The redistributive effects of political reservation for minorities: Evidence from India

Abstract

We examine the impact of political reservation for disadvantaged minority groups on poverty. To address the concern that political reservation is endogenous, we take advantage of the state-time variation in reservation in state legislative assemblies in India generated by national policies that cause reservations to be revised and the time lags with which revised reservations are implemented. Using data on sixteen major Indian states for the period 1960-2000, we find that increasing the share of seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes significantly reduces poverty while increasing the share of seats reserved for Scheduled Castes has no impact on poverty. Political reservation for Scheduled Tribes has a greater effect on rural poverty than urban poverty, and appears to benefit people near the poverty line as well as those far below it.

Exploring the Impact of Reserved Seat Design on the Quality of Minority Representation

“…In India, a higher number of reservations for scheduled tribes increases public spending as well as job quotas for group members (Pande, 1999(Pande, , 2003. However, these findings might as well show a more general redistribution effect toward poor people (Chin & Prakash, 2011).…”

“…In such cases, representation of a minority is guaranteed by law or constitution, ensuring that representatives with the exclusive task to represent these groups during decision-making enter legislature (Gallagher & Mitchell, 2005, p. 635). 1 Despite these laudable objectives, the benefits deriving from reserved seats are contested: some reserved seat states seem to be more successful in creating high-quality minority representation than others (Alionescu, 2004;Banducci, Donovan, & Karp, 2004;Cârstocea, 2013;Chin & Prakash, 2011;Jensenius, 2013;King & Marian, 2012;Lublin & Wright, 2013;Pande, 1999Pande, , 2003Protsyk & Matichescu, 2010;Protsyk, Matichescu, & Chatre, 2008;Stoychev, 2006;Summersby, 2009). Why does the efficiency of reserved seats vary?…”

“Is caste race?” Discourses of Racial Indianization

“…Although there has been some social mobility of SC and ST, due to reservation policies and educational quotas, Mohanty (2006) in a study demonstrates that not only are the upper caste Hindus (UCH) significantly better off than SC, ST, and other backward classes, but with the advent of the liberalization of the Indian economy and the changing needs of the labour market, the UCHs dominate in getting the best jobs. Further, research by Chin and Prakash (2011) shows that despite increasing the share of seats in jobs reserved for SCs there has been no impact on poverty. Deshpande (2005) further argues that "caste based discrimination in labour, land, capital and consumer goods markets (preventing SCs from entering, say, milk production and distribution) continue both in urban and rural areas" and "this is manifested both as wage discrimination and job discrimination" (p. 8).…”

Can Elected Minority Representatives Affect Health Worker Visits? Evidence from India

“…These elected representatives have the ability to address present issues with public service delivery through a variety of mechanisms, potentially resulting in lasting long-run consequences for the vast majority of the population. Previous studies have estimated the impact of political reservation for minorities on a variety of policy outcomes including welfare spending, land reforms, employment and poverty (Chin and Prakash, 2011;Pande, 2003;Prakash, 2009;Mookherjee, 2014). Despite the importance of these studies, to the best of our knowledge there is no empirical evidence on how these policies impact health provision.…”