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Right to food Archive
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NREGA for the disabled
Posted on August 15, 2009 |NREGA presents an unprecedented opportunity for disabled persons across India to earn a living and to showcase their talents. But as things stand, NREGA is not designed for disabled people to participate in it, but we can change it all with some tweaking. -
Politics, technology & accountability II
Posted on July 27, 2009 |“To be ruled is to be kept an eye on, inspected, spied on, regulated, indoctrinated, sermonized, listed and checked off, estimated, appraised, censured, ordered about…to be ruled is at every operation, transaction, movement, to be noted, registered, counted, priced, admonished, prevented, reformed, redressed, corrected”. Proudhon quoted by James Scott in Seeing like a state. The power of information is often used by those in powerful positions to control others. The right to information movement inverts this principle and turns the gaze on those in positions of power by making their actions visible and thus amenable to democratic control. Sharing information... -
America’s New Deal & India’s Employment Guarantee Act
Posted on June 25, 2007 |Comparisons are often drawn between the New Deal in USA and the Employment Guarantee Act in India (NREGA). One programme of new deal comes close to NREGA – Civilian Conservation Corps The Government of India passed the all-important National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in 2005 (for an intro click here). Whenever I mention it to my friends in USA the first question they ask me is, “is this like the new-deal”. The new deal has many similarities with NREGA, but is a much wider concept. NREGA is a programme dealing exclusively with labour-intensive, unskilled work. Employment programmes under new... -
Fighting corruption using right to information: Arvind Kejriwal’s talk
Posted on May 19, 2007 |Good introductory video on using right to information to combat corruption by Arvind Kejriwal Arvind Kejriwal has been at the heart of an inspiring campaign to combat corruption by using the right to information. He spearheaded a campaign in Delhi along with many other groups that popularised the use of right to information. Arvind got the Magasassay for his work. The videos below contain a talk he gave on using RTI, which I think is a good introductory material for people with an interest on how it could be used, and what it means. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQbigp_SHeE[/youtube] -
Right to information call centre in Bihar: Video clip
Posted on May 19, 2007 |It looks like Government of Bihar has launched a Right to information call centre. Personally, I think this is a great idea, though I dont know how it works at this point. If found a video about it in You Tube that has been widely televised. This is a eight minute clip about that appeals to different groups of people to use it, and gives an idea about how it could be done. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pq3H5i6bkmk[/youtube] -
Food Politics by Marion Nestle: How industries influence eating
Posted on May 14, 2007 |Food politics: how the food industry influences nutrition and health Rating: 5 out of 5 Author: Marion Nestle Year: 2002 Category: Nutrition, Political Economy, Agriculture Publisher: University of California Press Fascinating book on the politics of food in USA The book was motivated by the contradictions between nutrition policy and practice. The author argues that the basic nutrition advice has remained more or less constant for the last fifty years. She examines the role of food industry in the US in creating an environment conductive to over eating and poor nutritional practice. Overproduction, Competition & pressure to make people eat... -
Nancy Schepper-Huges’ graphic portrayal of hunger and violance in Brazil
Posted on February 25, 2007 |Death without weeping: The violence of everyday life in Brazil Rating: 4 out of 5 Author: Nancy Schepper-Huges Year: 1992 Category: Anthropology, hunger, violence, poverty Publisher: University of California Press Death without weeping is an ethnographic study of a town in North-Eastern Brazil. The theme of the book is hunger, child deaths and ‘every day violence’ in Brazil. The work is situated in a town she calls ‘Bom Jesus da mata’ in Pernambuco district of N.E. Brazil. The author visited the place first as a volunteer in 1964, and continued her association with the town ever since. After her training... -
Papers and Reports I was involved in
Posted on February 21, 2007 |Citizens’ Initiative for the Rights of Children Under Six. 2006. Focus on Children Under Six. Delhi: Circus. http://www.righttofoodindia.org/icds/icds_index.html. Mander, Harsh, Jean Dreze, and S. Vivek. 2002. Freedom from Hunger and Fear. New Delhi: Rajiv Gandhi Centre for International Studies. Vivek, S. Forthcoming. “Making Hunger a Political Priority in India.” In Human Right To Adequate Food: Definitions, Interpretations And Initiatives. Manila: Philippines: University of Philippines Press. ———. 2003a. “Notes from the Right to Food Campaign: People’s Movement for the Right to Food.” In Vol. New Delhi. Delhi: World Food Program. http://www.wfp.org.in/website/events/countdown_2007/s_vivek.pdf. ———. 2003b. “Hope in Our Hands.” Humanscape X (Xii; 10th... -
Resource Constraint
Posted on November 11, 2006 |I had a prolonged debate on school feeding with a friend recently. I pointed out that India’s school feeding does not have any ‘means testing’ and covers all children. If India with its resource base and a large school population can do it, most other countries afford it. He on the other hand pointed out that USA (read the richest nation in the world) uses means testing to filter children out since it would be infeasible to feed all children (read no other country can then afford it). Is it feasible since India does it? Or is it not feasible... -
Books and articles by Jean Dreze: A detailed bibliography (downloadable)
Posted on September 15, 2006 |This is a reasonably good list of books and articles by my favourite economist – Jean Dreze. These works are ‘academic’ and do not include some of his most interesting works including his diary as a squatter in London, and a set of essays edited by him, Bela Bhatia and Kathy Kelly on the Iraq peace camp. Agarwal, Bina, S. L. Rao, Jean Drèze, Patricia Uberoi, and National Council of Applied Economic Research. The Family in Public Policy : Fallacious Assumptions and Gender Implications. Golden Jubilee Seminar Series. Vol. 9th lecture. New Delhi: National Council of Applied Economic Research, 2000....
