Social disorganization in a modernizing Dalit community

Abstract

India has a traditional community justice forum, known as the panchayat, which settles disputes, keeping them from escalating into serious problems. However, this forum is in decline, with serious consequences for Indian communities. Here we analyze how the demise of the panchayat in the Dalit (untouchable) community of Pudur contributed to serious conflicts and crime. Panchayats have been impacted by India’s democratization, economic development, and urbanization. Dalits, especially, want to be independent, equal, and economically prosperous. In Pudur these needs have disrupted collective sentiment to an extent that fulfillment of them has become difficult. That several non-Dalits live in Pudur has made panchayat success even more unattainable. Socially disorganizing forces—modernization, opposing values of equality and caste hierarchy, intergenerational frictions, and Pudur’s unique history and caste composition—have all contributed to the panchayat’s demise and social ills. Modern societies looking for innovative solutions to crime through community justice can learn from Pudur’s negative experiences.

Acknowledgments

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. SES-8721483.

Notes

1 Dalit, “the oppressed,” is currently used to refer to untouchables by scholars and untouchables in India, including increasingly the Paraiyar caste in this study. It is displacing “harijan,” which was in use in South India 20 years ago during our initial study. The term “Paraiyar,” the actual caste name, is an anathema, especially to younger members of the caste.

2 The panchayat, a council of five elders (though it can contain more), processes disputes and norm-violations, sometimes even crimes which should be brought to police attention; it also administers village projects, such as temple building and maintenance, water works, and roads. There are two types of traditional panchayats, caste and village. Caste panchayats decide issues and disputes internal to their caste; in the past they enforced caste rules and decorum. They cooperate with other castes constituting the community. In multicaste communities castes are held together under the authority of the village panchayat, which consists of higher caste landowners, or by the numerically and economically dominant caste through its caste panchayat. Dalits, who have been made to live on the outskirts of the village or in separate hamlets, have their own panchayats. The Pudur panchayat could be considered a village panchayat in the mode of “dominant caste panchayat,” since there are only a few non-Dalit families living in Pudur, and all the Pudur panchayat elders are Dalit.