text]
  • The Economics of the Second World War: Seventy-Five Years on Continents and Changing the Lives of Millions
    The Second World War was the largest conflict in history, touching five The Economics of the Second World War: Seventy-Five Years On continents and changing the lives of millions. The scale of mobilisation of all sectors of the economy and society had redefined the concept of ‘total war’. It The Economics of the was the last time that Western societies were mobilised for an all-consuming conflict that demanded years of sacrifice and service from every citizen and every family. Such watershed moments are sometimes neglected in economics. This eBook brings together recent research on a range of aspects of the war Second World War: including the extensive war preparations of the great powers; the conduct of the war (including the management of economic mobilisation, economic warfare, economic exploitation, and the role of economists); and the war’s consequences for demography, inequality, economic recovery and political Seventy-Five Years On attitudes. The Second World War witnessed the growth and power of economics as a weapon and strategy in warfare. Economics – and economists – were everywhere in the war. Economic considerations motivated the war. The war was managed with the help of economics. Economic factors powerfully influenced its outcome. There were profound and persistent economic Edited by Stephen Broadberry and Mark Harrison consequences. The eBook examines the role of economics in the preparations, causes, conduct and consequences of the war. Chapters examine the importance of economic factors in the war preparations, studying the effect of the great depression on the German economy and its role in carrying Hitler to power, German economic mobilisation and the transformative rearmament plans of the Soviet Union under Stalin.
    [Show full text]