Daniel Little
A recurring theme in Understanding Society for the past several years is the occurrence of unfathomable atrocity in the twentieth century. Many of the examples considered occurred in Europe. But atrocities have occurred in many countries and civilizations. A horrific example occurred in Tamil Nadu, India, in 1968. In the small rural village of Keezhvenmani, …
Continue reading "A horrendous massacre in Tamil Nadu, 1968"
Morality is a part of everyday life and personal experience. It is also, of course, the subject of a large field of philosophy -- philosophical ethics. What principles should I follow in action? What kind of person do I want to be? What do I owe to other people in a range of circumstances? We …
Food safety is a very high-level concern for ordinary consumers. This is true because the food we eat can poison us or ruin our health, and yet consumers have little ability to evaluate the safety of the foods available in the marketplace. Therefore government regulation of food safety appears to be mandatory in any complex …
The entrenched rule of the BJP and its leader, Narendra Modi, has led to a truly alarming degradation in India's democratic institutions (link). Hindu nationalism and the degradation of citizenship rights for Muslims and other non-Hindus; the rise of paramilitary violence in cities; the repression of non-compliant students and academics through violence and the threat …
The Indian state of Kerala has taken an especially active approach to responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. Kerala, a state of more than 33 million people, is governed by the Left Democratic Front, having won state elections in 2016. LDF is a coalition of left-leaning parties, led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist and the …
The occurrence of anti-Muslim violence, arson, and murder in New Delhi last month is sometimes looked at a simply an unpredictable episode provoked by protest against the citizenship legislation enacted by the BJP and Prime Minister Modi. (See Jeffrey Gettleman and Maria Abi-Habib's New York Times article for a thoughtful and detailed account of the riots in …
[V. K. Ramachandran was a Professor of Economics at the Indian Statistical Institute, and is at present vice chairman of the State Planning Board of the state of Kerala. He is the author of Wage Labour and Unfreedom in Agriculture: An Indian Case Study. Previous discussions of Ramachandran's work in Understanding Society can be found …
Continue reading "Guest post: VK Ramachandran on details of life as a day laborer in India"
I have always found biographies a particularly interesting source of learning and stimulation. A recent example is a biography and celebration of Muthuvel Kalaignar Karunanidhi published in a recent issue of the Indian semi-weekly Frontline. Karunanidhi was an enormously important social and political leader in India for over sixty years in the Dravidian movement in …
The question of China's political future is an important one and a difficult one. Will China evolve towards a political system that embodies real legal protections for the rights of its citizens and some version of democratic institutions of government? Or will it remain an authoritarian single-party state in which government and the party decide …
Continue reading "New perspectives on Chinese authoritarianism"
There are a lot of opinions about China today in the United States -- authoritarian, farsighted, effective at economic progress, overly committed to Party authority, challenged by the environmental effects of rapid economic growth, burdened by a corrupt and aging party elite. Some believe China is on the path to becoming a dominant super power, …
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