John Harriss
Professor Emeritus, Simon Fraser University
PhD, University of East Anglia
Mackintosh-Corry Hall, B411
Queen's University
Department of Global Development Studies
Much of my research has been underpinned by an interest in the political economy of development. One expression of this is in my comparative work on the politics of development across Indiaâs major states, and in recent writing on the political economy of development in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. But my research has ranged widely, from an early but still continuing interest in agricultural development and agrarian change, and a little later in labour studies, to more recent work on civil society and democratic politics, and on social policy. These came together in a study, carried on with Indian and Scandinavian scholars, on the possibilities of the renewal of social democratic development. Most of my research has been focused on India, though I have also worked in Indonesia, Malaysia and Mexico, as well as in the other South Asian countries. Current project: writing a new book on Indian politics and society.
Professor Emeritus, Simon Fraser University
Cross Appointed to the Department of Global Development Studies and Cultural Studies
1982 Capitalism and Peasant Farming: Agrarian Structure and Ideology in Northern Tamil Nadu. Bombay: Oxford University Press
1982 Rural Development: Theories of Peasant Economy and Agrarian Change. London: Hutchinson Education (and later editions)
2000 (with Stuart Corbridge) Reinventing India; Economic Liberalization, Hindu Nationalism and Popular Politics. Cambridge: Polity Press
2001 Depoliticizing Development: the World Bank and Social Capital. London: Anthem Press
2013 (with Stuart Corbridge and Craig Jeffrey) India Today: Economy, Politics and Society. Cambridge: Polity Press
2016 (with Olle Tornquist) Reinventing Social Democratic Development. Copenhagen: Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
Journal Articles
1986 âThe Working Poor and the Labour Aristocracy in a South Indian City: a descriptive and analytical accountâ, Modern Asian Studies, 20, 2 pps 231-284. [reprinted in an Oxford Reader, Urban Studies edited by Sujata Patel and S Deb, Oxford University Press, 2007]
1999 âComparing Political Regimes Across Indian Statesâ, Economic and Political Weekly, vol XXXIV, no 48, pps 3367-3377
2002 âThe Case for Cross-Disciplinary Approaches in International Developmentâ, World Development, 30, 3 pp 487-496
2003 âThe Great Tradition Globalizes: reflections on two studies of âthe industrial leadersâ of Madrasâ, Modern Asian Studies. April 2003 [reprinted in Knut A Jacobsen (ed) Modern Indian Culture and Society. London & New York: Routledge, 2009]
2003 ââWidening the Radius of Trustâ: Ethnographic Explorations of Trust and Indian Businessâ, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, vol 9, no 4, pp 755-773
2006 âMiddle Class Activism and the Politics of the Informal Working Class: A Perspective on Class Relations and Civil Society in Indian Citiesâ. Critical Asian Studies 38, 4, pp 445-465
2013 âDoes âLandlordismâ Still Matter? Reflections on Agrarian Change in Indiaâ, Journal of Agrarian Change, 13 (3): 351-64
Book Chapters
2001 âIntroduction: the Anthropology of the Indian Stateâ, in, V Benei and C J Fuller, eds, The Everyday State and Society in Modern India. Delhi: Social Science Publishers and London: Hurst & Co. (with C J Fuller)
2008 âExplaining Economic Change: The Relations of Politics, Institutions and Cultureâ, in Alexander Ebner and Nikolaus Beck, editors, The Institutions of the Market: Organizations, Social Systems and Governance. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press
2009 âBringing Politics Back Into Poverty Analysis: Why Understanding of Social relations Matters More for Policy on Chronic Poverty than Measurementâ, in T Addison, D Hulme and R Kanbur (eds) Poverty Dynamics. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press
2018 âBusiness and Politics: The Tamil Nadu Puzzleâ, in C Jaffrelot, A Kohli and K Murali (eds) Business and Politics in India. New York: Oxford University Press