India's Development Experience
002CP Chandrasekhar_사 2010.6.23 5:47 PM 페이지29 (주)anyprinting(pmac)
DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIETY
Volume 39 | Number 1 | June 2010, 29-59
From Dirgisme to Neoliberalism: Aspects of the
Political Economy of the Transition in India
C.P. CHANDRASEKHAR | Jawaharlal Nehru University
This paper argues that internal contradictions arising from the inability of the postIndependence Indian state to introduce the institutional changes and adopt the interventions needed for successful import-substituting industrialisation, had resulted in a crisis in that growth strategy by the mid-1960s. Yet the transition to neoliberalism occurred only after a decade-and a half, and in accelerated fashion only after two decades. The paper would trace this lag to the timing of changes in the international financial system that was a prerequisite for liberalization. It would argue that once the transition occurred and gained momentum India emerged as a successful instance of neoliberal growth because of the foundations created in the import substituting years, her fortuitous ability to avoid severe balance of payments and financial crises, and the human face which governments were forced to adopt given the compulsions of democracy in a populous country with significant poverty.
Keywords: Neoliberalism, India, Industrial Growth, Finance Capital, Planning
002CP Chandrasekhar_사 2010.6.23 5:47 PM 페이지30 (주)anyprinting(pmac)
DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIETY, Vol. 39 No. 1, June 2010
Over the last two decades or more, the developing world has shifted out of development strategies involving a highly interventionist and often developmentalist state to one that has been widely characterised as a neoliberal strategy.
Neoliberalism is of course an ambiguous and loosely defined term, even when restricted to the economic sphere. So it would be useful to clarify the sense in which it is being used in this context. In what follows, neoliberal theory and practice are taken as referring to:
DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIETY
Volume 39 | Number 1 | June 2010, 29-59
From Dirgisme to Neoliberalism: Aspects of the
Political Economy of the Transition in India
C.P. CHANDRASEKHAR | Jawaharlal Nehru University
This paper argues that internal contradictions arising from the inability of the postIndependence Indian state to introduce the institutional changes and adopt the interventions needed for successful import-substituting industrialisation, had resulted in a crisis in that growth strategy by the mid-1960s. Yet the transition to neoliberalism occurred only after a decade-and a half, and in accelerated fashion only after two decades. The paper would trace this lag to the timing of changes in the international financial system that was a prerequisite for liberalization. It would argue that once the transition occurred and gained momentum India emerged as a successful instance of neoliberal growth because of the foundations created in the import substituting years, her fortuitous ability to avoid severe balance of payments and financial crises, and the human face which governments were forced to adopt given the compulsions of democracy in a populous country with significant poverty.
Keywords: Neoliberalism, India, Industrial Growth, Finance Capital, Planning
002CP Chandrasekhar_사 2010.6.23 5:47 PM 페이지30 (주)anyprinting(pmac)
DEVELOPMENT AND SOCIETY, Vol. 39 No. 1, June 2010
Over the last two decades or more, the developing world has shifted out of development strategies involving a highly interventionist and often developmentalist state to one that has been widely characterised as a neoliberal strategy.
Neoliberalism is of course an ambiguous and loosely defined term, even when restricted to the economic sphere. So it would be useful to clarify the sense in which it is being used in this context. In what follows, neoliberal theory and practice are taken as referring to:
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