Cities are our cradle of civilization in the post agricultural economy information era that we live in.  NASA Climate scientist has called climate change a ‘moral issue on par with slavery’ [1].  The recent discourse on Climate Change has primarily focused on rural areas in the developing world. Climate Change as a phenomenon is systemic; its impacts are to be seen in all shades of colours and across different time scales. Climate Change in a very simple nuance concerns with extreme weather events. Sociological characteristics of society such as class, gender, cultural and economic capital are brought in the spotlight, in the canvas of Climate Change. Extreme weather events threaten normalcy, such as flooding, drought and earthquakes. The focus of this paper is to re-direct the climate change conversation to urban communities and especially the urban poor. According to a recent Mc Kinsey study, by the year 2030 majority of the world’s population will be based in urban centres. China’s population as per newspaper reports has tipped over to the urban part. Climate Change cannot be compartmentalised within intellectual silos. It has to be dealt with in an inter-disciplinary manner. When rural folk move to urban areas in search of livelihood leaving their lands behind as they are not lucrative enough as a career path, an additional ecological cum economic load is added upon the urban ecosystem. Urban planners design city infrastructure for a certain population and model population growth over a period of time. These assumptions are usually confined to reports as reality is often stranger than fiction.

The main stress on urban infrastructure is not land scarcity, but water. It is either too much or too little of it. Variations in precipitation are climate controlled events. The urban poor who live in shanty towns of Mumbai and Manila often share similar issues. The slum dweller in Dharavi, Mumbai is so vulnerable of a single heavy shower which can wipe out these efforts for life.  The recent Bangkok floods have shown the kind of disruption to the economy an extreme weather event can have.  City level governance is often weak and hence more vulnerable. Centralized governance mechanisms are fragile, as the capital cities are in land entities and the cities on the frontline of climate change are on the coasts. These cities are positioned on the global maritime highways of commerce and since old coastal cities are economic centres, drawing inland rural folk. Urban resilience is a function of additional capacity to withstand shock. Spatial planning of cities also add to the climate change divide between the have and have not’s. The affluent will always be positioned on higher ground than the poor folk, struggling for survival.  The case of Mumbai and Manila exemplifies climate change needs in the governance discourse.

References:

[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/apr/06/nasa-scientist-climate-change?CMP=twt_fd (information retrieved on 6/04/2012)

We live in the social era. Everyone is one Facebook ‘liking’ each others posts, tweets about developments as they happen and professional networking on Linkedin while searching for jobs. Content creation too has been democratized beyond our imagination. Recently a superior showed his daughters blog on poetry, and she is all of nine. The stuff she wrote was good. She is a poet/writer from her pre-teen years. Unthinkable when i was growing up about a decade and a half back. I would have to type the article, send it over to the editor of the prospective magazine and wait for months before publication. Now a days, an aspiring singer/musician practices his/her craft, records it on the smart phone and uploads it on You Tube and it goes viral. The movie song ‘Kolaveri Di’ became an international phenomenon spurring derivatives of the original one.  Disruptive innovation is transforming creative production and distribution.  The era of intellectual property protection is diluted to no extent, as peer to peer websites have everything money can buy.

Amazon has changed the way we buy books. It has destroyed book store chains such as Borders and Barnes & Noble to close its business. Authors have their revenue streams cut. The royalty on an e book download is a fraction of its hardcopy counterpart. Authors publish their works for free by letting Amazon publish it only for the tremendous reach the website has. Book Publishing in its traditional sense is gone as is the Music Business. The Apple devices changed the dynamics of the music industry by i tunes. These are legitimate sources of revenue. Pirated music and books are available at a click of a Google search.  Internet Piracy websites are being shut and the owners prosecuted but another dozen copycats arise in a week’s time. Legislative mechanisms cannot keep track with the lightening pace of technology.

Good ideas are no one’s monopoly. Even if rampant copying of content takes place apart from an academic setting its fine with me as more the information spreads the better it is. Knowledge is there is enlighten us and individual egos are simply too trivial . Although this is bad news for musicians and authors, we would have to deal with it. New revenue streams have to be figured out. There is a positive that everyone has access to information which was earlier the privy of the intellectual elite.

The magazine or the newspaper which I earlier used to buy of the stands is now available online. Movies can be livestreamed as can TV shows. Businesses in this sector would have to be ‘really’ creative to make money apart from the construct of IP protection to make themselves survive.

Bollywood for me is not simply an cinematic art form, but has been an integral part of understanding about life. One of my earliest memories as a toddler, was watching the Subhash Ghai film ‘Ram Lakkhan’ and the Ajay Devgun debut film: ‘Phool aur Kaante’.  Since then, i have hooked to the song and dance, melodramatic genre of cinema called Bollywood. Well Amitabh Bacchchan detests the term and he prefers to term it the Indian Film Industry. I would rather call it the Hind ‘Phillum’ Industry, as there are other regional vernacular film industries that are bigger such as Tamil and Telugu film industries.  Films are a part of the rubric of contemporary Indian Culture. The trajectory of post liberalization India can be charted through Bollywood films from Darr to Dostana to Dabangg.

I am not a purist, nor claim to be a student of cinema but I am a affecionado of Bollywood fims. I have watched films from the brilliant to the bizzare. This term ‘Bolly Holic’ has been coined by my graduate student colleague in English Literature at the Nanyang Technological University Mr. JX Ho over a heated conversation over Rang De Basanti with another opinionated Colleague from India (ex JNU).  The beauty of a Dulhe Raja or a Partner by David Dhawan, cannot be expressed by a rational mind. A Dabangg or a Wanted is simply too entertaining for words. Bollywood has progressed with a better educated audience watching films like Kahaani or a Dirty Picture.

Bollywood is India’s Soft Power as is American films. A DON franchise film or an Agneepath, was shown in Singaporean theaters with non South Asian viewers.  Bollywood films emote so well, that the language gap is transcended. I have watched films in theaters across, South East Asia and the Middle East. There is a theater exhibiting Bollywood fare across almost every major capital across the Globe. As an expat kid in the Persian Gulf, Bollywood as a medium to connect to my cultural ethos. Watching ‘D’ and ‘Company’ connected me to Mumbai, the city of my Birth as does ‘Kahaani’, the city of my ethnicity.

The emotions expressed in a Bollywood film from a  mediocre student in 3 Idiots to the heartbreak in Rockstar all resonate with me and many millions. The quest to be someone and the zest for life in Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara is so refreshing. These are all cinematic experiences which make my life richer.

People should not compare Bollywood with Hollywood films, they are as different as having parathas and pizzas. Let us enjoy them for what they are for.

Over the past few days, a lot of equations in Indian politics seem to be changing since the verdict of the recent provincial polls came out. Samajwadi Party is King in Uttar Pradesh led by the unassuming environmental engineer by training Akhilesh Yadav. A 38 year old, led the party from the front changing many a perception of the archaic old school politics of the Lohia-ites, or the socialists. He spoke the lingo of the ‘aam admi’, although thoroughly populist rhetoric. It is certainly a breath of fresh air. The Trinamool Congress, the major player in West Bengal made a dent as the principal opposition force in the North Eastern state of Manipur.  It is slowly expanding its base in the Bengali speaking areas in the North East and filling the vacuum in the fragmented clan oriented politics of the region.

The Akali Dal in Punjab won the elections this without much of the contribution from the BJP. Odisha has seen a single party dominate the political landscape over the last 15 years with the BJD. It looks like that the dominance is set to continue. What Trinanamool Congress offered Bengal is not only an option from the ineffective governance of the Left over the last three decades but also an opportunity for the Bengali Identity to emerge from the Left rubric. Bengal used to contribute the maximum number of Left MP’s to Sansad Bhawan, but the power centre of the Left remained in Kerala. In short Bengal lost its voice in National politics. Its voice got drowned out in the cacophony of leftist jargon. Regional Parties are vital for regional development, Tamil Nadu and Bihar have showed the way in this respect.  Regional Identity with aspiration based politics is what made the JDU successful in Bihar. Regional identity based politics transcends religion, hence is a strong adhesive.

The Third Front is a political experiment bound to fail as it would require either of the national parties to prop up the arrangement. In the following days we can see the two major National Parties decline, as they have been unable to live up their promises. Most of the regional parties have charismatic leaders. From Nitish to Mamata to Naveen to now Akhilesh, they are populist with governance at the heart of their agenda. The National players lack strong presentable leadership as the top leadership in the BJP are competent but indecisive, and the Congress unable to convert Rahulji’s popularity in to votes.

May be we are heading towards a more federal structure indeed.

Recently i had attended a symposium on Science, Technology and Innovation Policy where the EU Commissionaire on Science and Technology spoke.  One of the startling things to note was the intellectual transition from the paradigm of  ‘Research and Development’ to ‘Research, Innovation and Enterprise’.  That the role of knowledge creation is towards job creation and monetary ends. Everything in the scientific en devour is for the knowledge economy. The best scientific minds it seems will shift globally for research funding and the correct innovation ecosystem. As Marx said, a man’s labor is for capital accumulation. seems fit in this regard.

Science is a game changing social institution, there is no two ways about that.  Scientific talent have changed society for the better mostly. Apart from Nuclear Technology which has a potential for destruction is also a source for energy independence from Oil.  The question which came to my mind is, where is the patience for fundamental scientific research if every piece of intellectual property  is geared towards capital generation. Core fundamental scientific research takes a long time to be of any use in a commercial form. The market does not have the time for such experimentation. Not all research is as easy as creating an i phone app, quantum physics to cancer biology research; things take time.  We have been sold the story about the IT phenomenon, but innovation has a price and real innovation needs persistence.  Good Science takes time.

Every technology has a unique epistemology which is followed. Core Science research cannot be open source totally. The main element which i find lacking in the current innovation discourse is the missing social centric approach. Application of Science towards developmental needs is critical. It is about time, that Innovation planners account for what kind of scientific solutions which communities shall require in the upcoming decades. Market is excellent when it comes towards disseminating a technology, not when it comes to a breakthrough. Defense Research created the Internet, Nuclear Energy came from the Manhattan Project; Its time to be Social Constructionist in Nature not Technologically Deterministic. A radical rethink is indeed required.

Sir V S Naipaul at the Tehelka Goa Think Fest a few months back while in conversation with Tarun Tejpal commented in response to his question regarding the best advice he can provide writers: and the venerable Mr. Naipaul said that it would the best thing for a potential writer to skip university. Thats a radical suggestion from all dimensions. The rationale which VS Naipaul gave that university shapes a person to think in a particular manner. The distinctive style of writing is thus lost which a person is born with, an artistic flair that is not manufactured and is thus a breath of fresh air. Education presents us cognitive frameworks to think, analyse content, data and situations. But the talent cannot be given birth in a creative writing class. It is the raw marble slab which is polished fine in an English literature program.   Education gives us certification, and the time to grow up to be what we are; but these things can be done after high school taking up an apprenticeship  and working up the ranks.  The Citadels of Higher Education are creating non functional beings, unable to think for themselves and hence becoming slaves of the market.

Innovative talent gets lost in the quagmire of structured learning as teachers want us to think in a particular manner. Its the teachers perspective which prevails. As a person shifting from Engineering to Sociology, I have faced the brunt of this treatment. I have miserably done in assignments as i ‘did not meet’ the teachers expectation. Is this grad school all about? Is it about social control and conditioning or about value creation and learning at the end of the day. So much for the oxymoron called ‘inter-disciplinary-learning’.  It takes time, effort and energy to make a domain transition and for cross-pollination of intellectual ideas. Structured learning does not have any room for that, and then these folks expect ‘out of the box thinking and learning’.

I am equally amused, bewildered and frustrated in equal measure. The Iron Towers of High Table Academia are impossible to breach as people need PhD’s and Post Docs to make it even to a reasonable university to teach. The paradigm of publish and perish makes it hard to hire good teachers which ultimately becomes difficult to create a generation of informed citizens as profs are more inclined towards writing papers and not towards teaching. Its a battle for tenure than teaching well at the end of the day. Do not blame them, we all have bills to pay and families to feed.

I have come across high profile managers who are doing good with an undergrad degree in their careers, who teach adjunct in universities and teach better than career academics. Salman Rushdie’s books are taught in post colonial literature PhD level modules in English Literature programs globally, and he himself is a history major from Cambridge and teaches at Emory in the USA. I support the Stanford Prof in Computer Science who quit his tenured post and started a open digital university offering courses. The Un College movement started by Dale Stephens, a Thiel Fellowship recipient offers training which is free and open source, which an average college student in US is raking up debt which they cannot pay back for years after graduating.

I feel as education has under-delivered when it comes to skills really needed in the market, an undergrad degree is equal to a diploma 30 years back. A double masters holder gets offered an entry level job. What the hell is going on? I feel saddened at the state of affairs, truly….

Whenever, the narrative about development is written it is always the rural poor which is focused upon.  The narrative often forgets that there is something as the urban poor which live in the flavellas of Rio to the slums of Dharavi. Slums in global megapolis’es are the economic engines of those regions. These are the areas which serve us. The domestic staff, factory labor and the minimum wage staff all live in urban shanty town’s. The inner cities are the heart of our cities really. Social Enterprises (or simply SE from now on in the article) mostly cater to the rural folks in selling artisan products or bringing skills training. Or the success story of Microfinance in Bangladesh brings credence to the story in circulation. Grameen and BRAC are both case studies in their own right because of their spectacular success. Microfinance is unique not only to the rural poor but also to the urban poor as credit access is limited by lack of identity proof and hence there is no question of credit history in this regard.  Singapore based  Microfinance SE Milaap is reaching poor urban communities in southern India in their quest for better life for the borrowers.

We can see in a Singaporean context that SE’s or Social Enterprises in short can fill up a niche, which is hard to bridge either by corporate s or by the Government. Old School is an educational SE that serves people who dropped out of formal public education early on. Or a World Toilet Organization which spreads the ‘good word’ about sanitation across developing countries globally. In Mumbai, India Ambulance 1298 is providing emergency access to ambulances during the ‘golden hour’, which saves lives. Embrace, a Stanford D School based SE is providing affordable non power based incubators for infants. In the developing world, power cuts are the norm rather than the exception even in urban spaces. As the world is getting more urbanized with China already crossing the psychological threshold of more residents in cities than in the rural areas, SE’s are the way ahead in building sustainable communities, one at a time complimenting local civic governments.

Dear Friend

Its Valentines day yet again!! This is one day that single guys like me post status messages, especially funny ones to heal the   burden of being, well what else but the fact of being single! Its almost been ages for me on this planet, observing the festival of love being celebrated in three different culturally distinctive regions of Asia. From the conservative to the liberal, call it globalization, neo-liberalization or Americanization; V Day is a global metaphor for celebrating the emotion of love, of being wanted, the irresistible feeling of being cherished and to cherish someone special. Whether it is  youth of Meerut (Or any other Tier 3 town) in India calling it ‘Pyaar ka Teohar’ or the festival of love, this day has evolved in to a life of its own divorcing itself from the traditional religious baggage.

Films such as Pyaar Ka Panchnama show the frailties of being in a relationship and all the emotional complexities that a young guy in a relationship goes through.  It is true to a large extent that relationships are hard to maintain. It is a work in progress and takes effort. But if two souls are willing to create magic then the magic is certainly present. And as always the best relationship advice comes from a friend who is perennialy single 🙂 Relationships have power dynamics but start off with the chemistry which is ethereal and magical. Lets celebrate the magic once again on this day.

This is one day where either we feel the sense of relief that our wallets are not being lightened or we want to feel that moment, which is truly priceless, even if the credit card statement for the next month is going to give one a bad financial hangover. Card Shops, Eateries and Coffee Chains make a killing on this day. Cannot find a decent place in a restaurant this evening for sure as love soaked birds would be sharing a wonderful time together. Well this makes me feel even better 😦

The World requires more days of Love, or celebrating, acknowledging the sanctity of love than strife and conflict. How many days in our globalized calender do we remember which glorifies strife. Media channelized new content is predominantly bad news, or gossip which is meaningless. How many days of our lives do we consciously  make a effort to demonstrate an act of kindness. This day is filled with symbolism, and symbolism is per say not bad if the essence behind the razzmatazz and hype is worth it.  Every day is worth living and loving to the full, every second of it. This is what creates the energy to live in the darkness around us. We need nodes like V Day in our lives, to channelize the emotion of love and bring the heart back in the mind-space instead of dry rationality that envelops us.

Most of my V Days since the past few years, are spent at School (Grad School) doing assignments, readings, meetings. In short its a normal day, very normal.  But the buzz around is special, that what makes it a special day. This year too will be no different, as my sing my favorite Adnan Sami Track – Kabhi To Nazr Milao to glory over Green Tea!

Have a Great V Day Friend, even if you are in a relationship with some one, or in a relationship with life itself, such as me:)

How can you know my madness till you become mad with me ?

With Love

Change Thinker

A few days ago while exchanging pleasantries with a friend of mine on Twitter, i had ‘favorited’ his post, and bang the reply came that i had extended the nation of the virtual like from Facebook on to Twitter. Yes, i was taken aback with the extent that Facebook-ization has enveloped my life and the legion of social media addicts. We engage with friends, acquaintances and online pals on a regular basis, and have translated one to one human interaction on the language on online space. The vocabulary of online interactions has exponentially increased certainly, with a dis-like button on You Tube, to express dissatisfaction. May be a kiss (with Valentine’s Day around the corner) and a slap is on the way (a very needed button indeed), with the ‘poke’ already around. We can like a comment, and now a like, does not really mean that we have to like, like it but it is just an acknowledgement that the comment has been well, acknowledged, received and read.

Social Media has about a billion users around the planet, with local languages expanding the reach further. This is changing how we interact in a highly connected, but disconnected generation. We might not know our next door neighbor very well in person, but we chat on Google Talk everyday saying Hi or Salaam. Has our quality of interaction bettered over the years? Or are we doing social media because some friends are on it.  We are chronicling our lives online, every event is being recorded in pictures, tag in to a place or simply status updates. The Cool Factor is certainly contributing to the buzz. We feel good at the end of the day when we get a like or a comment, and even better a meaning one on our thoughts that we have shared. This can even be a conversation initiator in the real world, the next time when we catch up with a friend.

I get to read some of the most amazing stuff posted by my friends on Facebook and Twitter and also the equally absurd content.  We the ‘Like’ -o-philic generation, we get to like stuff miles away from the actual event, share some insanely creative stuff.  Technology is like a kitchen knife, it can cut veggies as well as can be applied to heinous ends. It is the values which matter behind the technology and not the technology itself. Facebook is well on its way to create a lot of wealth for its shareholders through its IPO, well, thats something to ‘like’ about!

I was horrified today morning  by watching an emotionally soaked ad of Vedanta on an Indian News Channel, talking about the rhetoric of development. This is the same organization that has run in to controversy with the tribals in Orissa state in India over mining leases. This has even lead to protests by tribals. Similarly, savvy corporate communication strategists wean over any bad publicity by conning the general public with elegant media campaigns. Corporates have green washed their way through by tying up with non profits in exchange for some loose change in the form of grants. Academics are not untouched too. The Climate Change skepticism is fueled by the lobbies in America, fund research to discredit Climate Change such as the Koch Brothers. Climate Change is a meta phenomena which impacts poor, vulnerable communities from the Maldives to Tuvalu every single day. Media is also driven by advertising moolah, its role is implicit in the contamination of the narrative.

Green washing can help only so far. Sincere efforts are around, but they are few and far in between. The lust for money can lead to intellectual infidelity and professional devaluation. This is not un-natural as there are families to feed and bills to pay, but in such circumstances the moral and ethical entrepreneurs of our society have to brought to audit as well.  Think Tanks and Global NGO’s are driven by vested interests. Capitalist fodder drives them. The developmental narrative is hence not immune too.  Corporate Social Responsibility has a strategic social risk management value, and shared value can indeed be created, but the soul of development seems to be eroded. The MBA-ization of the development sector is impertetive but how much of the donor dollar is actually reaching the intended recipient is a different issue altogether. It seems, that neoliberal agenda rebrands its old wine in new skin every generation, the spirit of capitalism should be relived in its original avatar.