POLITICAL SCIENCE (SEMESTER-II)

FIRST ASSIGNMENT TOWARDS MID-SEMESTER EXAM

NAME: ANAND BHOMA

ENROLMENT NO.:2019021

SECTION: A

Question: “Governments must prioritize care as being as important as all other sectors in order to
build more human economies that work for everyone, not just a fortunate few.” Identify and
analyze which ideology enables the state to take up this role.

Answer: The article talks about the problem of unpaid care work in India. Care work basically
means the work that includes all tasks that involves care in service for other. In other words, the
work in which people are motivated to work for other reasons than financial needs. This kind of
working class includes women doing the majority of care work like looking after her children and
the family, cooking etc. which is obviously unpaid. This leads to undermining the rights and
opportunity of such unpaid worker leading to hampering of employment or in other words leads
to underemployment. The article shows that how a huge number of women’s skilled but unpaid
work directly or indirectly contributes to the economy of the country.

The world by adapting to the ideology of liberalism has countered communism to a great extent
but, some essence of capitalism is still present in the world due to the minimum governmental
control over the market, which is the main aspect of laissez fair policy of liberalism. The ideology
which we can refer in the context of article and the question asked is ‘positive liberalism’. Positive
liberalism is an ideology which talks about giving the state a more positive and larger role. Liberals
in certain ways tend to favor more governmental intervention so as to protect the social and
economic equality for e.g. bringing in minimum wages law, which can be brought in only with the
help of the government intervention. Whereas, liberals sometimes tend to oppose government
intervention into several aspects like ‘laws restricting homosexual marriages’. The role of
government in positive liberalism is to draw a distinctive line between this kind of liberal thoughts
and play the role of welfare state so as to provide maximum welfare to the people. As the idea of
economic individualism came under attack in the 20th century, the liberals reconsidered their belief
and attitude toward the state. They though that the classical theory of liberalism was no longer able
to serve justice and equality of the civil society. Thus, modern liberals agreed and encouraged to
develop an interventionist and enabling state which would work in welfare of a group rather than
in favor of a particular individual. J.S. Mill promoted the pleasures that develop individual’s
intellect, morals, values etc. and believed that the value of liberty is that is enables the individual
to gain talents, skill and knowledge to refine their sensibilities. He was concerned about one’s
personal self-development.

T.H. green believed that the unrestrained pursuit of profit, which is what the classical liberalism
talks about, has given rise to new form of poverty and injustice. The liberty given y state to a few
had a harmful effect on the life and liberty of many. He explained how economic freedom in the
market is an inadequate conception of individual freedom, as contracts of work are not made by
free or equal individuals. Thus, he proposed the idea of positive liberty as the ability of an
individual to develop his potential, attain skills and knowledge and achieve fulfillment.
Unrestrained capitalism fails to provide each individual equal opportunity to develop. If the society
does not provide individuals with equal opportunity to develop, modern liberals have argued that
this can been achieved through collective action taken by the government. The State in here is
viewed as positively enabling state, exercising social and economic responsibilities. Modern
liberals also talk about social welfare under social liberalism. They defend welfarism of state on
the basis of equality of opportunity to all the people in the society. If any group or individual are
disadvantaged by the social circumstances, then it is a responsibility of state to either reduce or
eliminate the disadvantage.

Talking about interventionist policies, it becomes important to take note of John Maynard
Keynes’s work and economic management. In The General Theory of Employment, Interest and
Money, Keynes challenged classical economic thinking and rejected its belief in a self-regulating
market. He suggested that governments can manage their economies by influencing the level of
aggregate demand. Keynesian demand management assured to give governments the ability to
manipulate employment and growth levels and hence to secure general prosperity. As with the
provision of social welfare, modern liberals have seen economic management as constructive in
promoting prosperity and harmony in civil society.

The article talks about bringing in care policies with the states intervention so as to regulate the
economy and to formalize policies for the unpaid care workers. The government should consider
the contribution of unpaid care workers to the economic growth. A budget bringing in positive
measures to honor the unpaid care workers and tax policies are some ways to recognize the
contribution of unpaid care work and help them.