Urban ‘Failures’
Municipal Governance, Planning and Power in Colonial Delhi, 1863–1910
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8961591 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Raghav Kishore (0000-0001-7767-4896, University of London, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 52 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 439-461 |
| Publication date | 2015-10-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Indian Economic & Social History Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0019-4646 • E-ISSN: 0973-0893 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0019464615603895 |
| OpenAlex | W2253658852 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
| References cited | 19 |
This article highlights the relationship between the ‘failures’ of municipal governance and the reproduction of its power in the colonial city. It examines the everyday operations of the Delhi Municipality between 1863 and 1910 and shows how the ‘failure’ to promote urban renewal actually provided ‘opportunities’ for the municipality’s own longevity. After the Rebellion of 1857, the Delhi Municipality was invested with a wide variety of powers to check sanitary offences and regulate building construction in Delhi. This article discusses how this very growth and centralisation of powers created severe challenges for the functions of the municipality. The growing complexity of its operations, recommendations of experts, costs of ambitious projects and resistance from city dwellers, it is suggested, constantly subverted municipal intentions. Yet, in bringing to light the ‘failure’ of municipal policies, this article will argue that failure was profoundly productive. Municipal ‘failure’ was always accompanied by the growth in its bureaucratic capabilities and regulatory powers
Bureaucracy · Business · Centralisation · Colonialism · Corporate governance · Decentralization · Economic growth · Economics · Political science · Politics · Power (physics · Reproduction · Resistance (ecology · Variety (cybernetics · Finance · Law · Public Administration · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies · Urban and Rural Development Challenges · Water Governance and Infrastructure
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Contesting Space in Colonial Singapore
Rule of Experts
The Making of Colonial Lucknow, 1856-1877
Imperial Designs and Indian Realities
Delhi's Belly
From source to sink
The Rule of Freedom
Rhetoric and Ritual in Colonial India
The Technology of Sanitation in Colonial Delhi
Urban Government under the Raj A Case Study of Municipal Administration in Nineteenth-Century South India
The Making of Colonial Lucknow, 1856-1877
Filth and the Public Sphere
| Citations per year | 0.56 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2017 - 2025 (9) |
| Highly cited | No |