Democratic Innovations in a Developing Context: A Case to account for Political Market Imperfections

Democratic innovations can be seen as an important approach in the continuing evolution of a democratic state and as a successful strategy to extend the reach of the state both spatially and temporally. The evolving nature of democracy in India offers a good case to illustrate the necessity and the issues with democratic innovations in a developing country with political market imperfections. The various instances of democratic innovations over the past few decades in India can be seen as responses to the long-standing questions of relevance of the state, representative legitimacy and implementation ability. This paper explores the recent of Mohalla Sabhas in Delhi and compares it to the Panchayat reforms in West Bengal in 1977 and Kerala in 1996 which was instituted based on the 73rd and 74th amendments to the Indian constitution. This study of socio-political contexts and design choices of Panchayat reforms and Mohalla Sabhas are further compared across the four democratic goods framework of inclusiveness, popular control, considered judgment, and transparency. This article based on review of various research reports, empirical studies and analysis of live Mohalla Sabha video recordings, show that along with extending the reach of the state and political parties; pacifying dissent and co-option of vocal elites are also co-intents of these innovations. It also argues that apart from offering a necessary deliberative space; these democratic innovations, by design, are sparing in the devolution of power and can sometimes reproduce the same hierarchies, they are typically meant to forego. The study argues that issues of information asymmetry, patronage politics, social hierarchy and other issues of political market imperfections need to be factored into the democratic innovation framework to ensure a more inclusive and deliberative democracy.