Your opinion on reservations (Affirmative Action) in this case

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian
Let's assume then that there was no oppression. Let's just look at the present inequity (rural v urban).

What would YOU do about it, if anything?

-Arrian

I'll illustrate with an example of what we should have done years ago.


Ten years ago, the government pretty much had a monopoly on the airlines, telecommunications, and ISP industries, and farmer' markets for food. You had to go through them to buy from farmers.

They got rid of that in the past few years.

That did it.

Ten years ago, there was no flight from Indore to Pune, and the one from Indore to Mumbai was obscenely expensive. It was unaffordable for anything except the most urgent work.

Today, there is an Indore-Pune flight every day, served by a full-service airline fora very reasonable cost. It is affordable.



Ten years ago, a cellular phone was an unthinkable luxury to anyone but the very rich, who only got very clunky and big ones.

Today, every single one my friends has a cellphone with more features than they care to remember. And these are usually people from middle-class families. Today, fishermen off the Maharashtra coast use them to get optimal prices for their fish in real time, by deciding on which point of the coast to sell. It has tremendously increased efficiency, and fairness, and reduced waste to next to nothing.



Ten years ago, a connection to the internet was slow, expensive, and totally unrealible.

Today, I have a connection which is on 24 hours a day, which is more than fast enough for my needs, and is extremely reliable.



Ten years ago, large retail stores were impossible, because you simply couldn't procure that sort of stuff freshly enough.

Today, large companies are dealing directly with farmers, who are much happier, because they can deal with people who are as interested in the trade as they are, get a fair market price instantly (bring your produce, and they pay you on the spot, by the quote the ticker says at the moment), instead of dealing with government bureaucrats who wouldn't do a single thing without bribes every stage of the way, by which time your produce would be the worse for wear. And I can get much fresher produce, at very reasonable prices.


All this, by the way, in a mere ten years - or six effective years.


So do you know what I suggest the government do?

I suggest it GET THE HELL OUT OF THE WAY!

[Arrian]

Thanks, LS.

So this bit (from the article aneeshm provided in the OP) rings true, then?

Justice A.P. Sen had explicitly observed in the famous K.C. Vasanth Kumar Vs State of Karnataka (AIR, 1985) case that “only the privileged groups within the backward classes reap all the benefits of reservation with the result that the lowest of the low who are stricken with poverty and are therefore socially and educationally backward remain deprived through these constitutional provisions…”

This elite class or creamy layer amongst the backwards, who usurp all the reservation benefits wants to maintain the current disparity of standards to emerge as the sole leaders *** supposedly emancipated representatives of their communities, by indoctrinating their ignorant brethren against their common enemy in demonical upper caste constructs.

-Arrian

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by aneeshm


As I said, when these group of people - who aren't traditionally backward in any sense anyway - wanted the tag "backward" to gain reservation benefits, there had to be a way of distinguishing them from the ones we already referred to using the word "backward". So the term OBC. Nothing pejorative about it.

Perhaps there is something lost in the Hindi to English translation. In english, this is somewhere between perjorative and condescending, and identical to terms used to describe african-american citizens in the not so distant past.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Arrian
Thanks, LS.

So this bit (from the article aneeshm provided in the OP) rings true, then?

I think so, at least in part.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Kontiki


Sorry, missed this post when I made my last one. This sure clears it up - in no way whatsoever.

I'll try to elaborate on what LS has said.

"Lower" means those traditionally socially disadvantaged. Usually based on the traditional caste hierarchy. This is a pejorative.

"Backward" means meeting a certain metric of disadvantage, usually economic or education. This one is not a pejorative.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by LordShiva
I don't support teh reservations policy, either. Everybody focuses on teh (also unwelcome) possibility of "reserved" seats being filled by unqualified individuals, but I think as big a problem is teh possibility that they're filled by teh elites within teh "backward" groups. There's enough economic and social mobility in India that teh relatively successful individuals then cakewalk into teh best schools because they aren't held to teh same standards as everyone else.

That's of course the issue with AA anywhere... if the percentages are as high as aneeshm stated, it's fairly unlikely to be a true problem IMO. Again, as long as people are 'qualified' in the minimum sense ('can graduate') I think it doesn't hurt anyone for them to go to a higher school than they otherwise would get into; maintaining that 'minimum qualified' is of course necessary in some sense, and that's the real pickle (and apparently not dealt with).

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by LordShiva
I don't support teh reservations policy, either. Everybody focuses on teh (also unwelcome) possibility of "reserved" seats being filled by unqualified individuals, but I think as big a problem is teh possibility that they're filled by teh elites within teh "backward" groups. There's enough economic and social mobility in India that teh relatively successful individuals then cakewalk into teh best schools because they aren't held to teh same standards as everyone else.

Ah yes, the infamous "Management Quota", or "discretionary" seats, coupled with quotas. Pretty picture we have here, no?

[Arrian]

So do you know what I suggest the government do?

I suggest it GET THE HELL OUT OF THE WAY!

So nothing, then (in the public sphere - IIRC, you were big on a private charitable literacy effort).

It sounds like there is a serious problem with primary education in rural areas. Isn't education the concern of the government?

For all the problems the US has with its public school system, it's hard to imagine our relative national success without it. One of the major problems we have currently is the wide gulfs between the good schools & bad ones, and the impact on the students... which seems to mirror the gulf between rural and urban India. You think that will be sorted out properly by "staying out of the way?"

-Arrian

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by snoopy369


That's of course the issue with AA anywhere... if the percentages are as high as aneeshm stated, it's fairly unlikely to be a true problem IMO.

That's teh argument used for making teh quotas so big.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by aneeshm


I'll illustrate with an example of what we should have done years ago.
< snip >
All this, by the way, in a mere ten years - or six effective years.


So do you know what I suggest the government do?

I suggest it GET THE HELL OUT OF THE WAY!

Most of that (excepting the food thing) could be said about the US also, though. 10 years ago cell phones were not common, now they are; 10 years ago broadband was expensive, now it is not. Etc.

I'm all for the market regulating, but there are times when the market fails, particularly due to social limitations (ie, discrimination, or non-mobility due to geopolitical factors). Whether or not this is a situation like that, is the question...

The point brought up above (that this is kept in place by the elites of the RC folks to keep themselves in power) is of course a very valid possibility, but there needs to be SOME solution to this. Simply assuming the market will fix it is NOT a solution - the market is terrible at fixing social inequality, it tends to enhance social inequality if anything.

[LordShiva]

Originally posted by Arrian


So nothing, then (in the public sphere - IIRC, you were big on a private charitable literacy effort).

It sounds like there is a serious problem with primary education in rural areas. Isn't education the concern of the government?

True.

Instead of focusing on trying to equalise higher education opportunities, teh government should focus, in a huge, almost raison d'etre kind of way, on primary education in rural areas.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Arrian

So nothing, then (in the public sphere - IIRC, you were big on a private charitable literacy effort).

I still am. The current statistics bear me out on that, too. Consider the single project which I consider the best hope as a model: the Ekal Vidyalaya.

As of December 2007, they're up to 24,000 one-teacher schools all over India, each capable of providing the basic education of fundamental literacy and numeracy, which, along with education, also work in social reform (breaking down caste barriers, reducing alcoholism, women's empowerment, increasing independence of village people, improving hygiene, and so on). They cover over seven hundred and twenty thousand children.

Originally posted by Arrian

It sounds like there is a serious problem with primary education in rural areas. Isn't education the concern of the government?

It's supposed to be, but it's the government. Corrupt to the bone. What can you expect?

Originally posted by Arrian

For all the problems the US has with its public school system, it's hard to imagine our relative national success without it. One of the major problems we have currently is the wide gulfs between the good schools & bad ones, and the impact on the students... which seems to mirror the gulf between rural and urban India. You think that will be sorted out properly by "staying out of the way?"

-Arrian

"Staying out of the way" in this context means that instead of demanding that all college admissions be through the government procedure, and that to be eligible for that procedure, you have to go through a government-approved school program, you simply let the colleges decide their own admission criterion, let them decide their own syllabus, and let them conduct their own tests. And let schools teach what they want, barring, of course, child abuse.

Basically, stop throttling the artificial bottlenecks you created in the first place!

That way, each community can make the trade-off optimal to them.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by aneeshm


I'll try to elaborate on what LS has said.

"Lower" means those traditionally socially disadvantaged. Usually based on the traditional caste hierarchy. This is a pejorative.

"Backward" means meeting a certain metric of disadvantage, usually economic or education. This one is not a pejorative.

In english, at least, "backward" is a condescending term implying certain people are inferior to others. Of course in Hindi I could not speak to its specific meaning.

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by snoopy369

Most of that (excepting the food thing) could be said about the US also, though. 10 years ago cell phones were not common, now they are; 10 years ago broadband was expensive, now it is not. Etc.

Maybe so.

But I can provide far more extreme examples.

When my father was younger, you ordered a scooter when a child was born, so that when they came of age (around eighteen), it would arrive. Yes, they were in THAT short supply, because the government wouldn't give the manufacturers permission to produce any more, it being classified as a "luxury" good. Today, I walk into a showroom and pick whatever I want.

When you wanted a landline phone connection, you ordered it when you started constructing the house. If you were lucky, by the time it was done, you would have telephone access. Today, the guy comes and sets it up either that day itself of the next day. And you have a choice.

Originally posted by snoopy369

The point brought up above (that this is kept in place by the elites of the RC folks to keep themselves in power) is of course a very valid possibility, but there needs to be SOME solution to this. Simply assuming the market will fix it is NOT a solution - the market is terrible at fixing social inequality, it tends to enhance social inequality if anything.

Well, one method having failed, isn't it better to at least give the other method a chance - even if limited - than to persist in folly?

[Arrian]

"Staying out of the way" in this context means that instead of demanding that all college admissions be through the government procedure, and that to be eligible for that procedure, you have to go through a government-approved school program, you simply let the colleges decide their own admission criterion, let them decide their own syllabus, and let them conduct their own tests. And let schools teach what they want, barring, of course, child abuse.

Except it seems that the schools (primary level) are failing miserably. How would you fix that, such that they would produce more qualified students, who could then attend university w/o caste-based quotas?

-Arrian