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Scientific, Technological and Gendered Relations: An Ethnographic Study of Women Scientists, Engineers and Factory Workers
Get PDFThe thesis draws from a year and a half long multi-sited ethnographic study of three empirically situated sites—1) a government space scientific research organization assembling satellites for the Indian State since the 1970s (which I will call iSpace), 2) a workplace in Whitefield, Bengaluru which is part of the largest Indian multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company founded in 1968 that I refer to as iTech and finally 3) an Industrial Modern Township, commonly called IMT Manesar, 60 km from Delhi and 21.4 km from Gurgaon, which is a planned cluster for automobile manufacturing. Borrowing from Stengers’ (2009) notion of the figure of a scientist "where the scientist submits to a becoming that cannot be reduced to the simple possession of a knowledge" and Weeks’ appeal to envision an immanent political intervention within post-Fordist regimes of work, one that is "no longer about a self to save or to recover but one to invent" (Weeks, 2007, p. 248), the thesis weaves an affective relationship between different situations encountered at each field-site. At iSpace, I locate an articulation of exhaustion that informs the figure of a woman scientist and use this articulation to locate the limits of women in science discourse in India. At iTech, I identify a desire for im/mobility that informs the figure of the IT worker. This desire, the thesis contends, makes visible a horizontal relation between work/labour, life and urban, a relation that is obfuscated within the existing literature on IT work and Bengaluru. At IMT Manesar, where I collaborated with Faridabad Majdoor Samachar—a collective that has been documenting the lives of workers through its monthly newspaper in the industrial belt in and around Delhi for the last 30 years—I locate a horizontality of relations and how it influences the form and content of the newspaper, as opposed to a vertical relation between workers, unions, management and state. By engaging with the form and content of the Newspaper, I identify a crucial need to map the situatedness of situated knowledge. An affective, ethnographic map of exhaustion, im/mobility and horizontality weaved together in the thesis offers an illustrative critique of existing debates within women/gender studies in India on intersectionality while also locating the limits of existing debate on situated knowledges that is central to feminist (techno) science studies
Development Policy as a Social Process: A Case Study of Niranthara Jyothy in Karnataka
Get PDFPublic policy processes are predominantly studied by separating processes of formulation, when the policy is thought to be ‘made’, from processes of implementation, where policy decisions are assumed to be ‘delivered’. Such a separation has significant analytical costs in the Indian policy making context, increasingly evident in policy domains that are marked by horizontal and vertical conflicts, where the state and its institutions, are engaged in an on-going process of re-calibration of their roles in response to pressures from globalization and a deepening of democracy. Increasingly, in several policy issues that directly affect livelihoods of diverse social groups, consensus during policy formulation is constructed through future imaginaries and narratives that are to be realised in ideal conditions. In such a style of policymaking, overarching commitment is to specific instruments of change or policy ‘models’. Policy goals, winners and losers from the change process are ambiguous, and conflicts of interests are resolved by delegating change to lower levels of decision-making. This study uses the policy case of Niranthara Jyothy to identify the processes of ‘how-actually’ policy change is negotiated in a complex policy domain that cuts across issues in energy, water and rural governance. It does this by showing how a thin overlapping consensus for change is negotiated around a policy instrument through narratives of efficiency and sustainability during policy formulation. It then traces the actors, their interests and justifications through which a delimited version of change is made acceptable when more context-specific knowledge and interests are accommodated during the policy process. By arguing that the policy process relies on fragmentation of arenas for gaining acceptance, each assembling a different set of actors, audiences and modes of justification, the study seeks to show how divergence of policy outcomes are in-built rather than incidental to the process of absorbing change, allowing both ‘success’ and ‘failure’ narratives to co-exist. By providing this descriptive account of policy deliberation that proceeds in multiple fragmented arenas, the study offers a contrast to the normative ideal of policy deliberation that relies on a consensus generated through open and rational deliberation in the public arena
En-gendering human-wildlife interactions in Northeast India: Towards decolonised conservation
Get PDFThis article applies a feminist political ecology framework to analyze a particular case of human-wildlife interaction from northeastern India, linking it to the emerging paradigm of 'decolonized conservation.' Through the oral testimonies of local community members with regard to living close to wild Asian elephants in a forest-agriculture landscape matrix of rural Assam, this article argues that place-based conceptualizations of 'wildlife', 'forest dependency' and 'living with wildlife' are affected by gendered roles and responsibilities, gendered access to spaces and gendered interaction with wildlife. By doing so, this article argues for (i) extending the discourse on 'decolonized conservation' towards the role of gender in rethinking these place-based conceptualizations and (ii) bringing forward such 'en-gendering' into redesigning wildlife policies, as that will have the potential of ensuring feminist environmental justice as well as positive conservation outcomes
The Significance of Ancient Water Systems and the Sacred Groves in the Landscape of Badami, Karnataka: A Geospatial Study
No full textModifying and exploiting the environment to cater to people’s needs have been a continuous process throughout history. A multidisciplinary analysis of settlements and their environs gives valuable insights into the infrastructure systems ( water systems) that existed in the past. It is possible to study the strengths and weaknesses of these systems, along with the positive and negative impacts on the environment and the changes that have taken place over the centuries. This chapter discusses the modifications carried out in the landscape of Badami in Karnataka to harvest water for the settlement since its establishment as an Early Chalukyan capital in the seventh century. The chapter also highlights the significance of sacred groves in the historic landscape of Badami. The remnants of fortified walls, temples, water features, and sacred grooves testify to the ingenious engineering systems that existed in the past. Some of these historical infrastructure facilities are functional even today. They support the present settlement of Badami, exhibiting resilience and sustainability as these modifications are sensitive to terrain conditions. The chapter concludes by stressing the importance of studying the past infrastructure systems sustained through ages
The City as Action: Retheorizing Urban Studies
No full textIn constructing the urban as a set of interconnected actions, this book presents a less travelled route to understanding the city. It leads to a fresh perspective on several issues central to urban theory, including the uniqueness of a city alongside practices it shares with other urban places.
This book presents an innovative theoretical contribution to the field of urban studies, bridging the gap between western centric scholarship and perspectives from the global South. It offers conceptually rich insights, combining notions of cities as organisms, and references to postcolonial urban studies, with insights around aspirations, capabilities, agency, and social identity. It develops concepts, like the Proximity Principle, that help explain the experience of a city.
This conceptualization of the city as a process should interest all who are sensitive to cities, whether they study them in academia or simply develop close associations with specific urban places
Education for sustainability: curriculum provisions and teaching–learning in India
No full textThe issues related to sustainability are emphasized in
policy documents and included in textbooks in India.
However, the dismal teaching–learning conditions raise
concerns about the quality of delivery to students.
Amidst these inconsistencies regarding education for
sustainability, the present study sought to examine its
existing status in two schools in Bengaluru, Karnataka,
India. An interview was conducted and classroom observations
made involving 35 teachers in total. The
study showed that teachers’ knowledge and attitude
about sustainability were limited and non-scientific at
times. Knowledge about climate and sustainability
was transferred in an exam-centred manner without
any focus on developing attitudes amongst the students.
Highlighting the role of social experiences and
cultural capital of teachers, this study suggests a need
for concerted efforts to address their deep-rooted understanding
and attitudes regarding sustainability
Fuels for Sustainable Transport in India
No full textThe fossil fuels have a 98% share in the energy consumption in the Indian transport sector. The Indian transport sector contributes to 13.2% of CO2 emissions in India. In the quest for cleaner fuels for the surface transport sector, a number of transportation energy sources fueling the vehicles (based on Internal Combustion Engines) have emerged as suitable alternatives in the 21st Century through decades of continued research and development efforts. Fuels such as natural gas (Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) or Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG)), Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), hydrogen, and biofuels have been the front runners as potential alternatives to crude oil-based gasoline and diesel. These alternative fuels for cleaner transport in India are detailed and compared on the basis of their physico-chemical properties, ignition characteristics, storage requirements, and safety parameters. The technical ‘availability’ of these fuels in the context of the Indian road transport is discussed as a segment of the broader analysis of these fuels under the 4A framework of Energy Security (Availability, Accessibility, Acceptability, and Affordability). These alternative fuels are characterized from two perspectives, i.e., fuel mix for the short to medium term use (during the energy transition in transport sector) and fuel mix for the long-term use (after the energy transition has taken place). These fuels driving the transport sector are also analyzed based on their use by two contrasting yet complementary segments, viz. passenger and freight. CNG and LPG are identified to be useful in the fuel mix for the passenger segment in the short to medium term future, while biodiesel is identified as a potential freight segment fuel in the similar timeframe. For the long-term future, ethanol is identified as a potential candidate for passenger segment, while LNG and Hydrogen are found to be suitable for the freight segment
Historical Developments, Influences of International Actors, and Education Reforms in India
No full textThe entry and prominence of international institutions in education have been striking
features of policy development in the last few decades. A particular area of interest is India’s
education system since independence, particularly in the context of the recent policy ideas
steered by international actors. Once a strong marker of the British colonial legacy, formal
education in India acquired different meanings post independence. The significance of
education has been understood as an essential part of social transformation, a resource for
mobility, and an instrument of empowerment. As the inherited system was domesticated, the
following challenges emerged: equitable access, relevance of formal learning, and a
fashioning of Indian national identity. Through a network of institutions, the enterprise of
postcolonial public education was shaped in the mid-20th century and was deeply entrenched
in the politics of class, caste, and gender. Mass education and schemes to enable access on
the one hand, and the development of highly selective, technology-focused institutions on the
other, became the route through which an extremely uneven landscape of education was
established.
A weakened public education system, growing private institutions, and the overall economic
turn toward liberalization marked the Indian educational politics of the 1990s. Diverse
international institutions, multilateral institutions, nongovernmental organizations, and
national governments came together during the World Education Conference of 1990 in
Jomtien, Thailand. For the developing world the policy process became globalized after the
conference, and it expanded to include multiple actors and partnerships. Thriving since then,
globalized education policy has become a space of solutions and authority. Given these
changes at large, it is important to understand the politics of policy production, actual policy ideas, and how they acquire legitimacy