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Private and public spheres inIndiaBhikhu Parekh aa University of Westminster , London, UKPublished online: 25 Jun 2009.

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Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy

Vol. 12, No. 2, June 2009, 313328

ISSN 1369-8230 print/ISSN 1743-8772 online 2009 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/13698230902892218http://www.informaworld.com

Private and public spheres in India

Bhikhu Parekh*

University of Westminster, London, UK

Taylor and Francis LtdFCRI_A_389393.sgm10.1080/13698230902892218Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy1369-8230 (print)/1743-8772 (online)Original Article2009Taylor & Francis1220000002009Professor [email protected]

In the traditional Indian way of life, the social realm consisting of thejoint family, the kinship network and the caste plays a dominant role, andcolonises both the private and public spheres. This is challenged by theincreasingly influential ideas of personal autonomy, equal citizenshipand a democratically constituted public realm. The tension between thetwo provides a clue to much of contemporary Indian political life. Indiacannot successfully cope with it without redefining the boundariesbetween private and public spheres and developing appropriate normsfor them.

Keywords:

autonomy; caste; family; hierarchy; kinship; marriage;privacy; public good; status; trust

Human activities and relations can be classified in several ways. The private-public distinction is one of them. It involves distinguishing them in terms ofthe two closely related ideas of who has access to and exercises control overthem. An activity or a relation is private if access to and control over it arelimited to a particular individual or group of individuals. To say that an indi-viduals beliefs, opinions or relations to his wife and children are private is tosay that they are entirely a matter for him, that he is not accountable to othersfor them, and that they may not pry into or interfere with them. The termpublic refers to what is open or in principle accessible to all and where theymay legitimately participate or take an active interest. Parks and streets arepublic in this sense, and so are books, cinemas, modes of transport and polit-ical institutions. By the terms private and public sphere, I refer to areas of lifewhere the activities and relations involved are respectively of a private orpublic nature as I have defined these terms.

No area of human life is inherently private or public. Where and howfirmly the line is drawn between them, what activities are placed under each,and the relative status or importance of the two spheres varies from society tosociety. There is nothing inherently private about even the basic biologicalfunctions and sexuality. They are so considered in most modern societies, butmany premodern and even some contemporary societies take a different

*Email: [email protected]

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view. In some societies, again, collective life is seen as the rulers fiefdom orprivate property, and he is free to conduct it as he pleases; in others it is apublic activity involving all citizens. In classical Athens a high value wasplaced on political participation, seen as the highest expression of humanfreedom, and private life, associated with the inherent compulsions of humanlife and considered a realm of necessity, signified privation. In modern soci-ety the opposite is the case. Privacy is associated with freedom and privilegeand is greatly cherished, whereas political life is assigned a largely instrumen-tal value.

The fact that an activity, a relationship or an area of life is consideredprivate does not mean that it is exempt from social regulation. Directly orindirectly it involves or affects others. And even when it does not, societyhas norms concerning the proper way to undertake it. In modern Westernsociety in which privacy is greatly valued, individuals are free to marrywhoever they like, but their spouses must be human beings (not animals), ofa certain age, outside a certain degree of consanguinity, and in most societ-ies of the opposite sex. Their sexual preferences are their own business,but these should not involve children, bestiality and, in most societies,sodomy. They may believe what they like and live as they please, but theirbeliefs should not incite hatred against other groups, and their ways of lifeshould not cause a nuisance to their neighbours, disturb public peace, violatenorms of decency, or endanger public health. Although regulated by socialconventions and even laws, the relevant human activity or area of life isprivate and free from others interference because the conventions and lawsare regulative and not prescriptive. They do not dictate choices, only specifythe general conditions all choices should meet. So long as individuals do so,they may make whatever choices they like without being answerable toothers.

Thanks largely to the spread of the idea of individual autonomy from theeighteenth century onwards, modern Western society has developed a histor-ically unique manner of defining and distinguishing private and publicspheres. Since it represents important values and provides a necessary back-drop to the discussion of the Indian way of life, a brief sketch of its basicoutline would be useful.

The idea of autonomy implies that individuals see themselves as self-determining agents, masters of themselves, and greatly value and indeeddefine their dignity in terms of their freedom to run their lives themselves. Itforms the basis of articulating human life into three broad areas, dependingon the kind and degree of autonomy they allow. First, private sphere or anarea of life where individuals are free to organise their personal lives as theyplease. Second, civil society or the area where they enter into uncoerced rela-tions with others in pursuit of self-interest, pleasure or common purposes.Third, the political community or the area of life where individuals are neces-sarily part of a collective life and are subject to its constraints.

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So far as their personal life is concerned, autonomous individuals takepride in organising it as they please. They make their own choices, marry whothey fancy, follow the career that interests them most, form their own viewsand beliefs, decide the size of their family, what tastes and interests to culti-vate, and so on. These are private matters for which they are not answerableto anyone and whose inviolability is protected by social and legal sanctions.Indeed a culture is developed in which individuals internalise respect not onlyfor their own but also for others autonomy, and refrain from interfering withchoices of even those who are closest to them.

In the nineteenth century, the ideas of autonomy and privacy came to beassociated with the rather different belief that individuals find their fulfilmentand are truly themselves only in the world of intimate relations representedby the family. Unlike the wider world, which was composed of strangers andgoverned by rules and thus artificial, the family represented a home, a placewhere one expressed oneself without inhibition and constraints. It wasgoverned by love and lifelong commitment, and provided an environment inwhich to explore and enjoy marital intimacy and nurture children. This belieffurther reinforced the importance and inviolability of the private sphere.

Civil society is the realm of associative freedom. It includes freely chosenactivities, relations and groups in which individuals come together to pursuecommon purposes. All associations are voluntary, and their members join andleave them at will. Unlike the family, civil society is not based on kinship butconsent and shared interests. It involves strangers with whom ones relationsare transactional and episodic as well those to whom one is bound by the tiesof varying degrees of closeness. It is governed by rules and social conventions,whose observance constitutes the practice of civility or civilised way of life.

The political community is a form of civil society but with importantdifferences. It is compulsory in the sense that one cannot avoid being amember of it. One may of course leave ones community, but only by joininganother. It is also coercive in that it enjoys the monopoly of violence and usesit as the last resort to ensure compliance with its laws. It has the power of lifeand death over its members and may require them to fight in its wars andimpose capital punishment. The principle of individual autonomy, however,requires that the political community should become a voluntary associationas much as possible. Its authority should be derived from the consent of itscitizens. It should protect the privacy of the family and the associative free-dom of the civil society, and pursue only those purposes that its citizensapprove. The political community is not the private property of its ruler but a

res publica

, a public institution serving public good in a publicly accountablemanner. Its affairs are their affairs and they have a right to debate, discuss,form and communicate their views on how these should be conducted. As apublic activity, governing the country should be transparent, based onpublicly accessible information, responsive to public opinion, and conductedin the full light of publicity.

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The political community understood in this way is underpinned by severalinterrelated beliefs and practices. It involves freedom of expression, includingthat of the press. It also involves equal citizenship. Autonomous individualsare equal in their moral status and demand equal rights. They possess therequisite basic capacity to participate in its affairs, and have an equal stake inthem. Since the state speaks in the name of them all and implicates them inits decisions, each of them has the right to ensure that he or she is happy withthese. Democracy in the sense of equal citizenship and universal franchise isentailed by the idea of individual autonomy, and over time and after a consid-erable struggle it became an integral feature of the modern Western politicalcommunity.

Since governing the political community is a public activity, it entails anew, public, identity that is governed by its own appropriate norms and insu-lated against the intrusion of other identities. Citizenship is a public status,and citizens are public persons who are expected to pursue public good anddisplay public spirit. They should vote and form their opinions on the basisof what best promotes the good of the community rather than what best servestheir personal interests. And they should discuss public affairs in terms ofpublic considerations and public reason, not their private beliefs and intui-tions. This is just as and even more true of public officials. They occupypublic offices, which are positions of trust, are intended to achieve clearlystated public purposes and are governed by rules and procedures. They aretherefore expected to rise above their personal interests, social affiliations andfamilial ties, and take decisions on the basis of an impartial assessment of allrelevant interests.

The modern Western way of structuring human life outlined above is notwithout its critics. So far as the inviolability of the private sphere isconcerned, feminists argue that it privatises and privileges a vital area ofhuman life, places women at the mercy of the dominant male, and protectsand intensifies gender inequality. Republican writers concentrate on children,and argue that as the nursery of future citizens, the family should be viewednot as a private but as a semi-public institution and brought under greaterpublic control. Socialist writers argue that the privatised family breedspartiality and selfishness, constitutes a bastion of privilege, and needs to besuitably redefined and reconstituted. Nationalists think that it cuts off thefamily from the nation, and fails to foster such virtues as love of the nationand the willingness to subordinate personal and familial interests and loyal-ties to those of the country.

These writers also question the current structure of the political commu-nity. For feminists it defines public life in terms of and privileges masculineconcerns and sensibilities, and has a patriarchal bias. For republicans it isindividualistic, takes an instrumental view of political life, does not provideadequate formal and informal spaces for participation, and fails to fostercivic and political virtues. For socialists the modern political community is

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atomistic, impersonal, abstract, tied to narrow class interests, and needs toembody the ethos of fraternity and solidarity. Nationalists think that it isheavily biased towards individual rights, mechanical in its operations, tooimpersonal in its ethos to engage the hearts of its citizens, and needs to bereorganised along familial lines. While these and related criticisms have ledto some modification in the structures of private and public spheres andmade their boundary less rigid, the basic belief that they are autonomous,separate and governed by different norms continues to command widespreadconsensus.

India

The traditional Indian way of structuring human life is significantly differentfrom its modern Western counterpart. This is largely because like the premod-ern West, Indians do not place much value on individual autonomy. Althoughthe latter has begun to enter Indian life and exercises varying degrees of influ-ence on different sections of society and in different areas, its reach remainsrather limited and its impact uneven. The tension it has created and the wayin which it modifies and is in turn modified by the traditional ways of life andthought provides an important clue to contemporary Indian society.

In the traditional Indian view which continues to underpin much of Indianlife, the individual is embedded in a web of social relations. These include thecaste, the extended kinship network, and above all the family, defined broadlyto include parents, siblings, wife and children. The individual grows up in themidst of these relations, feels different degrees of attachment and loyalty tothose involved, and inherits all manner of moral and prudential obligations tothem. The obligations arise from several sources such as the ties of kinship,common interests, past favours done to oneself or one parents, and theexpected or hoped for future help. When one falls on bad times, those mostlikely to help are ones kinsmen or members and welfare associations of onescaste. This is particularly so because the welfare services provided by the statewere and remain exiguous, bureaucratic and often corrupt. At a differentlevel, one would need to find a spouse for ones siblings or children, and thatagain depends on whether one is a caste member of good standing. A memberof ones family might fall ill and need long-term care or solace and support,and that too comes most readily from the kinship network and the caste.

The family is at the heart of the Indian life. The individual feels an integralpart of it, and is bound to his parents and to a lesser extent his brothers andsisters by the deepest ties of love and commitment. They also generally makegreat sacrifices to bring him up and to give him as good a start in life as theirresources allow, thereby placing him in their debt. Thanks to all this, the indi-vidual does not see his life as his to do what he likes with it. It is made possibleby others and is tied to theirs by the deepest bonds. They have thereforeclaims on him which he is not at liberty to disregard. His decisions concerning

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marriage, career, residence, pattern of life, etc. are all expected to be guidedby the interests of the family. And since ones parents know one as well asone does oneself, and additionally have greater experience and wisdom andones long-term interest at their heart, their advice in these matters is soughtand often followed.

Marriage is a relation not between two individuals but two families, andsignifies not a new relationship but the addition of a new female member tothe existing family. Since she brings with her a different attitude to life, hasher premarital attachments and can threaten the stability of the family, parentsand even siblings take great care, and use all kinds of incentives and threats,to ensure that the husband-wife relationship does not become autonomousand self-contained. When children appear on the scene, their grandparentsexercise considerable influence over and sometimes even take control of theirupbringing, often with the approval of the parents. In many Indian familieschildren grow up attached as much to their grandparents and even their unclesand aunts as to their parents. And adults are expected to make no moraldistinction between their own children and those of their siblings and to payequal regard to their interests.

Personal autonomy and privacy are not much valued in Indian society.There is nothing private from members of ones family, and there is no desireto clearly mark off ones life from theirs and claim exclusive control over it.While there is little privacy within the family, the privacy of the family isgreatly valued. What goes on within the family may not be disclosed tooutsiders, and those who do so incur its wrath. Outsiders also generallyrespect the privacy of the family and take no undue interest in its internalaffairs. Adulterous affairs within a family, for example, might be noticed byoutsiders, but are generally not talked about and made a matter of gossip.Thanks to the strong sense of propriety and respect for the privacy of thefamily, the usual kiss and tell stories by divorced spouses or jiltedmistresses are relatively rare in India, and those breaking the norm are lookeddown upon and even ostracised.

Even the private lives of well known public leaders are rarely a subject ofpublic curiosity. And when stories about these do the social round, they rarelyform part of public discussion. Even private conversations about their livesare generally restrained and tinged with a sense of guilt at breaking an impor-tant cultural norm. Pandit Nehrus relations with Edwina Mountbatten wereknown, but rarely pried into or discussed. Mahatma Gandhis complexemotional involvement with Sarladevi Chaudharani, whom he once called hisspiritual wife, were known in some circles, but no one thought it proper totalk or write about it. It needed his grandson to mention it in his biography ofhim, and even he was widely criticised for doing so, not because he had dentedthe halo surrounding the national icon, for Gandhi is too great a man to bedamaged by such stories, but because it was not a matter of public interest andpandered to prurient curiosity.

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It is this that partly explains the Indian tendency to avoid autobiographyor biography and, if it is written, to exclude personal details of a privatenature. Gandhi again provides a good example of this. When urged to writehis autobiography, he balked at the thought of making public his familydetails, such as the way his father treated his wife and children, his weak-nesses and indiscretions, the family disagreements and disputes, and so on.These were private matters. Some of these were told to him or done in thebelief that they would be kept confidential, and to make them public was notonly improper but a breach of trust. When Gandhi eventually wrote his auto-biography, he largely concentrated on the public or publicly relevant privatedetails of his life.

Since Indian social life is articulated in terms of the family, kinshipnetwork and the caste and greatly values their solidarity, much of socialmorality centres on these relations. Obligations to those involved in them areclearly specified, socially enforced, and often internalised. The individualdefines her self-respect and judges her moral worth on the basis of her consci-entious discharge of these obligations. The world beyond these relations,however, is composed of strangers with whom one stands in no recognisablerelationship. It is governed by moral and cultural norms that are vague, thin,without strong social sanctions, poorly internalised and violated with ease,and hence it is seen as cold, impersonal and marked by fear and distrust. Sincetheir social morality is heavily kinship-centred, Indians have had consider-able difficulty conceptualising and finding a respectable space for thatgoverning other kinds of relations. And since this is where the public sphereis located, public morality, including the basic norms of civil and politicallife, remains relatively weak in India.

Take something as simple as streets and public parks. Since they lieoutside the family home, they are seen as a no-mans land, an empty space,almost a wilderness. While the Indian home is clean and tidy, streets and evenparks are unacceptably dirty. Streets are used as garbage heaps, and rubbishand leftover food is thrown around in parks. Even the front of the house issometimes turned into as a garbage heap. Since public spaces are not seen astheirs, Indians generally take no care of them and expect the civic authorityto do so. And if it does not, as is generally the case, things are left as they are.It is striking that few Indians protest against dirty streets and lack of pave-ments and zebra crossings, almost as if they cannot see how things can beotherwise (Kakar and Kakar 2007, p. 21).

A similar attitude is at work in relation to ones neighbourhood and eventhe building in which one lives. A three-storeyed apartment building needs alift. Rather than build it themselves because it adds to the cost of the house,builders sometimes leave a space for it, expecting the apartment owners todecide whether to have one, when and of what kind. This is often a source ofconflict. Those on the ground floor will not pay their share of the cost of thelift because they do not need it. Some on the upper floors might be single or

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young couples and prefer to climb up the steps. The cost of the lift has to bedivided among the remaining few, who either resent their disproportionateshare or cannot afford it. The building is left with a large eyesore in themiddle, which is either left as it is or turned into a huge garbage heap withits rarely collected contents. If those on the upper floors needed the lift anddecided to install one, they will keep it locked and deny its use to others,who then make their lives miserable or the lift unworkable in all too familiarways.

Hardly any of those involved think that the lift is a public good eventhough they might not use it themselves and that their apartments are notlocated on an island but are part of a building whose upkeep is in theircommon interest. Nor is it appreciated that the huge gap left by the unbuiltlift is an eyesore and a public nuisance. Even the long-term calculation thatthe lift adds to the future value of ones apartment or might become necessaryin ones old age or when one has children is dismissed as too hypothetical tobe relevant. Since the idea of a public good presupposes that one views therelevant facility from a wider communal point of view, it does not arise ormotivate people when there is no sense of community outside a kinshipnetwork. It is striking that when the apartment owners belong to an extendedfamily or when the building is the property of a caste, the kind of problemraised by the lift generally does not arise.

This attitude also informs the conduct of political life where several struc-tural factors inherent in Indian society come into play and aggravate the situ-ation. As the modern view of political life sketched earlier rightlyemphasises, the political community is marked by several distinguishingfeatures and can only be sustained by respecting its appropriate norms.Members of a political community see themselves as citizens and conducttheir common affairs on the basis of what promotes the common or publicgood.

Qua

citizens or bearers of a shared political identity, its members areand recognise each other as equals. They conduct their affairs by means ofdebate and discussion in which arguments and reasons alone count. The forceof an argument depends on its intrinsic merit and not on the status of the indi-vidual making it. Arguments are depersonalised, detached from those makingthem, and their refutation in no way diminishes the dignity or the social statusof the individual involved.

The political community, further, is held together by common subscrip-tion to and respect for its shared institutions. Institutions involve offices,which carry appropriate forms of authority and are governed by a clearlystated body of rules and procedures. The office is depersonalised or separatedfrom its incumbent, and the latter, who acquires his authority from his officenot from his personal qualities and power, may not use it for purposes and ina manner disallowed by it. Finally, like any other form of common life, thepolitical community presupposes that citizens will observe its norms, thatnone of them will be a free rider, and that, if some were, they will invite

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appropriate sanctions. In other words the political community requires a basictrust between citizens and in public institutions.

Some of these constitutive features of political life are weak or poorlydeveloped in India. Thanks, among other things, to Indias centuries old castesystem, Indian self-consciousness is informed by a deep sense of status orhierarchy. As Sudhir and Katharina Kakar, two keen and comparative studentsof Indian society, remark, Irrespective of his educational status and more thanin any other culture in the world, an Indian is a

homo hierarchicus

(see Kakarand Kakar 2007, p. 8; for a fuller discussion, see Parekh 1999, ch. 2, especiallypp. 45 ff.). Individuals judge their self-worth and define their self-respect interms of their place in a hierarchy and their distance from others. One is nobodyunless one is somebody, and one is somebody only if one is above someone.Even the erstwhile untouchables have their own hierarchy, and their ownuntouchables! This is also evident in the way individuals are introduced tostrangers, beginning with a eulogy and emphasising their status. And callingcards often list almost all their bearers degrees and past and present officialpositions!

In an hierarchical society one dominates those below and debases oneselfbefore those above. Just as one expects the former to recognise their inferior-ity, one feels it ones duty to recognise ones own in relation to the latter. Asin other hierarchical societies, status difference in India infects ones veryhumanity and extends to all areas of life. Those of an inferior status areexpected to demonstrate their inferiority in all their relations. They may notsit when their superiors are standing, should yield them their seats on a trainor a bus, do their errands for them, render them appropriate personal services,and dare not disagree with them. Not surprisingly, individuals cannot takeeven their basic dignity and self-respect for granted unless these are under-pinned by an appropriate social status.

1

The idea of basic human equality is not unfamiliar to India. Throughoutits history it has thrown up egalitarian movements, but these remainedmarginal and did not alter the wider social structure. The decisive changecame with arrival of modernity which led to considerable moral and socialchurning and culminated in Indias democracy at independence. Unlikealmost all other democracies, which introduced legal and political equality instages, India granted it to all its citizens more or less in one go. This was aremarkable experiment in a society where over half the population wasbelow the poverty line, nearly two-thirds illiterate, and economic and socialinequalities were deep and firmly entrenched. Legal and political equalityhas generated its own momentum and is leading to profound changes inmany areas of life. It also, however, faces considerable resistance from thetraditional ways of thought and life, and its transformative potential is emas-culated. Equality remains largely confined to the legal and political spheres,and has not yet significantly transformed the structure and quality of normalrelations between different social groups. It has not yet decisively changed

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the hierarchical view of life either, and undermined or even significantlyweakened the obsession with status. Subordinate groups use the language ofequality to push their claims against their superiors, but resist the similardemands of those below them. This ideological incoherence generates deepmoral unease and even bad faith, and makes it difficult for them to unitearound the shared vision of a minimally egalitarian society.

The hierarchical view of life remains so deep that as the caste system isweakening, wealth and political power have begun to take its place as thebases of a new system of hierarchy. Unlike caste-based superiority, which isascriptive and cannot be taken away, that based on wealth and political poweris fragile and can be lost when fortunes turn. Not surprisingly, it breeds deepanxiety and insecurity about ones status, and leads to an intensely aggressiveand desperate concern not only to hold on to such wealth or power as onealready has but also to keep adding to it.

Wealth and political power are sources of inequality in all societies. InIndia they are also sources of status or overall superiority with the result thatthe ensuing inequality takes a particularly ugly form Since wealth and politi-cal power are taken to make one a superior person, that superiority needs tomanifest itself, and be acknowledged by others, in all areas of life. Wealth isnot only enjoyed but flaunted through such things as massive and extravagantmarriage receptions, a large number of attendants to herald ones arrival,exemption from norms that bind others, ability to humiliate others with impu-nity, and so on. Political power takes even uglier forms, largely because it ismore precarious, especially in a democracy, and less a result of ones ownefforts. Those in power surround themselves by a crowd of hangers-on, andthe greater their official status the greater is their retinue. They demand andgenerally get police escorts and security guards even when they do not needthese, because their purpose is not so much to protect as to affirm andproclaim the superior status of the persons involved. More importantly theyrefuse to be subject to the rules they rigorously impose on others. A securityofficer at an airport or a public function who dares to ask a superior-lookingperson for his identity card, invitation or security pass is sure to lose his job.

2

If a corrupt politician ever gets caught and is convicted, a rare event in 60years of independent India, he is not subject to the same regime as the otherinmates. He demands and often receives privileges they dare not ask for, andturns the prison into a virtual home when he is in jail.

The pervasive sense of hierarchy affects Indian political life at all levels.In every organisation, including political parties and government depart-ments, information and decision-making are centralised. Those lower downare afraid to take decisions lest they make mistakes or wrongly double-guesstheir superiors intentions, and feel paralysed without guidance from above.The organisation is personalised, belongs to those at the top, and others do notidentify with it, see it as theirs, and build up a sense of collective solidarity.This discourages collaborative or team work, and hinders institution-building.

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Those at the top are not used to criticism, and those at the bottom to makingit. If critical remarks are made, they tend to be taken personally and construedas a challenge and even as a slight. Losing an argument is sometimes equatedwith losing status, and hence as a form of humiliation. This inhibits rigorousdiscussion of policy and critical feedback, and tends to result in hasty andpoorly thought-out decisions.

Great hierarchies and inequalities make it difficult for people to identifywith each other and develop common interests and a sense of mutual concern.It is hardly surprising that the sense of social justice remains undeveloped inIndia. The acute and heartbreaking poverty in which a quarter of the countrylives is seen as an embarrassment rather than a matter of national shame, andprovokes little moral outrage except among a small enlightened section of theprofessional classes. The poor have no organised voice, and their problemsappear on the public agenda only when articulated in the language of andtaken up by castes. Since backward castes and marginalised social groupshave little faith in the states ability to deliver on long-term programmes, theyconcentrate on their short-term interests, especially their share of the jobsoffered by the policy of positive discrimination. As a result there is no polit-ical pressure to deal with health, education, public sanitation and othergeneral matters that affect the well-being of all and need urgent attention.Although the Indian public expenditure in these areas is one of the lowest inthe world, there has been little organised pressure to increase it.

One would normally expect political parties in India to develop andcampaign for comprehensive programmes of social and economic develop-ment, since they derive their support from coalitions of particular castes orreligious groups and the charismatic appeal of their leaders. However, theysee no need and feel no pressure to do so. They avoid internal institutionalstructures lest these should be used to hold their leaders accountable to therank and file, or to bind them to a particular policy and restrict their freedomto form self-serving alliances with other political parties. Political partiesrarely convene annual conferences where big issues can be publicly debatedand sensible policies formulated. Some even dispense with election manifes-tos. And when they do publish them, even their leaders have frequently beencaught out knowing nothing about their content. Not surprisingly elections arenot about ideologies but empty slogans such as

garibi hatao

(remove poverty)and

garvase kaho hum Hindu hai

(say with pride that we are Hindus).The Indian media are by and large fairly robust, and do a good job in hold-

ing the government accountable, airing public grievances, and giving thecountrys public life verve and vitality. They are not, however, very good atdebating great public issues and political programmes, and in any case theyare hardly the place to conduct a vigorous national debate on alternative visionsof the country. That role belongs to political parties and Parliament. Barringthose on the left, the former are heavily personalised and are little more thanpower-seeking instruments. And although Parliament has sometimes been a

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scene of great debates, it is often too fractious and rowdy to allow seriousreflection on the countrys problems. Not surprisingly many important deci-sions are taken behind its back and bounced on the country. Even such greatchanges as the programme of liberalisation that began in the 1990s and hascontinued since, and the fundamental shift in foreign policy that began in 2001and is symbolised by the proposed USIndia deal on civil nuclear fuel, werenot the products of extensive national or parliamentary debates and carefullong-term planning. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that India today lacksinstitutionalised public spaces where a sense of national purpose can bearticulated.

3

Since Indian social morality is heavily centred on kinship, civil and polit-ical life lacks clearly established norms and remains vulnerable to theconstant intrusion of kinship based demands. Occupants of public offices aresubjected to all kinds of pressure from their family, relatives and castemembers. The son, the wife and even the son-in-law and daughter-in-lawexpect to succeed their father, husband and in-laws as political leaders.Distant relations come seeking jobs or promotion. Caste members wantpublic funds or land for a building. Kinsmen want to be adopted as candidatesin local, state level and parliamentary elections. Greatly surprised when askedwhy he had appointed his son to an important job, a well-known politicianretorted, Who then? Your son? His reply reflects a fairy widespread attitudeand makes good sense within his moral framework.

A similar attitude to public office travels lower down. If seats in the exec-utive class on an Air India flight are empty, officials sometimes upgrade theirfamily members, friends and relatives from economy class. Their reasoningis fairly simple, and in their view fully justified. The seats are empty and donot belong to passengers. They, the officials, are in charge of the flight, andhence at liberty to dispose of these seats as they see fit. And by enabling theirfamily members to travel in greater comfort, they are promoting their goodand discharging their obligations to them without harming anyone. The ideathat this is a misuse of their authority, that their office requires them to ensureand their authority only extends to ensuring that passengers travel in the classthey have paid for, is not entertained. Nor is the obvious fact that filling theexecutive class in this way damages the long-term interests of the airline,whose executive class passengers abandon it in favour of another where theirhigher fare ensures them comfortable travel in a less crowded and less noisycabin. The attitude shown by the airline officials is even more pronouncedamong cabinet ministers. Air India is a national carrier and is supposed tobelong to the government whose ministers may therefore use it as theyplease. When travelling abroad with their usual large retinues, the most senioramong them sometimes demand seats at a very short notice, and legitimatepassengers get off-loaded.

4

Ministers turn up late for the flight, which thengets delayed, sometimes by hours. Similar things happen on the trains. Whenministers visit places, roads are supposed to belong to them and closed off to

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normal traffic. These and similar forms of behaviour are their ways ofshowing that they are superior people and exempt from the rules and disci-pline that bind others.

When confronted with kinship based claims, some public leaders andofficials think that these outweigh or are morally as weighty as the duty ofimpartiality entailed by their office, and either yield to them or work out somekind of compromise. Others who rightly uphold the public norms governingtheir office sometimes pay a heavy price. They are seen as sticklers for rules,rigid, unduly fastidious, uncaring, lacking a commitment to their family andrelations. Their disappointed caste members might loosen or even sever theirties with them, and deny their sons and daughters marriage partners. Theirfamily and kinsmen might become cool, sulk and refuse to extend such helpas they need in difficult times. One needs to be a moral hero to resist such pres-sures, and not all public figures and officials can or should be expected to beone. It is not enough to expect public figures and officials to observe the normsof public morality; social structure and public culture should not make it exces-sively difficult and socially costly for them to do so. Unless the traditional holdof the family and kinship networks is loosened, and the demands based on themare widely seen as illegitimate, public life in India remains morally fragile.

As I argued earlier, no common or shared good is possible without trust,especially one as complex and impersonal as the good of the political commu-nity. If citizens thought that a sizeable number of them were free riders, theywould see no reason to respect the law, pay the taxes, and in general to beartheir share of the inevitable burden of common life. Trust develops whenpeople feel confident that others will observe the relevant norms, ideallybecause they have internalised them, and that those transgressing them willbe subjected to appropriate sanctions. In India both these conditions generallyobtain within the family and the caste, and hence there is considerable trustamong their members. People make great sacrifices for each other in theconfident expectation that these will be reciprocated, and make informal loansof huge sums of money in the firm knowledge that these will be returned.

The basic conditions of trust are poorly developed outside the kinshipnetwork, and as a result there is much distrust and even cynicism in Indianpublic life. Norms of public morality are not widely internalised and woveninto the individuals sense of self-worth and self-respect. Their violations areaccepted as a normal part of political life, do not provoke a moral outrage, andcarry few social sanctions. In such a situation the state has a vital role to playin fostering trust. It can lay down appropriate norms of public life, honourthose who exemplify them to the highest degree, and visit those transgressingthem with the full rigor of the law. This has not happened in India to theextent that it should have. Leaders of independent India were acutely awareof the problem and began very well.

5

Drawing on the Indian tradition of

rajd-harma

and Western norms of public morality, they laid down high standardsof public life, set excellent personal examples, and saw to it that their

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violations were appropriately punished. Their task was made easier by themoral idealism of the independence movement, the determination ofthe Indian people to make a new historical start, the social homogeneity of thepolitical class, and its relative insulation from the pressures of caste andkinship networks.

As the older generation disappeared or failed to keep up the momentum,and the democratic process brought in new social groups with their urgenteconomic and other concerns, the public sphere began to lose its coherence.Many of these groups were rightly bitter and felt that, since the upper casteshad traditionally used the machinery of government to pursue their interests,it was now their turn to do the same. They were also rightly impatient, couldnot trust the state to look after their interests, and aimed at quick, short-termgains. Since they had no habit of working together, each group concentratedon looking after itself, and predictably relied on the solidarity of kinship andcaste. If political institutions and norms stood in their way, they were to bejettisoned. For their part the upper castes and vested interests are frightenedof losing control of the state and do the same.

The result is a drastic deterioration of Indias public life. Norms govern-ing it are vague and subordinated to group interests, and the institutions ofthe state are notoriously ineffective in enforcing them. In spite of widespreadcriticism, criminals are elected to Parliament and state legislatures, currentlyforming nearly a sixth of their membership. Those known to have grosslymisused their authority or violated basic norms of public life escape prosecu-tion or secure acquittal by corrupt means and political blackmail. No normsregulate, and no sanctions follow, the conduct of politicians offering theirloyalty to the highest bidder, or joining parties and espousing policies theyhad explicitly disavowed during their election campaigns. It is hardlysurprising that citizens trust in political figures and institutions is extremelylow. And when someone of Dr Manmohan Singhs exemplary integrity andhonesty becomes Prime Minister, he is hailed as a saviour and forgiven hisother limitations.

The general lack of trust means that few believe a word of what mostpublic figures say. This is of course a universal phenomenon, but it hasreached disturbing proportions in India. Politicians say things they do notbelieve; indeed many of them do not believe in anything. Their actions are notindicative of their convictions, for the actions are often politically motivatedand the convictions are fluid or offered to the highest bidder. Promises givenby political parties and governments are frequently broken and rarely trusted.When political speech gets devalued in this way and to this degree, the verylifeblood of political life is drained away. The lack of trust also extends to theconduct of public figures and officials. Few Indians trust their impartiality orexpect them to judge the demands of the general public on their merit. Theironly hope therefore is to find ways of exerting influence on decision-makersby finding appropriate connections, using corrupt means, or both.

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Conclusion

In the light of our discussion, India faces two problems in relation to the struc-ture of its private and public spheres.

6

So far as the former is concerned, themodern idea of individual autonomy is beginning to take roots and to generatedemands for greater personal freedom in organising ones life. Indianshowever continue to place high value on the family and kinship networks andthe obligations that these entail. They are rightly anxious that autonomyshould not lead to narrow and aggressive individualism and a social climateof loneliness, abandonment and insecurity, as it has done in much of the West.Their problem, therefore, which is in no way unique to India, is how to recon-cile individual autonomy with the rich world of social relations.

Indias public sphere is in a perilous state and faces even more acute prob-lems. Its regeneration requires a culture of equality and an end to the deeplyingrained hierarchical consciousness. It requires widespread recognition thatcommon life in different areas, such as a shared building, streets and parks,civic associations and above all the political community, has its own normsand constraints, and cannot be sustained if its members take a purely instru-mental and narrowly self-centred view of it. Regeneration of the publicsphere also necessitates a greater emphasis than hitherto on the shared iden-tity of citizenship. Unlike most of the modern West, India recognises the roleof social, ethnic, religious and other identities in the public sphere, partlybecause of the compulsions of its social structure, partly to ensure peace andstability, and partly because many Indians think that these identities enrichand have a rightful place in public life. India has, however, swung to the otherextreme. It has allowed these identities to colonise public life, and ignored thevital importance of shared citizenship without which they lack a coordinatingand regulative principle.

7

In its challenging task of restructuring its private and public spheres andestablishing a proper relation between the two, India has much to learn fromthe West. However since its history, traditions, social structure and moralaspirations are different, it cannot copy the West and needs to develop its owndistinct model. As of now the direction of its development remains confusedand unclear.

Acknowledgements

I am most grateful to my good friends Professor Nol OSullivan for several longdiscussions on the subject, and Professor Thomas Pantham for his helpful commentson this paper.

Notes

1. Mehta (2003). The book is a powerful Tocquevillian critique of Indias deeplyunequal social structure.

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2. Commenting on his inability to prevent the gross misuse of the practice of puttinga red or a blue light on the roof of the car to evade normal traffic regulations, thehead of police for New Delhi remarked that his police were too junior in socialstatus to the occupants of the car to have the confidence to stop them (cited inLuce 2006, p. 203).

3. See Mehta (2003), p. 129. See also p. 134 where he argues that Indian democracyis extraordinarily nondeliberative, especially about policy implications that havea long-run impact.

4. Edward Luce cites an interesting example. Although he and his two friends hadbought expensive tickets to watch a cricket match between India and England,they were denied entry to the ground along with thousands of other ticket-holders,many of whom had travelled long distances. This was so because the President ofthe Delhi Cricket Club, who was also Indias law minister, had printed and sentout thousands of complimentary tickets for VIPs. Since the ground was bigenough only to hold the latter, most of the others were turned away, with mountedpolice charging an angry crowd (Luce 2006, p. 204).

5. For some amusing examples and a game theory-based analysis of Indian behav-iour, see Raghunathan (2006).

6. For a fuller discussion see Parekh (2006). See also the articles by Mahajan,Beteille, Omvedt and Jain in Mahajan and Reifeld (2003).

7. For a useful discussion of this as well as the cultural context of the private - publicdistinction in India, see Madan (2006), chap. 13.

Note on contributor

Bhikhu Parekh is Professor of Political Philosophy at the University of Westminsterand Emeritus Professor of Political Theory at the University of Hull. He is a Fellowof the British Academy, President of the Academy for Social Sciences, and a Labourmember of the House of Lords. He is the author of several books, his latest being

Anew politics of identity

(2008).

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In spite of the gods: The strange rise of modern India.

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Madan, T.N., 2006.

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The public and the private: Issues of demo-cratic citizenship.

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