Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Cooperation in Uncertainty: Migration, Ethnicity, and Community Governance in India's Urban Slums

University Of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Abstract

In the face of common challenges, why do some vulnerable communities develop institutions that advance their collective interests and security while others fail? This research will investigate the foundations of community governance and development in India's urban slums. The project has two principal objectives. First, by drawing on variation in levels of inter-ethnic cooperation across India's slums, it seeks to illuminate the conditions that impede or facilitate political organization in socially heterogeneous groups. Second, it will examine how the nature of political organization within slums and the extent of political competition at the municipal and state level interact to produce variation in the distribution of water and electricity across slums. This project rests on a comparative research design that combines 12 months of qualitative fieldwork with a statistical analysis of survey data. In six slum settlements in the Indian cities of Jaipur and Ahmedabad, the co-investigator will trace the development of relations among migrant groups, community leaders, and local political parties. An original survey will be conducted across 1,200 households in the cities of Jaipur and Ahmedabad. This data will allow the co-investigator to statistically test the impact of community institutions and political competition on variation in the supply of public services across slum settlements. The research will advance three interdisciplinary bodies of scholarship. First, it contributes to the study of social identity and collective action. A growing literature in comparative politics argues that ethnic diversity can significantly undermine collective action and economic development. The emergence of sustained, inter-ethnic organization and development in slum communities in India presents an important theoretical puzzle for this larger literature. This dissertation will add to our knowledge of identity politics and collective action by identifying how diverse people in economically uncertain conditions develop trust and common strategies to improve their lives. Second, it contributes to research on community institutions. Through an analytical comparison of recent community histories, this dissertation will examine the origins of community institutions and the mechanisms of institutional change among diverse migrant groups. Third, development research overwhelmingly focuses on rural poverty. This dissertation joins a budding research agenda in political economy that examines community development and public goods provision in the urban areas of the developing world. Community development policies largely rest on the notion of "participatory development"--the notion that poor communities must engage in sustained collective action and synergistic relations with NGOs and local government bodies to improve their welfare and security. Through a rigorous analysis of the microfoundations of collective action and community governance in India's slum settlements, this research will have significant policy relevance for urban development efforts. More than one billion people in the world live in slum and squatter settlements. Beyond India, then, this research will extend to poor urban communities in developing democracies as diverse as Mexico, Bangladesh, Thailand, Argentina, and Ghana. In addition to publications and conferences in the United States, research findings will be presented at research institutions in India, including the Institute of Development Studies (Jaipur), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), and the Institute of Economic Growth in Delhi. All qualitative interview data and quantitative survey data will be made publically available for transparency and accessibility. Data will be permanently archived at JNU for scholars in India and will be offered to the Social Capital Document Library, a joint project by the World Bank and Michigan State University.