ABSTRACT
In the quarter of a century that has passed since then, there has been a fundamental change in the historical situation of postcoloniality. The new conditions under which global flows of capital, commodities, information and people are now regulated have created both new opportunities and new obstacles for postcolonial countries. The old idea of a Third World, sharing a common history of colonial oppression and backwardness, is no longer as persuasive as it was in the 1960s. The phenomenal growth of China and India in recent years, has set in motion a process of social change that, in its scale and speed, is unprecedented in human history.
I will argue that the forms of capitalist industrial growth in the twenty-first century may, in large agrarian countries like China, India and the countries of South-east Asia, make room for the preservation of peasant production and peasant cultures, but under completely altered conditions. The analysis of these emergent forms of postcolonial capitalism requires new conceptual work.
Author¡¦s biography
Partha Chatterjee was born in 1947. After getting his BA degree in Political Science
at University of Calcutta, India, he went on to earn his Ph.D. degree in Political
Science at University of Rochester in 1971. After teaching there for a year, he went
back to India and worked at the Center for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta.
He became a professor in 1979 and has headed the Centre from 1997 until 2006.
He was also visiting professor at Columbia University, New York; Oxford
University, England; New School, New York; and Leiden University, the
Netherlands.
Contact address: Department of Anthropology, Rm. 462 Schermerhorn Extension
Columbia University in the City of New York, 1200 Amsterdam Ave. & W. 119th St.
New York, NY 10027-7054 |
