Historical Hurdles in the Course of the People’s Planning Campaign in Kerala, India

Democratization in the Global South

“…Even the most advanced new transformative projects such as in Brazil, Kerala, the Philippines and South Africa (see Chapters 3, 4, 9 and 10, this volume; Törnquist with Tharakan 1996;Tharakan 2004;Törnquist et al 2009b) continue to grapple with the theoretical as well as practical problems of combining conventional liberal-democratic representation, lobbying and civil society influence on the one hand, with additional channels of more democratic issue and interest representation as well as direct participation, on the other hand. The same applies to the development of strategies that do not separate but combine democratization with reforms for welfare-based economic development.…”

“…Politics towards the kind of practices for fostering popular representation as envisaged by Avritzer have been most promising in the framework of participatory planning and budgeting in Brazil (see Baiocchi 2003 and Chapter 10, this volume) and the Indian state of Kerala (see Tharakan 2004). Meanwhile, appreciative scholars like James Manor, however, (2010 and Chapter 11, this volume) argue that such achievements call for extensive political facilitation; in Brazil by the Workers Party (PT) and in Kerala by a popular education movement in combination with leading segments of the Left Front government.…”

Visions of Socialist Democracy from South Africa: A Critical Review of Three Recent Contributions

“…Millions of residents have involved themselves in these processes. Even so, the People's Campaign for Democratic Decentralisation and its related participatory initiatives have VISIONS OF SOCIALIST DEMOCRACY FROM SOUTH AFRICA yielded often impressive but mixed results, both in terms of welfare and development gains and in securing inclusive participation (Thomas and Heller, 2003;Tharakan, 2004). Like participatory budgeting, it has achieved a popularity that crosses party lines, though it has not been free of party-political hegemonism and patronage.…”

Inequality and Political Clientelism: Evidence from South India

“…In a similar vein, Tharakan (2004) concludes that "the evolution of modern Kerala society and politics resulted in a process of party-politicisation of associational life, which subjected it to the clientelistic principle of winning support by way of partisan favours". In Tamil Nadu, Subramanian (1999, p.67) reports that "crucial Dravidianist policies (...) were clientelist as they targeted specific groups which gave the ruling party their support in return..".…”