Monday, May 31, 2004
Good News in India
When I first heard that the BJP (which stands for Bharatya Janata Party, or something like that) was beaten by the Congress party in the most recent Indian elections, I thought: oh shit (as nobel prize winners like to say), there go the reforms. India's economy has been humming along in recent years (and NOT just because of outsourcing, though that's certainly a nice feather in the cap). It seemed mildly insane to throw the people out who nominally were responsible for that success and hand it to a party that, due to its lack of a clear majority, would have to make common cause with the Communist party.
My knee-jerk response, however, appears to be wrong. First, Congress was the party who initiated the reforms that lead to India's vibrant growth in the first place. They started to untie the miles of red tape which stifled Indian industry in the first place (put there by Nehru as a way to encourage domestic Indian industry to replace all those British imports, which is a natural thing for a former part of the British empire to do, just ask Ireland).
When the BJP managed to win the election, they continued those reforms. In practice they were rather reluctant reformers given that they were a Hindu nationalist party, and nationalists don't tend to be the most economically enlightened. Fortunately, they were also rather reluctant to roll back the reforms, so India benefited and the BJP got to claim credit.
The Congress party, however, was the original reformer, and now that Italian-born Sonia Ghandi (not related to Muhatma, and I have NO idea if that is spelled right) has decided not to accept the prime minister's position, the role has passed to Mr. Manmohan Singh, the man who pushed through the original reforms in the first place.
Congress will still have to make an alliance with the Communists, but the Communists in India are not your grandfather's communist party. They rule in Kerala and have managed to make a decent run of things (where they have banned people from striking in the "strategic" IT services industry, a very un-communist thing to do). India's communists seem to concentrate simply on helping the poor and dispossessed to get a share of the pie, and hey, that ISN'T such a bad thing to do. They don't seem as beholden to dated concepts of state central planning.
Singh is also a Sikh, which is a relgion that is a hodge-podge of Islam and Hinduism (and I mean no disrespect by that). That might help him to strike a middle ground between Hindu and Muslim interests, and make him a decent negotiating partner in ongoing peace overtures towards Pakistan.
All things said, India's election generated a useful result. Now, if only America could free itself from domination by only two parties.
When I first heard that the BJP (which stands for Bharatya Janata Party, or something like that) was beaten by the Congress party in the most recent Indian elections, I thought: oh shit (as nobel prize winners like to say), there go the reforms. India's economy has been humming along in recent years (and NOT just because of outsourcing, though that's certainly a nice feather in the cap). It seemed mildly insane to throw the people out who nominally were responsible for that success and hand it to a party that, due to its lack of a clear majority, would have to make common cause with the Communist party.
My knee-jerk response, however, appears to be wrong. First, Congress was the party who initiated the reforms that lead to India's vibrant growth in the first place. They started to untie the miles of red tape which stifled Indian industry in the first place (put there by Nehru as a way to encourage domestic Indian industry to replace all those British imports, which is a natural thing for a former part of the British empire to do, just ask Ireland).
When the BJP managed to win the election, they continued those reforms. In practice they were rather reluctant reformers given that they were a Hindu nationalist party, and nationalists don't tend to be the most economically enlightened. Fortunately, they were also rather reluctant to roll back the reforms, so India benefited and the BJP got to claim credit.
The Congress party, however, was the original reformer, and now that Italian-born Sonia Ghandi (not related to Muhatma, and I have NO idea if that is spelled right) has decided not to accept the prime minister's position, the role has passed to Mr. Manmohan Singh, the man who pushed through the original reforms in the first place.
Congress will still have to make an alliance with the Communists, but the Communists in India are not your grandfather's communist party. They rule in Kerala and have managed to make a decent run of things (where they have banned people from striking in the "strategic" IT services industry, a very un-communist thing to do). India's communists seem to concentrate simply on helping the poor and dispossessed to get a share of the pie, and hey, that ISN'T such a bad thing to do. They don't seem as beholden to dated concepts of state central planning.
Singh is also a Sikh, which is a relgion that is a hodge-podge of Islam and Hinduism (and I mean no disrespect by that). That might help him to strike a middle ground between Hindu and Muslim interests, and make him a decent negotiating partner in ongoing peace overtures towards Pakistan.
All things said, India's election generated a useful result. Now, if only America could free itself from domination by only two parties.
