Research at the Centre extends beyond pure academic research and focuses on policy oriented research that acts as important academic input for informed policy making. Research at CDS is organized around the following eleven thematic issues conducted independently, or under various endowment units and endowment funds.
- Culture and Development
- Decentralisation and Governance
- Gender and Development
- Human Development, Health and Education
- Industry and Trade
- Innovation and Technology
- Labour, Employment and Social Security
- International and Internal migration
- Macroeconomic Performance
- Agriculture and Plantation Crops
- Politics and Development
Culture and Development
Studies under this theme have largely been historical. They explore the cultural and ideological bases of development in Kerala and the shifts in culture and ideology that shape particular development outcomes. The history of the shaping of public consent for state-sponsored artificial birth-control, the discursive dimensions of community assertion in development, the sub-nationalist ideology bolstered by developmentalism forming the basis of post-independence Kerala, and the discursive dimensions of gender and development have been actively explored at CDS. These studies have mostly relied on archival research and importantly, textual analysis, as their principal methods. Essentially, they represent interdisciplinary research at CDS which has appeared in a whole range of internationally and nationally renowned research journals across the social sciences and humanities. They examine the intertwining of development, politics, culture, and social institutions in Kerala that significantly shape the people’s well-being. Other studies include those on the cultural and historical aspects of women’s mobility into politics and paid work. Recent studies include those of the impacts of extraneous cultural flows that shaped Kerala’s specific historical experience of socio-political change in the twentieth century facilitated by mobility across colonial and post colonial geographies.
Decentralisation and Governance
Since the 1990s when the 73rd and 74th Amendments of the Indian Constitution came into force, decentralisation and local governance have been crucial to questions of welfare and development in India. This coincided with an interest in developing planning from below in ways that deepened democracy in Kerala, and with accelerated urban expansion in Kerala and elsewhere. Also, the coming of decentralised democracy meant the expansion of opportunities for women, both in the elected local bodies through reservations and in self-help groups. Research at CDS has followed these processes from different disciplinary perspectives and different methodological perspectives. Major projects that focused on local level development since the 1990s have been carried out. Studies have ranged from changing institutional structures of local governance, welfare programmes and redistribution, social security, infrastructural development, to local government finances. The Research Unit on Local Self-Government at CDS has been carrying out research on agriculture and local self-government and on environmental challenges in urban areas. Gender has been a key theme in research on local government at CDS. This has included research on elected women leaders in Kerala’s rural and urban local bodies, gender budgeting in panchayats, and the state-wide network of women’s self-help groups under the Kerala State Poverty Alleviation Mission, the Kudumbashree. Recent work includes research into the opportunities opened by decentralisation for women of the most marginal communities in Kerala and the ways in which these women have availed of them. A small but significant theme that is emergent is about the challenges in urban governance in a rapidly-urbanizing Kerala. Studies on urban housing schemes implemented by local governments are ongoing.
Gender and Development
Research in this domain has been quite diverse in terms of themes and disciplinary orientations. At present, there is cross disciplinary and/or interdisciplinary research that brings a gender perspective to bear on problems of labour, livelihoods, politics, health, migration and marriage. Gendered power relations were implicated even when not explicitly probed in the early research at the Centre (1970s) on questions of fertility transition and human development. Even as research in the 1980s and 1990s brought a clear focus on women’s work and employment, including the implications of wider definitions of work for computing national income, on women in agriculture and fisheries, and on understanding how women made good in the context of large scale male migration to the Middle East. The evolution of the CDS research agenda through critical engagement with earlier perspectives on development has been particularly marked in the case of the research on gender and caste since 2000. Gender in contemporary Kerala has been the focus of significant research. Recent research on gender and politics in Kerala has addressed decentralised governance, feminisation of local governance and student politics in higher educational institutions. Gendered livelihoods have come into focus in the context of self-help initiatives of women even as the persisting low female work participation in India and Kerala has continued to receive attention. There is ongoing work on state policy and the implication of gender and caste / religious identities in international migration of women workers from South India.
Human Development, Health and Education
Human development continues to be a celebrated theme of enquiry at the Centre for the state’s paradoxical distinction in this regard which compares with the developed world. The challenge of human development in the state unfolds perspectives like its sustainability in the long run as well as its virtues of inclusion. The compulsion of shrinking social sector investment coupled with public provisioning of health and education getting complemented by private provisioning poses a threat to sustainability and furthering of its achievements. Enquiries in the field of Health and education remain beyond their instrumental role in the assessment of human development. Topics of health research span from understanding economic of health and health care to equity, pricing and health system analysis in keeping with the evolving epidemiological transition. The alternative dimensions of health research include assessment of disease burden, modes of care provisioning during ultimate years of life along with concerns of sustaining better health indicators in the event of population ageing that is underway. With an evolving public-private mix in the provisioning of health care, health care decision making in consideration of cost and quality has been another prominent engagement in the field of health research. Allied topics like under-nutrition, dietary diversification as well as over/under utilisation of health care are also examined towards commenting upon the healthy makeup of the society. Similarly, works relating to the theme of education involves assessment of educational progress with its varied facets of characteristic inclusion, connections with the emerging labour market and educated unemployment, etc. Issues concerning quality of education, higher education and technical education too are highlights of Centre’s work in the field of education. The significance of enquiries in these two vital areas of human capability needs strengthening with theoretical formulations based on economic principles beyond the empirics that have been our strength till date.
Industry and Trade
Issues related to industry, trade and investments comprise one of the core areas of research at the Centre. Research related to industry specifically look into various aspects including performance of the Indian corporate sector, role of MNCs in Indian manufacturing sector, spill over effects of FDI inflows, implications of Global Value Chain, mergers and acquisitions, etc. There have been a number of studies specific to sectors like electronics, pharmaceutical, capital goods, paper, tea, etc. Another set of studies analyse issues like frugal innovation, STI policies, R&D tax incentives and IPR policy. Issues like competition policy, corporate governance, regional concentration and urban formation, diffusion of automation, innovation, disinvestments and CSR have also been well researched upon.
There has been a plethora of research being undertaken to analyse the various aspects of international trade – both theoretical and empirical. One debate that has remained the cornerstone of trade policy is that of protectionism vis-à-vis liberalisation. Further, in a continuously integrating world economy, such trade policies lead further to the debate between global free trade vis-à-vis regionalism. Theoretical research under this theme has contributed predominantly to these debates. There have been studies analysing the welfare implications of protectionism and the optimality of the mechanism of trade negotiations. The optimal structure of trade blocs has also been analysed. These studies have also considered the pivotal role of market structure in determining both the optimal degree of protectionism and the equilibrium structure of trade blocs. There has also been some work on the welfare implications of international capital flows. Empirical research under this theme has addressed various concerns with both international and national perspectives. Studies have analysed the myriad implications of trade and liberalisation on the Indian economy like growth, productivity, export pattern, R&D spillovers, FDI, mergers and acquisitions, etc. There have been studies focusing on inter-country comparisons, particularly in light of global economic crises. Further, implications of regional economic integration, particularly involving India, have also been analysed.
Innovation and Technology
The role of innovation in fostering and sustaining economic growth of nation states is now fairly well established. Innovation is the commercial introduction of new processes and products, essentially by firms. There are two different aspects of innovation that has merited the attention of researchers. First, is the generation of innovation and second is its diffusion within the economy. It was initially believed that the generation and diffusion of innovation happened in splendid isolation by the firm through its investments in R&D. However, towards the beginning of the 1990s, this view of generation and diffusion of innovation has undergone many radical changes. First of the changes is the systemic perspective in the generation of innovation. It is now increasingly recognised that the economy consists of a number of actors like the government, the higher education system, research institutes, business enterprises and so on and innovative activity is due to the interactions between these elements or actors in the system. This perspective or framework is generally referred to as the National System of Innovation (NSI). Nations, which possess robust NSI are supposed to grow faster than those, which have fragmented systems. Second, is the view that nations catch up with the rest on the basis of having innovative sectors or industries and in some cases sub national regions. Viewed in this perspective the sectoral and regional systems of innovation are more relevant to understanding the generation and diffusion of innovation. Third, is the view that innovations are also generated through a whole host of non-R&D routes, which have been laid bare by innovation surveys, done across the developing and developed countries. Fourth, is the fact that organisational and marketing innovations are also equally important as product or process innovations, although this aspect is much less understood. Fifth, a large number of innovations, especially through the non R&D route, emanate from the unorganised sector as well. A number of research studies reflective these five concerns or dimensions are currently undertaken at the Centre.
Labour, Employment and Social Security
Research in CDS on this theme has a long history with a wide canvass, that is continuously evolving both in terms of research themes and methodological approaches. In line with the prevailing economic structures of early 1970s research in CDS had contextualised the structural transformation including agrarian transformation in Kerala and focused on questions of agrarian structure and labour relations; emerging industrial workforce and industrial relations; and labour market outcomes. In the late 1970s with the gender question emerging in Kerala, a set of studies came out in the ethnographic tradition focusing on the gender relations in employment and occupations. The late 70s also was the period when open unemployment in Kerala started getting serious attention from CDS researchers. In the early 80s, the scope of research widened to include studies on labour processes and questions of labour market discrimination. During this period, while the main stream agriculture sector was held up in institutional stagnancy, the allied sectors like fishing was experiencing technological change. Micro-level studies, including village studies on technological change and livelihood, were closely researched during this period. Around this period, macro-level studies using large data sets also came to vogue, especially focusing on women’s work at the All India level. Sectoral studies focusing on labour processes also flourished during this period. With educated unemployment becoming a serious concern by the mid-80s a number of studies attended to this subject as well. In the early 90s, the process of informalisation; and livelihood of informal workers came to attention, placing development in a political economy framework. However, the late 90s saw a decline in research under this theme with few research conducted in this area. The core theme of research shifted to the problem of social security for the informal sector workers in early 2000s. During this period studies using a new lens, labour geography framework, also started looking at the process of informalisation.
In the context of widening income inequality, deepening agrarian crisis, stunted structural transformation and liberalisation of the Indian economy, one of the emerging themes of the current focus of research is rooted in the structural transformation and employment. A set of studies has looked into the question of jobless growth at the national level linking it up with the skewed structural transformation and economic liberalisation. In this background, studies have also investigated the nature of employment and labour relations in the rural sector which is characterised by stagnation of the agriculture sector. In the face of this agricultural stagnation, Public employment programmes to reinvigorate rural livelihoods, especially MGNREGS, has been evaluated and researched from various angles, including its impact on rural livelihood and political economy of asset creations. With the stagnation of agriculture and rising informalisation in both organised and unorganised sector, the issue of social security for workers has become an important concern. Studies have been analysing the alternative social security models across different governance structures in a comparative perspective and highlighting their effectiveness.
Another set of studies had been researching on inequality and discrimination in the labour market, focusing on social differentiation based on caste and gender, as well as economic differentiation based on endowments, skills and occupation. Following the same question, studies had been examining the functional distribution of income and the nature and causes for declining wage share in gross value added. Following liberalisation, the question of jobless growth in the organised sector has been of serious concern. On this, studies have analysed the causes for declining employment, and the composition of employment in the organised sector, including the public sector. On the question of gender, research focused on the declining labour force participation of women and its causal factors. In this context, the role of conventional institutions, such as gender norms and patriarchy in influencing women’s decision to participate in labour market, is also being explored. Further to the question of gender, field based studies were undertaken to comprehend the nature and context of livelihood diversification strategies among women. Another theme that is getting increasing attention is the political economy of displacement and livelihood issues surrounding displacement.
Macroeconomic Performance
Studies under this theme can be classified into those focusing on long term macroeconomic performance of Indian economy and those analysing short run macroeconomic issues such as monetary policy and inflation. Studies belonging to the first category focused on issues like long term growth performance of Indian economy. These studies made an attempt to identify and explain the growth phases of Indian economy. One study tries to explain these growth phases in terms of cumulative causation emerging out of positive feedback between producer services sectors and manufacturing sector. Another study examines the role of the crisis, change in economic policy regime and export performance in the growth trajectory of Indian economy. A third one analysed the relationship between public policy and economic growth in the Indian context.
International and Internal migration
Kerala is one of the states in India which has experienced very high rates of international migration. This has attracted much attention by researchers and policy makers alike. A number of analytical issues have come up for in-depth examination. The main topics are: (i) a systematic enumeration of the number of people who have migrated from Kerala to the Middle East; (ii) the characteristics of these migrants; (iii) the quantum of remittances and its impact on Kerala’s economy, iv) government policy, invisibility and the distinctive nature of women’s migration. Currently the issue of return migration is also analysed.
For more than two decades now, Kerala has also been experiencing growing in-migration of unskilled and intermediary skill category workers from across India. An enumeration and in depth study of child migrants accompanying families or otherwise is underway.
Agriculture and Plantation Crops
Research on plantation sector in CDS is being undertaken at the instance of the National Research Programme on Plantation Development sponsored by the Ministry of Commerce. The programme is expected to undertake policy oriented research on all aspects of plantation sector in India and help research capacity building.
Politics and Development
Studies in this theme have considered the larger questions of shifting relationships between the state, political society and the formal political public, and particular regimes of development, particularly, development policy. The shifts in politics, welfare, and the move from government to governance that characterised the 1990s have been of considerable interest here. Studies that reflect on the politics of the shift from centralised government to decentralised governance, and of the political economy of agrarian change in the wake of the intensifying impacts of globalising neoliberal capitalism, the politics of gender emergent in urban governance, have been carried out. Also, historical work on the politics of welfare in pre- and post-independence Kerala, on marginalisation, exclusion, and abjection in development particularly with reference to dalit people and sexual minorities, and local histories on politics and development in micro-sites of extreme marginalisation and deprivation in Kerala have been published. These studies too constitute a significant part of the interdisciplinary research at CDS in the recent decades. Methodologically, most of these studies employ a diverse set of tools. Most often, descriptive statistics, qualitative methods including interviews of different kinds, focus group discussions, and participant observation, as well as textual and discourse analyses are employed and triangulated. Most of them also deploy a historical perspective that traces different strands of social and political change across time.