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The lessons and non-lessons of Kerala: agricultural labourers and poverty
Economic and political weekly • 15 (41, 42, 43) • Published In 1980 • Pages: 1781-1783, 1785, 1789, 1793, 1795, 1797, 1799, 1801-1802
By: Mencher, Joan P..
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
In the 1960s and early 1970s, the government of Kerala undertook a series of public campaigns that resulted in higher literacy rates and improved access to health, reflected not just in an expansion of clinics but in real drops in child mortality, food insecurity and other health risks. The state was hailed as an exemplary case for improving the wellbeing of rural people without political revolution or huge amounts of development aid. This study examines the validity of this optimistic claim based on detailed accounts of changes at the household and community levels. Focusing on Kerala’s large agricultural labor class, the study concludes that the majority of these workers did not benefit from "the miracle of Kerala," not even from the land reform for which they had militantly fought.
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Research and development
- Real property
- Agricultural science
- Cereal agriculture
- Castes
- Political movements
- Political parties
- Medical care
- Medical personnel
- Birth statistics
- Morbidity
- Mortality
- Labor supply and employment
- Income and demand
- Wages and salaries
- Hospitals and clinics
- Preventive medicine
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Kerala
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 2017
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- Asia
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- South Asia
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- article
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Anthropologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- Teferi Abate Adem ; 2016
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- 1970-1975
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 1940-1980
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- Palakkad, Alappuzha, and Kottayam districts, Kerala, India
- NotesAdditional notes
- Joan P. Mencher
- Includes bibliographical references (p. 1802)
- LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
- sa 67002009
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Kerala (India)