Premium
Democracy and human development: recent legislation in India
Author(s) -
Ghosh Sujay
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
development policy review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.671
H-Index - 61
eISSN - 1467-7679
pISSN - 0950-6764
DOI - 10.1111/dpr.12162
Subject(s) - legislation , democracy , politics , globalization , political science , human development (humanity) , political economy , public administration , economic growth , law , economics
Human Development ( HD ) requires that development must accompany fundamental human concerns that make life worth living. It is surprising that despite being a democracy, India performs poorly on HD . In this backdrop, four pieces of legislation of different orientations have been passed since 1998–99: ‘Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana’, the ‘Right to Information’, the ‘National Rural Employment Guarantee Act’ and the ‘Right to Education’. Where successful, they have empowered the beneficiaries. Though not expressed as such, nor exclusively directed to this end, these pieces of legislation are bound together with democracy's demand for HD : they are influenced externally by various aspects of globalisation; internally, development is continuously interrogated by democracy, competitive politics and social activism.