![]() ![]() The case of quotas in India illustrates how policy choices often result from long path-dependent processes, how policy makers struggle with trade-offs when trying to design institutions, and also the power of expectations in shaping the perceptions of the outcomes of those institutions. This created a disjuncture between the design of the quota system and the expectation of what it would achieve. Also, while the quotas were designed to integrate SC politicians into mainstream politics, there was a subtle and gradual shift in the debate about them, to being about development for the SC community as such. Goldenweizer at Columbia University on 9th May, 1916 and first printed in: Indian Antiquary Vol. ![]() ![]() Ambedkar’s paper on Castes in India: Their Mechanism, Genesis and Development, A paper presented at an Anthropology Seminar taught by Dr. The quota system was in the end a compromise between several political goals, and was not strongly supported by anyone. Hopefully you have not forgotten that all of the above text is from Dr. Tracing the history of these quotas through four critical junctures, I show how a British attempt to strengthen their own control of India eventually resulted in one of the world's most extensive quota systems for minorities. ![]() These quotas have been praised for empowering members of a deprived community, but have also been criticized for bringing to power SC politicians who are mere tools in the hands of the upper castes. Since independence, India has had electoral quotas for Scheduled Castes (SCs, Dalits, “untouchables”). ![]()
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