Sunday Posts

The relationship between state and enterprise has been at the heart of public policy debate for many years. There was the Nineteenth Century Liberal idea, reformulated in the Twentieth by the Libertarians, that the relationship between the two is necessarily antagonistic: The activities of the State discourage enterprise through regulations, taxes and by subsidising inefficiencies. On the other side, there were the Twentieth century ideas of the Welfare State, rediscovered as the 'Entrepreneurial State' in the Twenty-first, which posited the opposite: That the state and enterprise live in a symbiotic relationship, not just because the State creates the right environment, but also because it can enable the enterprise, by spreading education, improving health and supporting fundamental scientific research. Both are plausible arguments, and adequate empirical and anecdotal evidence can be marshalled to support either. The debate, however, has been deeply ideological, and it ...

At some point in 2006, the nature of the Higher Education changed. Many developing countries, led by China and India, embraced the idea that a college educated population is the key to escape poverty and develop the country. So began a great experiment - of opening new institutions, mainly by granting approvals to private entrepreneurs to do so. In doing so, China more or less doubled its college-going population; India's numbers, less spectacular, still grew rapidly between 2006 and 2014, with 10 new colleges, on average, being opened a day. And, this was not just China and India: Many African and Middle Eastern countries had done the same, following similar strategies - granting approval to private entrepreneurs - and ushering in an all-new 'mass Higher Education', the likes of which we have not known before. This phenomenon is now entering a mature phase, and we should be able to analyse what happened. The growth, both of college population and growth of jobs in Hi...

Two things trigger this thought. First, the conversation I have been recently engaged into, and particularly the question, why is Indian IT Industry is not more innovative. And, second, this is about the Not-For-Profit projects which I dabble with, which concern themselves with the task of creating innovation ecosystems in India and Africa. My point is - despite all the fuss about Innovation - developing countries are doing quite poorly in innovation. Overall, the world is living in a bubble that Fredrik Erixon and Björn Wiegel will call an Innovation Illusion. There is a lot of talk and lots of people claiming that they have made a truly new thing - and media fawning over this and that - but apart from 'digitization' of some of the tasks, we are moving forward little. And, this is particularly acute in the developing world, which is doing some 'Copy and Catch-up' innovation (Tyler Cowen's term) but failing to solve their most basic problems. In more ways than...

To me, democracy, of late, has been a disappointment. Or, to be precise, I have been on losing side of the argument all too often in the last couple of years. For example, the Indian electorate in 2014 voted overwhelming to bring in a Hindu Nationalist government: This was due to a combination of voter fatigue with the previous administration, which proved to be inept and corrupt at the same time, but I did not want a Fascist leader, which Mr Modi most certainly is, to be India's Prime Minister. Also, I was on the losing side of Britain's EU referendum, where the British electorate apparently voted for a closed economy and inward-looking society. And, indeed, like everyone else, I am now bracing for Trump victory in US Presidential election; whether or not that eventually happens, I wouldn't, like many US voters who will vote against Trump, feel elated about a Hillary Clinton presidency either, as she is only the lesser of the two hard-to-like candidates. Despite thes...

Greece proposes to raise the Corporation Tax rates from the current 26% to 28% (and possibly to 29%, if needed) in the plans submitted to its various creditors, alongside other measures such as tax rises and pension savings. This immediately draws the usual complaints - that businesses would have less money to invest and create jobs - and makes an interesting contrast with the UK, where the Chancellor has proposed a reduction of Corporate Tax rates, all the way down to 18% by 2019. The rationale presented is simple - that this would attract businesses and create jobs. Both countries are technically in austerity, though in completely different economic positions. Though the welfare cuts in UK were no less severe than those proposed by the Greeks, the two countries are taking two different lines as far as businesses are concerned. Greeks are proposing to raise corporation tax - something that is completely out of fashion at this day and age - while UK is trying to become, almost, a tax...

In an insightful article in Strategy and Business, John Jullens present a view on How Emerging Markets Can Finally Arrive . This is required reading for anyone who cares about emerging markets, if only for going beyond the orthodoxy of free trade and flexible labour market. The broader point - that every market needs its own strategy and that the strategy may vary from stage to stage of development - is also extremely valuable, as this is usually overlooked in any politically tinted discussion about development.  At the core of it, this article has a China theory at its core. China is affecting a transformation of its economy, and it may just pull it off. While some commentators in the United States would say that China can not be a model for most other countries, just because of its political structure, it is becoming a model for many countries, including, for India, the alternate that these commentators would love to highlight. China has proved the naysayers wrong several t...

I have three data points about Kolkata, which I talk about often.  First, Kolkata was the first Indian city to reach a million population, and only the second city in Asia to do so (Tokyo is the other one). Second, it is the only city in the whole world, in this day and age of urban expansion, to have lost population in the last ten years. The loss was marginal, and it is still a very populous city, but this is not good. Third, it is the only Indian metropolis with abundant supply of drinkable water. Assuming that water is going to be a big issue in the next twenty years, Kolkata seems secure as a City. These three data points capture the usual narrative. We often talk about the city's illustrious past, as the Second Capital of the British Empire, Capital of India and as home to many leading modern Indian intellectuals, a place of learning and a hotbed of Indian nationalism. We also hope about its promising future, pointing to various geographic, demographic and e...

An old, dated piece on Kolkata, titled ' Why Kolkata will win in 20 Years ', came to my attention. There are a number of things mentioned in this article that I don't agree with: The statement that Mamta Banerjee represents the moral end of Indian politics may invoke ridicule today, and the stereotype of Bengalis as business-averse and that they would need a Bengali-speaking non-Bengali for saving is mind-bogglingly absurd. But the two key propositions articulated here - that Kolkata is one of the most sustainable of the Indian cities, and that it can be fixed with good governance - are rather self-evident. Of course, Kolkata is home and I am partial, and I shall make no claims to objectivity here. However, the fact that I keep writing about it - and indeed, there are many many people from Kolkata spread all around the world will do the same - proves perhaps that there is more to it than the dirty, dreary, poor city that the place appears to be to a casual visitor....

The education problem is obvious. There are more than 550 million school-age children who don't have access to school. There are more than 400 million adults, most of them in South Asia, who can't read or write. In some countries, majority of children coming out of primary school, over 90% in some cases, can't read or write. Bad Higher Education is wasting whole generations in countries like India, affecting close to 100 million people. Graduates can't get jobs in Europe because their education isn't good enough, and they are not paying back their loans. Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa note that they are not doing much in college either. It looks pretty bad all round. This looks so bad is because we talk about it. In fact, we are talking about it more and more, even more than things like safe drinking water, which affects more people, because of two reasons.  First, the wider economy is feeling the impact of the education problem. The fact that someone does ...

Institute of International Education's (IIE) Rajika Bhandari writes about the roles Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) can play in education of developing nations ( see here ) and highlights five key questions regarding infrastructure availability, relevance in the context of non-formal education, impact on gender gap, impact on the role of the teacher and local relevance. I feel these questions are extremely relevant, but ones that the MOOC enthusiasts often lose sight of. In fact, the biggest danger for the MOOCs is not that it may not work, but rather one puts expectations on it that can't be satisfied, and this becomes another bubble that bursts in time. The questions, as raised here, can help focus the discussion and understand what the MOOCs can and can not do in the developing countries. 1. The Infrastructure Gap Most MOOC advocates have a limited view of the developing country higher education infrastructure. The reason for such limited perspective is this: ...

Hope has made a comeback in India. The grand yet sombre swearing in of the new Prime Minister yesterday made an impression; at least one Western commentator, John Eliot, wondered whether Mr Modi will become a transformational leader like Nehru ( see here ). The assemblage of South Asian leaders, specially invited for the occasion, also ignited hope of peace, stability and freedom of movement in South Asia, which will, in turn, make India's prosperity stronger and sustainable. Besides, the spectacle itself, that a new Prime Minister from outside the ruling elite is being sworn in, is a sign of how strongly embedded democracy has become in India (though as I argued elsewhere , it should never be taken for granted). The hope for India's prospects rests primarily upon the electoral fact that first time in thirty years, India has a majority government. The successive coalition governments, held at ransom by India's regional parties, struggled to move forward and respond to...

My particular interest in West Bengal should be obvious: That's home. And, with all my familial and cultural roots firmly embedded, it is unlikely that my quest to be Global makes any difference to this feeling. In fact, the more interconnected my life becomes, I feel more connected to Bengal, even more responsible. It is a chromosome thing, as Amit Chaudhuri may have illustrated, and whatever I do, I can never truly stop caring. This brings me to one of the things I always wanted to do, build a coalition of all the people who care for the place to bring together in a global conversation on what can be, should be done. Indeed, this is not about government and politics - the state's politics remains toxic - but rather a civil society thing. However, as the recent rise of Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi has shown, the civil society's moment in political conversation may have come: 2014 and its momentous election may just be the perfect time for all concerned to engage in the conve...

Indian election is quickly turning into a battle between democracy and development. Underlying this tension, there is a thesis that democracy is only a luxury and can wait. Despite India's pride in being a democracy, this idea is as old as the country itself. Many people thought it was madness to have democracy in India, a poor and illiterate country at the time of Independence, in the first place. The privileged, the upper caste Hindus, the landlords, the princes, the educated, almost always thought this was a disaster. Indira Gandhi's brief adventure in authoritarianism was cheered on by many of these people: This was perhaps the reason why she was so wrong-footed eventually - everyone around her told her that this was great idea until the voters threw her out. Wealthy Indians nowadays point to China's development and blame their own democracy for failing to catch up, and this has become well accepted among the rich, powerful and the non-residents. Middle Class Indians ...

It is fashionable to think that vocational education is something every developing country needs. The economic logic is simple: Since the only model of economic growth we are comfortable with is the Anglo-Saxon model based on consolidation of land holdings, mechanisation of agriculture leading to a significant displacement of rural labour into urban and industrial activities, vocational education is seen as the catalyst that makes such transition possible. It is that secret potion that can take the farm hands into urban technicians and industrial labour, smoothing out the problems of land acquisition of large-scale farming, resource extraction and industrialisation, raising 'productivity' by moving people from low-yield small-holder agriculture to large industries and urban professions, and allowing urbanisation which is supposed to raise the standards of living. It really does not matter that this model of development is about two hundred years old. Besides, based on the...

Yesterday I was speaking at a 'Beyond China' event, arranged by Asia Pacific Technology Network in London. The idea was to look at the reconfiguration of the global economy at the wake of the end of 'cheap' China. There were different presentations, one from CBBC on the changing Chinese economy, followed by presentations on South-East Asia, India, Africa and US. Pratik Dattani, a friend and the current UK Director of FICCI, was speaking about India, though on a personal capacity. I was speaking about Africa, though my exposure to the continent is only through the African academics I speak to and African students that I teach. My case was that the end of Cheap China is only an opportunity for Africa, and that Africa is mainly looking to do things with China rather than moving beyond it. However, as China becomes a more difficult place to invest in - for operational reasons rather than costs - Africa will emerge as an exciting, perhaps the most exciting, place for g...

Employability programmes are hugely interesting, particularly because they are so popular but still means nothing in particular. While employability schools, courses, self-help materials and even, almost absurdly, certifications are cropping up everywhere, inherent in those programmes is an admission of failure of the education process itself. It is like getting another medicine when medicines have failed, which indicates how students approach education - not with the usual, healthy scepticism of a standard consumer, but with faith befitting a true believer, which bestow more than usual responsibility on an educator, though, at the same time, it makes life easy for a snake-oil salesman. However, despite my usual aversion for 'employability' programmes, here I am - designing a programme for global employability! I am not hypocritical: I didn't start this, but this is what the customers want. A number of business schools I have been speaking to want a finishing school pr...