Society Politics And Development In North East India

Contributed articles chiefly with reference to rural development in Northeastern India; includes articles on cultural history of the region.

In many senses, India's Northeast has been an enigma to the rest of the country. Beginning with the earliest challenge of the nation-building process in India, this highly diverse and multicultural region has, through its multiple identity movements and militant separatism, thrown up several major issues which have resulted in re-drawing the parameters of the Indian nation-state and helped to re-define the idea of nationalism itself. This selection of essays/commentaries, written over some three decades, analyze the complex processes of the nation-state's engagement with the demands for autonomy/independence raised by the small nationalities of the northeastern region but also focuses on the contradictions and new equations that have been emerging both within these movements and in the State's response to them. The factors behind the rise of ethnic nationalist assertions, the role of civil society, the rise of exclusivist politics and the question of citizens' rights are other issues that figure prominently in the discussions.

Contributed papers presented at a symposium held in 1999.

The only book that brings together ideas and insights for social sector development of North-East India arguing for careful formulation of social development policy keeping in mind the ethnic and cultural diversities of the region.

This book examines the relationship between civil society and human security in the Indian state of Meghalaya, part of the region known as Northeast India. Civil society has been revived over the last two decades and is now one of the key concepts in development, politics, and international aid. The concept has gained particular significance as part of attempts to analyse and instigate grassroots democratisation through widespread political participation. This is seen as enabling a broader range of issues to be politicised and made a part of political agendas at the local, national, and global levels. However there are few studies that examine the constraints on civil society at the local level, even in contexts where civil society may appear to be active and vibrant. Those studies that do exist tend to focus on the constraints coming from the state, overlooking the constraints that come from within civil society itself. During the same period human security has gained prominence as a challenge to state-centric conceptions of security and as an alternative approach to development by focusing on the security and insecurity of groups and individuals. The concept has been taken up by international organisations, development agencies, and bilateral donors as a more effective way to understand the difficulties people face in their everyday lives that go beyond conventional categories and indicators. In order for those experiencing insecurity to identify and contest the causes of insecurity, participation in civil society is necessary.

India’s Northeast has long been riven by protracted armed conflicts for secession and movements for other forms of autonomy. This book shows how the conflicts in the region have gradually shifted towards inter-ethnic feuds, rendered more vicious by the ongoing multiplication of ethnicities in an already heterogeneous region. It further traces the intricate contours of the conflicts and the attempts of the dominant groups to establish their hegemonies against the consent of the smaller groups, as well as questions the efficacy of the state’s interventions. The volume also engages with the recurrent demands for political autonomy, and the resultant conundrum that hobbles the region’s economic and political development processes. Lucid, topical and thorough in analysis, this book will be useful to scholars and researchers in political science, sociology, development studies and peace & conflict studies, particularly those concerned with Northeast India.