Anil Kumar Vaddiraju

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• Professor
• Professor (Full) at Institute for Social and Economic Change

We live in strange times. Extraordinary economic inequalities, extraordinary technological developments, authoritarian states and reversal of social and political thought. In such contexts, is it possible to think of a society where family, private property and the state do not exist?

The Indian middle class is estimated to be anywhere between 250 million to 300 million out of 1.2 billion population. There are various estimates and the figures vary. However, what is effectiveness of this middle class in Indian polity, society and economy. Is this middle class nationalist, globalist or simply narcissist?

Despite the quantitative estimates, there are different scholarly opinions on this middle class. Firstly, middle class is supposed to be strategically important class as it controls most of the strategic positions of the polity, economy and society. Second, opinion is that there is an older middle class and new middle class; while the older middle class owed its origins to dirigiste economy, the new middle class owes its origins to the economic boom since liberalization of the economy. It is also said that while the old middle class stood for unity of the country, taking a nationalist stand point, the new middle class is more regional and champions diversity. Another opinion is also that this middle class is consumerist and profligate; unlike the older middle class which was simple and prudent.

Therefore is the question what is the extent of middle class quantitatively in Indian population? and what is its effectiveness in Indian society and polity and economy? Does it stand for all that is bad about Indian society, or does it stand for all that is good --as Aristotilians would want ,(a golden mean in class structure is always preferable as it ensures stability of a polity in the longer run as Aristotilians would prefer.) or is it neither. Finally is it an open class or closed class of two hundred and fifty million people? Does it constantly allow mobility or does it attempt to preclude mobility into the class from lower classes and castes? Last, and certainly not the least, is the Indian middle class simply a parasitic class feeding on the surplus generated by working classes of Indian society? Or is this middle class a productive class of the economy, polity and society?

There is well established deductive method of understanding the higher order political economies in order to understand the development of lower order--assuming an hierarchy and a teleology of orders exists, of course--political economies. This is also supposed to help understand the development of today's developing countries. That the understanding of the development of their political economies is possible if we understand the political economies of the metropolitan countries first. Or to say the same differently, the path of development of today's developing countries is more easily comprehensible, if we understand the path/s(?) of development of advanced countries. If this is the general methodological proviso, then does the same apply to understanding the developing country cities? That if we understand the path of development of New York or London, we can perhaps understand the path of development of Bangalore or Mumbai? If the methodological canon holds in agrarian studies, why can not the same hold in urban studies---and to the transition from rural to the urban of societies?

There are pointers world wide that liberal democracies are increasingly becoming illiberal. That they are tending to be neither liberal nor democracies. Indian liberal democracy originating from a respectable constitution, seems to follow the trend. There are two problems within my question. One, are we as a society increasingly becoming illiberal and intolerant. Second, are we as a political democracy increasingly being driven to wall a) by majoritarian politics b) electoral manipulation of various means c) institutional decline i.e., those who occupy political institutions do not care for their sanctity and integrity--or even rule of law.Therefore the two sided problem is leading to the decline of Indian liberal democracy. While I am open to the reassurances that we are a great and world's largest democracy, I am also open to cynics who scoff at the glaring shortcomings of the same. Therefore is Indian liberal democracy irretrievably on the decline?

It is observed in some writings that some countries do have a high social trust; whereas some others have poor social trust. Where does this concept originate and how to go about understanding and enhancing the same. When does the lack of social trust prevail? and why? Is social trust inversely proportionate to inequality? Is this social trust inversely proportionate to social unrest? Is this lack of social trust related to essential conditions of existence under capitalism? The latter question means that in a society where there is no capitalism there should by high social trust. Besides the empirics of studying this one more final question: Is this essentially to do with our premises about human nature? That there is an essentially benevolent human nature distorted by capitalist conditions? That is to say social trust is directly proportionate to social equality and absence of alienation? Because this question has wide ranging implications for social and political theory , given that all major social and political thinkers have written to some extent about their own view of human nature.

I will be grateful for your comments.

Here the question is, whether the Indian urbanization is much like the Latin American urbanization wherein a few 'primate cities' occupy prominent place in the process and policy. This appears to be the case prima facie when we take the growth of state capitals in each of the Indian states at the same time compare them with the growth of district level cities in the respective states. This calls for an understanding of disparities in urban development between the state capitals and the district level cities. While both might be growing, the rates of growth of state capital cities appears to be much higher. Thus making them into 'primate cities'. Hence we are openly questioning as to whether our hunch regarding Indian urbanization is also supported by research by other social science scholars working on Indian urbanization? Your kind responses are welcome.

Generally urbanization in developing country cities is characterized by a high migration of poor people to cities. This is particularly the case where agriculture's incapacity to absorb surplus labour is marked. Therefore the growth of cities should also be characterized by a high number of migrants forming slums. In that case is developing country urbanization positively correlated with the size of slum population? The bigger the city the more the slums?

This question is to understand the extent of economic inequality in India today.