The politics of the urban informal sector and dominant social institutions : a case study on the Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA)

Since the 1970's the economics of the urban informal sector (UIS) has received tremendous attention in development literature. Recently, scholars have delved into the politics within which this sector is embedded. With respect to the politics of its external relationship, conventional wisdom argued that quintessential to achieving positive outcomes for the UIS poor was the practice of autonomy of groups representing-the latter from dominant social institutions such as unions of formal sector workers, political parties and the government since political processes operating through these institutions was unresponsive to the needs of the UIS poor. The objective of this research is to revisit the history of an organization that has delivered positive outcomes for the UIS poor with the ultimate objective of answering the following questions: What is the nature of relationship between the UIS poor and dominant social institutions, primarily, the government? What are the conditions, if any, under which there could be a more cooperative and complementary relationship between these actors, while ensuring positive outcomes for the UIS poor? Can these conditions be generalized or are they time, place and case specific? I analyze the case study of the Self-Employed Women's Association (SEWA) to answer these questions. SEWA is one of India's most successful voluntary organizations having its roots in the trade union movement in India and has since 1972 organized more than 300,000 UIS women workers. I analyze the above-mentioned relationships during SEWA's evolution from its birth to its growth.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2004

Author dc:creator

• Venkatesh, Harini, 1978-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Bishwapriya Sanyal.

• Urban Studies and Planning.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/17705

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/17705