La questione sociale in India

The year 1991 was a landmark in the Indian economic and political scenario, as the country started a process of integration into the international economic order characterized by the ascendance of neoliberalism. This article aims to retrace salient aspects of India’s social question more than two decades after the shift towards a neoliberal policy paradigm. This will require in the first instance to focus on some significant features of the country’s recent growth trajectory, in order to explore the nexus between the unfolding of specific dynamics of immanent growth and the (re)production of social exclusion. In parallel to this, in a scenario characterized by overt informalization policies as well as by an intensification in the «decent» work deficit, specific attention will be given to the labour question. The implications of the increasing spread of informal employment relations in all types of occupation in terms of social vulnerability will be highlighted. In the face of this scenario, a critical reflection on the limits of the social policy framework currently dominant in India will be proposed. This raises the question of the urgency to move beyond the neoliberal paradigm, as a condition to confront the social question.