State spatial restructuring, subnational politics and emerging spaces of engagement for collective action: Labour regimes in Tamil Nadu, southern India

Abstract

This paper contributes to the emerging literature on state rescaling by examining how processes of restructuring in late transitioning countries like India shape spaces of collective action for labour. India’s subnational States, which have become increasingly critical scales for shaping processes of economic restructuring, face competing governance imperatives. On one hand, they must offer a business-friendly environment, including cheap labour, in order to attract private investments. On the other hand, in a democratic polity, they are compelled to secure political power through electoral appeal to labour. Through a study of labour regimes in the southern State of Tamil Nadu, I argue that subnational governments have responded to this challenge by enabling a scale of labour governance that undermines labour’s ability to engage with new spaces of collective action opened up by reforms and globalization. Rather, the State subsidizes labour through welfare provisioning in their residential spaces even as it draws upon inter-State migrant labour that wields less electoral power.