From Protests to Policies: Actors, Spaces and Processes

Abstract

This paper addresses a rather understudied aspect of the ways through which protests get translated into policies by focussing on the actors, spaces and processes. It further identifies key actors in the policy making formulation process, which we call ‘policy intermediaries’. It discusses the emergence of ‘policy intermediaries’ in relation to the history of social movements in post-colonial India. It situates the policy making processes in the country and the role of ‘policy intermediaries’ therein, in the overall context of changing configurations of relationships amongst the state, non-governmental organisations, think tanks and the emergent transnational networks and discourses. By implication, it maps out some of the attributes of middle class activism with illustrations from select social movements in India. The paper explores the multiple spaces in which ‘policy intermediaries’ function, the diverse roles they play and the networks in which they are wilfully or otherwise enmeshed.