British Academy: The UK's National Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences

Thursday 5 October 5 2006

ABSTRACT

Becoming politicians: the politics of caste, kinship and factionalism
in a north Indian town
Lucia Michelutti (ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow, LSE)

Using the ethnography and historiography of a powerful northern Indian caste (the Yadavs) the paper explores why certain groups are more apt to successfully exert their influence within the democratic political system, and why others are not, regardless of the fact that in many instances they have similar economic and political incentives and resources.  In doing so I show how a particular kinship structure by triggering factionalism and internal competition influences the way people are politically socialized and participate in the democratic political process.

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