Work, Institutions and Sustainable Livelihood: Issues and Challenges of Transformation

by Virginius Xaxa, Debdulal Saha, Rajdeep Singha

Overview

The book explores the debates surrounding sustainable livelihood in the neoliberal era effected through transformation of the nature of work and the role of institutions, particularly in the Global South. By creating gainful work and employment opportunities through formal and informal institutions using progressive instruments and innovations within rural and urban economies, livelihood becomes ‘sustainable’, thereby reducing inequality and increasing resilience among households.

Based on both theoretical and empirical studies from Asia and Africa, the book establishes the relationship between three broad concepts – work, institutions and sustainable development. The content has been divided into three broad sections: Rural Economy and Its Transformations; Urbanisation and Sustainable Livelihood; and Innovations and Instruments of Transformation. This book is a valuable resource for scholars of development studies, rural and urban studies, labour studies besides economics, sociology, political science and policymaking.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789811354823
Publisher:	Springer Nature Singapore
Publication date:	12/11/2018
Edition description:	Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 2017
Pages:	333
Product dimensions:	5.83(w) x 8.27(h) x (d)

About the Author

Virginius Xaxa is Professor of Eminence at Tezpur University and former Deputy Director of Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Guwahati Campus, Assam, India. He is the author of Economic Dualism and Structure of Class (1997) and State, Society and Tribes (2008), co-author of Plantation Labour in India (1996) and co-editor of Social Exclusion and Adverse Inclusion: Adivasis in India (2012).

Debdulal Saha is an assistant professor at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Guwahati Campus, Assam, India. He is the author of Informal Markets, Livelihood and Politics: Street Vendors in Urban India (2017), co-author of Financial Inclusion of the Marginalised (2013) and co-editor of Food Crisis and its Implication on Labour (2013).

Rajdeep Singha is an assistant professor and chairperson of the Centre for Labour Studies and Social Protection at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Guwahati Campus, Assam, India. Prior to joining TISS, he taught at the Department of Economics at St. Joseph's College (Autonomous), Bengaluru, and was a research associate at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.

Table of Contents

List of Tables

List of Figures

List of Abbreviations

About Editors

List of Contributors

Preface

Introduction

Virginius Xaxa, Debdulal Saha and Rajdeep Singha

Part I Rural Economy and its Transformation

1. Rural Transformation and Indigenous Peoples in India

Virginius Xaxa

 2. Ghana’s Gold Boom and Multinational Corporations: Resource Nationalism or Countervailing Force?

Patrick Kwamla Agbesinyale

3. Augmenting Small Farmers’ Income through Rural Non-farm Sector in India: Role of Information and Institutions

Meenakshi Rajeev and Manojit Bhattacharjee

4. Social Welfare, Unemployment and Public Works in Rural Southern Mozambique

Ruth Castel-Branco

5. Understanding social reality(ies) of rural livelihoods: Insights from a comprehensive study in two villages in Mozambique

Claudia Levy

Part II Urbanization and Sustainable Livelihood

6. A New Approach to Rural Labour Mobility in the Labour Surplus Economy: A Tripartite Labour Supply Model

Cheng Li

7. Urbanization, Land Alienation and Proletarianization: a Study of Rajbansis in North Bengal

Hemantika Basu

8. Street Food, Food Safety and Sustainability in Emerging Mega City: Insights from an Empirical Study in Hyderabad, India

Christoph Dittrich

Part III Innovations and Instruments in Transformation

9. The Promises of New Instruments for the Promotion of Decent Work

Christoph Scherrer and Stefan Beck

10. Microcredits, Returns and Gender: of Reliable Poor Women and Financial Inclusion in South Asia

Christa Wichterich

11. Organizing the Informal Economy in Senegal

Thomas Greven

Index

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Xaxa, Saha and Singha tackle some of the most urgent questions that face the lower income half of the world. This collection is a necessary contribution to a momentous global dialogue.” (Chris Tilly, Professor of Urban Planning, UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, Los Angeles, USA)

“The challenge in the developing world is to enable institutions that trigger sustainable work and development. This insightful book critically discusses various attempts towards that objective in different economic sectors and regions of the world. It is an important contribution to our understanding of livelihoods and the socio-economic and political forces that influence them.” (Errol D’Souza, Professor of Economics and Dean (Faculty), IIM Ahmedabad, India)

“The volume carries insightful contributions on critical issues of rural and urban transformation in Asian and African countries focusing on marginalized sections. It will be of value to scholars and policy-makers who are engaged in understanding the dynamics of the process of securing sustainable livelihood in contemporary times.” (Manoranjan Mohanty, Former Professor of Political Science, University of Delhi, India, and Editor, Social Change)