The Politics of Science, Technology, and Development: A View From India towards the World

• In Event: Can the Subaltern Research? I

Abstract

India is a lively experimental space for initiatives that use science and technology to alleviate poverty and inequality. The government and domestic NGOs sponsor creative efforts to develop traditional knowledge for the contemporary world, seed innovation and entrepreneurship among poor and marginalized communities (especially women), and encourage scientific and technological literacy as a means of political empowerment. Meanwhile, entrepreneurs and universities are developing technologies for the “base of the pyramid”. Many of these initiatives are indigenous, blossoming in a country with ancient knowledge traditions, respect for makeshift innovation (in Hindi, jugaad), and a significant science and engineering workforce. Others are promoted by Western development agencies and international institutions like the World Bank and OECD. What are the epistemologies, and ideologies, of each of these approaches? Do they happily coexist, and where do they come into conflict? What relationships between science, technology, and power do they embody? Why do some of these approaches influence international expert discussions regarding science and development, while others receive no attention or validation at all in the global context? And what does that tell us about the politics of subaltern science and technology? This paper explores these questions through a two-part analysis. The first is a critical inquiry into efforts to use science and technology to alleviate poverty and inequality in India. The second focuses on how and why some of these schemes are understood as acceptable and viable interventions in international discussions, while others are not. Here, we see conflicts between subaltern and Western modes of knowing and evaluating, which have enormous consequences for India’s—and potentially the world’s—poor.

Author

• Shobita Parthasarathy, University of Michigan