[Reader-list] Fwd: NMML Seminar_Dr. Navdeep Mathur_ 1 April 2013

[Nagraj Adve]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: nmml ccs01 <nmmlccs011 at gmail.com>
Date: 30 March 2013 18:02
Subject: NMML Seminar_Dr. Navdeep Mathur_ 1 April 2013
To:


*Nehru Memorial Museum and Library*

cordially invites you to a



Seminar



Title:  ‘Remaking the Urban State in India: The Ahmedabad River front in
Perspective’





Speaker: Dr. Navdeep Mathur, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.



Date: Monday, 1 April 2013



Time: 3.00 p.m.



Venue: Seminar Room, First Floor, Library Building, Nehru Memorial Museum
and Library, Teen Murti House, New Delhi



*Abstract:*

The last decade has witnessed a remarkable profusion of rhetoric and action
regarding urban transformations and the place of India’s cities in the
21st century.
 Much of the action has been State-coordinated, having internalised certain
implicit and explicit assumptions in the rhetoric of the role of markets
and private sector in urbanization and urban development. In particular the
central government’s flagship program, the JNNURM, has played a pivotal
role in reshaping how the State relates to urban space, encompassing and
framing its natural landscape as well as people. This process of
transformation (state-remaking) is illustrated using the example of
Ahmedabad where the commodification and appropriation of the Sabarmati
River became the site for the exercise of power by a transforming State  in
which private actors are formally privileged to make public decisions,
institutionalizing boundary blurring (particularly as seen in the use of
the term Partnerships). The presentation is based on 4 years of critical
research engagements spanning a variety of “urban projects” that paved new
trajectories of graded and inequitable re-subjectification of citizens.



*Navdeep Mathur* is Assistant Professor at the Public Systems Group, Indian
Institute of Management Ahmedabad. His research interests lie in
intersections between social justice and public services, democratic
governance, and the role and participation of communities in the processes
of planning and policymaking. He specializes in critical/interpretive
research methodology, and adopts research methodologies that are
collaborative and action oriented in nature. He teaches courses in critical
policy studies, participatory theatre for development, the impact of
corporations on social/cultural/ecological sustainability in a democratic
society, and interpretive research methods.