Expertise, legitimacy and subjectivity: Three techniques for a will to govern low carbon energy projects in India

Abstract

This paper advances the understanding of the politics of governing energy for development projects by non-state actors. Building on Tania Murray Li’s work on trusteeship, and drawing on governmentality studies, along with ethnographic insights from two low carbon energy projects, this paper illuminates two less examined aspects of politics of energy projects. First, the designs of these projects embed particular imagined subjects, and specific techniques, to afford governance. In particular, trustees use techniques of expertise, techniques of legitimacy, and techniques of subjectivity. Second, trusteeship is a contingent phenomenon as a clear line between trustees and subjects is often missing. Many actors, simultaneously trustees and subjects, also carry socio-cultural subjectivities of class, caste and gender, which complicates the conduct of conduct. Some trustees look for benefiting people, some for profits, some to make a political career and, yet others, to support their social groups. By engaging with trusteeship, the paper flags that the governance techniques do not always benefit the ‘beneficiaries’ and are often counterproductive. The article emerges from nine-month ethnographic research done in 2012–13 in five villages in India using participant observations, interviews and group discussion, in addition to analysis of project websites and documentary materials.