Calibrated Indifference: Understanding the Structure of Informal Labour in India
Paper presented to the 3rd Conference of the Association of Indian Labour Historians, New Delhi, March 2002; and published in S. Bhattacharya and J. Lucassen (eds); Workers in the Informal sector: Studies in Labour History 1800-2000; New Delhi, 2005
The phenomenon of informality in labour relations is now an accepted fact of economic life in India. Between 7 and 8 percent of India’s total labour force of 390 million persons (inclusive of families and agrarian workers) work in the so-called organised sector, in registered firms, on regular salaries. This leaves some 350 million people in the unorganised, or informal sector, that allows (fifty-five years after Independence) for a work process that remains unmonitored, unregulated, casualised and without access to any official security systems whatsoever. Most registered firms also employ a certain percentage of causal labourers, thus ensuring a symbiotic link between two kinds of labour-process.
There exists a large body of data about this, indicating considerable research (both official and non-governmental), but insufficient attention has been paid to analysing endemic informality as a systemic structure. What determines its persistence? Is it sufficient to define it in terms of casual, unregulated, seasonal, unregistered, underage or mediated employment, or are there other aspects that need to be taken into consideration? What are the connections between these features, and its functional dynamic? Higher standards of living for these 350 million people would create massive demand and transform the economy. Why is this not happening?
Iniquitous work regimes are held together by what is euphemistically known as extra-economic coercion. One aspect of the relations governing informality that should enter a rigorous definition, is the prevalence of corporal punishment and intimidation as the mode of control at the work place. The state’s regulation of the recruitment and working conditions of casual and contractors’ labour is non-existent, laws on minimum wages rates in agrarian labour are rarely enforced, and maternity leave, health and accident insurance, are unknown, (despite being present in the recommendations of say, the National Commission on Rural Labour of 1991). Official under-regulation implies that other, ‘conventional’ modes of recruitment and regulation involving caste, kinship and gender operate in their place. What are these, how do they operate and what purpose do they serve in the larger order of things? This paper will explore of these issues..
Even a cursory study of casual labour and informality in India provides insights for an understanding of the most endemic of Indian malaises, that everyone complains of but few can comprehend. The relentless habit of subtracting from wages and deploying conventional prejudice for holding down those of ‘low’ social status, is, in my opinion, the stable foundation of the Indian economy and polity. Here is ‘corruption’ in action, performing its most vital function, blending caste and capital, tradition and modernity, economic coercion and violence in a system of untrammelled plunder. State officials are aware of this, and possess the power to enact and enforce regulations. That they choose not to do so implies that the problem goes much deeper. As we have noted above, it is political authority “that gives legitimacy and permanence to systems of social relations”
Read the full paper and download the pdf file: http://www.sacw.net/article2401.html
See also:
What is Corruption? An Essay on Informal Accumulation in Colonial India
The phenomenon of informality in labour relations is now an accepted fact of economic life in India. Between 7 and 8 percent of India’s total labour force of 390 million persons (inclusive of families and agrarian workers) work in the so-called organised sector, in registered firms, on regular salaries. This leaves some 350 million people in the unorganised, or informal sector, that allows (fifty-five years after Independence) for a work process that remains unmonitored, unregulated, casualised and without access to any official security systems whatsoever. Most registered firms also employ a certain percentage of causal labourers, thus ensuring a symbiotic link between two kinds of labour-process.
There exists a large body of data about this, indicating considerable research (both official and non-governmental), but insufficient attention has been paid to analysing endemic informality as a systemic structure. What determines its persistence? Is it sufficient to define it in terms of casual, unregulated, seasonal, unregistered, underage or mediated employment, or are there other aspects that need to be taken into consideration? What are the connections between these features, and its functional dynamic? Higher standards of living for these 350 million people would create massive demand and transform the economy. Why is this not happening?
Iniquitous work regimes are held together by what is euphemistically known as extra-economic coercion. One aspect of the relations governing informality that should enter a rigorous definition, is the prevalence of corporal punishment and intimidation as the mode of control at the work place. The state’s regulation of the recruitment and working conditions of casual and contractors’ labour is non-existent, laws on minimum wages rates in agrarian labour are rarely enforced, and maternity leave, health and accident insurance, are unknown, (despite being present in the recommendations of say, the National Commission on Rural Labour of 1991). Official under-regulation implies that other, ‘conventional’ modes of recruitment and regulation involving caste, kinship and gender operate in their place. What are these, how do they operate and what purpose do they serve in the larger order of things? This paper will explore of these issues..
Even a cursory study of casual labour and informality in India provides insights for an understanding of the most endemic of Indian malaises, that everyone complains of but few can comprehend. The relentless habit of subtracting from wages and deploying conventional prejudice for holding down those of ‘low’ social status, is, in my opinion, the stable foundation of the Indian economy and polity. Here is ‘corruption’ in action, performing its most vital function, blending caste and capital, tradition and modernity, economic coercion and violence in a system of untrammelled plunder. State officials are aware of this, and possess the power to enact and enforce regulations. That they choose not to do so implies that the problem goes much deeper. As we have noted above, it is political authority “that gives legitimacy and permanence to systems of social relations”
Read the full paper and download the pdf file: http://www.sacw.net/article2401.html
See also:
What is Corruption? An Essay on Informal Accumulation in Colonial India
