Theorizing Cohesive Development: An Alternative Paradigm

289 Pages·2019·1.556 MB·English

by  Sunil Ray, Neetu Choudhary, Rajeev K. Kumar

Theorizing Cohesive Development
This volume proposes an alternative development paradigm to the existing capitalist
extant one, and studies how it is distinctly different from the older system. Rooted in
the principles of solidarity between humans, as well as between humans and nature,
this alternative paradigm replaces the methodological individualism of capitalism
by ‘reciprocal altruism’, a new logic of capital, to give pace and direction to the
development process.
The essays in this volume highlight instances of various forms of solidarity that
have emerged in the contemporary world – such as resistance movements of informal
workers, the formation of an autonomous cooperative of self-employed waste
pickers in India, called SWaCH, and Brazil and Cuba’s experiments with social and
solidarity economy (SSE) – to achieve long-sustaining cohesive development. They
also provide recommendations as to how the state can mold its development process
to the benefits of the marginalized communities especially in India and Bangladesh.
Featuring insights from leading experts in the field, Theorizing Cohesive
Development will be an indispensable read for students and researchers of
development studies, economics, political economy, political science and sociology,
minority studies and Asian studies.
Sunil Ray is Professor of Economics. He was previously Director of A. N. Sinha
Institute of Social Studies, Patna, India and Dean of School of Social Sciences and
Head of the Centre for Economic Studies and Policy at the Central University of
Bihar, India. He has been a visiting fellow at the Institute of Development Studies,
Sussex, UK, and the Institute of Oriental Studies, Moscow, Russia. His papers have
appeared in various national and international journals such as Economic and
Political Weekly, International Journal of Ecological Economics, Asian Survey,
Saving & Development, and Capitalism Nature and Socialism. He has authored
several books, including Protection and Industrial Growth in India (1998), Natural
Resources Organization and Technology Linkages (1997) and Management of
Natural Resources – Institutions for Sustainable Livelihood (2008).
Neetu Choudhary is Adjunct Faculty with the School of Human Evolution and
Social Change, Arizona State University (ASU), USA. She was also Fulbright Fellow,
2018–19, at ASU. Prior to that, she was Assistant Professor of Economics with the
A. N. Sinha Institute of Social Studies, Patna, India. She has worked and published
considerably on issues of nutrition, gender and informal workers’ organizing.
Rajeev K. Kumar is Assistant Professor of Sociology and Social Anthropology at the
A. N. Sinha Institute of Social Studies (ANSISS), Patna, India. His research focuses
on tribal development and public health issues. Prior to joining ANSISS, he was
Assistant Professor at the International Institute of Health Management Research,
Jaipur, India, where he worked on numerous projects on public health and was also
Assistant Editor of the Journal of Health Management. He is the author of one book
and several research papers and articles.

Theorizing Cohesive
Development
An Alternative Paradigm
Edited by Sunil Ray, Neetu Choudhary
and Rajeev K. Kumar
First published 2020
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2020 selection and editorial matter, Sunil Ray, Neetu Choudhary
and Rajeev K. Kumar; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Sunil Ray, Neetu Choudhary and Rajeev K. Kumar to be
identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors
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Contents
List of contributors vii
Preface x
1 Introduction: cohesive development as an alternative
development paradigm 1
SUNIL RAY
2 Cohesive development: forging theoretical space for
alternative developmental paradigm 25
GAIL OMVEDT
3 Enemies of cohesive development 34
AMIYA KUMAR BAGCHI
4 The power of audibility: contestation and communication
as a route to cohesive development 44
ANTJE LINKENBACH
5 A genuine social democracy: the only way! 68
M. V. NADKARNI
6 Reimagining socialism for the 21st century: Cuba’s
experiments with cooperativism and solidarity economies 81
JOSEPH THARAMANGALAM
7 Territorial development and social and solidarity economy
in Brazil: some contributions to cohesive development 98
LEANDRO MORAIS
vi Contents
8 Tracing cohesive development from practice to theory:
experience in Maharashtra 114
BHARAT PATANKAR
9 Towards developing the theoretical perspective
of cohesive development 127
ABHIJIT GHOSH
10 Formal, informal, social and unsocial economy: waste
and the work and politics of women 142
BARBARA HARRISS-WHITE
11 Integrating the informal with the formal: a case of cohesive
development in urban waste chains 174
V. KALYAN SHANKAR AND ROHINI SAHNI
12 Organizing among informal workers: can pragmatism
invoke cohesive development? 186
NEETU CHOUDHARY
13 Does community-driven development empower
the powerless? The case of urban Bangladesh 201
PARVAZ AZHARUL HUQ
14 Neo-community formation, contestation and policy making
in India: narratives from Chilika 222
LALATENDU KESHARI DAS
15 Community network for cohesive development in rural
India: an exploratory study 236
MEGHADEEPA CHAKRABORTY
16 Implementation of the Forest Rights Act 2006 and its
implications for cohesive development: the case
of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh 252
M. GOPINATH REDDY
Index 265
Contributors
Amiya Kumar Bagchi is Emeritus Professor, Institute of Development Stud-
ies, Kolkata, India, and Adjunct Professor, Monash University, Australia.
His publications include Private Investment in India 1900–1939 (1972),
The Political Economy of Underdevelopment (1982), Public Interven-
tion and Industrial Restructuring in China, India and the Republic of
Korea (1987), Capital and Labour Redefined: India and the Third World
(2002), Perilous Passage: Mankind and the Global Ascendancy of Capi-
tal (2005), and Colonialism and Indian Economy (2010).
Meghadeepa Chakraborty is Assistant Professor, Banasthali Vidyapith,
Rajasthan, India. She has previously worked in the development sector.
Her research interests include community development, rural and urban
livelihood, and household livelihood strategies.
Lalatendu Keshari Das is Postdoctoral Fellow at the Indian Institute of Tech-
nology, Bombay, India. He has published in journals such as Economic
and Political Weekly and Sociological Bulletin. His research focuses on
the Marxist debate on capitalist development, political subjectivity, and
the informal sector. Through this, he tries to understand issues ranging
from social movements, agrarian change, and fisheries to ecotourism.
Abhijit Ghosh is Assistant Professor of Economics, A. N. Sinha Institute of
Social Studies, Patna, India. His research interests include human devel-
opment and related issues (education, health and food security), regional
economics, local government and panchayati raj institutions, and applied
econometrics. He has published extensively in reputed international and
national journals, as well as in edited volumes.
Barbara Harriss-White is Emeritus Professor and Fellow of Wolfson College,
Oxford, UK, and Visiting Professor at JNU, India. Her work focuses on
field economics research on rural markets and development, and policies
affecting Indian agriculture, commodity markets, informal economy and
small towns. She also studies the various aspects of deprivation and their
relationship to markets. She has published various books and papers.
viii Contributors
Parvaz Azharul Huq is Professor and Former Chairman, Department of
Public Administration, University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh. He is also
Director of the Centre for Governance and Development Studies (CGDS),
University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh. His research focuses on governance
and development. He has published various articles in refereed journals
and chapters in peer-reviewed books.
Antje Linkenbach is a long-term fellow at the Max Weber Centre for
Advanced Cultural and Social Studies, University of Erfurt, Germany,
and at the M.S. Merian – R. Tagore International Centre of Advanced
Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences ‘Metamorphoses of the
Political’, Delhi, India. She has held teaching and research positions in
Germany, Switzerland and New Zealand. Her expertise includes anthro-
pological and sociological theory, anthropology of development and
environment, social movements, justice and inequality, human rights,
and indigenous rights.
Leandro Morais is an economist. He is Professor and Researcher at UNESP,
Araraquara, Brazil; Coordinator of the Extension and Research Nucleus
in Solidarity Economy, Creativity and Citizenship (NEPESC); Full Mem-
ber of the International Scientific Committee of CIRIEC International
and Member of the Task Force on SSE at the United Nations. He is also
an international consultant and lecturer in the field of SSE, cooperativ-
ism, SDG, ecosystems, and international cooperation.
M. V. Nadkarni is Honorary Visiting Professor at Institute for Social and
Economic Change (ISEC), Bengaluru, India. He was previously ICSSR
National Fellow, Vice Chancellor of Gulbarga University, Karnataka,
India, Chairman of the Editorial Board of the Indian Journal of Agricul-
tural Economics, and Professor of Economics at ISEC.
Gail Omvedt is a sociologist and human rights activist. She has published
numerous books on the anti-caste movement, Dalit politics, and women’s
struggles in India. She has been involved in Dalit and anti-caste move-
ments and environmental, farmers’ and women’s movements, especially
with rural women. She has also served as Dr Ambedkar Chair Professor
at National Institute of Social Work and Social Sciences in Orissa, India;
Professor of Sociology at the University of Pune, India; and Guest Pro-
fessor at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen, Denmark.
She was Senior Fellow at the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library,
India, and former Chair Professor for the Dr B.R. Ambedkar Chair of
Social Change and Development at IGNOU, India. She currently holds
an ICSSR National Fellowship on the bhakti movement.
Bharat Patankar is a leading activist of the left-wing Shramik Mukti Dal
and of the peasant movement in Maharashtra. He is one of the architects
of equitable water distribution movement in Maharashtra, India. He has
Contributors ix
published extensively, including 20 English-language articles and books
such as Characteristics of Contemporary Caste System and Its Annihila-
tion, Maharashtrache Shilpakar Nana Patil (2002), and Mudda Ahe Jag
Badalnyaca (1989).
M. Gopinath Reddy is Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at the
Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), Hyderabad, India. He
is Principal Coordinator for the Division for Sustainable Development
Studies (DSDS) at CESS. He has published extensively on decentralised
governance, forest governance and livelihoods, and natural resources in
the journals of Development and Change, The Small Scale Forestry Jour-
nal, and Economic and Political Weekly (EPW).
Rohini Sahni is former Professor and Head, Department of Economics,
Savitribai Phule Pune University, India. She co-edited the volume Pros-
titution and Beyond: An Analysis of Sex Work in India (2008). She was
also the Principal Co-Investigator of the First Pan India Survey of Sex
Workers (2009–2013).
V. Kalyan Shankar is Assistant Professor at Symbiosis School of Economics,
Symbiosis International (Deemed University), India. He was formerly a
Fulbright-Nehru scholar at the India China Institute, The New School,
USA, and ICSSR Postdoctoral Fellow at JNU, Delhi, India. He is also the
recipient of the EXIM Bank IERA Award for the best doctoral thesis in
international trade by an Indian national (2014). His research has been
published in journals such as Economic and Political Weekly, Higher
Education, IIC Quarterly and WSQ.
Joseph Tharamangalam is Emeritus Professor of Sociology, Mount Saint
Vincent University, Canada, and Adjunct Professor of International
Development Studies, St. Mary’s University, Canada. His research inter-
ests include agrarian relations and peasant movements in India, reli-
gious pluralism and secularism, and more recently comparative studies
of human development across Indian states and different countries. His
academic papers have appeared in reputed journals such as Critical Asian
Studies, Journal of Peasant Studies, and Economic and Political Weekly.