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Plato and his allegory 1
Plato and his allegory
Type Reading notes Date Plato: Greek philosopher born in Athens. The Republic - Book
The Allegory of Cave:
This is a story he wrote to compare the effect of education and the lack of it on our nature. Imprisoned people are living in a cave where is no light. They have always lived there and they don’t know anything about the outside world. There is no natural light in the cave and the walls are dark. The inhabitants can see the shadows things on wall due to the light of fire. The people there saw the shadow of animals, things and considered those as real forms and considered that as the wisdom. One day, a prisoner escaped a cave and went out and saw the natural light and the real form of things he saw as shadows earlier. Plato wrote - Previosly he had been looking merely at phantoms; now he is nearer to the true nature of being. The man went back to the cave again to explan about the real forms to the other prisoners. When he told about all this, the other prisoners considered him as a mad man and killed him. Allegory: It is the allegory of all enlightened people. The prisoners are humans before philosophy. The sun is the light of reason. The alienation of the man is the result of all truth tellers. @August 21, 2023
Plato and his allegory 2 Plato belives that most people are living in shadows without knowing the real truth and merely following what was given to them. Plato considers this problem as something where all people start their life. The solution to this problem is by imparting philosophical education to all. Wisdom starts with owning upto ignorance. True knowledge of the world can only be obtained through the pursuit of wisdom rather than through the senses.
The Ship of State metaphor:
This is a metaphor for the state. The ship has a pilot. Plato says that this pilot knows nothing which eventually leads to the sailors to fight amongst themselves to gain control over the ship and eventually he becomes the sailor. This person who won the competition against other sailors also knows nothing about steering the ship. The true pilot who has the knowledge is unconcerned about this competition and imcompetent in this. The reason is that he has to look at the stars to give direction in case the equipment fails. The real ingredients of seamenship: Knowing the weather Which way the wind will blow So the true pilot always looks upwards looking at the sky at night and clouds at day. His gaze is not horizontal. So he is not looking at the other sailors. They other sailors are looking horizontal because what they want to do is to gain control of the ship. So the difference is the knowledgable person and politically competitive person. So the true pilot is ill equipped to become the actual pilot. Contemporary eg: Shashi Taroor and Kharge Plato says that it is impossible to arrive at a consensus when people are fighting with each other. This is a state of insurgency where people cannot be trained to govern things. This example is the stepping stone to Philosopher King.
Plato and his allegory 4 Who rules based on rational thinking and philosophical understanding. Soldiers Aristocrats: They represent the glory, spirit Working class Human character of appetite Every soul has the quality of human appetite, rational thinking and spirit. The matter determining the place in above three is the fact which quality dominates and which subordinates. The Real world is the imperfect representation of a perfect idea. Eg: The idea of rain: If it is drizzling, if it is a downpour → These are the imperfect representation of the perfect idea of rain Eg: The idea of justice: Abstract idea → How many idealistic ideas forms the whole of justice. Criticism: There is a theory of non infterference within those 3 classes. A working class person cannot become a philosopher. Eventhough there can be social mobility, the structure is the problem. Not all have the means to social mobility.
Rousseau - Social Contract theory 1
Rousseau - Social Contract
theory
Type Reading notes Date Reading material https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SJi0sHrEI His criticism of Hobbes and Locke: He said that they were talking about social life and taking the character of character of social life to individual state of nature. He is claiming that both of them’s state of nature concept is not state of nature but a fully formed society. According to Rousseau, Man are born free yet everywhere are in chains In state of nature, human beings are absolutely free and primitive. His life has 3 drives. Appetite Sexual gratification Sleep They are not in the state of war. They have the compassion because they hate suffering. They people were living apart from each other without communication or interaction and without the ability to reflect and reason upon conditions. At times of scarcity, there are 3 options: Compete/ confiscate Innovate (Production) @August 21, 2023
Ambedkar - Representative democracy 1
Ambedkar - Representative
democracy
Type Reading notes Date The main aim of Ambdkar → Substantive and Pariticipatory democracy His main concern while writing on law → The relation between constitutional form and social structure. How can representative democracy function in a social structure of oppression, marginilasation? If popular rule entails majority rule, then the minorities will be dispossesed permanently 3 Aims: Demogratic self- governance Protection of minorities Empowerment of minorites 2 Major strands of thinking of Ambedkar: Working of democratic political institutions in an inequal society: Reservation in civil service, Seperate electorate for Dalits, Nonterritorial eleltorates Actual functioning of law is conditioned by social life: Socio economic equality, Constitutional morality, civic religion are preconditions for democratic governance. 1919 Southborough committee- Ambedkar: It is not enough for the government to simply transmit the force of individual opinion, it must allow individual participation. Government is not only for the people, but by the people. @August 22, 2023
Ambedkar - Representative democracy 2 The goal of political rights was to provide active participation in association life and the communities should have a goal, aspiration. Majority in India is not a political majority unlike western societies. It is divided on caste and communal basis → So one group will eventually represent the other → Participation will be active the minorities are represented by them → Proportional representation will help. Ambedkar and constitutional liberalism: Proposed a government structure - Shared power (counter majoritarian) Seperate electorate for Dalits and weightage to compensate their oppression. This would give stable representation in executive, parliamentary and administrative bodies. This might lead to the minorities not actually having the power to control them. So he gave a solution. : Shared Sovereignity Socially and economic majority caste Hindus → They should be given relative majority in political sense and not absolute majority → Social minority: Inversen proportion to their social standing. Grounding of law in social life: He transformed from law to socity in matters of rights and equality in 1940s. He wrote in 1936 in Annihiation of State: Political revolution is always preceded by social and religious revolutions. The force to destroy untouchability would come from outside of India → A state dedicated to empowering minorities and eliminating civic disabilities. He says that the western liberal democracy only grants formal rights and failed to understand social inequality. Marx: Governing class based on economic terms Ambedkar: Governing terms based on social and political terms.
The State - Partha Chatterjee 1
The State - Partha Chatterjee
Type Reading notes Date
The State Structure after Independence:
Sovereign legislature elected by direct universal suffrage without communal representation but with reservation for SC and ST. Set of fundamental rights for citizens. As a federal state, India was more centralized than most federations. ICS → IAS, District officer for maintaining law and order and development. Working of HC and district courts, armed forces → same as colonial rule. Creation of SC and its functioning was new.
State and Politics, 1947-67:
Congress system → Formation of developmental state intervening in economy, planning, growth for the welfare of population → This was the principle government function that legitimized postcolonial rule. Mixed economy → Public sector in heavy industries. Private sector in consumer and immediate goods. 1960s → Food shortage, wars. Congress losing power in states. Devaluation of rupee.
Analyzing the state: The first 2 decades.
Features such as patronage based on caste, religious and ethnic loyalties considered as vestiges of underdevelopment. Rajni Kothari: Political system as working around a ‘dynamic core’ of institutions characterized by the dominance of Congress. Dominance of a political centre and @October 23, 2023
The State - Partha Chatterjee 2 dissent from peripheries. The emphasis was on consensus making and coalition building which was undermined by activities like Emergence. The key idea was that of a coalition of dominant class interests. India’s character was different capitalist societies like Europe. The Indian capitalist class did not have the social power to exercise hegemony and had to share power with other dominant class like traditional landed elites.
State and Politics in 1970s:
Indira Gandhi won with a populist campaign under the slogan of ‘remove poverty’. Her system was different from the Nehru system. Performance of particular leaders were judged by how much they had done for their respective constituents. Food crisis → Green revolution → New class (rich farmers) influencing national politics. Restoration of Congress under Indira Gandhi: Her section deriving its identity from its leaders. State socialism Welfare packages considered as gift from central leadership. Emergency leading to defeat of Congress in north and a short lived Janata Government came.
Analyzing the state: 1970s and 1980s: (Passive revolution)
3 dominant class - Capitalist, rich farmers, Bureaucracy Dominant coalition model → Agrarian bourgeoisie - A strength that could mobilize the rural electoral support. → Bourgeoisie democracy. Tussle between demand polity and command polity. Demand polity - Societal demands expressed as electoral pressure dominates the state Command Polity - State hegemony prevails over society.
The State - Partha Chatterjee 4 Presence of both civil society (urban middle class dominated by capitalists ) and political society (rural pop and urban poor exercising political bargaining). The political society is governed through various political negotiations. So, passive revolution is still valid. → Capitalist class exercising political hegemony over civil society controlling the governments through bureaucratic managerial class (media, judiciary, independent regulatory bodies). However, the practices of state include government activities in political society. → Political society accepts the capitalist hegemony because of the capital accumulation leading to rapid industrial growth. (Corporate capital)
Political society and management of non-Corporate capital:
In political society, people are not regarded as proper citizens with rights and belonging to proper civil societies. - Seen as belonging to specific characteristics which are targets of particular government policies. Their entitlements never become rights. Compared to the situation of street vendors. Civil society: Corporate capital hegemony. Political society - Space of management of non-corporate capital. Requirement of corporate capital be given priority - holds sway over civil society (urban middle class). Treat informal sector and political society with intolerance. The civil society thought that the rapid economic growth sill solve problems of poverty. The informal sector does not lack organization. Purpose - Operate within the rules to ensure livelihood of its members. The survival depends on government support demanded by poor. The response to the demands is flexible. Divide into smaller fragments for specific targets and divide the potential opposition to the state. Most of those who provide leadership in political society are political leaders. → Directly affiliated to political parties.
The State - Partha Chatterjee 5 Peasant agitation against the discrimination faced. The downside of political society: Marginalization of some groups and marked by the exclusion from peasant society who are low castes people and do not practice agriculture. These people do not have electoral mobilization. State system: Binding civil society to political society under the dominance of capital. → Primitive accumulation. Political negotiation of demands for the transfer of resources from the accumulation economy to governmental programmes aimed at benefiting the poor. The capital class will keep the marginalized out of primitive accumulation. Electoral democracy makes it unacceptable for the state to leave these people without the means of labor.
Between State and Society:
While the pressures have increased on state institutions to provide more benefits (because a large section started to participate in mobilization), there is a contrary pressure on the state, exerted through fiscal, judicial and other regulatory institutions to curtain the range of its activities and allow these sectors to operate themselves. Emergency of one branch of state as a self conscious check on the perceived excess of the others. Government → Acting on demands of heterogenous pol society. Court → Homogenous civil society of equal citizens. (Eg: PIL, where court can take matters of public interest). Urban middle class has not abandoned democratic political institutions.
Parliament - Hewitt & Rai 2 Decline of single party government since 1990s → Stimulated parliamentary functioning. 19 Committees. 4 have to table their reports to parliament. Ministers cannot be members. 7 ad hoc committees.
Parliamentary Membership:
Ability to mirror wider social diversity. Allow non-elites to the political process through their individual right to a free and fair vote. The attempts to redress the under representation of some groups began under the British government, which introduced quotas for different minorities under the Government of India Act, 1935 and a serious of separate electorates for different religions. Separate electorates were abolished at independence. Reservations for SC and ST, while improving their presence in Lok Sabha have led to the reproduction of sub elites within these groups. Indian Muslims, despite suffering from material deprivation do not get reservations. Women’s representation challenged by equal citizenship rights. Selective inclusion of women with no connection to women’s movement poses a challenge. Quotas not based on principle but political opportunism → Challenge.
Parliamentary Practice:
The efficacy of parliament is the function of the marginalized people’s presence within the specific parties working inside parliament to represent social interests and advocate policies on their behalf. Indira Gandhi’s convening of Sarkaria commission and not referring it to commission of enquiry act. → Undermining the moral ethics of parliament procedure. Opposition’s form of fight: Extra-Parliamentary protests: Eg: Indira Gandhi’s former foreign minister’s fast unto death for Gujarat elections and BJP’s protest for Ayodhya.
Parliament - Hewitt & Rai 3 Opposition calling a proposed legislation into question because of the form in which it is submitted, drafted or tabled. Eg: Indira Gandhi’s bill to abolish Princes Privy Purses voted down in Rajya Sabha. Morarji Desai and Vajpayee’s pursuance to the speaker to withdraw preventive detention bill because of its poor drafting.
Coalition government and the enhanced role of the speaker:
Due to the rise of coalition government after the fall of Rajiv Gandhi’s government, there were an increase in the number of private member bills. The prospect of a speaker and PM finding themselves at odds is a real possibility.
The Parliament: Its future role and potential obstacles:
With the onset of coalition governments, the business of piloting legislation through India’s parliaments has become a balancing act, with parliamentary time tabling derailed ver the need for consultations. Some coalition governments have used ordinances to avoid debating legislations with their partners as much as with the opposition.
Federalism 2 1st Phase: Independence to mid 1960s Nehru wrote to CMs every month keeping them informed of the state of the nation. Solicit their attempt to rebuild national consciousness. Co-optation of local and regional leaders in the national power. Sending out Congress observers from the Centre to mediate between warring factions. 2nd phase: 4th General election (1967): Change in Centre state relations. Congress dominated Centre began cohabiting with opposition parties in regional levels. That balance was lost due to Indira Gandhi’s radical centralized leadership. 3rd phase: End of 1980s. Coalition government → Regional parties asserting interests openly and increased their assertion at the Centre.
Institutional design: Strengths and Weaknesses:
India: Quasi- Federal: state with subsidiary federal features. 3 Lists Sharing of power: Vertical power sharing Allocation of issue areas. Decision made by either Centre or state or local level. Horizontal power sharing Sharing of competences at Central and sub national levels between the branches of government. Transversal power sharing Structural and processual sharing of powers between levels of government.
Federalism 3 Political interlocking: Non hierarchical and joining informal modes of joining levels through coordinating mechanism. At the Union level → Tripartite power sharing, Horizontal sharing → Legislative, executive, judiciary. A number of informal fora (Finance Commission, Inter state council) serve as a bridging mechanism between the levels of government). Criticism: Role played by governors within the Indian states and the use of President’s rule. Framer of constitution: Wanted governor to play minimal role in politics in crisis situations. Institution of governor has had a veto power to the democratic setting. Issue of territorial integrity of the states. The fact that the states within India did not enjoy a guarantee of territorial integrity, which could be waived only with their express consent was one of the reasons why India was called quasi federal. SC: Centre having greater power in the constitution does not mean that the states are mere appendages of Centre.
Institutional design and the Political Process:
Both the Union and the states were a simultaneous creation of the constituent assembly. The consent of the states, those forced to cede territory is not required for alteration of the names or boundaries of the state. Even though in normal times, the states have the exclusive power to make laws in the areas allotted to them, the parliament has extraordinary power of legislation on state subjects in the national interest when authorized by Rajya Sabha. The composition of Rajya Sabha does not reflect the equality and dignity that is accorded to all members of a federation unlike other federations. Governor being the extension of Centre. Potential threat to federalism: President’s rule in a state.
