India is one of the countries which looks upon industrial development as the golden means for improving the living standards of her teeming millions. Why India lags behind in industrial development in spite of the strenuous efforts made under successive plans since independence, is a question asked both by the scholars and ordinary people alike. In Culture and Industrial development: the Indian experience, the author makes an earnest attempt to uncover how culture matters in industrial development by examining the Indian experience. The thrust of the study is to examine the whole process of industrial development by focusing on the entrepreneur and the industrial worker, the two human agents involved in industrial activities. While entrepreneurial activities were growing at a niggardly rate during the pre-independence period apparently on account of the absence of any mercantile tradition, the entry of the state as an entrepreneur has been detrimental to an upsurge in entrepreneurial development during the post-independence period. Marxian ideology, which is hostile to capitalism and which became the accepted creed with a sizable section of the people in states like Kerala and West Bengal has been obstructing the growth of industrial ventures under private enterprise by creating an unfriendly environment. To the Indian tradition relating to work which is termed as "aram", meaning rest and relaxation, militancy also has been added as another component in the behavioural pattern especially with the organized labour since independence. Needless to say, such behavioural pattern also stands in the way of any orderly development of industries. In sum Dr. Joseph presents an array of facts and figures gathered from the Indian experience to uncover how development resistant elements of culture thwart the process of industrialization of any country.
There are no reviews yet.