Скачать или смотреть Democracy and its Trajectories: India at 70 - Opening remarks

Conference opening remarks by Alf Gunvald Nilsen

How did class and caste power shape the making of India’s postcolonial democracy? In what ways were the particularities of the freedom struggle inscribed in its Constitution, and how can we understand the constitutive role of violence in the making of the Indian republic? How have women’s struggles in and through the feminist movement expanded democratic meanings and practices? What challenges does the media confront in India today and what role can it play in animating and sustaining the pulse of the country’s democracy? These are some of the questions that are discussed in the contributions to this symposium, which was organized in Oslo in October 2017. In addition, scholars, activists and journalists investigate the contemporary life of caste in discourses of merit, the lineages of the rise of the Hindu right, the status of secularism and religious pluralism in the context of a revived Hindutva project, and the politics of counterinsurgency and the limits of democratic legality in contemporary India. Together these inquiries added up to a remarkably searching and thorough conversation about the current conjuncture in India.

Collaboration between:
Department of Global Development and Planning at the University of Agder & Department of Sociology at the University of Bergen

Part of the project:
Democratizing Indian Democracy? Social Movements and State Formation in India – Towards a New Research Agenda

Funded by:
Norwegian Research Council (grant 230998)