New Paths of Development by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030560966
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Conclusion

The state-led Nehruvian socialism established the role of the state as the supreme arbitrator, manager and governor. It led to the growth of the developmentalist state in India. The state led centralised growth model of the first few decades after independence ignored the demand and needs of the local populace in general. The dominant groups (middle-class, industrialists, policy makers) used the S&T led imaginaries of development, which prioritised economy over environment and social justice. The economy grew at a slow but steady rate. Socio-environmental concerns were mostly neglected at the ground level. The voice of the farmers and indigenous communities were increasingly got side-lined and re-appropriated in many cases (Shah 2007; Reddy and Mishra 2010). As a result, by the 1970s, the overpowering state was confronted by the community led environmentalism from the bottom. The bottom-up environmentalism was guided by Gandhian environmentalism, Marxist socio-ecological movements and indigenous environmentalism (Gadgil and Guha 1994). As a result, India achieved “growth without equity”.

The introduction of market-based approaches from the 1980s onwards further strained this situation. For a long period, no market environmentalism emerged in the country after the adoption of market-based approaches. The focus remained on economic growth and social justice and environmental sustainability did not achieved priority. In the hegemonic neo-liberal economic development post 1990s “economic growth” remained the primary goal! Economic inequalities, stagnation in the job market, domination of capital, and political marginalisation of common masses happened along with economic growth (Kohli 2007). Even though, at another level, the state-based regulations and policies kept engaging with the environmental discourse emerging during these periods.

The environment and sustainability debate in India cannot happen without addressing the inequality and equity related concerns. Those who engage with the question of inequality, such as social scientists and other actors, primarily ignored the environmental concerns. Whereas, for long environmentalists representing the state and market interests failed to engage with the question of inequalities and social justice. The inequalities are of different types, based on gender, class, caste, region and even religion. In the neo-liberal growth phase, the middle class “idea” of development is being portrayed as the voice of the nation. In this background, the bottom-up environmentalism of the subaltern class come in direct conflict with the dominant imaginary and models of development.

However, at the normative level, the state led environmentalism led to the emergence of multitude of organisations, networks, policies and laws dealing with environment. The state actors asserted their “commitment” to the idea of sustainable development. Similarly, market environmentalism promoted the idea of “green” growth. However, the economic assumptions in decision-making processes in these models remained tied to the capitalist models of economic growth. The revival of community-based institutions based on traditional and indigenous knowledge system comes as footnote in the policy discourse. Recent scholarship has conceptualised community led development, which has roots in Gandhian environmentalism and ecological Marxist movements as a degrowth model capable of offering an alternate to capital dominated growth models in context of global south (Gerber and Raina 2018; Pansera and Owen 2018).

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