Penn IUR Book Talk with Sai Balakrishnan

On February 20, Penn IUR hosted a book talk for the latest release in the City in the 21st Century (C21) book series, Shareholder Cities: Land Transformations Along Urban Corridors in India (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019), by Penn IUR Scholar Sai Balakrishnan, Assistant Professor of Urban Planning, Harvard University. In Shareholder Cities, Balakrishnan argues that some of India's most decisive urban conflicts will unfold along the new economic corridors being built through formerly agricultural lands to connect Indian cities.

Balakrishnan began her talk by explaining that the idea of a sharp urban-rural divide in India—a conception common to many Western depictions of the country—is inaccurate. She described instead an “entangled agrarian-urban” situation in which different social and economic systems are in tension. Her research, she said, focuses on the encounters between electorally strong agrarian classes and financially powerful urban firms, two groups that are being brought into conflict by urban development along the country’s new economic corridors. In her book, Balakrishnan explores how these power struggles are playing out in Maharashtra state along the Mumbai-Pune Expressway, the first economic corridor built in India.

Balakrishnan outlined for the book talk audience the political dynamics at play in three new towns along the expressway: Magarpatta, Lavasa, and Khed. As she described, the construction funding and ownership models in each of these towns represent different ways of negotiating a conflict between two major reforms in India’s recent history: the marketization of agricultural land and the enfranchisement of the rural population. Balakrishnan offered several examples of how urbanization has unfolded differently for these communities, explaining that the use of collectively pooled resources among agrarian property owners has led to different development outcomes than in towns constructed with government or private funding.

In the question-and-answer session following her talk, Balakrishnan expanded on the political ramifications of urbanization along India’s economic corridors, saying that she sees an opportunity for a “new social contract between territory, citizen, and state.” To realize an inclusive outcome—creating what she calls a “shareholder city”—Balakrishnan recommends that planners embrace local social movements and look beyond city boundaries to anticipate regional transformations. As more corridors cross the Indian countryside in the future, Balakrishnan hopes her research will inspire leaders to work with agrarian populations to ensure that development doesn’t lead to displacement.

For a list of all books in the C21 series, and to buy Shareholder Cities: Land Transformations Along Urban Corridors in India, visit https://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/series/C21.html.