Centre for Policy Research & Trivedi Centre for Political Data (Ashoka University) invite you to a discussion on
‘Blackout: The Political Dynamics of Power Outages’ by Brian Min
Discussants:
Brian Min, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Michigan
Neelanjan Sircar, Senior Visiting Fellow, Centre for Policy Research
Ashwini K. Swain, Fellow, Centre for Policy Research
Moderator:
Gilles Verniers, Assistant Professor of Political Science & Co-Director of the Trivedi Centre for Political Data, Ashoka University
About the Discussion
Access to electricity in India has increased dramatically in recent decades. On the other hand, the quality of electricity remains uneven in some areas, characterized by blackouts, load shedding, and reliability problems. Brian Min introduce new data on power outages derived from satellite imagery captured nightly over each village since the 1990s. The data suggest that the rapid implementation of village electrification projects has often coincided with a decline in the quality of electricity service. The worst outages are in areas which most aggressively pursued new electrification efforts. The patterns are consistent with an electoral strategy that prioritizes more visible, short-term accomplishments over less visible longer-term investments jn service quality. The results support an electoral explanation for the quality deficit that characterizes the delivery of many public services in democracies across the world.
About the Series
The CPR-TCPD Dialogues on Indian Politics brings together academicians, policy and political practitioners, and civil society actors to grapple with important social and political issues in India. It provides a forum for intellectually rigorous, non-partisan commentary to strengthen public discourse on politics in India. This dialogue series is an effort to understand the changing dynamics of Indian political parties, the impact of new and emerging social movements and the use of new instruments of mobilisation in our polity.
The CPR-TCPD Dialogues is curated by the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) and the Trivedi Centre for Political Data (TCPD) at Ashoka University. Founded in 1973, CPR is one of India’s leading think tanks, providing rigorous policy research on a variety of issues. Founded in 2015, TCPD is among India’s most well-respected institutions working with political data, providing data-driven research, policy work and journalism on India’s political life by producing and disseminating in open access scientifically collected and treated political data. The CPR-TCPD Dialogues leverages the unique strengths of these two institutions to provide rigorous and innovative commentary on India’s social and political challenges.
Please RSVP at president.cpr@cprindia.org. The seating at the venue can accommodate up to 60 people on a first come first serve basis.
