Skip to content Skip to navigation
University of Warwick
  • Study
  • |
  • Research
  • |
  • Business
  • |
  • Alumni
  • |
  • News
  • |
  • About

University of Warwick
Publications service & WRAP

Highlight your research

  • WRAP
    • Home
    • Search WRAP
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse WRAP by Year
    • Browse WRAP by Subject
    • Browse WRAP by Department
    • Browse WRAP by Funder
    • Browse Theses by Department
  • Publications Service
    • Home
    • Search Publications Service
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse Publications service by Year
    • Browse Publications service by Subject
    • Browse Publications service by Department
    • Browse Publications service by Funder
  • Statistics
  • Help & Advice
University of Warwick

The Library

  • Login

Agency, injury, and transgressive politics in neoliberal times

Tools
- Tools
+ Tools

Madhok, Sumi and Rai, Shirin. (2012) Agency, injury, and transgressive politics in neoliberal times. Signs, Vol.37 (No.3). pp. 645-669. ISSN 0097-9740

[img]
Preview
Text
WRAP_Rai_662939.pdf - Published Version

Download (207Kb) | Preview
Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/662939

Abstract

Through an analysis of agency and risk, this article argues that an outcome-driven agenda of neoliberal developmentalism treats women’s agency as an instrument of social change without giving sufficient attention to existing power relations in which agential capacities are formulated and exercised, and in which risk is negotiated and managed. Analyzing the Women’s Development Programme in Rajasthan, India, we argue that an individualized development logic continues to disregard the injuries to those it mobilizes; we suggest that this trend needs to be challenged in order to support sustainable participation.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman
J Political Science > JC Political theory
Divisions: Faculty of Social Sciences > Politics and International Studies
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Political activists, Indian women activists, Political participation -- India, Neoliberalism
Journal or Publication Title: Signs
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISSN: 0097-9740
Date: 2012
Volume: Vol.37
Number: No.3
Page Range: pp. 645-669
Identification Number: 10.1086/662939
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Restricted or Subscription Access
References: Abu-Lughod, Lila. 1990. “The Romance of Resistance: Tracing Transformations of Power through Bedouin Women.” American Ethnologist 17(1):41–55. Apffel-Marglin, Frederique, and Suzanne L. Simon. 1994. “Feminist Orientalism and Development.” In Feminist Perspectives on Sustainable Development: Shifting Knowledge Boundaries, ed. Wendy Harcourt, 26–45. London: Zed. Archer, Margaret S. 2003. Structure, Agency, and the Internal Conversation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Asad, Talal. 2003. Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Bakker, Isabella. 2007. “Social Reproduction and the Constitution of a Gendered Political Economy.” New Political Economy 12(4):541–56. Bakker, Isabella, and Stephen Gill, eds. 2003. Power, Production and Social Reproduction: Human In/Security in the Global Political Economy. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Banerjee, Sushmita. 1984. “Sathin Training: Report on Training Programme Conducted in Padampura.” Report, Institute of Development Studies, Jaipur. Barrientos, Stephanie, and Diane Perrons. 1999 “Gender and the Global Food Chain: A Comparative Study of Chile and the UK.” In Women, Globalization and Fragmentation in the Developing World, ed. Haleh Afshar and Stephanie Barrientos, 150–73. Basingstoke: Macmillan. Baxi, Pratiksha, Shirin M. Rai, and Shaheen Sardar Ali. 2006. “Legacies of Common Law: ‘Crimes of Honour’ in India and Pakistan.” Third World Quarterly 27(7):1239–53. Beck, Ulrich. 1992. Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. Trans. Mark Ritter. London: Sage. Benerı´a, Lourdes. 1999. “Globalization, Gender and the Davos Man.” Feminist Economics 5(3):61–83. Brown, Wendy. 1995. States of Injury: Power and Freedom in Late Modernity. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ———. 2003. “Neo-Liberalism and the End of Liberal Democracy.” Theory and Event 7(1). http://muse.jhu.edu/login?urip/journals/theory_and_event/ v007/7.1brown.html. Burawoy, Michael, Joseph A. Blum, Sheba George, Zsuzsa Gille, Teresa Gowan, Lynne Haney, Maren Klawiter, Steven H. Lopez, Sea´n O´ . Riain, and Millie Thayer. 2000. Global Ethnography: Forces, Connections, and Imaginations in a Postmodern World. Berkeley: University of California Press. Burchell, Graham. 1996. “Liberal Government and Techniques of the Self.” In Foucault and Political Reason: Liberalism, Neo-Liberalism and Rationalities of Government, ed. Andrew Barry, Thomas Osborne, and Nikolas Rose, 19–36. London: UCL Press. Castel, Robert. 1991. “From Dangerousness to Risk.” In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, ed. Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon, and Peter Miller, 281–98. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Chakravarti, Uma. 2006. “Rhetoric and Substance of Empowerment: Women, Development and the State.” In Contested Transformations: Changing Economies and Identities in Contemporary India, ed. Mary E. John, Praveen Kumar Jha, and Surinder S. Jodhka. Delhi: Tulika. Coole, Diana. 2007. “Experiencing Discourse: Corporeal Communicators and the Embodiment of Power.” British Journal of Politics and International Relations 9(3):413–33. Cruikshank, Barbara. 1999. The Will to Empower: Democratic Citizens and Other Subjects. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Das, Maitreyi. 1992. “The Women’s Development Programme in Rajasthan: A Case Study in Group Formation for Women’s Development.” Policy research Working Paper WPS 913. Population and Human Resources Department, World Bank, Washington, DC. Dean, Jodi. 2008. “Enjoying Neoliberalism.” Cultural Politics 4(1):47–72. Debord, Guy. 1990. Comments on the Society of the Spectacle. Trans. MalcolmImrie. London: Verso. Desai, Mihir. 2003. “Starting the Battle.” Combat Law 3(5). http://www.india together.org/combatlaw/vol3/issue5/visakha.htm. DRDPR (Department of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj). 1984. “Women’s Development Project Rajasthan.” Concept paper, Department of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Jaipur. Escobar, Arturo. 1995. Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Foucault, Michel. 2000. Ethics: Subjectivity and Truth. Ed. Paul Rabinow. London: Penguin. Giddens, Anthony. 1990. The Consequences of Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Government of Rajasthan. 1999. “Prashasnik Prativedan avam Pragati Vivaran, 1995–99.” [The annual reports of the Department of Women, Child Development and Nutrition]. Report, Directorate of Women, Child Development and Nutrition, Government of Rajasthan, Jaipur. ———. 2002. “The Rajasthan Human Development Report.” Report, UN Development Programme, Delhi. http://planningcommission.nic.in/plans/state plan/sdr_pdf/shdr_raj02.pdf. ———. n.d.a. “Parliamentary Committee on Women and Empowerment, 30th September 1997 to 3rd October 1997.” Note on Jaipur District, Office of the Project Director, District Women’s Development Agency, Jaipur. ———. n.d.b. “A Review of the Women’s Development Programme Rajasthan, 1984–88.” Report, Government of Rajasthan, Jaipur. Jahan, Rounaq. 1995. The Elusive Agenda: MainstreamingWomen in Development. London: Zed. Jain, Sharada, Kavita Srivastava, Kanchan Mathur, Mamta Jaitly, and Nirmala Nair. 1987. “Exploring Possibilities: A Review of the Women’s Development Programme, Rajasthan.” Research report 015. Institute of Development Studies, Jaipur. John, Mary E. 1996. “Gender and Development in India, 1970s–90s: Some Reflections on the Constitutive Role of Contexts.” Economic and Political Weekly 31(47):3071–77. Kurup, Saira. 2006. “Four Women Time Forgot.” India Times, May 7. http:// timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1519056.cms. Laraip-Fonderson, Josephine. 2002. “The Disciplinary Power of Micro Credit: Examples from Kenya and Cameroon.” In Rethinking Empowerment: Gender and Development in a Global/Local World, ed. Jane L. Parpart, Shirin M. Rai, and Kathleen Staudt, 182–98. New York: Routledge. Lemke, Thomas. 2001. “‘The Birth of Biopolitics’—Michel Foucault’s Lecture at the Colle`ge de France on Neo-Liberal Governmentality.” Economy and Society 30(2):190–207. Liddle, Joanna, and Shirin Rai. 1998. “Feminism, Imperialism and Orientalism: The Challenge of the ‘Indian Woman.’” Women’s History Review 7(4):495– 520. Madhok, Sumi. 2003a. “Autonomy, Subordination and the Social Woman: Examining Rights Narratives of Rural RajasthaniWomen.” PhD dissertation, University of London. ———. 2003b. “A ‘Limited Women’s Empowerment’: Politics, the State, and Development in North West India.” Women’s Studies Quarterly 31(3–4):154– 73. ———. 2007. “Autonomy, Gendered Subordination and Transcultural Dialogue.” Journal of Global Ethics 3(3):335–57. Mahmood, Saba. 2005. Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Mohanty, Chandra Talpade, Ann Russo, and Lourdes Torres, eds. 1991. Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Mouffe, Chantal. 1993. The Return of the Political. London: Verso. Naples, Nancy A. 2002. “The Challenges and Possibilities of Transnational Feminist Praxis.” In Women’s Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics, ed. Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai, 263–77. New York: Routledge. Navlakha, Gautam. 1995. “Under the Guise of Empowerment: Fate of Rajasthan’s Sathins.” Economic and Political Weekly 30(27):1645–47. Ong, Aihwa. 1988. “Colonialism and Modernity: Feminist Re-Presentations of Women in Non-Western Societies.” Inscriptions 3(4):79–93. ———. 1999. Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationality. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. ———. 2006. Neoliberalism as Exception: Mutations in Citizenship and Sovereignty. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Parpart, Jane L., Shirin M. Rai, and Kathleen Staudt. 2002. “Rethinking Em(power)ment, Gender and Development: An Introduction.” In Rethinking Empowerment: Gender and Development in a Global/Local World, 3–22. New York: Routledge. Rai, Shirin M. 2002. Gender and the Political Economy of Development: From Nationalism to Globalization. Oxford: Polity. ———. 2007. “Deliberative Democracy and the Politics of Redistribution: The Case of the Indian Panchayats.” Hypatia 22(4):64–80. ———. 2008. “Civic Driven Change: Opportunity and Costs.” In Civic Driven Change: Citizen’s Imagination in Action, ed. Alan Fowler and Kees Biekart, http://www.iss.nl/Portals/Civic-Driven-Change-Initiative/Essays-Policy- Briefs-and-Links. The Hague: Institute of Social Studies. Rai, Shirin M., and Georgina Waylen, eds. 2008. Global Governance: Feminist Perspectives. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Rankin, Katharine N. 2001. “Governing Development: Neoliberalism, Microcredit, and Rational Economic Woman.” Economy and Society 30(1):18–37. ———. 2003. “Anthropologies and Geographies of Globalization.” Progress in Human Geography 27(6):708–34. Rofel, Lisa. 2007. Desiring China: Experiments in Neoliberalism, Sexuality, and Public Culture. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Rosa, Eugene A. 2000. “Modern Theories of Society and the Environment: The Risk Society.” In Environment and Global Modernity, ed. Gert Spaargaren, Arthur P. J. Mol, and Frederick H. Buttel, 73–101. London: Sage. Seymour, Susan. 2006. “Resistance.” Anthropological Theory 6(3):303–21. Shakya, Yogendra B., and Katharine N. Rankin. 2008. “The Politics of Subversion in Development Practice: An Exploration of Microfinance in Nepal and Vietnam.” Journal of Development Studies 44(8):1214–35. Stokes, Susan C. 1998. “Pathologies of Deliberation.” In Deliberative Democracy, ed. Jon Elster, 123–39. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Tomar, K. S. 1998. “Atrocities against Rajasthan Women on the Rise—Report.” Hindustan Times, May 28. Unnithan-Kumar, Maya, and Kavita Srivastava.1997. “Gender Politics, Development and Women’s Agency in Rajasthan.” In Discourses of Development: Anthropological Perspectives, ed. Ralph D. Grillo and Roderick L. Stirrat, 157–82. Oxford: Berg. Wilson, Kalpana. 2007. “Agency.” In The Impact of Feminism on Political Concepts and Debates, ed. Georgina Blakeley and Valerie Bryson, 126–45. Manchester: Manchester University Press. ———. 2008. “Reclaiming ‘Agency’, Reasserting Resistance.” IDS Bulletin 39(6): 83–91.
URI: http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/id/eprint/43504

Request changes to a record

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Document Downloads

More statistics for this item...
twitter

Email us: publications@warwick.ac.uk
Contact Details
About Us