日本、印度金融支持农村基础设施建设的经验及启示

日本、印度两国在农村基础设施建设过程中,有多种金融机构提供多样化的金融服务,如日本的农协、农林渔业金融公库,印度的国家农业和农村开发银行等,为农村基础设施建设提供了贷款、担保等服务,确保了农村基础设施建设的金融需求。日本、印度的金融支持农村基础设施建设的实践给我国提供了有益的启示。     

The political economy of global firms from India and China

This article attempts to build a bridge between contemporary studies of global firms from emerging economies and existing theories in comparative political economy. It argues that given the primacy of the state as an economic actor in developing countries, the variety of capitalism literature could provide a theoretical foundation for firm-level analyses of emerging market multinationals. For example, the authors suggest that China and India may be moving towards a ‘hybrid market economy’. They also offer a typology of Indian and Chinese corporates to demonstrate an empirical approach to analysing domestic business–government relationships and the ways in which these firms are shaped by the peculiarities of their respective institutional setting. Finally, they identify some of the likely pitfalls of doing cross-national comparisons of emerging market multinationals, particularly with respect to the reliability of corporate data.     

Bodo ethnic self-rule and persistent violence in Assam: A failed case of multinational federalism in India

Indian federalism has been credited in the literature on comparative federalism for having successfully resolved many of its ethnic conflicts (in a country of immense ethnic diversity) since 1956 by conceding varied forms of statehood. In most cases, the resolution of ethnic conflict has entailed self-determination for ethno-nationalist groups. There are however cases when the experiment has failed and the institutional arrangements for recognition of ethnic self-determination have given birth to more conflicts and persistent violence. In this article, we argue that the Bodoland Territorial Authority (created in 2003) in Assam is a failed case of multinational federalism in India. We argue that the case of Bodoland illustrates the limits of territorial management when groups are intermixed and highlight the need for power sharing in government and/or non-territorial representation as a better method for managing ethnic conflict in such cases.     

Influence of Voter Demographics and Newspaper in Shaping Political Party Choice in India: An Empirical Investigation

Choice of political party is an important decision a citizen faces in a democracy. In recent times, as democracies in many countries have matured, a number of studies are focusing on party and candidate choice and their various determinants. India, being the largest democracy, provides a fertile ground for such research. Accordingly, in this paper we concentrate on demographic characteristics, newspaper-reading habits of voters, and their political choice. To study this we have considered a very unique data set collected just before the watershed elections in the state of West Bengal in India, where the ruling Communist coalition was defeated after thirty-four years of power in the state. The survey was conducted using a structured questionnaire to collect information on demographic characteristics of voters and their political choice. The respondents were asked to indicate their party choice from among the three major political parties. As the literature shows that gender, age, education, income levels, marital status, occupational status, and choice of newspaper have significant impact on political choice, we have considered these as predictor variables for our study. From our study it is seen that among the demographic determinants, gender, marital status, and income of the respondents do not influence the choice of political party in our sample. However, occupation and newspaper choice of voters have significant impact on political party choice in our sample. In addition, we have observed that certain categories of age of voters significantly influence decision making of voters along with occupation and newspaper choice categories.     

The ‘rule of experts’ in making a dynamic micro-insurance industry in India

India is reported to have the most dynamic micro-insurance market in the world and the largest weather-index insurance market among developing countries. This is interesting because, paradoxically, reports readily suggest that the primary hindrance for the industry is the widespread lack of effective demand for insurance. This paper seeks to identify, understand and problematize the paradox of resolutely promoting micro-insurance and its apparent rapid growth despite a manifest absence of demand for insurance. Neo-classical theories about risk-averse behaviour do not explain the current lack of appeal of insurance among the poor. Rather, I draw on a postcolonial political economy framework to argue that expert investment in getting prices and culture right while safeguarding micro-insurance supply currently explains the celebrated dynamism of Indian micro-insurance. I argue that promoting comprehensive institutional reform for an ideal investment and entrepreneurial climate involves securing mutually beneficial linkages, collaborations and knowledge within a broad assemblage of profit motives, insurance expertise, policy-makers and professionals. Insurance experts rule by promoting the micro-insurance sector while simultaneously investing in and gaining from discursive, material and pedagogical construction of this industry. Future research should address whether such processes and products are effective in managing financial risks of the poor.     

East Is East and South Is South: The Cases of Sarojini Naidu and Arundhati Roy

Boehmer begins by outlining suggestive parallels between the doubly orientalizing reception of an Indian woman poet, Sarojini Naidu, in 1890s London, and the publicity and critical enthusiasm surrounding the appearance of Arundhati Roy's first novel, The God of Small Things , in the 1990s. Building on these century-broad connections, she goes on to observe how, despite its liberatory agendas, certain constructions within postcolonial criticism appear to emerge virtually intact out of the colonial discourses of the past: in particular, the conflation of biology and biography in representations of the writing of the South, and constructions of a singular oriental femaleness, and an extravagant oriental style. The second part of the essay examines more closely these seemingly 'neo-orientalist' underpinnings of postcolonial literary criticism located in the West, and then considers resistances to these, both in terms of cultural contextualization and verbal recalcitrance.     

Calling Local/Talking Global: the cosmo-politics of the call-center industry

In 2015, pioneering Saudi vlogger Juju Sajer revealed her face on YouTube after three years of performing in relative invisibility. She used her beauty vlog for small family dramas as well as beauty advice, translating the global genre to stage Saudi womanhood in modest and modern ways. This article analyses Juju’s use of digital frames as material for building a representational apparatus for young Saudi women. It takes a posthumanist approach to media roles as materially entangled with apparatuses of production, attending to the performer’s construction of networks and her onscreen performances. Juju’s evolving role from beauty vlogger to proto-talk show host, accompanied her increasing control over means of digital production after she gained corporate sponsorship and put her face on her brand. In contrast to theorists of communicative capitalism, I examine Juju’s self-branding as a networked performance of self, which enlivened and extended representational repertoires for young Saudi women. As a niche YouTube channel, it shows the potential of digital performance repertoires to develop within a framework of gendered modesty.     

The role of collective mobilization in the divergent performance of the rural economies of China and India (1950–2005)

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the divergent performance of the rural economies of China and India after 1950 was a product of the different capabilities of the Chinese and Indian governments to mobilize the labor force and financial resources of the rural population. By mobilizing unpaid labor and the financial resources of the villagers through mediation by the collectives (before 1984) and local administrations (from 1984 to the abolition of agricultural taxation and compulsory rural labor mobilization in 2006), the Chinese state developed rural infrastructure and the quality of the labor force at a pace and geographical scope that was far beyond its limited fiscal capacity. Efforts by the Indian state to establish rural organizations with similar mobilization capabilities failed due to the effective opposition of well-entrenched political and economic interests in the countryside. Unable to mobilize the labor and financial resources of the villagers, the Indian government relied primarily on its limited fiscal resources, which produced a much slower development of physical infrastructure and labor force quality. These are the primary reasons why China’s rural economy developed much more rapidly than India’s, which contributed significantly to the divergence of their national economies in the post-1950 era.     

Redistribution and recognition: land reforms in Kerala and the limits of culturalism

The most important achievements of the Communist governments in Kerala, India were the implementation of the land reforms and the legislation of the Agricultural Workers' Act. Using ethnographic and archival research based on these events and the processes through which they became a reality, this paper will question some of the fundamental assumptions of the influential Subaltern Studies project and postcolonial theory like the positing of governmentality and passive revolution as the general characteristics of ‘Third World’ societies' experience with modernity. It will argue that, more importantly, their culturalist framework, with its gross ignorance of class and material concerns, is hardly adequate to understand the fusing of the aspirations of recognition and redistribution or the material and cultural that characterizes the struggles by the peasantry and agrarian labor, and their synthesis by the Communist Party. Despite their professed aim of inaugurating a democratic project with the peasant as citizen, Subaltern Studies and postcolonial theory, unlike the Communist movement, do not envisage any material transformation of the agrarian classes that will actualize this objective.