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The Rediscovery of India
What makes India a nation? What has held its many disparate societies with their diverse, sometimes conflicting, narratives together for more than sixty years? What has allowed India to sustain its commitment to the democratic process, given its location in a region that is largely undemocratic? In this magisterial analysis of the last five hundred years of Indian history, Meghnad Desai looks at India's colonial past, its struggle for independence and its many contemporary conundrums, to discover answers to the questions that have confronted India-watchers for decades. Meghnad Desai draws on a wealth of sources to illuminate India's journey to the twenty-first century. Whether it is an examination of British parliamentary debates on the question of India's independence, or the liberalization of the economy after decades of licence-permit raj, or the state's complicity in the Gujarat riots, Meghnad Desai's original, occasionally iconoclastic, approach to seemingly settled arguments makes The Rediscovery of India a path-breaking and comprehensive account of India's past and present.
Arguing for a Better World
The publication will reflect Lord Desai's work in diverse fields of the social sciences (economics, philosophy, political science) as well as his passionate commitment to the freedom and wellbeing of individuals, and his optimism about human progress and globalisation.
The Selected Essays of Meghanad Desai: Macroeconomics and monetary theory
Meghnad Desai's work presents a significant challenge to economics as currently practised. This volume brings together a collection of essays on issues in macroeconomics and monetary theory from an unorthodox but rigorous position. Beginning with a series of essays which address the inflation problem using an extension of the Goodwin model, the volume continues with his revisionist interpretation of the Phillips Curve, assessments of monetarism, discussion of the economics of Keynes and Hayek, and an original paper on monetary theory. Later chapters include the author's work on applied econometrics, endogenous and exogenous money, and financial innovation. The volume also includes a substantial autobiographical preface, in which Lord Desai explains how he became an economist and the influences behind the development of his thought, as well as a specific introduction explaining how he came to produce the papers included in this volume.
Pakeezah
Meghnad Desai tracks the film's tortuous journey and reveals fascinating, little-known aspects of it. He foregrounds the craftsmanship, perseverance and perfectionism of its maker, Kamal Amrohi, who would wait weeks for the perfect sunset. Desai sees the film as a 'Muslim social' set in a 'Lucknow of the Muslim imagination', as a woman-centric film with a dancing heroine at a time when they were a rarity and above all, as a film that harkes back to an era of 'nawabi culture with its exquisite tehzeeb', a world that is lost forever. Pakeezah: An Ode to a Bygone World is a fitting tribute to a film that Meghnad Desai calls 'a monument to the golden age of Hindustani films'.
Testing Monetarism
Testing Monetarism pursues the complex question of the nature of the controversy surrounding monetarist theory and evidence, and the reasons for the persistence of this controversy. The theory of monetarism is examined in its old guise as the Quantity Theory of Money, and subsequent chapters look at the evolution of the theory to its present form in the period since the 1950's, and Desai weaves together issues of theory with those of econometric evidence. He looks in turn at major predictions of monetarism, critically examining the claims made in the literature in the light of his discussion of the methodology of testing theories and highlights flaws in the empirical data surrounding monetarism.
Rethinking Development and Politics
This collection of essays has been collated from Professor Lord Meghnad Desai's published and unpublished papers written between 1994 and 2016. It will provide ideas and inspiration for those seeking humanitarian solutions to the problems that confront us all.
Rethinking Islamism
Despite increasingly frantic calls - especially after the London bombings of July 7, 2005 - for western leaders to 'understand Islam better', there is a still a critical distinction that needs to be made between 'Islam' as religion and 'Islamism' in the sense of militant mindset. As the author of this provocative new book sees it, it is not a more nuanced understanding of Islam that will help the western powers defeat the jihadi threat, but rather a proper understanding of Islamism: a political ideology which is quite distinct from religion. While Islamism may be draped in religious imagery and suffused by apocalyptic language, it nevertheless is similar in nature to secular ideologies of terror. And once, the author holds, this is properly appreciated, the ways to defeat it will become much better evident. Historically sophisticated and passionately argued, "Rethinking Islamism" makes a powerful case by a master theorist of political philosophy. It will be essential reading for students and policy-makers in the fields of politics, current affairs and religion.
Dead On Time
For the Right Honourable Harry White, Britain's charismatic and politically savvy prime minister, it is a busy day like any other at 10 Downing Street. Every minute is packed with politics, people and policies, and the odd flirtation. There is a peremptory invitation to lunch with megalomaniac media lord Matt Drummond, a parliamentary rebellion to be batted away, an urgent call from the White House about a crisis in the Middle East. Until, finally, Harry White and his entourage are ready to fly to Glasgow for the last item on their schedule: the Old Firm game between Rangers and Celtic, the traditional Scottish rivals. It is a game that Harry has little interest in, but there are at least tw...
Raisina Model
Meghnad Desai reflects on Indian democracy as it completes seventy years of colourful, eventful and energetic parliamentary existence. Pulling no punches, Desai looks at the history and evolution of Indian democratic institutions, pinpointing their achievements, but also their repeated failure to live up to the standards envisaged by the nation's founders. Drawing on his own career as a Labour peer in Britain's House of Lords, Desai has the rare understanding and familiarity with the process of politics, and is able therefore to identify its universal features and zoom in on its uniquely Indian aspects. This is a candid, reflective and unsparing view of the precepts and practice of Indian politics. It traces at the evolution and growth of identity politics, coalition governments and single-party rule and the differing political narratives of the north and the south. The Raisina Model is a critical and frequently uncomfortable meditation on India's contemporary political culture.
