Ep 290: Karthik Muralidharan Examines the Indian State
The Seen and the Unseen - hosted by Amit Varma
The Over Centralization of State Governments
Constitution was designed for war time, but it got rotinized and became subservient to the central government. It's important not just to blame the centre, rigt the bigger culprit is state governments because they have not actually decentralized any authority to local governments. Nobody wants to climb the long climbing the greasy, polar power to get to the top and then give it away? Like, you know. So there's all these tendencies towards over centralization.
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In 1947, few people gave us 75 years. Bloody hell, here we are! And it is up to us now to make this country the best version of itself. Karthik Muralidharan joins Amit Varma in episode 290 of The Seen and the Unseen to discuss one of our problem areas: the Indian state. Can we fix it? Yes we can! (For full linked show notes, go to SeenUnseen.in.) Also check out: 1. Karthik Muralidharan on Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Scholar and UCSD. 2. Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS) 3. Fixing Indian Education -- Episode 185 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Karthik Muralidharan). 4. Understanding Indian Healthcare -- Episode 225 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Karthik Muralidharan). 5. General equilibrium effects of (improving) public employment programs: experimental evidence from India -- The paper on NREGA by Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukhtankar. 6. Kashmir and Article 370 -- Episode 134 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Srinath Raghavan). 7. The Citizenship Battles -- Episode 152 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Srinath Raghavan). 8. The Loneliness of the Indian Woman — Episode 259 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shrayana Bhattacharya). 9. In Service of the Republic — Vijay Kelkar and Ajay Shah. 10. The Art and Science of Economic Policy — Episode 154 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Vijay Kelkar and Ajay Shah). 11. Pramit Bhattacharya Believes in Just One Ism -- Episode 256 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Pramit Bhattacharya). 12. The Paradox of Narendra Modi — Episode 102 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shashi Tharoor). 13. The Life and Times of Montek Singh Ahluwalia -- Episode 285 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Montek Singh Ahluwalia). 14. Episodes of The Seen and the Unseen on the creator ecosystem with Roshan Abbas, Varun Duggirala, Neelesh Misra, Snehal Pradhan, Chuck Gopal, Nishant Jain, Deepak Shenoy and Abhijit Bhaduri. 15. The Case Against Sugar — Gary Taubes. 16. The Big Fat Surprise — Nina Teicholz. 17. The Forgotten Greatness of PV Narasimha Rao -- Episode 283 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Vinay Sitapati). 18. The Macroeconomist as Scientist and Engineer -- N Gregory Mankiw. 19. The Gated Republic -- Shankkar Aiyar. 20. Despite the State — M Rajshekhar. 21. The Power Broker— Robert Caro. 22. The Death and Life of Great American Cities — Jane Jacobs. 23. India’s Security State -- Episode 242 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Josy Joseph). 24. We Are Fighting Two Disasters: Covid-19 and the Indian State -- Amit Varma. 25. India’s Lost Decade — Episode 116 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Puja Mehra). 26. The Importance of the 1991 Reforms -- Episode 237 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shruti Rajagopalan and Ajay Shah). 27. State Building: Governance and World Order in the 21st Century — Francis Fukuyama. 28. The Origins of Political Order — Francis Fukuyama. 29. Political Order and Political Decay — Francis Fukuyama. 30. Computer Nahi Monitor -- Episode 5 of season 1 of Panchayat. 31. 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Our Parliament and Our Democracy -- Episode 253 of The Seen and the Unseen (w MR Madhavan). 58. Elite Imitation in Public Policy -- Episode 180 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shruti Rajagopalan and Alex Tabarrok). 59. Urban Governance in India -- Episode 31 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Shruti Rajagopalan). 60. The Life and Times of Abhinandan Sekhri -- Episode 254 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Abhinandan Sekhri). 61. The Tiebout Model. 62. Every Act of Government Is an Act of Violence -- Amit Varma. 63. Taxes Should Be Used for Governance, Not Politics -- Amit Varma. 64. The Effects of Democratization on Public Goods and Redistribution: Evidence from China -- Nancy Qian, Gerard Padró i Miquel, Monica Martinez-Bravo and Yang Yao. 65. Sneaky Artist Sees the World -- Episode 260 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Nishant Jain). 66. Science and Covid-19 -- Episode 221 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Anirban Mahapatra). 66. 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Objects Speak to Annapurna Garimella -- Episode 257 of The Seen and the Unseen. 78. Letters for a Nation: From Jawaharlal Nehru to His Chief Ministers 1947-1963 -- Edited by Madhav Khosla. 79. To Raise a Fallen People -- Rahul Sagar. 80. The Progressive Maharaja -- Rahul Sagar. 81. India = Migration -- Episode 128 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Chinmay Tumbe). 82. India: A Sacred Geography -- Diana Eck. 83. Unlikely is Inevitable — Amit Varma. 84. The Law of Truly Large Numbers. 85. Political Ideology in India -- Episode 131 of The Seen and the Unseen (w Rahul Verma). Check out Amit’s online course, The Art of Clear Writing. And subscribe to The India Uncut Newsletter. It’s free! The illustration for this episode is by Nishant Jain aka Sneaky Artist. Check out his podcast, Twitter, Instagram and Substack.
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