Conversations on Institutions and Public Policy *

Abstract

Centre for Budget and Policy Studies, a public policy research institute, recently celebrated completion of 25 years of its existence and work with a two-day conference on Institutions and Public Policy. The conference explored the relationships between institutions and public policy in relation to the themes of independent institutions and policy discourse, gender and public spaces, education as a public good, public finance and governance, health and social security. This descriptive article, acting in-part as the Proceedings for the Conference, engages with the various dimensions of these themes and summarises the major arguments articulated within the conference.

Introduction

The Centre for Budget and Policy Studies, a public policy research institute located in Bangalore, completed its 25th year in February of 2023. To celebrate this 25th anniversary, we hosted a two-day conference entitled Institutions and Public Policy on 16 and 17 March 2023 in Bangalore. The objective of the conference was to explore the relationship between institutions and public policy, in relation to the following themes:

Independent institutions and policy discourse

Gender and public spaces

Education as a public good

Public finance and governance

Health and social security

One of the primary reasons that we decided on these themes was because we wanted to document the role that independent institutions have had in transforming public policy and public policy research over the years in various domain areas. We also wanted to document the role that evidence-based policymaking has in creating good governance practices, and the potential challenges in doing public policy research. Moreover, we aimed at highlighting the importance of interdisciplinarity, diversity, multiplicity and complexity in public policy research through these five interconnected themes. In fact, one of the objectives of the conference was to understand the diversity and multiplicity of public policy research, engage with the political economy of public policy and ask pertinent questions related to conditions that enable evolution and growth of independent institutions that could aid to the meaningful public policy discourse in India.

In order to do this in a coherent fashion, we had an opening and a closing keynote lecture, respectively, by Aruna Roy and Ashwani Saith who spoke about the importance and relevance of institutions in public policy. In addition to the keynote lectures, both the opening and closing sessions had a panel discussion each, entitled Building and Sustaining Independent Institutions and Role of Independent Institutions in Policy Discourse and Delivery, respectively. The opening panellists such as N. V. Varghese, Shyam Menon, Siddharth Varadarajan and Jayna Kothari reflected on their experiences of institution building linking those to the wider political economic philosophies and political environment. Avani Kapur, K. Srinath Reddy, Rohit Dhankar and Sarojini Ganju Thakur, the panellists for the closing session took the discourse forward by engaging with the importance of independent institutions to build the democratic discourse of the country, adding to the discussions held in other thematic sessions on education, gender, health and public finance.

The chief guests for the opening and closing sessions, Shantha Sinha and J. V. R Prasada Rao, also reflected on these issues in their speeches. These speeches and discussions helped to create an enriching dialogue and raised important questions about creating and sustaining local and national institutions that can build an engaged citizenry. Some of these questions such as—What is the role of the independent research institution? What are the challenges faced by these institutions? What are the potential strategies for sustainability and longevity of these institutions?—were tackled throughout the conference.

Some of these discussions were also relevant to each of the parallel sessions which was chaired by the lead speakers, who later joined as panellists for the closing panel, followed by paper presentations on the topic area by young scholars. The themes of the four sessions, organised as two parallel sessions, were: (a) gender and public space, (b) education as a public good, (c) public finance and governance, and (d) health and social security.

Gender and Public Spaces

In this session, we explored the various dimensions of public space, including the diversity of public spaces, the laws and rights that governed public spaces and the experiences of women within public space. Essentially, the focus of the theme was largely to understand the nature, definition and engagement with gendered public spaces. Sarojini Ganju Thakur, the lead speaker for the session, delved into the issue of gender and public space through exploration of the concept of ‘Public lenses’. The session explored various interconnected themes: violence and public spaces, the continuum between private and public spaces, the subject of transgenders and their exclusion from the public spaces, and the importance of the application of an intersectional lens to look at something as complex as gender and public spaces. The challenges of designing and funding gender responsive public policy interventions for issues of gender-based violence and gender-based crimes were also discussed.

Education as a Public Good

In this panel, we explored the importance of diversity and pluralism in education, the inclusion of critical thinking pedagogies and curricula, the potential of education in engendering quality equity and inclusion as part of the larger question of education serving as a public good. Professor Rohit explored the idea of education through examining the relationship between reason, freedom, human dignity and education. He argued for going beyond the economic conception of education as a public good and linked it to the need for self-development drawing from Emmanuel Kant’s argument about the duty of humans to develop one’s own talents. These thoughts were also echoed by some of the discussion around presentations by young scholars who also tried to establish interlinkages between education as a public good, social justice and critical pedagogy.

Public Finance and Governance

The chair and the speakers on this panel focused on the institutional processes and structures related to public expenditure, fiscal policy, processes and structures of public finance, and the centrality of democratic processes in public finance and governance. The panel discussion also helped to understand the various frameworks necessary to ensure public accountability and democratisation of the local governing processes. Avani Kapur, the lead speaker for the theme of Public Finance discussed about the fiscal landscape in India, while emphasising the need to go beyond data and to understand the underlying factors influencing state capacity and capability. The discussion in the session revolved around issues such as underutilisation and misallocation of funds, the complexities of the public finance system and the importance of organisational and administrative capacity. This also brought the need for paying attention to governance while discussing public finance issues to the fore.

Health and Social Security

The session focused primarily on understanding the historicity of healthcare systems, the importance of reliable data in ensuring the feasibility of social protection schemes and policies, the precarity of livelihoods with respect to health and sanitation and different ways of measurement that will provide the pathways to better health policies. Dr K. Srinath Reddy, the lead speaker, spoke on the importance of the health sector in development and the role of public institutions in generating and converging knowledge from multiple disciplines to support the idea of health as a human right. The role of knowledge and data at various levels in responding to health needs was also deliberated upon.

Given that the conference was geared heavily towards institutions and public policy, it should not come as a surprise that much of the conversation, formally and informally, was related to various themes involving independent institutions. In reviewing the various themes that emerged from the conference, we found that there were four threads of conversations that were particularly useful:

Evolution and importance of independent institutions in a functional social democracy.

The characteristics and factors that define independent institutions.

The role of research or academic institutions in shaping public policy.

Building and sustaining independent institutions.

Although the context in which each of these themes emerged were different—some were articulated more clearly in a panel discussion while others in a paper presentation —we found that these themes were useful in unpacking the relationship between institutions and public policy. This descriptive article, acting in-part as the Proceedings for the Conference, will therefore engage with the various dimensions of the four (aforementioned) themes and will summarise the major arguments articulated within the conference.

Evolution and Importance of Independent Institutions in a Functional Social Democracy

Institutions as the Foundation for Democratic Action

One of the foundational themes that was discussed throughout the conference was the importance of independent institutions for the functioning of a democratic India. Many speakers, including Aruna Roy, noted that while in our day-to-day lives, we tend to think of the Constitution as a static document, it is, in fact, a radical instrument supported by various institutions that ensure our basic constitutional rights. Not only do these institutions uphold constitutional guarantees for marginalised populations, they also ensure that multiple value systems are protected. When India gained independence, the early legislators recognised essential inequalities that existed in our society, and consequently, the Constitution that they framed put into place liberty, fraternity and equality as foundational values. Our Constitution, therefore, was framed to formulate and imagine an idea of a social democracy. However, these ideals or values can just as easily (and systematically) be eroded. Especially in contexts where nationalism becomes stringent and dictatorial, there is a desperate need for institutions who have principles and practices unpacked from the Constitution in order to create a cultural, social and economic democracy.

Institutions are also important for a functioning democracy because they are able to provide inputs to public action, which in turn, act as amplifiers of constitutional rights and bolster the mechanics of democratic privilege (Aruna Roy, 16 March 2023). These institutions could be as diverse as institutions of justice, those that govern our elections or even educational institutions. For example, some sessions referred to the fact that institutions such as the justice system or systems that govern elections (such as Supreme Court or the Election Commission) have a tremendous impact on the way in which democracies function. Even short-term institutional frameworks such as fact-finding missions or independent commissions (as part of a democratic process) can be very powerful in moulding public policy especially if their work is both honoured and not interfered with (Sarojini Ganju Thakur, 17 May 2023). In situations where these independent institutions start to get compromised, public action and citizen monitoring starts to become very critical. What was also highlighted in the conference was that these kinds of institutional processes of monitoring or checks-and-balance mechanisms have started to be systematically eroded, and this has implications for the institutional support for public action.

As an example, scholars in the opening panel spoke extensively about the ways in which cultures within institutions such as an educational institution derives its nature from its governing framework. In an educational institution, if the grants or permissions are provided with a set of conditionalities attached to it, it often leads to breeding cultures of suspicion and distrust (Shyam Menon, 16 May 2023). The independence of institutions, on the other hand, can provide strong positive economic and social results, as illustrated by investment in health institutions (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 May 2023). In health, for example, when economic planning agencies attempt to prioritise population coverage, service coverage and cost coverage for universal health, independent institutions have a greater role in resolving the tensions (in competing demand and supply factors) between all three. Therefore, democracies are not just dependent on citizen action, but also on the institutionalisation and formalisation of democratic values.

Institutions and Governance

These democratic values and actions have been etched within our institutions of governance as well. Many in the conference spoke eloquently about the manner in which government institutions are able to draw attention to inequalities, injustices, corruption and misuse of powerful social forces. In fact, the basis for government is the proper enactment of law and policy and its duty is to ensure the proper mechanism for delivery and monitoring of these laws and policies. Therefore, the corruption of these government institutions or structures—whether they are in the form of autocratic rule or through the resistance to accountability mechanisms—can be detrimental to a functioning social democracy (Aruna Roy, 16 March 2023; Shyam Menon, 16 March 2023; Siddharth Varadarajan, 16 March, 2023). In building an educational institution, for example, the cooperation between the state and the institution is crucial for its independent functioning (Shyam Menon, 16 March 2023). When there is a relationship of trust and mutual respect, then building of new democratic environments such as the confidence to experiment with new concepts, engagement with new pedagogies, deploying differential fee structures, collaboration with civil society and activist organisations, and freedom to reframe rules and regulations can be accomplished.

Conversations in the conference also centred around the autocratic tendencies of governing systems, and the manner in which these have to be dealt with (Rohit Dhankar, 17 March 2023). For example, many in the conference spoke about the manner in which the restructuring of India’s democratic frameworks is being undertaken and the systemic ways in which governing institutions are being tampered within, making them ineffectual. Although India has faced internal repression of many kinds (e.g., in 1971, restrictions on free speech and expression), the manner in which certain forms of silencing is taking place currently appears to come from deep fears and silent acquiescence. Even the media that is supposed to serve as a mirror to the governing institutions and transmit people’s concerns are failing to do so as the result of a multiplier effect of ‘corporate and communal synthesis’ (Aruna Roy, 16 March 2023). Therefore, the hallmarks of democracy—participatory policymaking, governance spaces to interact as equals and respect for the demand for transparency and accountability—are rapidly disappearing. What was earlier a well-functioning synergy between civil society, government and the people which gave rise to radical laws such as the Right to Education or Right to Information has started to vanish in the face of manufactured narratives that are fallacious and controlling. As a consequence, people’s voices such as women’s voices which were clear and loud through the women’s movement have started to fall silent within the halls of governance (Sarojini Ganju Thakur, 17 May 2023).

Given that it is important to ensure that civil society acts as a counter-point to the hegemonic practices of governments through research, critique and engaging the media, these discussions, therefore, gave rise to spaces to reflection for questions such as: How can we reflect on our ways of engaging with the government? What are the constructive ways for civil society to inform and transform public knowledge and action? What are the alternate visions that civil society can engage with in relation to these governing institutions? In asking these questions, what was clearly established was that neither governing bodies, the public, nor the civil society can be seen as monolithic creatures that only have antagonistic relationships with each other. Instead, it is also important for civil society institutions or the public and the government to find allies and partners in one another and to create spaces to resist the imperious nature of particular governing institutions.

Evolution of Institutions

A major theme that emerged from the conversations around institutions was the evolution of these institutions. In fact, the opening panel provided great insights into the various ways in which institutional support for policymaking has evolved over the years. The evolution can be broadly divided into four phases: (a) establishing the institutions in the 1950s, (b) putting to use the knowledge production of these research institutions between 1965 and 1980, (c) marketisation and commercialisation of knowledge production that has taken place under the growth of NGOs and (b) survival of these institutions in the post-truth era (N. V. Varghese, 16 May 2023).

In the 1950s, the Indian state not only created the largest number of bridges and dams but also the largest number of institutions. In fact, because of this early investment in institution building, we had one of the largest numbers of research institutions in any developing country, and approximately 80% of the research institutions in all of South Asia is in India. This push for creating these institutions, as mentioned earlier, was also because of the democratic commitments that were enshrined in our Constitution. So, public sector institutions were established with the express idea that these would enable and support the planning process of the country through its close alliance with the planning commission. These institutions were also committed to the scientific methodologies and therefore, invested in creating knowledge actors who could act as experts in their respective fields. In the second period, that is, in the late 1960s and 1970s onward, many of these institutions became vibrant, dynamic and active in producing research evidence. In the 1970s and 1980s, research shifted from universities to research institutes and these institutions produced a large amount of empirical data. Universities started to rely mostly on secondary sources of data, but independent research institutes continued to be engaged on the ground using primary sources for empirical analysis.

In the third phase, which was marked by the liberalisation policy, many of these practices shifted and the space for NGOs grew with primary backing coming from international funding agencies. While the growth of this alternate sector of independent organisations was welcome, the diversity of the organisations as well as the emphasis laid on specific results fuelled by funding concerns meant that the data produced as well as the conclusions drawn were not reliable and verifiability as a primary scientific principle became harder and harder to apply. In fact, one of the panellists said that this stage was often characterised by: conclusions were given first, data was collected later and the report was written at the end (N. V. Varghese, 16 March 2023). This also led to our current phase, which was referred to as the post-Truth era where policies are often made first and supportive evidence is then gathered. This has also meant that the foundational principles by which independent institutions worked both with people’s requirements and government policies disintegrated. In this era, for many organisations, financial instability and uncertainties were the price they had to pay for autonomy of the organisation in the short term, and institutional viability and sustainability, in the long run.

Role of Research Institutions

The instability of these organisations as well as the rupture away from the planning process and authorities has also meant that their role in providing knowledge for public action or public awareness has started to dwindle and, in some cases, has proven to be unreliable. For research organisations, in particular, this has proven to be challenging.

One of the major roles that independent institutions play is of generating knowledge that are not always palatable to those in power. Often, the studies conducted bring light to understudied, overlooked areas of social life. Ground-truthing is one of the major functions of an independent institution (Avani Kapur, 17 March 2023). In fact, one of the responsibilities of an independent organisation is to ask pertinent questions about what is working, what is not working and why or how it is not working. Moreover, one of the functions of the research organisations in this space is to bring to light the knowledge systems that do not find purchase in upper echelons of policymaking. While the original functions of these institutions, now diluted, has always been that of an interlocutor, an informed facilitator and a translator (of sorts) that is able to translate the needs and demands of the people to actionable social policy; these functions also require an independent, transparent and receptive space to navigate.

If the role of the independent institution has been to evaluate, monitor and understand the impact of the public policies being implemented (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March 2023), there also needs to be a receptacle or an ecosystem for these findings. At the same time, the independent institutions also have to be vigilant to ensure that their engagement with social data is done with scientific credibility, evidence and rationale on the one hand and political and social feasibility on the other. Therefore, independent institutions, especially those who are heavily into public policy research have to be multidisciplinary in nature so as to be able to address the scientific credibility, financial feasibility, operational stability and political viability of social policies. Without these perspectives, social policies advocated by independent institutions cannot address the major structures of oppression or discrimination.

Vibrant Ecosystems

Independent institutions also require a vibrant ecosystem to function within. In fact, these vibrant ecosystems are vital to do any form of interdisciplinary work, whether it is in research or advocacy or implementation. Moreover, the active engagement of people in knowledge creation or application is only possible if these ecosystems are expanded to include those who are often deemed as beneficiaries. Especially in discussions which involved specific ways in which institutions (both government and independent) are interacting with each other, it was emphasised that while knowledge production is a vital function of this relationship, taking the learnings back to communities, to the actors who stand to benefit most from these forms of knowledge production is very crucial (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March 2023). In fact, one of the key lessons of the concluding panel discussion was that finding allies and partners within the community is important not just because the communities are the beneficiaries of many of the policies recommended or introduced by independent and governing institutions, but they are also change agents. The role of the independent institutions, therefore, is to also ensure that in addition to amplifying advocacy, accelerating action, or asserting accountability, assembling of allies is as much, if not more, a critical function of independent institutions. In fact, passive commentary is often not a useful exercise, and therefore, it is important that institutions play an active role in creating inclusive pathways for those in the margins to direct action in the centre. All this led us to some pertinent questions: In what ways should we engage in public action? What are the protections that are available to independent institutions? How do we leverage independent institutions to create a viable social democracy?

The Characteristics and Factors that Define Independent Institutions

Another thread of the conference that emerged from various formal and informal discussions in the conference was around the definition of independent institutions. Although there was no singular consensus nor was there agreement on particular roles or responsibilities of independent institutions, some characteristics and factors emerged that appeared to cut across domain areas, disciplinary lenses and ideological stances.

Ability to Tackle Diversity

One of the characteristics that can potentially define independent institutions is not only that they are diverse in nature, but they can also easily engage with diversity. As an example, many of the governing, educational and research institutions try to resist homogenising principles, including those related to the composition of the population, the methodologies used, or ideas that are generated (Shyam Menon, 16 March 2023). This also means that the diversity of requirements, needs, knowledge systems and agencies of marginalised populations can be taken into consideration. The ability of independent institutions to tackle diversity also means that complexity of social situations need not be flattened. Instead, institutions have the potential of bringing clarity to complexity, engage with the diversity of voices and articulate the needs of marginalised communities, instead of compelling a hegemonic or a one-size-fits-all framework of policy planning (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March 2023).

Accountability

Another characteristic that already exists or desirable in independent institutions is the concept of institutional accountability, whether it is to its own ideals, or to the ideas that it has generated or both. Given the diversity of independent institutions, it is important to create accountability systems. These could include advisory boards that serve as an independent body to ensure that people within the organisation are accountable or responsible for their practices. This is not only significant for the everyday functioning of independent organisations but also helps build a culture of particular values the organisation holds dear, the breaching and breaking of which are non-negotiable. Given that independent institutions act as the conscience-keepers of the governing processes, they are themselves also accountable for holding up to the same standards as expected of governing institutions.

Knowledge Production

A primary role (as briefly mentioned earlier) that institutions perform are that of brokering ideas and acting as intermediaries, translators and channels between governments and community (Avani Kapur, 17 2023; K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March 2023). The ability of institutions to decode the complex maze of governance, analyse it and create knowledge outputs that various communities could use is one of the foundational characteristics of independent institutions. A lot of discussion within the conference centred around this idea that especially for research institutions, the work done by institutions has to work with a clear understanding of chance, bias and variance, and engage with the foundational principles of scientific enquiry. Whether that is in the replicability of results, the internal or external validity of the analysis or the generalisability of findings, it is important for independent organisations to have strong foundations in diverse scientific methods. In doing so, independent institutions must also be aware of the manner in which knowledge production is valued or de-valued in certain forms and spaces (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 May 2023). This way, policy can be guided by not just the content of policy analysis but also the context of these analysis. In some sense, what was clear from the discussions was that the knowledge production has to be characterised by two things that Louis Pasteur recommended to his young scholars (as quoted by K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March 2023): Keep your enthusiasm, but let verification be its constant companion.

Independence and Self-reflection

A constant theme in the conference was the question: How do we maintain independence of institutions, whether they are governance or civil society? Based on the discussion, it was clear that for maintaining independence, the institution must be aware of its vision and be true to it. While there might be changes over the years, and there might also be conflict related to the dilution, shifting, or changing of the primary purpose or vision of the institutions, it is important for institutions to have clarity on the primary objectives for its existence. Only then can certain forms of independence be maintained. This requires open-mindedness, constant and collaborative self-reflection and commitment to change.

Role of Research and Data

The increasing reliance on collection of data by government and various other entities and puzzlingly, the simultaneous lack of data to facilitate development and management of public sectors merited attention in the conference. The lack of reliable data available in public sphere was discussed across sessions, including the ones on gender and public spaces and health and social security.

Governance has changed significantly in the last decades; it is now centred around data governance making it the ‘new normal’. Citizen data, both personal and non-personal, can have varied uses. However, collectively, data help in creating an evidence-based approach to running administrative machinery more efficiently, sustainably and transparently (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March). The Indian government has also been collecting and storing vast amounts of citizen data for various purposes. However, there are growing concerns about the lack of governance and management of these data, which is leading to serious privacy and security risks. Despite the government’s efforts to implement data protection regulations, the absence of a comprehensive framework to safeguard citizen data has resulted in instances of data breaches, misuse and abuse.

Simultaneously, however, the lack of data was cited as a key challenge across sectors. Key challenges in the health information system in India are divergent figures, matrices and periodicity in data from different sources, non-standardised and decentralised procurement of information on human resources in the health sector, lack of a centralised mechanism to link data from different sources, lack of private sector data and limited disintegration of data (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March).

The same is true for public finance and governance (Avani Kapur, 17 March). In a world that is increasingly focusing on the digital realm, there is a dearth for accountants and statistical assistants whose work is vital to processing the massive amounts of data piling in government offices all over the country. These officials are often contractual employees; thus, there is a severe dearth of human power and mechanics to process data, both digital and non-digital, resulting in an information vacuum.

This brings us to the point that it is important to look at what data represents. Public finance and service delivery shed light on factors other than data. In a typical project management model, it is expected that certain inputs made by everyone with the right intentions result in desired outputs and outcomes. However, the reality is quite different, and there is not necessarily an ‘either, or’:

It is important to remember that measuring state capacity and capability requires actually matching the actions of agents to facts in the ground. Not always assuming that people have their best intentions nor assuming that people have their worst but recognizing that all of us in a system are made up of human beings who kind of straddle different elements through our work. It is important to remember that facts are not always facts. (Avani Kapur, 16 March 2023)

The conversation can thus, not be limited to judging states based only on expenditure. It is important to understand and consider the various factors that go into a state choosing to prioritise or act the way it does.

Data or more precisely, the access to data is also used as a controlling tool. Along with manipulation of media and digital media, controlling information is used to compromise democracy. Cutting down on the periodicity of data, manipulation of statistics are some of these tactics being used (Ashwani Saith, 17 March).

Corporatisation of knowledge production is also a concern everywhere. Increasingly, topics of research are decided by corporates and their interests as they are the ones who are funding research. The in-house research earlier conducted by corporates is increasingly being moved to public universities. While universities are partly being funded by public money, most of the public money goes towards salaries and not for research. Thus, agenda setting for research in many public institutes is being driven by corporates interests and not public interest. In such a context, independent research institutes which create and disseminate knowledge in public interest become crucial. In fact, independent institutions that generate, translate, apply and evaluate knowledge are crucial in protecting fundamental rights including health (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March). What is required in such an environment from the perspective of academic research is that the communities become participants as well as partners in the knowledge creation process.

There are various incentives and disincentives that can have an influence on this process. Siloed funding streams for instance are one of the major disincentives. To address these, institutional reforms are going to be required for multi-disciplinary research and those have to be identified. Creating a research ecosystem which is not vulnerable to ego system requires change in overall climate in which independent institutions perform (K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March). For the research conducted by independent entities in the public policy to be effective, it is also extremely important for them to work in collaboration with governments as well as people’s movements. The way research should be conducted is not to produce evidence to support policies, rather to produce evidence which provides support to frame policies.

In order for independent academic/research institutes to be able to work with the governments in a constructive manner, it is necessary to think about how individuals within the governmental structures can become changemakers. It is extremely important for civil society to find out the relevant allies within the governmental structures and then work with them to effect change (Sarojini Ganju Thakur, 17 March; Avani Kapur, 17 March). The conference highlighted several instances wherein individuals within governmental structures are keen to share and connect with like-minded individuals and yet, very few platforms exist for such sharing and collaborative engagements. There is a need for endeavours which will foster this collaborative engagement between policymakers, practitioners and researchers.

The aim of research is to provide evidence-informed, context-relevant, resource-optimising, culturally adaptive, equity-promoting recommendations for policy and practice. Venturing upon the relationship between science and public policy, Mr K. Srinath Reddy remarked Science is sterile if it lacks a social purpose and must connect with public policy. And the public policy will crumple upon clay feet if it does not stand on the strong base of sound Science. Independent institutions, thus, have a critical role in converging knowledge from multiple disciplines to make better sense of the situation. Independent institutions are also critical in critiquing and verifying the data generated by the state.

Ultimately, research institutions form part of a larger totality where the markets, the state and the civil society interact and in order to foster a social democracy, conversations and arguments between the three has to happen. Arguments are at the heart of the democracy. However, even in order for arguments to happen, there needs to be some commonality.

In order to facilitate this, researchers/academics have to ask the right questions, ask them fearlessly and without any party identifiers or affiliation and let that work accumulate over time (Ashwani Saith, 17 March). The three key takeaways for researchers that emerged are: (a) consciously deciding the scope of work and questions we want to ask, (b) engaging with the boundaries and expanse of the spheres of influence of our work and (c) the modes of knowledge dissemination and sharing that has been meticulously generated (Avani Kapur, 17 March). For research that aims to contribute, the non-negotiable principles or factors are criticality of self-reflection, commitment to social change, recognition of importance of public good, diversity of methods and lenses and clarity in complexity.

Many of the speakers at the conference also spoke about the role of young researchers in taking the discourse forward. Young people who are willing to contribute to such conversations with dedication are desperately needed in order to contribute to the ground swell of people expressing themselves. What is also needed is active engagement of young researchers who are willing to work for public good and not only for personal gratification (which researchers are often accused of). Considering that the conference made an effort to encourage and promote this through the call for papers from young scholars, many speakers mentioned that the conference provided some encouraging signs of this happening. They also recognised the role of organisations such as CBPS in facilitating this process (Ashwani Saith, 17 March; K. Srinath Reddy, 17 March).

How to Build and Sustain Independent Institutions

Given the critical role of independent institutions in ensuring a functional and effective democracy, one of the key themes for the conference was how to build and sustain independent institutions. We tried to draw insights from a diverse range of institutions as to how they have managed to build and sustain autonomy given financial and operational constraints. We heard from representatives across sectors such as media, academia and research and civil society organisations at the conference.

One of the key challenges that was discussed for institutions, especially those operating as not-for-profit organisations, was to ensure financial independence and sustainability. Various speakers elaborated on the constraints and impact on independent functioning that being dependent financially brings in. For instance, freedom of press is often compromised by the interlinkages with for-profit entities owned by their promoters since these are the businesses which support the media arm financially. Government funding or grant for academic institutes is also accompanied by many conditionalities and can be hindered by bureaucratic discretion. Civil society research organisations often have to scrounge for increasingly limited sources of funding with various conditions attached.

With such limitations of funding, even the form of organisation needs careful consideration. Siddharth Varadarajan from the Wire spoke about how establishing the Wire as a non-profit was an outcome of much deliberation as they did not want to be subject to any kind of influences or pressures from their investors. However, before making such a choice, there has to be confidence in their audience that there is a willingness and ability to pay for news without bias. In case of Wire, a conscious decision was made that they would believe in the appeal of their content and in the presence of a section of citizenry which is willing to pay for independent content. In the initial days, till enough content and subscriber base was generated, they had to rely on grants from a foundation. However, they are now in a position where they can sustain their operations from the revenue generated.

In the context of academic institutes with government funding, Dr Shyam Menon spoke about developing other sources of funding through implementation of differential fee structures which let them charge students with ability to pay while subsidising fee waivers for students without the ability to pay. He also spoke about the necessity of developing the ability to navigate the bureaucracy by establishing relationships with officials at all levels of the government. Thus, it becomes important to be able to navigate the bureaucratic state as well as political state. It was also discussed that for many academic institutes and thinktanks, there is a very high reliance on government for funding which compromises their autonomy (N. V. Verghese, 16 March). In such a context, assertion of their own autonomy while not compromising on their sources of funding becomes the biggest challenge.

In addition to challenges related to financing, there are other challenges related to building of institutions which require innovative and deft manoeuvring. For academic institutes, attracting and retaining talent who will not give in to intellectual stagnation is a key challenge. Adopting innovative includes reaching out to people who are publishing in related areas through whatever means available and building an environment in the institution which facilitates ownership by each stakeholder. Building a team of people who have worked together, who have authentic experience and who are confident enough to experiment played a crucial role in building an institution such as AUD (Dr Shyam Menon, 16 March). Public academic institutes in India also face another challenge as they have to operate within guidelines and frameworks inherited from colonial times while operating in an environment which has changed drastically. Continuous reinterpretation and reframing of these guidelines and frameworks has to be undertaken to be able to operate in such a context.

Now there are other concerns including the simultaneous clamp down on activists as well as availability of foreign funds through FCRA restrictions. Domestic fund and grant sources are limited, especially for rights-based work. So the means to stay independent and autonomous continues to be a challenge. The work on equality law and honour crimes bill by legal researchers has received contentious and negative attention, and, therefore, it may be a challenge to be able to continue to do that kind of work (Jayna Kothari, 17 March).

While these discussions dealt with the operational and day-to-day aspects of building and sustaining independent institutions, there were also deliberations of larger aspects in relation to independent institutions at the conference. While there is a perception of threat to independence from the overall governing and regulatory environment, institutions also have to look at and reflect on their own ways of engagement with the environment: Are they engaging with the government in a constructive manner? While institutions can definitely be critical of policies formulated, they have to be careful before accusing the government of being vindictive and should have sufficient grounds for doing so (Rohit Dhankar, 17 March). Some of the enablers that can help build and sustain independence is to ensure presence of well-known and credible people on board and to make the most of statutory bodies. At present, there are obvious issues of independence internally within organisations. Vision and objectivity of many such organisations can be questioned as there are direct political agendas associated with them (Rohit Dhankar, 17 March).

Thus, one of the quintessential ways to build independence is to be true to your purpose. While there might be a complete difference of opinions with the regulatory environment and other stakeholders, it is important to continue the dialogue and the process of engagement. And organisations need to be wary of getting caught in the trap of saying we need solutions/impact and, instead, have trust in the process of arriving at solutions (Rohit Dhankar, 17 March). Before seeking independence, we have to ask: What are we seeking independence from and to do what? This will help us identify our positive anchors, whether it is reason, truth or constitutional principles.

Mr Dhankar also suggested that apart from reflecting on our ways of engagement with the larger environment, organisations/institutions must adhere to the following which will help them maintain independence: (a) commitment to objectives through openminded and objective inquiry, (b) commitment to truth, (c) constant collaborative reflection in the presence of an external entity who will play the role of devil’s advocate.

Thus, while we see that there are multiple challenges to autonomy and independence of organisations including the increasingly repressive political and regulatory environment and shrinkage of funds available for work critical of the government, organisations continue to navigate these challenges and ensure that they remain true to their objectives through innovative means. We see that many of these institutions follow non-conventional processes and systems to gain trust of the larger environment. Setting up the organisation as a non-profit, ensuring transparency in operations and disclosures to gain public trust and setting up grievance redressal mechanisms to address customer complaints as well as internal grievances help give credibility to the institutions and in turn maintain their independence.

Maintaining commitment to objectives and remaining true to the organisational purpose helps maintain independence. Operating in an environment which does not facilitate autonomy, leadership of the organisation plays a crucial role in asserting autonomy. Hence, the selection of organisation leadership becomes crucial. Ultimately, autonomy is something not to be demanded, nor to be granted; rather, it is to be asserted (N. V. Verghese, 16 March).

Conclusion

The conference entitled Institutions and Public Policy was very instrumental in articulating the importance, the characteristics, the relevance and the challenges faced by institutions. Through this conference, we were able to document that institutions have a body of social norms and rules which impact behaviour, attitudes, access, and to a large extent, the social norms that direct action.

This special volume of the Journal of Development Policy and Practice consolidates the conversations from the conference on ‘Institutions and Public Policy’. The articles in this volume are selected from amongst those which were presented at the conference while also drawing from the conversations around the various sessions at the conference. The articles in this Special Issue have undergone a rigorous review process, ensuring the quality and relevance of topics discussed. This volume hopefully will serve as a valuable resource for researchers, scholars, practitioners and activists interested in institutions and public policy.

There are eight articles which constitute this volume. The article by Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey draws from the opening keynote delivered at the conference and talks about the importance of independent institutions in a democratic framework, with a focus on the Indian constitution and the erosion of its principles in recent times, leading to question the constitutional institutions that have been the unshakable pillars of Indian democracy. The essay by Ms Shantha Sinha, the chief guest at the conference, details the reason why the spirit of a democratic culture by citizens from the level of gram panchayats and municipalities to the district, state and national level has the capacity to expose and resist the construction of Hindu nationalist hegemony, its falsity and authoritarianism. The following essay by Dr Jyotsna Jha will draw on several concepts on institutions and institutionalisation as well as her experience in leading an organisation to analyse the evolution of Centre for Budget and Policy Studies and reflects the themes of the conference—as described in this essay—on building and sustaining such institutions.

This Special Issue also contains four articles selected for each of the thematic session that was presented by young scholars. In the session on Education as a Public Good, Neha Ghatak and Rajat Chaudhury argue that the understanding of public goods stemming from the discipline of economics is inadequate to define the needs of the contemporary education systems and that the idea/element of ‘social justice’ is central to understand the concept of education as a ‘public good’. In the session on Gender and Public Spaces, Tanya Rana (with other authors) attempts to explore the needs for finances for implementation of women’s safety schemes and tries to assess the effectiveness of present financing vis-à-vis the funding needed for effective implementation. Dr Gayathri Raghuraman (in collaboration with other authors) discusses the need for reimagining the monitoring framework for public service delivery and presents an alternative framework by studying the taluk level data collected from anganwadis in Karnataka. With regards to Public Finance, as the young scholars, Sowmya J. and Abida U. C. (in collaboration with other authors) present a framework that can help in analysing the underpinnings of what makes a gram panchayat child-friendly by analysing data from 10 panchayats in Karnataka.

What the four articles on institution and public policy (including ours) and four articles in the various domain areas illustrate are some critical questions about the state of public policy research institutions: What is the role of public policy research in today’s context? What are the ways in which to engage with the truth claims of the government? Who are we accountable to? How do we hope to change or move the development discourse towards democratic values?

These questions about institutions and public policy are especially relevant when we examine the strong hold that misinformation and ‘popular opinion’ have on the democratic discourse of the country. When opinions start to become separated from access to information, knowledge or context, then it is even more important to work on grounded methodologies that can produce all three. It is important, for example, to showcase: (a) people matter, but so do structures, and (b) structures matter, but so do people. Moreover, it is vital to insist on dual conversations of agency and resistance, to insist on democratic ideals and clear planning processes and to resist the lure of ‘sound bites’ or disassembling complexity and to insist on understanding the ‘whole’ and working within it.

It is also important to highlight that for any independent organisation to be independent, it requires certain forms of autonomy. That said, working within an ecosystem is equally important, and a large part of that ecosystem is the government. What the conference highlighted quite strongly is that instead of vilifying the government as a monolithic power-hungry institution or to bend towards its universalising and oftentimes, authoritarian agenda, there are multiple pathways to engage with governing institutions. It is possible to understand the knowledge systems residing within the government, to recognise the potential for its scale and potential to influence people’s lives, and to engage with state actors to move towards democratising institutions and processes. By holding onto both structure and people, it is possible to claim one’s role and explore the means of joint knowledge production—the manner in which the grounded ideas can be incorporated into the hallowed halls of policymaking. The shaping of ideas need not only be directed towards the government, but is related to the process of knowledge production, whether it is in the capacity building of young scholars or panchayat members, or in the writing of papers and articles, or in the conversations with the public.

Part of the process of creating this dialogue is to commit to values and practices of critical thinking and democratic values. It is important to say yes to difference, to possibilities of failure or of being wrong and to be subject to scrutiny. It is also important to commit to interdisciplinarity, to diversity, to multiplicity and to complexity. Each of these, when translated into concepts, methods, analysis and writing can create better knowledge of the world. This knowledge, we argue, is not just produced by a few case studies, a few focus group discussions or a few regression tables, but is co-created and understood within the context of people living and working with these policies. In spaces where misinformation creates a particular form of ‘stickiness’ that makes it harder for complexity to exist, it is more important to create independent institutions who can bring clarity to the conversation, to situate and contextualise any social insight within the larger social, cultural and economic milieu. This is all the more important for the endeavour of creating firm knowledge bases which are essential for the democratic discourse of the country and to create sound public policy. The role, therefore, for independent institutions is not only to understand the knowledge systems in the social space, but also to recognise the potential for its application, understand the manner in which it can influence people’s lives and to engage with actors (state or non-state) to move towards democratising institutions and processes. Therefore, building institutions that value interdisciplinarity, diversity, multiplicity and complexity is absolutely necessary because as was quoted in the conference: ‘If we do not create change, the present will extend itself’.