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Politics and Democracy in Our Time
A shift from policies to that of the politics of the distribution of power and privilege in societies may bring with it recognition of the entirely new ethos of nationalism and democracy in our times. This article begins with this changed ethos by invoking that politics, and especially, a politics of indifference. It deals with two dimensions of the rule of indifference, beginning with the matter of difference as pluralism, and then turning to the issue of lack of sympathy with the here and now, the present generation, those living through the uprooting and displacement of diverse projects of "development." It should become clear from what follows that these two senses of the term, and the practices flowing from them, feed on each other, even if they appear in rather different guises and seem to be directed at very different kinds of objects.
This is an expanded version of a Distinguished University Lecture delivered at the University of Hyderabad in January 2015. I am grateful to the participants at the University of Hyderabad, and to my colleagues Ruby Lal, Velcheru Narayana Rao and Ajay Skaria, for their helpful comments.
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