About Book
This set presents a comprehensive analytical study of the state of social justice in India. The four volumes undertake theoretical and empirical inquiry into the various spheres of justice, collectively creating what can be termed a 'report card' of the regime of social justice in the country. Authored by some of the finest ethnographers and analysts in the country, the works approach the issue of justice in the broader context of post-colonial democracy, and look at the limits within which democracy permits justice, social justice in particular. The volumes, which are part of the series "State of Justice in India: Issues of Social Justice", reveal that the issues pertaining to social justice are extremely contentious, and hence, dynamic. The ethnographic-historical studies are cast in an archaeological mode of inquiry. They highlight how time, place, history, perceptions, arrangements or apparatuses (such as legal, judicial, constitutional and administrative apparatuses) play significant roles in influencing social justice. This set will be a rich resource for students and researchers working in the fields of justice, sociology, law, political theory and Indian democracy.
It will also be immensely useful for policy makers, policy analysts, human rights activists and NGOs. "Volume I: Social Justice and Enlightenment: West Bengal" is edited by Pradip Kumar Bose, Professor of Sociology, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta, Kolkata and Samir Kumar Das, Professor of Political Science, Calcutta University, Kolkata. This first volume of the series presents a collection of insightful writings on the state of social justice in present-day West Bengal. It studies the silent disjunction between the nineteenth-century and the early twentieth century notion of enlightened politics and social justice. It was this notion of enlightened politics on which the constitutional Left in West Bengal later on thrived for several decades. The volume probes the issue of whether there is a necessary connection between enlightened politics and the attainment of social justice? "Social Justice and Enlightenment: West Bengal" (Ist part of a four-part set) is based on ethnographic studies, which suggest that rule of law as the main mechanism of justice makes little sense in the specific context of the local demands for justice and semi-legal practices.
It questions why the archaic principle and the structure of rule of law has to still remain fundamental in administering and delivering justice under the Left Front rule. As its conclusion, it maintains that the West Bengal experience demonstrates that while democracy may widen through the mass entry of workers, peasants and the rural and urban poor, and though this may facilitate long-denied political justice for them, this does not ensure social justice per se. "Volume II: Justice and Law: The Limits of the Deliverables of Law" is edited by Ashok Agrwaal, Lawyer, researcher and civil rights activist and Bharat Bhushan, Editor of the "Daily Mail Newspaper". This second volume of the series focuses on the perennial tension between law and justice. The articles highlight the way law creates dichotomies in its attempt to be a guardian of justice. The authors seek to articulate the idea of a 'justice gap', which must always lie between the claims for justice and the way the dispensation of justice is organised.
"Justice and Law: The Limits of the Deliverables of Law" (IInd part of a four-part set) opens with two articles on how our legislators engaged with the issues during the course of framing the Constitution. They bring out the inevitability of compromise (between law and justice) in such an exercise. It then moves on to explore the tension over the issue of reservations for scheduled castes, and other backward castes. One article documents the history of reservations in India in the background of political contentions, elections and judicial activism. Another traces how the 'game of justice' gets played in the language of the courts and the law. Both articles indicate that the issue of social justice is closely linked with the expansion of democracy. The last article seeks to measure the limits of the legal system in providing justice to those who have become marginalised on account of their sexual preferences.
"Volume III: Marginalities and Justice" is edited by Paula Banerjee, Head of the Department of South and South East Asian Studies, University of Calcutta, Kolkata and Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, Kolkata and Sanjay Chaturvedi, Professor of Political Science at the Centre for the Study of Geopolitics and Honorary Director, Centre for the Study of Mid-West and Central Asia, Panjab University, Chandigarh. Volume three of the series shows how marginalities in social spaces marked by power raise the issue of justice. It deals with the situation of people living on the margins of the society and their relationship with communities and sections of citizenry who have the resources and the wherewithal to secure their rights. It reveals how modes of governance intentionally or unintentionally use strategies of inclusion, exclusion, differential exclusion, and, most importantly, techniques of turning spaces into 'marginal enclaves', giving rise to injustice, and thereby, the demand for justice. "Marginalities and Justice", (IIIrd part of a four-part set) demonstrates the fundamental fact that justice emanates from the dynamics of marginality.
The same governmental techniques that, to some extent, address issues of social justice, may produce marginal positions too. This collection, therefore, suggests the existence of a remainder - the one that remains outside the operations of governmentality - and explores the arrangement of social spaces in marking out a particular regime of justice. "Volume IV: Key Texts on Social Justice in India" is edited by Sanam Roohi, Programme Associate, Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, Kolkata and Ranabir Samaddar, Director, Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, Kolkata. "Key Texts on Social Justice in India" carries forward the debate on social justice as the fourth volume of the series. It brings out the relational nature of justice as well as the fragmented nature of its existence. This final part of a four-part set, which is a compendium of key texts on social justice, explores how well the law fares in delivering justice, how violence becomes an essential part of the popular notion of justice and how the dynamics of justice is linked with the emergence of marginal situations.
Each text of the series is, on one hand, an appeal for justice, or a response to the urge for justice, and, on the other, a manifesto that state actions fall short of ensuring justice. This compilation is meant for the students and researchers working in the fields of justice, sociology and law. It will serve as supplementary text in law as well as a source book that gives a comprehensive analysis of justice in the Indian scenario.