Kanchan Chandra, professor of politics at New York University, has just edited the book, Democratic Dynasties: State, Party and Family in Contemporary Indian Politics (Cambridge University Press). Excerpts from an interview where she talks about the ways in which the dynastic principle is shaping and adapting to Indian politics:
You have drawn some interesting conclusions that political dynasties are both exclusive and undemocratic, and at the same time inclusive in certain ways.
With the data on the three 21st century Parliaments, we looked at around 1,200-plus distinct individuals. We coded them on a whole range of things like family ties, relationship with the party leadership, caste, etc., to arrive at a complex understanding of the nature of dynastic politics. There are two things which for us suggested that it was a violation of certain democratic ideals as we understand them. First, dynasty amplifies the dominance of the ‘forward’ castes in representative institutions. A lot of what has been written on Indian democracy recently has spoken about its increasing subalternisation, so you have, on the one hand, more voters from Dalit and backward castes (less so Muslims and Adivasis), if not in higher proportions, but at least in equal proportions. The representation of these groups in legislatures has also gone up in the past few years. And yet you find upper castes still remaining a dominant force in the legislature, around 43 per cent in 2009, and around the same in 2014, despite the change in parties in power.
If you look at the dynastic class, there too the upper castes have an even greater percentage: in 2014, 53 per cent of all political dynasties represented in Parliament came from the forward castes. There is, therefore, an amplification of dominance. If you think of dynasties as a kind of inner circle of power, you can conclude that the upper castes are over- represented there, and in the outer circle of representation in legislature. This is one way of looking at dynasties as being exclusionary.
How is it then inclusive?
Although dynastic politics has increased exclusion in some respects, it has also had an inclusive effect. It has provided a channel for representation for members of social categories — women, backward castes, Muslims, and youth — which do not find, or have not found, a space in politics through normal channels. In this sense, dynastic ties in India have performed the same function as quotas for members of underrepresented social groups. It is significant that the two subaltern groups among which dynasticism among Indian MPs is highest, women and Muslims, do not have the benefit of quotas. Those subaltern groups, Scheduled Castes and Tribes, who have mandated representation through quotas are less dynastic.
This does not mean that dynastic politics is a normatively desirable channel to bring about political inclusion. But in an unequal polity in which there are already high barriers to the entry of new groups into politics, dynastic politics has become an informal, second-best means of overcoming some of them. In fact, in the absence of dynastic ties, the level of representation of these groups may have been even lower.
Why do parties nominate dynasts if they are not especially qualified or guarantee victory?
In a separate paper that Anjali Bohlken and I wrote… we found that measures of qualification, skill and winnability are not significantly associated with parties’ preference for dynastic candidates. We concluded that parties favour dynasties because family ties act as an informal substitute for loyalty. Parties do not have formal criteria for candidate selection or formal procedures for preventing defections in their local units. So parties are overwhelmingly concerned with loyalty within the ranks at the local level. The use of dynasties allows parties, in this weakly organised environment, to ensure some loyalty in their local units. If you announce ahead of time that you are going to follow a dynastic principle of succession, it stems defections to some extent…
In Congress the system of using family ties to ensure loyalty is particularly prevalent. In the BJP, where there are other institutional ways of ensuring loyalty, this tendency is lower. [Of] Congress MPs, in the 2014 Parliament, 43 per cent are dynastic, and in the BJP the percentage is 15 per cent. But, significantly, when the BJP was selecting candidates for 2014, it renominated almost all of its dynastic MPs who were locally rooted, that is, dynastic MPs who had followed other family members in the same constituency. So there is also a concern for local-level loyalty there.
How do you explain a party like the BSP, where the current leader was groomed to take over, but there is no number two in the party.
When it comes to dynasticism among Dalit MPs, it is lower than several other castes. In 2014, around 8 per cent of Dalit MPs were dynastic, but the majority of the dynasts were from mainline parties like the Congress or the BJP. Our data reflect a very paradoxical and interesting point through this. It’s not that subaltern parties like the BSP do not patronise dynasties. But they do so from among upper caste candidates, as the threat of a dynasty to the central leadership from a subaltern group is greater in terms of dominating the party’s core. The insecurity of the leader is always tied to the survival prospects of the central leadership. Therefore for Mayawati, a Dalit dynasty is more of a threat than, say, promoting Satish Chandra Mishra’s family. Same with Samajwadi Party, the main dynasty there comes from the Yadav family, and promoting non-Yadav dynasties is less threatening to the leadership than promoting Yadav dynasties.
The Congress party has been going through a generational shift. Where do you see this going?
There is this debate over the efficacy of dynasty in leading the Congress party, especially in the aftermath of the 2014 elections. But what is also quite interesting is that even those who oppose Rahul Gandhi’s leadership are not putting forward a non-dynastic alternative. The alternative to Rahul Gandhi’s leadership in the Congress is Priyanka Gandhi. This ties into how Indian parties are so weakly organised that you have what I term as a “dynastic imperative”, where sooner or later, the need for loyalty, the need for trust within the party apparatus pushes even those leaders who were non-dynastic to begin with to go down this road. The best examples currently are Mamata Banerjee and Mayawati. For Ms. Banerjee, not being from a political dynasty was a huge part of her brand, but now we see her nephew being pushed forward. In the case ofMs. Mayawati, we see her brother getting active within the party. It remains to be seen how this will go.
So are we looking at a situation where dynasties are going to overrun party structures?
No, dynasties require parties to succeed in India. They are encased within parties. They cannot just win by themselves. The interesting thing about dynasts who have won elections is that parties are important. No dynast in these three Parliaments (2004, 2009, 2014) who has fought outside of a party structure has won. Also, in India, the number of independents who fight elections is going up, but those winning is decreasing. Therefore, however weak a party structure may appear, it remains important… The paradox therefore is that in India, parties are so weakly organised, but they remain so important.
