The comparative study of South Asian politics begins with many antecedent questions. What are the reasons why a strong national political identity in the Indian subcontinent was no consolidated and territorial boundaries defined until the advent of the British Raj? Alternatively, given major regional diversities, why did the subcontinent not become differentiated into a large number of national states on the model of Europe? To what extent was the movement toward a unified territorial state weakened by colonial policies that recast social groups in terms of new pan-Indian categories based on caste and religious identities? What factors led to the partition of the subcontinent at the time of independence on the basis of religion, and what consequences did partition have for the strategies adopted by each state to develop an overarching national identity and universal principles of legitimate state power? Although the greater part of the course will address these questions by analyzing the social and political dynamics of democracy in India, they are equally relevant for understanding the difficulties encountered by Pakistan in defining a core identity and a stable form of government.
