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When Biopolitics Turn Digital: Transparency, Corruption, and Erasures from the Infrastructure of Rationing in Delhi
Author(s) -
Dandurand Guillaume
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
polar: political and legal anthropology review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.529
H-Index - 27
eISSN - 1555-2934
pISSN - 1081-6976
DOI - 10.1111/plar.12305
Subject(s) - rationing , transparency (behavior) , biopower , state (computer science) , language change , business , food security , computer security , politics , political science , law , geography , computer science , literature , archaeology , algorithm , agriculture , art , health care
Following the ratification of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) in 2013, the Indian state digitized its food rationing infrastructure, replacing paper‐based ration cards with digital rationing documents and other technologies of authentication. The shift from analog to digital documentary practices has rematerialized documents and devices to enable closer monitoring of the exchange of food entitlements in ration shops. Making biopolitics digital has enabled the state to exert greater control over rationing practices by rendering them more transparent. However, the state's obsession with preventing practices of corruption has hindered, rather than facilitated, access to entitlements for some rightful beneficiaries of the NFSA.