<< This syllabus was prepared for the undergraduate students of Sciences Po Paris (Le Havre campus) for the academic year 2016-17. The course outline is archived on Academia.edu.

This course aims at introducing students to India’s social and political transformations since Independence in 1947. It will make sense of the rise of India as the world’s ‘largest democracy’ and its emergence as an actor of international importance. We will question the way Indian leaders approached internal as well as external threats to its stability, such as secessionist movements, guerrillas, ethnic and religious conflicts, social movements and various sustained tensions with neighbouring countries. This course also debates the changing nature of Indian democracy in the context of 1990’s liberalisation and the end of the Cold War order. This dual-faceted approach will provide the students with perspectives and understandings of fundamental stepping stones of Indian politics: secularism, linguistic diversity, federalism as well as multilateralism, regional cooperation, etc. Throughout, this course will allow students to see how the study of a new geographical space can be problematised, and how India can help us renew the understanding we have of societies’ core notions. This course will be divided into three sections. The first will provide an overview of past and current methodological and thematic questions related to the study of non-Western societies. The second part will analyse the founding pillars of constitutional democracy and the way they are implemented. Moreover we will make sense of India’s approach of diplomacy in the international scene. Subsequently we will understand how India deals with multiple conflicts in South Asia. An overview will be given of the internal challenges to its sovereignty like Kashmir, Khalistan and other conflicts in India’s tribal belt, as well as protracted conflicts with its two major neighbours, China and Pakistan. The last section will question Indian parliamentary democracy in the context of raising inequalities, uneven growth, rapid urbanisation, gender discrimination, resilience of caste politics and the raise of threats against Muslim and Christian minorities. We will see how these social obstacles hamper the rising prospects of India today.

Type of course: Elective course taught in English.

Assessment

1. A 10 to 15 minutes presentation that a group of two/three students is expected to make starting from the third course. The presentation consists of a literature review; the group is expected to formulate a research question on a topic approached in one of the sessions. (40%)
2. Class attendance, participation and discussion. (20%)
3. A written essay (4,000-6,000 words). Students will answer the research question outlined in the presentation; the topic will be chosen with the advice and consent of the Professor. (40%)

Detailed outline

Tuesday 30/08/2016, Session 1: Introduction. Problematising India: historical perspectives and debates on India’s democracy and foreign policy
Tuesday 06/09/206, Session 2: Methodological considerations: How to write a research paper? What makes a good and researchable question for a dissertation? How to review literature and choose appropriate research methods? Some precautions to avoid research biases: issues of eurocentrism, orientalism and concepts definition. Tuesday 13/09/2016, Session 3: Discussing the pillars of Indian democracy: dealing with the colonial legacy, the making of the Constitution, the functioning of the Congress one-party system, federalism and state-level democracy
Tuesday 20/09/2016, Session 4: Minority rights in India: marginalisation of Muslims and tribals. Class presentation 1
Tuesday 27/09/2016, Session 5: External Threats: a conflict-ridden neighbourhood
Tuesday 04/10/2016, Session 6: Internal Threats: the Maoist insurgency and secessionist movements. Class presentation 2
Tuesday 11/10/2016, Session 7: Challenges: the non-secular forces of the Hindutva. Class presentation 3
Saturday 15/10/2016, Session 8: Reconfiguring India after the liberal turn: federal evolutions and the post-Cold War emergence of India’s economic diplomacy. Class presentation 4
Tuesday 18/10/2016: Session 9: The rise of a plebeian democracy: caste politics in the 1990’s and new social movements. Class presentation 5
Tuesday 25/10/2016: Spring Break
Tuesday 1/11/2016, Spring Break
Saturday 5/11/2016, Session 10:  Which democratic model is India today? Social inequalities and capitalism. Class presentation 6
Tuesday 08/11/2016, Session 11:  Interrogating Gender Equality in India. Class presentation 7
Tuesday 15/11/2016, Session 12: Conclusions, and class discussion on the research paper  
Tuesday 06/12/2016: Paper submission for the last presenting group    

Required readings (provisional)

• On session 1: Introductory reading. Nehru, Jawaharlal The Discovery of India (Oxford University Press, 2002 [1946]): chaper 3, ‘The Quest’ pp49-68.
• On session 2: Halperin, Sandra and Oliver Heath, Political Research: Methods and Practical Skills (Oxford University Press, 2012): chapter 5, ‘Asking Questions: How to Find and Formulate Research Questions’, pp101-126 Complementary reading: Said, Edward Orientalism (Penguin Classics, 2003 [1978]): chapter 2, ‘Orientalist Structures and Restructures’ pp31-110.
• On session 3: Niraja, Gopal (ed.), Democracy in India (Delhi, Oxford University Press, 2001): Introduction, ‘Situating Indian Democracy’ pp1-51 Complementary reading: Khilnani, Sunil, The Idea of India (New York, Farrah Sraus Giroux, 1999): chapter 1, ‘democracy’ pp15-61.
• On session 4: Gayer, Laurent and Jaffrelot, Christophe, Muslims in Indian Cities: Trajectories of Marginalisation (London, Hurst, 2012): Conclusion, ‘In Their Place: The Trajectories of Marginalisation of India’s Urban Muslims’ pp311-331 Complementary reading: Basant, Rakaesh and Shariff, Abusaleh Hanbook of Muslims in India (Oxford University Press, 2010): chaper 2, Habib, Irfan, ‘Indo-Islamic Thought and Issues of Religious Co-existence’.
• On session 5: Peer Basharat, Kashmir’s Forever War (Granta 112, Pakistan, Essays & Memoir, September 2010)[1] Complementary reading: Raghavan, Srinath, War and Peace in Modern India (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010): chapter 8, ‘China 1961-1962’ pp311-321.
• On session 6: Shah, Alpa, In the Shadows of the State (Duke University Press, 2010): chapter 6, ‘The Terror Within: Revolution against the State?’ pp162-184 Complementary reading: Nelson, Cary and Grossberg, Lawrence, Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture (Palgrave Macmillan, 1988), Chapter 13, Spivak, Gayatri, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ pp271-313.
• On session 7: Jaffrelot, Christophe, Hindu Nationalism, A Reader (Princeton University Press, 2007): part 1, ‘The Invention of an Ethnic Nationalism’ pp1-27 Class video: “Lecture on Nationalism at Jawaharlal Nehru University by Romila Thapar” March 7 2016.
• On session 8: Jenkins, Rob Democratic Politics and Economic Reform in India (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1999): chapter 2, ‘The Evolution of Economic Reform in India’ pp12-42 Complementary reading: Tillin, Louise, Remapping India: New States and Their Political Origins (London, Hurst, 2013): chapter 3, ‘Social Movements, Political Parties and Statehood: Jharkhand and Uttarakhand’ pp67-109.
• On session 9: Ganguly, Sumit et al., The state of India’s Democracy (Baltimore and Washington, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007): chapter 4, Christophe Jaffrelot, ‘Caste and the rise of marginalized groups’, pp67-88 Complementary reading: Dirks, Nicholas, Castes of Mind: Colonialism and the Making of Modern India (New Jersey, Princeton University Press, 2001): part1, ‘The Invention of Caste’ pp1-61 and M. N. Srinivas, Social Change in Modern India (Orient Longman, 2005 [1966]): chapter 1, ‘Sanskritization’ pp1-49.
• On session 10: Drèze, Jean and Sen, Amartya, An Uncertain Glory: India and its Contradictions (New Delhi: Princeton University Press, 2013): chapter 8, ‘The Grip of Inequality’ pp213-243 Complementary reading: Kohli, Atul, Poverty Amid Plenty in the New India (Cambridge University Press 2012): chapter 3, ‘Regional Diversity: To Him who Hath’ pp144-211
• On session 11: Maitreyee, Chadhuri, Feminism in India (Zed Books, 2005): chapter 1, Kamla Bhasin et al. ’Feminism: Questions from the Indian Context’. Complementary reading: John, Mary Women’s Studies in India: A reader (Penguin India, 2008): chapter 28, Sharma Kumud, ‘Women in Struggle: A Case Study of the Chipko Movement’
• On session 12: Concluding readings. Jeffrey, Craig, Timepass Youth, Class, and the Politics of Waiting in India (Stanford University Press 2010): chapter 3, ‘Life at the Crossroads: Timepass’, pp72-103. Arundhati, Roy, The Doctor and the Saint, introduction to the annotated edition of Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste (Verso Books, 2014)[2]

  (A longer list will be provided to the students during the first class) [1] Accessible here : https://granta.com/kashmirs-forever-war/ [2] Accessible here: https://www.caravanmagazine.in/essay/doctor-and-saint