• ISBN13: 9780199475278
• Binding: Hardcover
• Subject: Politics and Current Affairs
• Publisher: Oxford UP
• Publisher Imprint: Oxford UP
• Publication Date: September 16, 2017
• Pages: 272
• Original Price: INR 850.0
• Language: English
• Edition: N/A
• Item Weight: 500 grams

Globalization, as commonly understood, limits policy choices of a nation by creating structural and institutional constraints. This leads to an important question: are political actors still relevant in shaping policy in the interest of domestic socio-economic concerns? Locating labour as a critical political economy factor, essential for production and capable of political action, this book examines the political economy of labour reforms. Through a careful study of labour market reforms across subnational states of India, it draws attention to the continuing relevance of local politics in influencing public policy. Drawing on the evidence from the pairs of institutionally and economically alike states, Gujarat–Maharashtra and West Bengal–Andhra Pradesh, this book shows that despite pressures of convergence under conditions of globalization, reforms vary across states, depending on partisan governments, dynamics of interest group negotiations, and party competition. Using both qualitative and quantitative analyses, the book argues that ‘who governs’ matters for how globalization unfolds in any society, and that public policies continue to be nuanced, if not shaped, by politics.
By analysing the labour policy in India, the book makes an important contribution to political economy research on transitional economies.

Zaad Mahmood is a departmental lecturer of South Asian politics and development, Oxford Department of International Development, University of Oxford, UK, and teaches political science at Presidency University, Kolkata, India.