| Summary: | Prerna Singh’s book comes with some trailing glory: It won the 2016 Woodrow
Wilson Foundation Award of the American Political Science Association,
and was also a co-winner of the 2016 Barrington Moore Book Award of the
American Sociological Association. It deals with some important questions:
Why do some Indian states have better social service provision and welfare
outcomes than others? What are the conditions that promote social welfare?
What best explains the stark variations in educational and health outcomes
within India? How might it be possible to improve outcomes in laggard states
such as Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar towards those achieved by Tamil
Nadu and Kerala?
The comparisons between these three north and two south Indian states
are well known to economists, public health specialists and educationalists,
but there are few good explanations out there that try to account for these
differences. In the feld of political economy, one of theseincreasingly
challengedis that public goods are less likely to be delivered in settings of
social diversity, as indicated by caste, religion or ethnicity. Singh’s contribution
to the debate is that “subnational solidarity fosters a sense of collective
welfare, promotes political awareness and participation, and encourages
popular monitoring of public goods” (55).
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