Create the opportunity for people to enter the market

Amartya Sen tells Shekhar Gupta, Editor-in-Chief of The Indian Express, the success of a global entry into a global economy depends to a great extent also on what we do within the nation. Excerpts from an interview on NDTV 24X7’s Walk the Talk:The Indian Express Tuesday, July 27, 2004

I think the special feature that Shantiniketan had is that it had great pride in the Indian tradition, Indian identity, and yet it had a very strong awareness of the world. It’s a globalisation in itself, not so much economic globalisation but a cultural one. And one in which the globalised world wasn’t just as what was quite standard then—mainly India and Britain—but also other countries, like China and Japan and the Far East and Africa, other European countries, America, all these were very present in our lives. I think globalisation has two features, one is the globalisation of idea, not being parochial, not being what in Sanskrit they would say koopamanduk, that is being a frog in the well, and have an awareness of the whole world. That’s one thing. Some of the debate about globalisation today is not about that, of course, because lots of the supporters of open ideas happen to be rather critical of the economic opening-up. So that’s a separate issue.

In order for the Indian economy to flourish in the global economy, in a way that benefits every section, what you need is a comprehensive programme, much more radicalism than they actually had. I’m very much in favour of the Indian economy. It’s playing a big part in the global economy, we are able to do it. We can produce competitively, we have the talents and the resources and the opportunity to expand our presence in the world in a big way, in the economy too. And yet, at the same time, what we have to do is make sure that it’s not just a small section who succeeds. And of course, we all take pride in the success of the Indian information technology and software industry and they’ve done tremendously well and we’re proud of it. But that’s a small group and even the leaders of this group will tell you that they are concerned that a lot of people in India are excluded.

So the radicalism is to create the opportunity for people to enter the market. You know my main complaint about the market economy—I’m one of those who think the market economy has many merits and I also take the market seriously enough to want everybody to be able to enter it—but in a situation where people are illiterate, where people suffer from tremendous health problems, no micro-credits, there’s no way they can enter the market.