Violence of Democracy: Interparty Conflict in South India

In Violence of Democracy Ruchi Chaturvedi tracks the rise of India's divisive politics through close examination of decades-long confrontations in Kerala between members of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and supporters of the Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh and the Bharatiya Janata Party. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and extensive archival research, Chaturvedi investigates the unique character of the conflict between the party left and the Hindu right. This conflict, she shows, defies explanations centering religious, caste, or ideological differences. It offers instead new ways of understanding how quotidian political competition can produce antagonistic majoritarian communities. Rival political parties mobilize practices of disbursing care and aggressive masculinity in their struggle for electoral and popular power, a process intensified by a criminal justice system that reproduces rather than mitigating violence. Chaturvedi traces these dynamics from the late colonial period to the early 2000s, illuminating the broader relationships between democratic life, divisiveness, and majoritarianism.

Author: Ruchi Chaturvedi
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 08/04/2023
Pages: 272
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.89lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.61d
ISBN13: 9781478020776
ISBN10: 1478020776
BISAC Categories:
- History | Asia | South | India
- Political Science | World | Asian
- Social Science | Anthropology | Cultural & Social

About the Author
Ruchi Chaturvedi is Senior Lecturer of Sociology at the University of Cape Town.