Bihar is widely regarded as one of India’s poorest and most divided states. It has also been the site of many social movements that have left indelible marks on the state’s politics and identity. Little...
Participatory livelihoods projects are a popular model for anti-poverty projects in India. Such projects are implemented in several states of India through various partners - that include the national...
Caste is a persistent driver of inequality in India, and it is generally analyzed with government-defined broad categories, such as Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe. In everyday life, however, caste...
This paper examines the relationship between caste and gender inequality in three states in India. When households are grouped using conventional, government-defined categories of caste the paper finds...
It is widely acknowledged that top-down support is essential for bottom-up participatory projects to be effectively implemented at scale. However, which level of government, national or sub-national, should...
In many developing countries, environmental quality remains low and policies to improve it have been inconsistently effective. This paper conducts a case study of environmental policy in India, focusing...
This paper is organized in following headings: can we trust shoestring evaluations?; evaluation of development programs: randomized controlled trials or regressions?; effects of Colombia’s social protection...
In response to the problems of high coordination costs among the poor, efforts are underway in many countries to organize the poor through self-help groups (SHGs) - membership - based organizations that...
This paper provides an economic rationale for the practice of consanguineous marriages observed in parts of the developing world. In a model of incomplete marriage markets, dowries are viewed as ex ante...
In response to the problems of high coordination costs among the poor, efforts are underway in many countries to organize the poor through "self-help groups" (SHGs) -- membership-based organizations that...
The authors use recent data from the 2006 National Family Health Survey of India to explore the relationship between religion and demographic behavior. They find that fertility and mortality vary not only...
The institution of consanguineous marriage-a marriage contracted between close biological relatives-has been a basic building block of many societies in different parts of the world. This paper argues...