DEMOCRACY IN INDIA

DEMOCRACY IN INDIA

India has turned out to be the biggest democracy on the world. After gaining independence after 1947 Nehru created an interim government and also created a Constituent Assembly to create a Constitution.

In 1950 India adopted the constitution and became a democratic republic.

For the first half our democracy was shadowed by the Congress. Congress held power from the first election in 1950 and till 1977. In 1977 for the first time a non-Congress government came to power under Moraji Desai, which was a coalition government. However this government only lasted for two years before Congress came back to power, in 1980. The reason Congress dominated and was supported in the country because everyone saw it as the party that bought India to freedom and there was no other party strong or nig enough to challenge the Congress.

In 1975 India was imposed the Emergency by the Congress and this is considered to be darkest era of Indian Democracy.

In 1980 the BJP was formed, though it did not seem to challenge the power of Congress. However this party in 1992 after adopting the Policy of Hinduvita posed as threat Congress. In 1999 BJP came to power and that lasted to 2004. The support of the Congress for the first was shaken and it began to lose its support.

However Congress came back to power after the 2004 election and it came back with a bigger bang after the 2009 election with a majority of 206 seats in Lok Sabha. Manmohan Singh is the current Prime Minister.

India has adopted a system that balance powers with three institutions of Indian democracy that is Legislative, Judicial and Administrative. Each one acts as a check and balance on each ones power.

NATIONS

NATION

Nation, named human community possessing an historic territory, shared myths, symbols, and memories, a common and distinctive public culture, and common laws and customs for the members.

There is no exact definition of a nation. They are all varied. Some scholar are stipulate (proposing how the term should be used) or ostensive ( defining it by pointing out examples). There is an assumption that the nation is a product of nationalism. There is an objective of nationhood through criteria’s such as language, religion, territory etc. and also psychological criteria’s such as will, imagination memory etc.

Later on nation also included criteria’s such as borders, citizenship, political community, sovereignty.

Basic features of nations:

1. a growing communal self-definition, including self-naming, and contrasting self with other communities, “us” and “them”; 2. the development and cultivation of a fund of distinctive symbols, myths, memories, and traditions of the community; 3. the growth of collective attachments to an ancestral land, or to a land associated with a particular ethnic community; 4. the development and dissemination of a distinctive and shared public culture to the members of a community; and 5. the standardization and application to its members of common laws and customs, which normally involve common rights and duties. These are general processes that, as we shall see, find their way into many influential accounts of the formation of nations.

In the 19^th and 20^th Century most of the member of the nations were not conscious of their of long standing nation hood and had to be aroused by nationalist. These nationalist began to be revive the country. For example in India we have our own share of leader who during the colonist time aroused the public to stand for their country.

Nation and nationalism are seen as a product of modernization. This is because modernization began to bring people together and closer and a few people realized that they have very similar culture and tradition and theses people began a process of join kingdoms into a nation.

Nations were formed in various ways.

n Gellner- Industrial modernization was uprooting villagers eroding their culture and traditions and forcing them to adopt a new culture and tradition in an anonymous and impersonal city. The homogeneity and fluidity of modern societies serviced by a highly mobile, literate workforce tended to iron out cultural differences.

n Benedict Anderson provides an alternative constructionist account that locates the origins and spread of nations in the realm of culture. Imagined community coz members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them or even hear of them, yet in their minds each lives the image of their communities.The community is imagined as in a comradeship but still inequalities and exploitation take place. Religion is imagined by humans in response to the burden of human suffering

n Eric Hobsbawm and his associates that nations are not only recent, but “invented”, social constructs engineered by ruling state elites through the judicious selection of “invented traditions” of national community, history, mythology, and language, which link a modern nation to a fictive historical past the nation became a form of social control, and nationalism was encouraged in order to manipulate and channel the sentiments and votes of the newly mobilized and enfranchised masses in rapidly industrializing and democratizing societies

Types of nations:

Liberal Nations – Nations are genuine organic communities. It talks of sovereignty and world of nations states.

Conversation Nation – Definite view on a nation. Could be external or internal. Internal means a group of people dictates what it means to a citizen. External means foreign countries dictates what a country is.

Expanision – Expanding what a nation is.

Anti- Colony Nations--- These refer to the nations which are formed by opposing the colonist rule over them. There was a mushrooming of them in 1950s and 60s and especially over Asia and African countries

CASTE POLITICS IN INDIA

CASTE POLITICS IN INDIA

Caste politics in India refers to politics played by politicians to get votes from a particular caste community and this is normally done through a policy of appeasement. It was first started by Babu Janjan Ram from the Congress in 1970s.

Historically, the basic limitation of lower caste mobilisation in the north was its failure to break out of the Sanskritisation mould in contrast to western and southern India where caste movements were questioning Hindu religious culture. In Tamil country, the multi-layered ideology of Dravidianism emerged out of opposition to Brahmanism and Brahmin institutions of colonial rule, and in the hands of Periyar became associated with a vision of Dravidian and Shudra primacy against Aryan Brahmanism. In Maharashtra, Jyotiba Phule blamed Brahmins for the deprivations of the lower castes and hence of the many ills of society. There are three tendencies in lower caste politics in north India: Laloo Yadav's cultural critique and opposition to upper caste-class privilege; Mulayam Singh Yadav's substitution of upper castes politics with a model of a peasant-cum-caste politics; and Mayawati's Dalit power agenda.

Caste system has been in India for a very long time. Various attempts to eradicate it has resulted failure, so much so that Dr. Ambedakar even decided to convert to Buddhism to escape. The Indian Government officially abolished the caste system in 1950 after the enactment of the Constitutions. Untouchability was abolished under article 17. It forbids discrimination of caste under Article 15. However the leaders still realized that enactment of this would not be enough since it would require changing the mindset of the public and for this a reservation system was created. Reservation was given to Schedule Tribes (STs) and Schedule Castes (SCs) and Dalits. Reservation was supposed to be removed after ten years of independence, however ten years later there was still a strong discrimination against the lower caste and hence through a constitutional amendment it was extended. In time the situation has not changed while the reservation only increased from political bodies to administrative bodies to educational bodies. Article 47 provided promotion of educational and economic interests of SCs, STs and other weaker sections. Also there is the ST and SC Commissions that oversees the welfare of SCs and STs.

THE MANDAL COMMISION

In 1979 the Mandal Commision was set up to identify the socially or educational backward. It was headed by an MP, Bindheshwari Mandal to consider the question of seat reservations and quotas for people to redress caste discrimination.

The Commission gave reservation from 27% to 49% in government jobs and universities. It introduced OBCs (Other Backward Classes) . The Commision laid down certain criteria on which if a community passed it could become an OBC. The big controversy over addition of OBCs is that if a community is backward in a particular State or area it did not mean that community is backward in others. For example the Jats in Bihar are backward but the Jats in Punjab are quite well to do.

CASTE IN TODAYS PLOTICS

Caste plays an important role in politics. Though reservations provisions have been there since independence there seems to be a slow change in the minds of the people. Interestingly the tenure of the reservations provision will be getting over in a year.

Indian parties playing vote bank politics make sure that they have people from these communities to show that they are representation that community. So much so that Parties that are special appealing to these communities have been set up such as Janta Dal, BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party).

The BSP can be called revolutionary party in terms of caste politics. The Party was set up (1984) Kanshi Ram. The party claims to take inspiration from Dr. Ambedakar. The party claims to represent all the repressed people. The significance of this in 2007 BSP lead by Mayawati, a Dalit leader captured power in Uttar Pradesh. For the first time in India a Dalit leader can boast of such feats.

PANCHAYAT RAJ

PANCHAYAT RAJ

In democracy it is about giving power to the people and that’s what panchayat raj is about. The Central Government gives local political bodies autonomy. The Government recognized a third tier political after the Central and State Level it recognized the village. It was adopted by the government in 190s and 60s and it also has a Constitutional provision in the 73^rd Amendment in 1992. The point of Panchyat Raj is decentralization.

Decentralization has been able to create more accountability:

--- Active participation (voting, attending meeting, running for office) in governance by all villager.

--- Fiscal (financial) and political authorities from higher authorities of government.

--- The existence of competitive political parties whose legitimacy depends on the support of the majority of the village and that include the STs, SCs and weaker sections.

Dr. Ambedakar, Gandhiji and Nehru all had different views on establishment of Panchayat Raj.

n Dr. Ambedakar: His main aim was to abolish the untouchables system. He belived that it existed at all levels and giving power the people at lower levels were not good. He also did not completely support centralization. He believed in modernity and he look towards urban areas.

n Gandhi: wholly supported the idea of panchayat raj, of giving the people the right to geverven themselves.

n Nehru: He was against this idea. He felt that people of the villages were not equipped with the knowledge to govern themselves.

PANCHAYAT RAJ FOLLOWS A THREE TIER SYSTEM

Under the 73^rd Amendment there are three level of the Panchayat Raj

n Gram Sabha at the village level which is headed by a council leader called a Sarpanch

n Panchayat Samiti consists of all the Sarphachs in a Taluka from all the Gram Sabhas. It is the link between the Gream Panchayat and the district administration.

n

FOUR STAGES

Panchayat raj has an evolution of four stages.

n Feudal/Traditional: Panchaytat with a single head

n Managerial Paternal: Here a group of people benefit controlling the Panchayat. For example if a sugar factory owner gets elected to the village all the sugar farmer become a patron of the person. This types are found in Maharashtra and Delhi.

n Fragmented : Here the groups are fragmented. Panchayat do not patronize a group but the village as a whole. Found in West Bengal.

n Democracy: The last and final stage. The ultimate stage. No more inequalities.

CRITCISM AGAINST PANCHAYAT RAJ

n There is a threat that the village will be held by a few who do not care about the welfare of the village and patronize only a particular section of society.

n There will be a filter down of political parties resulting in villagers losing power and the panchayat becomes all about politics and which party is winning instead of focusing on village issues.

n Villagers are uneducated and are not able to take proper decisions.

n Villager will support a lot of wrong decisions if given a free hand. This can be seen in Khap Panchayats in Haryana.

Blue ocean Strategy notes

BLUE OCEAN STARTEGY

NEW MARKET SPACE

This means creating a new market demand. Companies need to stop competing with each other, they need to stop competiting with the competiton.

Red ocean- all the industries in exisitence

Blue Ocean- All the industries that are not in exisitance- unknown market space.

THE CONTINUING CREATION OF BLUE OCEANS

Most of earlier industries were once upon a time blue ocean – automobiles, health care, avation

Market is on a continuous evolution. Industries never stand still.

Most of the strategic thinking has been based red ocean stragegies.

14% of business launches are blue ocean that take 38% of companies revenue and reap a 61% profit in a company as compared to Red ocean which occupies the rest.

THE NEED FOR BLUE OCEAN MARKETS

While supply is on the rise there is no clear rise in the demand and this includes developing markets to. In overcrowded industries differentiating brands become harder in both economic upturns and down turns.

FROM COMPANY TO INDUSTRY TO STRAGIC MOVE

Companies need not compete head on. A strategic move is a set of managerial actions and decisions involved in making a major market creating business offerings. Blue ocean can be captured by all and any industry.

VALUE INNOVATION THE CONNERSTONE OF BLUE OCEAN

Blue ocean does not follow a bench mark of competition instead it looks toward value innovation. Value innovation looks to create a new set of demand and market. It does not focus on beating the competition but opening new and uncontested market space. Value innovation place equal focus on value and innovation. Value without innovation focuses on value creation. Value innovation is a new way of thinking about and executing strategy that results in creation of a blue ocean and a break from the competition. Value innovation sees that blue ocean purses differentiation and low cost simultaneously. For example a circus acquiring expensivce clowns and lion tamers results in having high cost structure and no new experience for the customers. However Cirque du Soleil created a theme which had a story lined which resulted in a theatre performance and eliminated the expensive and gave a whole new experience.

Value innovation (Figure 1-2) involves reducing cost (eliminating things that the industry competes on) while increasing buyer value(by creating and offering a whole new experience)

FOUR ACTION FRAMEWORK (Figure 2-2)

Reduce- Raise A new value curve Eliminate-Create

1^ST Question: Which of the factors that the industry take for granted should be eliminated?

2^nd Question Which factors should be reduced well below the industries standers?

3^rd Question Which factors should be raised well above the industries standards?

4^th Question Which factors should be created that the industry has never seen?

[This system forces a person to ask question and take action

1^st Question- Eliminate factors that companies have long competed on. These are factors that have been take for granted which no longer have any value or may even detract value.

2^nd Question- Determine if products or services have been overdressed to compete with others and have resulted in a burden for customers.

3^rd Question- Uncover and eliminate the compromise ur industry forces customers to make.

4^th Question- Help u discover new sources of value for ur buyers and to create new demand and shift the strategic pricing of the industry.]

1^st Managers do not eliminate or reduce their investment on what the industry competes on resulting in mounting cost structures.

2^nd Gives insight into buyer’s value and new demand. Also shows how to reconstruct buyer value element resulting in giving a whole new experience and keeping cost structure low.

For example Yellow tail did not steal the sale form the competitors it grew its market. Yellow tail did not have to compete with sale as it grew its own market; it bought non-wine drinkers (beer drinker and cocktail drinkers) into the market by offering wine which was soft in taste and the flavours were of fruit flavours; the packaging was of simple bottles of bright vibrant colours- orange and yellow; the employees became the brand ambassadors by wearing bushman hats, oil skins and jackets, and this made the employees very happy; the variety of the wine were of only two a red and white. All this contribute to creating a new market- wine towards non-wine drinkers.

Applying the four grid system gives four benefits:

§ It pushes industry to pursue low cost and differentiation.

§ It forces on companies that are only focused on raising and creating and lifting costs structure and over engineered products and services-- a common plight amoung companies

§ It is easily understood by all level managers and creates a high level of engagement in its application.

§ Coz completing the grid is challenging it forces a company to scrutinize every inch of itself.

THREE FEATURES OF A GOOD STRATEGY

FOUCS: Every strategy has a focus and a company’s strategic profile or value curve should show that. For example Southwest’s profile gives three focuses—friendly services, speed and frequent point to point departures.

Divergence: The value curve of blue ocean strategies always are different from the rest. By applying the four grid system they differentiate their profile and stand apart from the rest.

Compelling Tag Line: A good tag should not only deliver a clear message but also advertise an offering otherwise the customer may lose interests. A good strategy always contains a strong and authentic tagline.

FOCUS ON THE BIG PICUTRE AND NOT NUMBERS

Focus on the big picture, not numbers. This approach unlock the creativity of many people within an organization, opens an organization’s eyes to blue ocean strategy and are easy to understand and communicate for effective execution.

FOCUSING ON THE BIG PICTURE

By building a company’s strategic planning process around a strategy canvas a company focus and its managers focus on their main attention(big picture) rather than become immersed in numbers and jargon and getting caught up in operational details.

Strategy Canvas does three things:

§ 1^st it shows the strategic profile of an industry by depicting the factor (and the future factors) that affect competition

§ 2^nd it shows the strategic profile of current and potential competitors .

§ 3^rd it shows a company’s strategic profile/ value curve—depicting how it invests and how it might invest in the future.

If a company’s strategy curve does not reveal that then it is likely to mixed-up, undifferentiated and hard to communicate.

DRAWING YOUR STRATEGY CANVAS

Asses what extent you company and its competitors offer various competition factors. Most managers thing they know how they and their competitors fare, but what they have is only a two dimensional image and few can see the overall dynamics of the industry.

§ 1) Visual Awakening: --- Compare your business with you competitors by drawing ‘as is’ strategy canvas.

--- See where your strategy needs change.

§ 2) Visual Exploration: ---Go into the field to explore the six paths of creating blue ocean

--- Observe the distinctive advantage of alternative products and services.

--- See which factors you should eliminate, create or change

§ 3) Visual Strategy: --- Draw your ‘to be’ strategy canvas based on insights from your field observation.

--- Get feedback on alternative strategy from customers, customer’s competitors and non customers.

--- Use feedback to build the best ‘to be’ strategy’

§ 4) Visual Communication: --- Distribute your before-and-after strategy profiles on one page for easy comparison.

--- Support only those projects and operational moves that allow your company to close the gape to actualize the new strategy.

DEMOCRACY NOTES

DEMOCRACY

Democracy is a political government either carried out directly by the people (direct democracy) or by means of elected representatives of the people (Representative democracy). The term is derived from the Greek: δημοκρατία - (dēmokratía) "the power to the people",^[1] which was coined from δῆμος (dêmos) "people" and κράτος (krátos) "power", in the middle of the fifth-fourth century BC to denote the political systems then existing in some Greek city-states, notably Athens following a popular uprising in 508 BC.^[2] Even though there is no specific, universally accepted definition of 'democracy',^[3] there are two principles that any definition of democracy includes, equality and freedom.^{[4][dubious – discuss]} These principles are reflected by all citizens being equal before the law, and having equal access to power,^[5] and freedom is secured by legitimized rights and liberties, which are generally protected by a constitution.^[6][7]

Deocracy is a the government is of the people, by the people and for the people. This is established by the various ways. Democracy originated in Greece. Greece was divided into small city states. All citizens were eligible to speak and vote in the Assembly, which set the laws of the city-state.

It evolved with the magna carte and the glorious revolution. It evolved again with the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen where the Divine Rights of a King were abolished.

Today more that 50% of the countries in the world have a democratic set up.

Democracy gives a voice to all the its citizens of the nation. It gives everyone the right to express their opinion. However not everyone gets their way and there only the wish of the majority is possible.

Aristotle is critical of Democracy—He says that the popular principle of justice is to have equality according to number and not worth and the decision of the majority must be final; each citizens must have an equal share and this results in democracies the poor are more powerfull than the rich. For a man to live as he likes is to give him liberty and the exisistance of slaves continues.

CONCEPTS OF DEMOCRACY

n Under minimalism, democracy is a system of government in which citizens give teams of political leaders the right to rule in periodic elections. According to this minimalist conception, citizens cannot and should not “rule” because, for example, on most issues, most of the time, they have no clear views or their views are not well-founded.

n Direct democracy, on the other hand, holds that citizens should participate directly, not through their representatives, in making laws and policies. Proponents of direct democracy offer varied reasons to support this view. Political activity can be valuable in itself, it socializes and educates citizens, and popular participation can check powerful elites. Most importantly, citizens do not really rule themselves unless they directly decide laws and policies.

n Governments will tend to produce laws and policies that are close to the views of the median voter – with half to his left and the other half to his right. This is not actually a desirable outcome as it represents the action of self-interested and somewhat unaccountable political elites competing for votes.

CRITISM OF DEMOCRACY: Although that all depends on what kind of democracy you live in. If by democracy you mean "majority rules" then you leave the minority to live by rules set by the majority. If the Majority vote to demoralize the minority, it could be done. This is why the founding fathers of the USA hated democracy, and instead opted for a republic...but you didn't ask about a republic. The founding fathers of the USA also thought that the majority of the common people in the US were not intelligent enough to make their own decisions, and they felt that if you have unintelligent people making democratic decisions, then the state would eventually falter and fail

n Mob Rule: This refers to Oligarchy where the power rests with the small elite segment of society who are wealthy, powerful

n Moral Decay:

n Political Instability: A political party in democracy itself is every time threatened with factionalism and splits. The minority who are opinions are not listened to can rise up in protest.

n Slow Government response: Democratic institutions work on consensus to decide an issue, which usually takes longer than a unilateral decision. This is because a government has to consult with a lot of people before it

TYPES OF DEMOCRACY

n Direct Democracy: it is a political system where all citizens participate in decision making personally.

A direct democracy gives the voting population the power to:

1. Change constitutional laws,

2. Put forth initiatives, referenda and suggestions for laws,

3. Give binding orders to elective officials, such as revoking them before the end of their elected term, or initiating a lawsuit for breaking a campaign promise.

n Representative Democracy: A group of people is voted by the public into a government to represent them. Representatives may be elected or become diplomatic representatives by a particular district (or constituency), or represent the entire electorate proportionally proportional systems, with some using a combination of the two. Some representative democracies also incorporate elements of direct democracy, such as referendums. A characteristic of representative democracy is that while the representatives are elected by the people to act in their interest, they retain the freedom to exercise their own judgment as how best to do so.

n

Enigma

An enigma is what we are from the time we are born
An enigma to ourselves,
An enigma to others,
And every day we try to decipher this enigma,
Only the creator knows the true nature of this enigma,
Only those of us can wonder what it us, wonder
The rest don’t give a fuck.