Democracy Indian Style: Subhas Chandra Bose and the Creation of India's Political Culture

by Pelinka,Anton

• ISBN13: 9780765801869
• ISBN10: 0765801868
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-07-31
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

As a nation India is very old. It had deep roots in its precolonial history, but it is also a product of Western-style democracy, which has shaped and even created the nation. Democracy Indian Style focuses on the Indian factors underlying its successful democracy by describing and analyzing the life of Subhas Chandra Bose, who competed with Nehru for the role of Gandhi's heir, and his impact on India before and after Independence.The book is balanced between chapters that explain Bose's life and career and those that describe and analyze the Indian political system. It explains India's stable democracy as a mixture of British and American patterns -- Westminster parliamentary rule plus federalism -- and a specific set of power-sharing arrangements among religions, linguistic groups, and castes. India fulfills all the criteria the traditional understanding of pluralistic democracy implies. Basic freedoms are guaranteed, despite the temptation during Indira Gandhi's "emergency" rule to follow the path of authoritarian development. Precisely because India, after Pakistan's separation, did not become "Hindustan" but stayed on track as a secular, pluralistic democracy, it became the most prominent challenge to the traditional wisdom of comparative politics.Democracy Indian Style gives one answer to the Indian enigma of how democracy succeeds by describing the working of the Indian constitution, the weaknesses of the party system, and the specifics of Indian elections. The focus on Bose provides the second explanation. The author describes Bose's rise to the leadership of the Indian National Congress in the 1930s, his attempt to combine an economic leftist outlook with an extremelypragmatic foreign policy, his failure to get serious help from Nazi Germany, his success with the Japanese war lords -- and his tragic end in August 1945. Democracy Indian Style is a timely exploration of the roots of Indian de

Author Biography

Anton Pelinka is professor of political science at the University of Innsbruck and director of the Institute of Conflict Research in Vienna.

Table of Contents

Tables	vii
Acknowledgments	ix
Why Bose?	1	(14)
Why India?	15	(16)
The Rise of a Nationalist	31	(26)
The Roots of Modern India	57	(24)
Interlude in Vienna	81	(28)
Indian Democracy: Constitution, Parliament, Federalism	109	(22)
Gandhi's Friend and Foe	131	(26)
No Parties---Or Too Many Parties?	157	(24)
Interlude in Berlin	181	(26)
India---One, Two, or Many Nations?	207	(28)
At the Right Place---At the Wrong Time	235	(30)
A World Power Waiting in the Wings	265	(20)
Bose---The Myth Lives On	285	(20)
Sources and Bibliography	305	(8)
Index	313