Prof. Dhanagare delivered the first lecture in the series “Perspectives on the Contemporary Societies” organized by the Departments of German, Sociology and Political Science under the ‘Quality Improvement Programme’ of the University of Pune. He spoke on Neo-Marxism, as an approach to developmental studies, focusing on the peculiar nature and problems of the Third World Countries. They are diagrammatically different from the western economies when they were in the developing phase. Hence the process of economic change in developing countries will not follow the trends set by the rich North.

He said that the developed world, figuratively, constitutes the core of world economy while the developing nations are the periphery, their ‘surplus’ flying to the core on the wings of international trade, currency flows, contract bindings etc…. Normal capitalism has been unable to thrive in the periphery due to various reasons.

He quoted Samir Amine who says that these are ‘Disarticulated Economies’. He referred to Amine’s analysis that the Indian political class is disoriented towards promoting the growth of capitalism, as such. The rate of investment in production units is too low; as surplus is diverted into commercial channels like retail, shares, real estate etc…; not contributing to the growth of capital formation. Dhanagare expressed concern over the low rate of savings in the Indian Economy which translates into low investment and ultimately, sluggish growth of production units. India needs 40% of its GDP to go into savings to sustain 10% growth, he said.

He also drew attention to the integration of pre-industrial socio-economic formations in the current capitalist development model. Instead of creating conditions which could annihilate institutions like bonded labour, child labor, landlordism, share cropping etc. the Indian capitalism benefits from them. It has not helped in eradicating, if not encouraged, the growing informal employment in our economy.

In a still radical flavor, he said that Neo-Marxism looks into how and who distributes surplus in the economy and the character of the political class administering this process. It tries to find reasons for increasing inequities. He also spoke of the plight of farmers. They have been made to practice monoculture and buy their subsistence needs from the market. They are increasingly vulnerable to desperate selling and inflation, not surprisingly. Vidarbha cuts out a representative example, he said.