Governing India's Metropolises

International audienceUrban governance today is characterised by the multiplicity of actors involved in the management of local affairs. The questions for inquiry are: who are the individuals and institutions, public and private, who actually plan and manage urban affairs? In what ways do they do so? Whose interests are accommodated, and under what conditions can co-operative action be taken? And more generally, in what ways are interactions between the many actors of urban governance patterned? This volume discusses the governance of Indian metropolises with these questions in mind, and focuses especially on changes brought on by policies of liberalisation and decentralisation over the last 15 years. Governance is here analysed through a series of case studies from Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Hyderabad, focusing on six collective services: primary education, healthcare, subsidised food, slum rehabilitation, water and sanitation, and solid waste management. The book documents the continued appropriation of the state by an enlarged elite (including the vast middle class) and an incomplete democratisation of urban local bodies (evident in the lack of empowerment of municipal councillors), which goes along with a new economic regime as defined by new modes of engagement between the private sector and the state. Also, the concept of governance as it is operationalized in this volume highlights the importance of class in interactions between actors. By disentangling formal elements of governance (legitimised by the state) from informal ones (involving actors who are beyond the recognition of the state) the book ultimately reveals various power equations at play