FRIENDS:
Nos. 44 - 46 (April 2008):
India’s Runaway ‘Growth’:
Distortion, Disarticulation, and Exclusion
From the new issue:
“An alternative path of development must be based on transforming agrarian relations. Growth rates would not seem so spectacular, but the growth would be meaningful for the people and be more reliable, because based on an internal dynamic. Moreover, the process of transforming agrarian relations would bring to the fore long-suppressed social forces capable of pursuing a development path in favour of the vast mass of people – whose productive energies too would be progressively unleashed in this course.”
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Also available online:No. 43:
What Keeps Disputes on River Waters Alive?
“The ruling class parties, and assorted appendages of ruling class politics (regional chauvinist outfits, ambitious clerics, film stars and their fan clubs, opportunist trade unions/peasant fronts), choose to present the issue of the inter-state distribution of river waters as the most important problem of the peasantry.” Plus: Suniti Kumar Ghosh on 1947; Dipankar Dey on FDI in India's retail trade.No. 42:
'Counter-Revolution in Military Affairs?
"Wired" or "postmodern" warfare, it was widely claimed, would transform the 21st-century battlefield and assure American supremacy for generations to come. ... US strategists are now re-learning the fundamental lessons of Vietnam: that guerilla war is a political, not merely a military, struggle; that technology cannot defeat a determined popular resistance; that resistance fighters draw their power from the sympathies and co-operation of the people. Plus: Wheat Imports: A Tool for Reshaping Indian Agriculture.No. 41:
'Global Power', Client State
In recent years, successive governments at the Centre have actively promoted the notion that India is emerging as a 'global' or 'great' power, and that this is a matter of national pride. Now the United States has declared that it plans to "make India a world power". What sort of 'global power' is India in the process of becoming?No.s 39 & 40:
The Story of Otis Elevators
Plus: Examining the Current Boom; Budget 2005-06: Seeing through the Propaganda; more.No. 38:
The UPA Government's Economic Policies
Plus: Squeezing state finances; the US and conscription; foundations and imperialism; debate on the WSF; more.No.s 36 & 37:
The Real State of India's Economy
From the issue: “[T] the entire ‘India Shining’ campaign is a cheap statistical fraud. There is no significant turnaround in the economy as a whole. The actual condition of the people and their productive future — the only real measure of economic performance — is appalling.”No. 35:
The Economics and Politics of the World Social Forum
From the issue: “‘Globalisation’, a misleading word for the current onslaught by imperialism, can be resisted, and even defeated, by a combination of struggles at various levels, in various countries, in various forms. ... However, a careful analysis reveals that the World Social Forum is not an instrument of such struggle. It is a diversion from it.”Nos. 33 & 34:
Behind the Invasion of Iraq
“[S]ynthesizes the seemingly disparate threads of the US war drive in a blistering indictment of American foreign policy . . . The effect is of puzzle pieces clicking into place.” —CounterpunchSee also Back Issues.
Note: Behind the Invasion of Iraq has been issued in book form and may be ordered online from Monthly Review Press.
All material © copyright 2008 by R.U.P.E. (Research
Unit for Political Economy)
Ground floor, Sidhwa Estate, N.A. Sawant Rd, Colaba, Mumbai (Bombay) 400005,
India.