Development from Representation? A Study of Quotas for the Scheduled Castes in India

Abstract

This paper estimates the constituency-level development effects of quotas for the Scheduled Castes (SCs) in India, using a unique dataset of development indicators for more than 3,100 state assembly constituencies in 15 Indian states in 1971 and 2001. Matching constituencies on pre-treatment variables from 1971, I find that 30 years of quotas had no detectable constituency-level effect on overall development or redistribution to SCs in reserved constituencies. Interviews with politicians and civil servants in 2010 and 2011 suggest that these findings can be explained by the power of political parties and the electoral incentives created by the quota system.

Ethnic Quotas and Political Mobilization: Caste, Parties, and Distribution in Indian Village Councils

“…What our findings do suggest is the primacy of the political-for instance, of patterns of party organization and of dynamic incentives engendered by political competition-in shaping the distributive effects of 68 However, using a difference-in-differences design, Jensenius (2012) finds no impact of reservation of state assembly seats on SC/ST welfare. As the reservation status of state assembly constituencies was left unchanged from 1974-2008, this suggests that rotation of quotas is not necessary to engender null effects.…”

Do the Effects of Temporary Ethnic Group Quotas Persist? Evidence from India

“…First, since electing more SCs is perhaps the most immediate goal of reservations. Second, since reservations, while they are in effect, unambiguously increase the number of SCs elected to office, even as their effects on socio-economic outcomes are less certain to non-existent (Chin and Prakash 2011;Jensenius 2015;Pande 2003). If reservations for SCs fail to improve socio-economic outcomes while they are in place, they are presumably even less likely to improve socio-economic outcomes after they are withdrawn.…”

When do the poor vote for the right-wing and why: Status inequality and vote choice in the Indian states

“…These codes enabled me to merge the 1931 census data with the state assembly data for election years between 1985 and 1995 used in this paper. A more detailed description of the electoral data used and a discussion of electoral and census boundary merging can be found in Jensenius (2015). 9 Only one assembly constituency in the states of Tamil Nadu, Periyakulam, had a negative value.…”

“…The findings of this paper also have implications for recent studies on South Africa that have demonstrated the prevalence of cross-class solidarities amongst whites in favor of greater redistribution during apartheid (Lieberman 2003) This paper also contributes to the large literature on caste in India. Scholars working on caste and voting have typically examined the mobilization of lower castes into politics and the effects of political quotas and affirmative action on lower caste developmental outcomes (Jaffrelot 2005a, Chandra 2004, Chauchard 2014, Jensenius 2015. This paper offers new insights by focusing on how upper castes responded to challenges to their social dominance.…”