242. Dynamics of Rural Democracy

An ethnographic study of Indian democracy that shows how agrarian life creates values of citizenship and active engagement that are essential for the cultivation of democracy, Cultivating Democracy provides a compelling ethnographic analysis of the relationship between formal political institutions and everyday citizenship in rural India. Dr. Mukulika Banerjee draws on deep engagement with the people and social life in two West Bengal villages between 1998 and 2013 to show how the micro-politics of their day-to-day life builds active engagement with the macro-politics of the state. Her sensitive analysis focuses on several "events" in the life of the villages shows how India's agrarian rural society helps create practices and conceptual space for citizens to be effective participants in India's great democratic exercises. In this episode of  BIC Talks, Dr. Banerjee, social anthropologist, scholar and author engages in a coversation with scholar and economist Dr. Vijayendra Rao on the various facets of a functioning democracy and lessons the urban set ups can learn from rural governance. Subscribe to the BIC Talks Podcast on your favourite podcast app! BIC Talks is available everywhere, including iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Castbox, Overcast and Stitcher.