Alien concepts and South Asian responses and reformulation

the long version

The endeavour to internationalise the social sciences has a long history. Some have advanced this cause as a genuine effort to foster a dispassionate understanding of human society without 'national' frontiers; others have perceived it as a way of establishing the ideological hegemony of either capitalism or socialism. In the latter confrontational framework, social scientists of the so-called 'Third World' are dismissed as mere pawns who are incapable of shaking off the vice-like grip of intellectual colonialism. In this thought-provoking book, Professor Oommen challenges such facile formulations and demonstrates that Indian social science is not a mere captive of Western or Marxian theories and concepts. The essays in the first part present a response to five important Western/Marxian theories and concepts: the old concept of dichotomy and the new one of continuum; Weber's notion of charismatic leaders; political pluralism; voluntary associations; and the nature of students' movements in the context of revolution. In the second part, Professor Oommen reformulates some of the theories and concepts. Among the phenomena he evaluates are the nature of the political mobilization of the agrarian classes; the juxtaposition of movements and institutions; the theory of alienation; the relationship between Hinduism and economic development; and the concepts of state, nation and ethnie. Both the responses and reformulations are based on empirical evidence from Asia.