Page 5 - Lessonnote_ Social Movement

Can we apply the Distinction between old and new social movements in the Indian
Context?

India has experienced a whole array of social movements involving women, peasants, dalits, adivasis
and others.
Gail Omvedt in her book Reinventing Revolution points out that concerns about social inequality and
the unequal distribution of resources continue to be important elements in these movements.
Peasant movements have mobilised for better prices for their produce and protested against the
removal of agricultural subsidies.
Dalit labourers have acted collectively to ensure that they are not exploited by upper caste
landoners and money lenders.
The women’s movement has worked on issues of gender discrimination in diverse spheres like the
workplace and within the family.

Identity politics, cultural anxieties and aspirations are essential elements in creating social
movements and occur in ways that are difficult to trace to class-based inequality.
These social movements unite participants across class boundaries.
For ex- the women’s movement includes urban, middle-class feminists as well as poor peasant
women.
The Regional movements for separate statehood bring together different groups of people who do
not share homogenous class identities.

Ecological Movement

 Over the decades there has been a great deal of concern about the unchecked use of
natural resources and a model of development that creates new needs that further
demands greater exploitation of the already depleted natural resources.
 This model of development has also been critiqued for assuming that all sections of
people will be beneficiaries of development.
 Thus big dams displace people from their homes and sources of livelihood. Industries
displace agriculturalists from their homes and livelihood.
 The Chipko Movement, an example of the ecological movement, in the Himalayan
foothills is a good example of such intermingled interests and ideologies.
 According to Ramachandra Guha in his book, Unquiet Woods, villagers rallied together to
save the oak and rhododendron forests near their villages. When government forest
contractors came to cut down the trees, villagers, including large number of women,
stepped forward to hug the trees to prevent their being felled. At stake was the question
of villagers’ subsistence. All of them relied on the forest to get firewood, fodder and
other daily necessities. This conflict placed the livelihood needs of poor villagers against
the government’s desire to generate revenues from selling timber. The economy of
subsistence was pitted against the economy of profit.
 Along with this issue of social inequality (villagers versus a government that represented
commercial, capitalist interests), the Chipko Movement also raised the issue of ecological
sustainability.