The Making of Neo-liberal India: Nationalism, Gender and the Paradoxes of Globalisation

This book examines the impact of globalisation on the discourse on Indian culture and identity. Though concerned primarily with developments following the liberalisation of the economy in the early 1990s, an extended history is provided of each of the issues addressed, which reveals the gradual mutations in definitions of ‘women’s liberation’ or ‘national security.’ Three sites of public debate are explored — the introduction of satellite television and the opening up of the airwaves; the 1996 Miss World pageant; and India’s declaration of nuclear weapons capability in 1998. Drawing on sources ranging from court cases to commercial advertising, the author tracks the efforts to realign the borders and boundaries of the nation-state through the rhetoric of safeguarding sexual mores and of masculine virility.