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Madhushree Sekher · Radu Carciumaru
Editors

Including the
Excluded in
South Asia
Power, Politics and Policy Perspectives
from the Region
Including the Excluded in South Asia
Madhushree Sekher Radu Carciumaru
•

Editors

Including the Excluded

in South Asia
Power, Politics and Policy Perspectives
from the Region

123
Editors
Madhushree Sekher Radu Carciumaru
Centre for Study of Social Exclusion South Asia Institute
and Inclusive Policies Heidelberg University
Tata Institute of Social Sciences New Delhi, India
Mumbai, India

ISBN 978-981-32-9758-6 ISBN 978-981-32-9759-3 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-32-9759-3
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part
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Singapore
Foreword

Despite its intuitive appeal and wide political use, social inclusion displays all the
features of an essentially contested concept on closer scrutiny. Despite the alacrity
with which advocates from all sides of the ideological divide use it in their political
rhetoric, there is no deep consensus on its operational meaning. The endless debate
between protagonists of caste as the criterion of ‘reservation’ as opposed to class
points towards one of the main difficulties of social inclusion as a useful category of
analysis. Is ‘exclusion’ germane to the primordial identity of the actor (for example,
untouchability), or is it the function of an existential condition such as poverty?
Where should action aimed at ridding society of social exclusion be located?
Operationally, should social action to correct for structural inequality start at birth,
or progressively, through the different entry points to active life such as schooling,
higher education, recruitment and promotion? Most seriously, why does democracy
—an accessible universal ladder for representation, participation and mobility—
come across as inadequate when it comes to social exclusion? Do groups who
consider themselves to be outside the charmed circle of the privileged perceive the
source of their problem as endogenous or exogenous? Finally, these issues might
appear to be beyond the ken of conventional social analysis. To the discomfort
of the empiricist, these disputes cannot be settled by direct measurement. Empirical
investigation is unlikely to yield answers that would be acceptable to advocates
ranged on opposite sides of the ideological divide.
This important and timely text provides conceptual, analytical, methodological
and comparative answers to some of these questions. The collection of essays
moves on effortlessly beyond the everyday reality of injustice, inequality and
exclusion to concepts that underpin them, and institutional arrangements that might
deliver much needed course correction. The actor-centred approach of this volume
puts the onus of articulation of injustice and exclusion on actors linked to social
cleavages of caste, race, tribe, religion and class. The authors link the agency of the
actor with the process of aggregation of individual choices into social outcomes. In
a deft move that connects agency and process, the book moves on to the level of the
political system. One thus finds, in the rich cases studies drawn from India,
Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, a comparative analysis of inclusion and

v
vi Foreword

exclusion that conflates ‘politics within the system’ with ‘politics of the system’.
The neo-institutional approach that analyses the evolution of norms and innovation
of new, corrective institutions and provides conceptual bridge to essays that might
otherwise appear to be set on their own, individual trajectories, is both imaginative
and helpful for further analysis.
While social exclusion linked to identities appears to be the flavour of the month
in this genre of social analysis, this book will attempt to go beyond such banalities.
It argues that hierarchies and inequalities based on social identities cut across and
affect various groups of excluded. Consequently, these phenomena create or lead to
various processes of exclusion. Thus, the collection of essays successfully
demonstrates that academic analysis of social exclusion should not be limited to
differences that characterize the exclusionary processes. Instead, it argues that
research should also focus on strategies of inclusion. As such, the book demon-
strates that social exclusion is not simply a description of groups that face exclu-
sion, but also an effort to understand the systems and processes that create social
exclusion in a systematic way. This knowledge alone can help create opportunities
for correcting the course of the social process that leads to the unfortunate reality of
deep social exclusion.
With its comparative approach and the thematic integration effectively executed
in the introduction, the book should be of great value within South Asia where the
post-colonial states that share a common origin have followed contrasting paths
towards social justice. Beyond South Asia, the book should have great resonance
among the global community that focuses on democracy and social justice. They
should find in this book some innovative juxtaposition of majoritarian democracy
and sectional justice by the way of reservation policies. Long established Western
liberal democracies, now struggling with unforeseen problems of migration,
cross-border terrorism, violent populism and alienation of disenchanted voters will
benefit from its comparative and theoretical insights. I warmly welcome this useful
addition to our knowledge in a critical area of political and social contestation.

July 2019 Subrata Mitra

Professor emeritus
Heidelberg University
Heidelberg, Germany
Preface

Focusing on South Asia, the book analyses and discusses the multiple dimensions
of social exclusion/inclusion seen in the region, to not only capture how ‘social
exclusion’ is intrinsic to deprivation or deprivation in itself, but also the processes
of political engagement and social interactions that the socially excluded develop as
strategies and networks for their growth/advancement. In the process, the book
attempts to grapple with the question of whether governance processes adopt a
more dynamic approach to provide spaces for the ‘socially excluded’ to have their
own ways of tackling exclusion, thereby raising discussions around the contested
positions that underlie development discourse on social exclusion and social
inclusion. With inter- and transdisciplinary contributions from scholars from India,
Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Germany, the book explores emerging and
relevant issues on social exclusion/inclusion in South Asia, such as:
• The mainstream concerns like diversity and attention to strands of social
exclusion (e.g. race/ethnicity, caste/tribe, religion, etc.).
• The pro-devolution discourse, looking at issues of inclusive and participatory
democracy.
• The neo-institutionalist perspective, looking at new governance structures, and
the system openness (spaces), and equality opportunities that exist therein.
While social exclusion linked to identities is being studied, this book attempts to
argue that hierarchies and inequalities based on social identities cut across and
affect various groups of excluded. This creates or leads to various processes of
exclusion. The book, therefore, argues that social exclusion should not be limited to
privileging the differences that characterize the exclusionary processes, but should
also comprise underpinning strategies of ‘inclusion’, emphasizing the need to focus
on imperatives to ‘include’. In the light of this perspective, the book acknowledges
that social exclusion is not only studying the different identities that face exclusion,
but also understanding the systems and processes that create social exclusion, or
create opportunities for inclusion of the excluded.

vii
viii Preface

The book, thus, comprehensively presents an analysis of the discourse on social

exclusion/inclusion in South Asia, by looking at—(1) the nature of social exclusion
practiced in the society, and how the constitutional provisions, laws and institutions
have been able to address exclusionary/discriminatory processes through policies
and development and empowerment facilitation; and (2) the contribution of
inclusive policies for welfare and inclusive development, to address the issues of
exclusion.

Mumbai, India Madhushree Sekher

New Delhi, India Radu Carciumaru
Contents

Social Exclusion and Including the Excluded: A Perspective . . . . . . . . . 1

Madhushree Sekher and Radu Carciumaru

Contextualizing Social Exclusion/Inclusion

Inclusion Versus Marginalization: Concepts and Measures . . . . . . . . . . 13
M. H. Suryanarayana
Persisting Ethnic Tensions in Sri Lanka: Towards a Structural
Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Siri T. Hettige
Social Inclusion/Exclusion: Policy Discourse in Nepal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Om Gurung

Inequality and Politics of Inclusion

State and Muslims in India: Politics of Inclusion and Exclusion . . . . . . 59
Anwar Alam
Constitutional Reforms in Sri Lanka: From Majoritarian Control
System to Integration and Accommodation? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Radu Carciumaru
Politics of Public Policy in India: Institutional Internalization
of Inequality in Policy Legislation and Including the Excluded . . . . . . . 97
Madhushree Sekher and Suchandrima Chakraborty

State, Institutions and Representation

Democratic Participation in Bangladesh: Does It Vary Across
Ethnicity, Religion and Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Sk. Tawfique M. Haque and Md. Akram Hossain

ix
x Contents

Democratic Institutions in Sri Lanka’s Local-Level Politics:

Challenges to Social Inclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Shashik Silva and Mark Schubert
Intricacies of Nation-States and Incidences of Exclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Allen Thomas

Governance Systems and Opportunities for Inclusion

Emerging Politics of Accountability: Sub-national Reflections
from Bihar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Himanshu Jha
Land Alienation and Threats to Livelihoods of Indigenous
Populations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Seema Mallik
Manual Scavengers: A Blind Spot in Urban Development
Discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
Shaileshkumar Darokar
Diversity in Higher Education in India . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
P. Geetha Rani
Institutional Responses to Exclusion and Poverty in Highlands . . . . . . . 241
Mansi Awasthi
Editors and Contributors

About the Editors

Madhushree Sekher is Professor at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.

Institutions, political economy of representation, governance, inclusive develop-
ment and policy implementation are her core research interests. Her current research
is on institutions for food security, inequalities and social welfare systems, and
democratic representation in India. She has been a recipient of the Australian
Research Council (Discovery) Grant, and grants from International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI), Indian Council for Social Science Research and Sir
Ratan Tata Trust. She is currently associated with an international research con-
sortium to study ethnic power relations funded by Swiss Development Council and
Swiss National Science Foundation. She was a Visiting Faculty at IFPRI—
Washington, and Universities of Hohenheim, Sydney and Alberta, and at Cornell
University. Also, she was author of many research articles and books, including
‘Feeding India: Livelihoods, Entitlements and Capabilities’ (Earthscan, 2013) and
‘Governance and Governed: Multi-‐Country Perspectives on State, Society and
Development (Springer, 2017). She had a Ph.D. in Political Science from the
Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore, and was recipient of World
Bank Robert S. McNamara Fellowship for post-doctoral research.

Radu Carciumaru is Head of CrossCulture Programme at ifa (Institute for

Foreign Policy, Germany) and Associated Researcher at the South Asia Institute,
Heidelberg University. Prior to joining ifa, Radu Carciumaru acted as Resident
Representative/Head of Heidelberg University’s New Delhi Branch Office and
governing board member of the German Centre for Research and Innovation New
Delhi, for over 4 years. Radu Carciumaru holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from
Heidelberg University and has several publications on institutional design in plural
societies, conflict negotiation, prevention and management.
He is board member of the Research Committee Politics and Ethnicity (RC14)
of the International Political Science Association (RC 14), co-founder of APSA

xi
xii Editors and Contributors

Foundation and Sri Lanka Working Group, Fellow of South Asia Democratic
Forum (SADF, Brussels), Research Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Law and
Governance, member of the editorial board of Politex (St Petersburg State
University, Russia), former Managing Editor of the Heidelberg Papers in South
Asian and Comparative Politics (2010-2016), as well as former Research Fellow at
the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Assistant
Professor of Political Science at Ashoka University. His areas of expertise include
institutional design in plural societies, power-sharing and negotiation theories,
ethnic conflict regulation, international and regional cooperation, comparative
politics and political economy.

Contributors

Md. Akram Hossain is a doctoral candidate at the University of Bergen (UiB),

Norway. His Ph.D. research is focused on governance in five South Asian coun-
tries: Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. After graduating in Public
Administration, Mr. Akram worked as a researcher for around 6 years at Public
Policy and Governance (PPG) Program of North South University (NSU). He has
published several journal articles and book chapters that mainly cover citizens’
trust, knowledge management, governance, local government, gender and human
resource management. As a researcher, he actively took part in the regional survey
called ‘State of Democracy in South Asia (SDSA)’ which is considered as South
Asian Barometer under the Global Barometer network. His major research interest
includes public policy, public administration, governance and democracy.
Dr. Anwar Alam is currently Senior Fellow with Policy Perspectives Foundation,
New Delhi. Earlier he served as Full Professor at Department of International
Relations, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Science, Zirve University,
Gaziantep, Turkey; Professor and Director at the Centre for West Asian Studies,
Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI); Assistant and Associate Professor at Centre for West
Asian Studies, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU),
New Delhi; and Lecturer, Department of Political Science, Aligarh Muslim
University, Aligarh. He has been awarded a number of long-term and short-term
fellowships including International Visitor Programme (Islamic) Scholarship, USA
(2002); Indo-French Social Scientist Exchange Programme Fellowship (2003,
2010); Alexander Von Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellowship, Germany (2004–2006);
and AVH Renewed fellowship, Germany (June 2016, May–October 2017). He was
Visiting Professor at Fatih University, Istanbul, Turkey (September 2010–August
2011). Some of his recent publications include Muslim Minorities in Europe and
India: Politics of Accommodation of Islamic Identities (co-edited 2016), Arab
Spring: Reflections on Political Changes in the Arab World and its Future (ed.
2014), ‘Emergence of Muslim Middle Class in Post-Independence India and Its
Political Orientations’, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, vol, 35, number 1,
2015, (Routledge: London) pp., 1–18, The Roots and Praxis of Fethullah Gulen’s
Editors and Contributors xiii

Educational Discourse’, Hizmet Studies Review, Vol. 2, No. 3, Autumn 2015

(Belgium), pp. 9–30, The Arab Spring: A View From India’ in Routledge
Handbook of the Arab Spring: Rethinking Democratisation (Routledge, London,
2014), pp. 636–649, and ‘Islam and Violence’, GITAM Journal of Gandhian
Studies. Vol. 3. No 1, 2014. His area of research interests includes International
politics, politics in Middle East, political theory, religion and politics, political
Islam, globalization and Muslim societies.
Mansi Awasthi is a Ph.D. candidate at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS),
Mumbai, where she examines the genesis of industrial agglomerations and their
contribution to economic growth from an institutional perspective in the state of
Uttarakhand, India. She is a Doctoral Fellow under the TISS-ETH Zurich Research
Project on ‘Ethnic Power Relations and Conflict in Fragile States’ from August
2015 to July 2018. She supports analytical work for the Project where her key
responsibilities are creation and validation of macro-datasets on ethnic power
relations and ethnic mobilization in Indian context. She has taught a paper on
‘Global Economic Governance’ to the students of Masters in Globalization &
Labour, TISS. Her interest areas include institutional analysis of regional devel-
opment, new economic geography with a particular emphasis on employment and
migration and inequality–grievances–mobilization nexus.
She was selected for Second Young South Asian Scholars on ‘Labour
Economics: Theories, Methodologies and Research Issues’ being organized by the
ILO, Institute for Human Development, UNESCAP & IDRC under the auspices of
South Asia Research Network on Employment and Social Protection for Inclusive
Growth (SARNET) in December 2014. She is the recipient of ‘Sir Ratan Tata Trust
Scholarship’, 2011–2012 for academically outstanding student of the Institute and
the second-best student in her Master’s degree. She holds an M.Phil. degree in
Labour Studies from TISS, Mumbai.
Dr. P. Geetha Rani is Professor and Head at Department of Economics, Central
University of Tamil Nadu. Prior to that, she worked at the Department of Education
Finances, National University of Educational Planning and Administration
(NUEPA), New Delhi. She has contributed to the financial memorandum for Right
to Education Bill under Central Advisory Board on Education (CABE), the highest
advisory body to advise the Central and State Governments in the field of educa-
tion, constituted by the Ministry of Human Resources Development (MHRD) and
the financial implications of national and state-wise estimates of Right to Education
(RTE) Act, submitted to the 13th Finance Commission. Her core competencies
include research, teaching, training and consultancy in the area of development
economics, economics and financing of education. She has co-authored two books
and co-edited a volume on Right to Education by Routledge. She has authored more
than 50 research papers and published in journals of national and international
repute.
xiv Editors and Contributors

Dr. Om Gurung has a Ph.D. in anthropology from Cornell University of Ithaca,

New York. He is one of the founding faculty members at the Central Department of
Sociology/Anthropology at Tribhuvan University of Nepal. He has been teaching
anthropology for graduate students at Tribhuvan University for more than 37 years.
In addition to teaching, he is heavily engaged in organizing national and interna-
tional seminars and managing academic exchange programmes. He has completed a
number of research projects on contemporary social, political and environmental
issues in Nepal and published dozens of research articles in national and interna-
tional scholarly journals. He is a co-author of several ethnographic profiles of
indigenous peoples of Nepal. He is also a co-editor of ILO Convention-169 and
Peace Building in Nepal (2005) published by NEFIN and ILO Nepal, Occasional
Papers in Sociology and Anthropology of Nepal (2009–11), Ethnicity and
Federalization in Nepal (2012) and Social Inclusion Atlas and Ethnographic
Profiles (2014) published by Tribhuvan University and Asian Anthropology (2006–
7) published by Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is a recipient of many
research fellowships, such as Norwegian Research Fellowship for Development
Research and Education, the Developing Country Training Fellowship from
Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research and the Ph.D. Dissertation
Research Fellowships from Social Science Research Council (SSRC), New York.
He also received several visiting fellowships to University of Wisconsin-Madison,
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, University of Bergen, Norway, Liverpool John
Mores University, UK and University of Lille, France.
Dr. Sk. Tawfique M. Haque is a Professor of Public Policy and Governance at the
Department of Political Science and Sociology of North South University (NSU),
Dhaka, Bangladesh. He is also working as the Director of South Asian Institute of
Policy and Governance (SIPG) at NSU which is conducting regional Master and
Ph.D. programmes and joint research in partnership with India, Nepal, Bhutan and
Sri Lanka. Professor Haque has the experience of university teaching with more
than 15 years of undergraduate and post-graduate level teaching in Norway, Sri
Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal. He has studied at University of Dhaka and
University of Bergen, Norway. He was the Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at
University of Bergen, Norway. He was awarded NORAD Fellowship, SSRC
Fellowship of Ministry of Planning, Bangladesh Government and Norwegian State
Education loan fund. His area of research interest covers Asian models of gover-
nance, organizational culture, local government, transparency and accountability of
third sector, globalization, international trade regime and trade policy, women
empowerment, development management, geo political issues and international
relations. He has published three books and seven book chapters from reputed
international publishing houses such as Springer, Routledge, Ashgate and Palgrave
Macmillan and more than 20 scientific research papers in national and international
research journals in the field of administrative culture, models of governance, NGO
accountability, local civil society, globalization and democratic practices.
Editors and Contributors xv

Dr. Siripala Tellambura Hettige is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at the

University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the RMIT
University, Melbourne, Australia. Professor Hettige was recently appointed as the
Chairman, National Police Commission, Sri Lanka. He is also the Honorary
President of the Association of Sri Lankan Sociologists and Chairman, the Working
Committee on Social Sciences, National Science Foundation, Sri Lanka. He has
published widely on such themes as youth, education, social and political conflict,
social policy and governance and development. He has also served as a Visiting
Professor/ Researcher at a number of overseas universities such as University of
Zurich, Switzerland; University of Kuopio, Finland; Melbourne University; and
University of Adelaide, Australia. His most recent publications include
Globalization, Employment and Education, co-authored with Angela Little,
Rutledge, London (2013); Governance, Conflict and Development in South Asia,
co-edited with Eva Geherz, Sage publications, Delhi (2014); and Towards a Sane
Society, Sarasavi, Nugegoda, Sri Lanka (2015).
Dr. Himanshu Jha is Faculty at the Department of Political Science, South Asia
Institute, Heidelberg University in Germany. His most recent research explores the
why, how and what of institutional change by examining the evolution of Right to
Information Act in India. Jha also works in the area of state capacity, welfare and
public policy. At the moment, he is working on his book manuscript and has widely
published in leading area studies and interdisciplinary journals such as the Pacific
Affairs, India Review, Economic and Political Weekly, Indian Journal of Public
Administration and Indian Journal of Federal studies. In addition, he has con-
tributed chapters in several edited books. Jha holds a Ph.D. from the National
University of Singapore. He has an M.Phil. in Public Policy from Australian
National University, Masters in Political Science from Jawaharlal Nehru University
and Bachelor with Honors in History from University of Delhi. Prior to his aca-
demic engagement, he was working in the developmental sector in India.
Dr. Seema Mallik is Faculty in the Department of Political Science at Utkal
University, Bhubaneswar (Odisha) since 2010. With a Ph.D. from Jawaharlal Nehru
University (JNU), New Delhi, she has contributed articles in journals and edited
books, and authored the book, ‘Women, Panchayats and Natural Resource
Management’. Her areas of research interest are democracy and governance,
political economy of India and state-civil society interface. She received Charles
Wallace Research Grant to UK in 2013, on understanding the ‘changing role of the
state in development in India from the British colonial period till today’. She also
received ICSSR (India)-NOW (The Netherlands) Social Science Scholar Exchange
fellowship to visit the Amsterdam Institute of Social Science Research (AISSR),
University of Amsterdam in 2014.
Mr. Mark Schubert is presently pursuing his Bachelors Degree in Law at the
Open University of Sri Lanka. Since graduating from Colombo University, he has
worked at the Social Scientists’ Association, Colombo in the capacity of Research
Assistant initially, and subsequently as Researcher. He has almost 5 years’
xvi Editors and Contributors

experience of working as a researcher. While adopting a more ethnographical

approach to research, he has also received training in survey research and quanti-
tative data analysis. His areas of interests include local democracy, inter-group
violence, identity and reconciliation. He has worked extensively in the area of local
democracy. In 2016, he led a team of researchers to conduct a baseline survey for
CARE International’s two projects, SPACE and RtM. In the same year, he was a
member of the team which conducted the Evaluation of CAFOD Supported
Participatory Governance Programmes in Sri Lanka. Furthermore, he contributed
to the research commissioned by Transparency International titled, Study on
Corruption and Vulnerability in Accessing Local Authority Services, in 2017. The
exposure and experience from these research developed an understanding of local
democracy, participatory governance and the practices and challenges for deep-
ening democracy embedded therein.
Ms. Jince Shajan is currently a Research Scholar at Central University of Tamil
Nadu, Thiruvarur (India).
Mr. Shashik Dhanushka Silva is currently employed at the Social Scientists’
Association as a Senior Researcher and serves as the manager at the same insti-
tution. He is part of a qualitative research which seeks to examine the complex
relationship between service delivery and state legitimacy. He has been involved in
a series of researches which sought to unpack local government in Sri Lanka. In
2016, he was instrumental in developing the Vulnerabilities & Corruption
Assessment Tool in order to identify various vulnerabilities when accessing local
authority services, the use of corruption when accessing local authority services and
their relationship to each other. He has been part of numerous consultancies for
CARE International and CARE Sri Lanka over the years. Furthermore, he has
studied the experiences of minority communities’, particularly the Upcountry Tamil
Community’s, engagement with and expectations of local government and local
democracy.
Dr. M. H. Suryanarayana is Faculty at the Indira Gandhi Institute of
Development Research (IGIDR), Mumbai since 1988. He has taught courses
on econometrics, development economics, food policy analysis, human develop-
ment and Indian economy at IGIDR and other post-graduate centres. He served
as Senior Economic Advisor (L-5/9) (2004/05) at the International Policy Centre
for Inclusive Growth, UNDP Brasilia.
He also served as consultant for ADB, OECD, UNDP and World Bank, and
provided technical assistance to developing country governments including
Bangladesh, Botswana, Brunei Darussalam, India, Nepal, Somalia and Vietnam.
He is a development economist with experience in providing technical assistance
in the preparation of human development reports, poverty reduction strategy papers
and tracking of MDGs. As a ‘Senior Trainer’, he designed, developed and con-
ducted a workshop on ‘Food Policy Analysis’ (sponsored by the FAO, IFPRI and
Editors and Contributors xvii

the Government of Bangladesh) for academicians and policymakers in Bangladesh.

He formulated and taught a course on food policy at the Maastricht Graduate
School of Governance.
Also, he designed an empirical methodology corresponding to the one in Human
Development Report 2011 and estimated Inequality Adjusted Human Development
Indices for states in India. He drafted and finalized a Poverty Monitoring and
Analysis System for the three administrations of Somalia. He also prepared the
concept paper on Sustainable Development Goals for Somalia.
Allen Thomas is a Ph.D. scholar in Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policies at the
Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Currently, he is a recipient of the
UGC-UKIERI Thematic Partnership Fellowship (2018–2020). He completed his
Master’s degree in Development Studies from Ambedkar University Delhi in 2015.
His thematic area of interest is state-society relations, transition to democracy,
democratic consolidation, ethnic conflict and politics of representation. He has had
enriching field experiences at the Naxal affected areas of Jharkhand and Bihar
(Hazaribagh, Chattra and Gaya), riot affected area of Uttar Pradesh
(Muzaffarnagar), rural development programme in Chhattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh,
and evaluated ethnic divided in Assam and West Bengal. Being a keen and active
scholar, he has presented at and organized various national and international
seminars. Presently, he is working on democratic consolidation in India.
Social Exclusion and Including
the Excluded: A Perspective

Madhushree Sekher and Radu Carciumaru

Abstract The development literature in recent years has seen the emergence of the
concept of ‘social exclusion’, which focusses attention on the relational aspects of
deprivation. Social exclusion may be regarded as intrinsic to deprivation or depri-
vation in itself. It could also be seen as instrumental in leading to other aspects
of relative deprivation reflected in socio-economic disparities. Social exclusion in
its multiple dimensions, also, provides a useful framework to capture the processes
underlying group-level inequalities and poverty in a society. Seen from this lens,
social and political participation is important for social inclusion, because depriva-
tion is not just income poverty. Political engagement and social interaction are two
lenses for accessing the inclusion of the socially included.

Introduction

The development literature in recent years has seen the emergence of the concept of
‘social exclusion’, which focusses attention on the relational aspects of deprivation.
Social exclusion may be regarded as intrinsic to deprivation or deprivation in itself. It
could also be seen as instrumental in leading to other aspects of relative deprivation
reflected in socio-economic disparities. Social exclusion in its multiple dimensions,
also, provides a useful framework to capture the processes underlying group-level
inequalities and poverty in a society. Seen from this lens, social and political par-
ticipation is important for social inclusion, because deprivation is not just income
poverty. Political engagement and social interaction are two lenses for accessing the
inclusion of the socially included.

M. Sekher
Centre for Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences,
Mumbai, India
e-mail: madhusekher@gmail.com
R. Carciumaru (B)
South Asia Institute, Heidelberg University, New Delhi, India
e-mail: carciumaru@sai.uni-heidelberg.de

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 1

M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru (eds.), Including the Excluded in South Asia,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-32-9759-3_1
2 M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru

Accordingly, to better understand why social inclusion is increasingly promoted

and accepted as part of government policies and public services and the ways by
which modern societies seek to achieve social and economic legitimization through
‘inclusive governance’ need to be better understood. Promoting inclusion, integration
or cohesion has become a key part of the contemporary political agenda. In fact,
an imperative need of social policy and governance around the world, including
India, is not only to focus on tackling social ‘exclusion’ but also to move towards
‘inclusion’ by ensuring that citizens play a part in mainstream society and in their
own development. The development agenda, today, therefore has a strong emphasis
on citizen participation in governance reforms, not only through formal processes but
also more in informal ways by which people influence decisions that affect them, and
also their involvement in activities of community and in community mobilization.
At the same time, inclusive governance does not necessarily reflect a deepening
of the modern democratic ideals of liberty and equality. Rather, it could be a measure
to ensure that all subscribe to and accept a range of uncontested objectives, which,
by default, does not recognize any other alternatives to tackling social inequalities,
but that which is acceptable to the mainstream. It is, therefore, also important to take
cognizance of the ways in which the ‘socially excluded’ develop their own social
networks and strategies, not merely as a response to exclusion but also for their
survival and development. It is, thus, important that governance processes adopt a
more dynamic approach that provide spaces for the ‘socially excluded’ to have their
own ways of tackling exclusion and working for their own development.
Two key theoretical debates influence this position:
(i) The dominant neo-classical paradigm focusses on human well-being, assessed
by the availability of disposable income or goods consumed, which is measured
by the levels of utility achieved in the consumption of commodities (water, land
or labour) and wherein social order emerges by the ways utilities and gains are
maximized. Within this neo-classical paradigm, justice is assessed in terms of
how and when the utility level of someone increases without a decrease in the
utility level of another person.
(ii) Second is the capability approach, which challenges the neo-classical under-
standing of human well-being as defined within the utility/commodity space,
and which postulates human well-being as not so much in terms of what people
are or do, but in terms of what they are free to be and do/what they are able to
be and do—being able to participate in the life of the community (Sen 1999).
This approach, by not specifying any particular good as being above others,
and making individual freedom and pluralism as central to human well-being,
provides the general framework for analysing individual advantage and depri-
vation in contemporary society within a set of ‘functioning’—the ‘functioning’
of the society/community; the ‘functioning’ of the state/government; and the
‘functioning’ of the market.
There is, thus, a need to focus attention on ‘institutions’. This will be a step towards
better understanding that ‘social inclusion’ is not so much a matter of promoting
individual capabilities but a matter of institutions (structures), of the state or the
Social Exclusion and Including the Excluded: A Perspective 3

society/community, that ensure living for good life (human well-being) and protection
from human fallibilities.

Inequalities Intrinsic to Nation-States and Their Welfare

Mechanism

Nation-states play a pivotal role in the sustenance of today’s modern world. The
state guards our basic fundamental human rights by holding a monopoly over vio-
lence. Alongside it provides welfare measures to its citizens ranging from infrastruc-
tural, educational, health, telecommunicational and economic assistances through
tax payer’s money and other additional sources. It defends its citizens both within
and outside its territorial area from external threats. Nation-states are at the heart of
everyday struggle. Every issue that has had repercussions on a section of the soci-
ety, such as religious minorities or tribals, in an unacceptable way needs suitable
state interventions, along with change in social behaviour. Thus, it is essential to
understand state machinery and its functioning, only through which can we attempt
to remove social exclusion from all spheres. Alongside the nature of nation-state
is such that it has the organizational structure strong enough to create symbols and
diffuse those symbols into the society, that is symbols pertaining to certain values
and beliefs that can be embedded into the society through religious institutions,
publishing houses, schools and many more.
Today’s state is an evolution of the organizational structure of the past. Our human
society has evolved through various stages from hunter-gatherer to agricultural soci-
eties which inevitably lead to the industrial and post-industrial societies. Focussing
on the evolution process from the hunter-gatherer society to that of the agricultural
society, this particular evolution has led to major breakthrough and is indebted with
the most influential characteristics prevalent in today’s world, that is, the introduction
of the conception of private property and accumulation of wealth. This conception
of private property and accumulation brings in aspects of resource inequality. Accu-
mulation of wealth requires an organizational structure whose basic purpose was to
sustain conditions of protected living and sustenance of the societal structure. This
essential political character of the agricultural society brought the then monarchic
and self-governing settlements. The monarchic settlements were those settlements
in which the merchant would pay the bandit to protect himself from the bandit and
external sources. The bandit acts as both the sword and the shield. Self-governing
were those settlements in which the merchants used their own time and resources to
protect themselves and did not rely on anyone else. The resource inequality subsided
into political or the then organizational structure since individuals and groups with
animal resources and modes of agriculture dominated and made decisions regarding
the organizational structure. Resource inequality gets transcended into other modes
of inequality, be it social, economic, political and spatial inequalities. One lens for
capturing intrinsic inequality and understanding who get excluded is to look at the
4 M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru

ways modern societies seek to achieve social and economic legitimization through
‘inclusive governance’ (Ryan 2007). Promoting inclusion, integration or cohesion
has become a key part of the contemporary political agenda. An imperative need
in social policy making of governments around the world, including India, is to not
only focus on tackling social ‘exclusion’ but also to move towards ‘inclusion’ by
ensuring that users of welfare services play a part in mainstream society and in their
own development, rather than just being dependent on welfare services and bene-
fits. Seen in this context, there is a strong emphasis on participation in governance
reforms, not only through formal processes but also more in informal ways by which
people influence decisions that affect them, and also their involvement in activities of
community and in community organizing. At the heart of this are the distributional
processes and welfare mechanisms to include the excluded.

Political Engagement and Social Interaction as a Tool

to Study Social Exclusion

There are existing researches on how group-based identities affect political processes,
wherein distinctive groups adopt certain political identities. In this paper, we intend to
highlight certain communities that are excluded/marginalized, and how the practice
of marginalization is evident even in the sphere of political engagement and social
interaction. Political engagement refers to the actions of individuals and groups which
seek to influence or support government or political parties. Political engagement can
be accessed through various civil activities such as voting, protests or movements.
It has profound consequences for governance, policy selection and development
outcomes (Khemani et al. 2016). Political engagement happens irrespective of the
institutional governance structure (democracy, autocracy etc.). Social interaction, on
the other hand, refers to the dynamic order of social actions between individuals or
groups. These interactions form the basis for social structure and are a key object of
basic social inquiry and analysis.
For instance, in India, according to Census 2011, scheduled caste has 16.2%
and scheduled tribes had 8.2% proportion in the Indian population. The Muslims
constitute 14.23% of the Indian population. But their social, political and economic
engagement in the country’s development process and growth story is low.
The lack of engagement is a result of the inherited systemic processes and struc-
tures on which the Indian state and society has been erected.
Social Exclusion and Including the Excluded: A Perspective 5

Inclusion of the Excluded Through Strengthening

Institutions

Institutions are broadly defined under two literatures: first, according to the likes
of Samuel P Huntington who refer to institutions as ‘stable, valued and recurring
patterns of behaviour’, and secondly, we have Geoffrey M Hodgson who states that
institutions that are ‘integrated systems of rules that structure social interactions’
(Hodgson 2015). Here institutions would be referred to as bodies or agencies that
bring about interaction between various key stakeholders.
The inequalities present in our state and society are intrinsic to the existing order
of norms, values and institutional setup. It is essential to focus on the institutions
and their functioning. The institutional structure of the state is the very backbone
of the state machinery. The institutions supervise and safeguard the state and its
society. It is these institutions that act as a pillar, helping sustain democracy. We can
take, here, the case study on the industrial growth policy of Japan highlighting the
tremendous growth from being devastated in World War II to becoming the second
biggest economy in the world by 1990s (Johnson 1982). The major reasons for such
a growth were the cooperation of Keiretsu (manufacturers, suppliers, distributors
and banks in a closely knit group), powerful enterprise unions, good relations with
government bureaucrats and the guarantee of lifetime employment (Johnson 1982).
Such an institutional structure supported both the economy and the state to sustain
the society and its needs.
The institutional structure has to be re-oriented or its practices enforced in a man-
ner that excluded groups get to participate in the mainstream. Political institutions
should become more exclusive in giving participation to excluded communities. This
would enable excluded communities to gain recognition and negotiate with the state
and political forces with their claims. M. V. Nadkarni highlighted the process of
broad-basing, through which increasing numbers of social groups enter the main-
stream of social, political and economic activities, and progressively derive the same
advantages that groups from the mainstream share (Nadkarni 1997).
It is, thus, important that processes for inclusion of the excluded adopt a dynamic
approach that provides spaces for the ‘excluded’ to have their own ways of tackling
exclusion and, working for their own development. In this regard, it is important for
governments and governance processes to recognize that participation in/as part of
‘mainstream society’ is not the only possible response to ‘exclusion’, and that the
people’s user and self-help movements have strengths and capacities that also need
to be acknowledged. Two key theoretical debates influence this position.
This brings us to the following issues which underlie the concern in this volume
for understanding inclusion of the excluded:
• The interconnectedness of human development and capability/freedoms that peo-
ple have;
• Institutions as manifestation of power and as ‘structures’ of engagement through
which the freedoms can be expanded;
6 M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru

• Democratic/participatory decision-making expressed through the institutions as

an exercise of freedom in the community.
Institutions are of the fundamental nature that can mend the functioning of the
society. The institution of public policy slowly creates a change in the values and
belief system of the society. This change can be guided and monitored according to
the results required.

Organization of the Book

This volume raises discussions around these contested positions that underlie devel-
opment discourse on social exclusion, and inclusion of the excluded. Contribution of
scholars of different disciplines from India and the South Asia region discusses the
emerging issues, looking at the system of participatory democracy; the governance
structures, and the system openness and equality opportunities that exist therein; and
the mainstreaming of concerns like diversity and attention to some strands of social
exclusion such as caste and religion. The discussions in the book have been grouped
along the following lines.
(i) The discourse of development and contextualizing social exclusion/inclusion,
(ii) inequalities and politics of inclusion, (iii) democratic participation, and the role of
state, institutions and representation processes, and (iv) policy interventions towards
attaining inclusion through governance systems and opportunities for inclusion.

(i) The Discourse of Development and Contextualizing Social Exclusion and

Inclusion

The discourse surrounding development and social exclusion and inclusion revolves
around multiple ideas, including resources and their allocation, structured inequal-
ities, and influencers in decision-making. This section succinctly and comprehen-
sively provides an understanding of social exclusion has gone far beyond per capita
income to address various kinds of distributional concerns. Disaggregating the social
exclusion concept, an expansive approach includes a broad range of social, economic
and political conditions that affect human well-being. Contemporary development
policy literature is replete with references to terms like ‘inclusion’, ‘exclusion’,
‘mainstreaming’ and ‘marginalization’ without a well-defined concept or measure
for each of these terms. Of course, these terms pertain to the different distributional
dimensions of the development process. The chapter by M. H. Suryanarayana pro-
vides a conceptual framework to define these dimensions in an integrated framework.
It defines empirical measures for the corresponding outcomes to facilitate policy for-
mulation, monitoring and evaluation, with reference to the Indian experience.
The case of Sri Lanka, in the chapter by Siripala Tellambura Hettige, provides
an interesting analysis of the continuing resistance on the part of the nationalist
groups connected to the majority Sinhalese community to efforts aimed at finding
a constitutional solution to the problem of national disunity. He argues that the
Social Exclusion and Including the Excluded: A Perspective 7

reproduction of exclusive ethnic identities through social and cultural processes,

existing economic and policies that perpetuate gross social and economic inequities
and the persisting gap between the centre and the periphery are the main reasons for
this situation.
Looking at the spread of the concept of social exclusion/inclusion in Nepal,
the paper by Om Gurung critically analyses and provides deeper understanding of
Nepal’s structural history, respect and recognition of social diversity, group identi-
ties, and representation of the excluded groups in the state politics, as key conditions
to make the country an inclusive society.
(ii) Inequalities and Politics of Inclusion
The next section in the volume presents a set of papers that articulate the fact that
social exclusion lies at the heart of the processes that generate inequality among
social categories. Existence from the effects of social exclusion, and therefore, inclu-
sion, depends on the programmes and policy initiatives that create opportunities to
bypass exclusionary conditions and processes. Taking cues from the experience of
democracy in the region, the papers in this section argue that democratic institutional
structures interact with exclusionary and inclusive process at various levels.
Looking at the case of Muslim community in India since independence of the
country in 1947, the chapter by Anwar Alam argues that the lack of participation of
the community in the development process of the country, in effect, negatively affects
the choices and capabilities of the community to partake into the ‘developmental
goods’. This has partly emerged from the notion of ‘Muslim politics’, which pays
heavy premium on the ‘politics of identity’ and ‘security’, and its imagination of
Indian state system.
The chapter by Radu Carciumaru looks at constitutional reforms in post-civil war
Sri Lanka, especially since 2015 with the Nineteenth Amendment and the setting
up of the Constitutional Assembly, and explores the role of ethnicity in shaping the
constitutional reform process in the country and the challenges it poses. It compares
the Sri Lankan case study to constitutional designs in other plural (deeply divided)
societies from South Asia, such as India and Nepal.
Continuing the discussion on the politics of inclusion, the next chapter by Mad-
hushree Sekher and Suchandrima Chakraborty looks at how inequality and concerns
of excluded get reflected in, and impact public policies. Looking at the institutional
landscape of competing pressures that forms the core of the politics of public policy
legislation in India, the chapter provides an analysis of formulation and provisioning
of public services, and the consequent politics of inclusion, in the country.
(iii) State, Institutions and Representations
Arguing that social exclusion is reflected in and perpetuated by the dominant social
structure and the structures of opportunities that the excluded face, this section draws
focus on the role of various agency and processes to include the excluded, the exclu-
sions that can/may happen in this process. Viewing civic participation as a broad
indicator of democratic culture in a contemporary society and as a testimony to
a functional democracy in a country, the paper by Sk. Tawfique Haque and Md.
8 M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru

Akram Hossain addresses two research questions: (i) What is the level (in terms of
both quantity and quality) of participation of Bangladeshi people in political activi-
ties? (ii) Does this participation vary across the demographic identity of citizens? The
paper assumes that the intensity and quality of participation would vary across the
demographic identity such as gender, religion, ethnicity, income, age and education.
In this context, minority groups, disadvantaged and backward population might be
left out from political engagement.
In their paper on democratic institutions in Sri Lanka’s local-level politics, Shashik
Dhanushka Silva and Mark Schubert explore the clientelistic nature of politics and
practices in the country’s local government that often either hinders inclusion or
reproduces exclusion. In line with this context of governance and exclusion, the
chapter by Allen Thomas explores the various manifestations of social exclusion that
emerge from the interaction between state and society on the structural arrangements
prevalent in nation-states. These structural arrangements highlight the governing
principle and logic of the structures that preside over the various state institutions
and society, leading to incidences of exclusion.
(vi) Governance Systems and Opportunities for Inclusion
This section vividly focusses on encompassing the various concerns of social exclu-
sion and developing policy interventions in order to create a more inclusive society.
The chapters in this section enumerate an analysis of various policy interventions and
the outcomes, thereby pointing out to the fact that tackling social exclusion requires
concerted and long-term efforts, not only through government initiatives that address
issues of legal rights and distribution of resources but also governance processes that
aim at changing attitudes and perceptions. Himanshu Jha, in his chapter analyses the
Right to Information intervention in India. Adopting a political economy perspec-
tive, Seema Mallik, in her chapter argues that development strategies driven by heavy
industrialization and mining, further increase the vulnerabilities of the poor, mainly
tribals who are forest-dependent communities and face eviction due to such develop-
ment strategies. In order to make development inclusive, government strategies need
to be more socially embedded. Focussing on the working of Municipal Corporation
of Greater Mumbai and the process of urban solid waste management, the chapter by
Shailesh Darokar looks at the life of conservancy workers and highlights the chal-
lenges they face through a few narratives of the workers themselves. P. Geeta Rani
and Jince Shajan, in their chapter, attempt to look at diversity through the lens of
numerical representation of different social groups in professional higher education
in India. Continuing with the argument being made in this section, the chapter by
Mansi Awasthi examines the shaping of inequalities and opportunities through an
analysis of the interplay of government and the institutions of interactions in the
Indian province of Uttarakhand. It stresses that the spatial dynamics and experiences
of the process of industrial transformation and inter-firm networks create a hierarchy
of production, employment and space.
Focussing particularly on India and the Indian sub-continent, the book thus, dis-
cusses the multiple dimensions of social exclusion/inclusion seen in the region, to
not only capture how ‘social exclusion’ is intrinsic to deprivation or deprivation in-
Social Exclusion and Including the Excluded: A Perspective 9

itself but also the processes of political engagement and social interactions that the
socially excluded develop as strategies and networks for their growth/advancement.
In the process, the volume attempts to grapple with the question of whether gover-
nance processes adopt a more dynamic approach to provide spaces for the ‘socially
excluded’ to have their own ways of tackling exclusion? Thereby, the volume raises
discussions around the contested positions that underlie development discourse on
social exclusion and, inclusion of the excluded.

References

Hodgson, G. (2015). Conceptualising capitalism. Journal of Institutional economics, 497–505.

Johnson, C. (1982). MITI and the Japanese miracle. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Khemani, D. S., Ernesto, D. B., Ferraz, C., Frederico, S., Corinne, L., Scott, D., et al. (2016). Evi-
dence on the impact of political engagement. In Making politics work for development: Harness-
ing transparency and citizen engagement (pp. 130–171). Washington, DC: World Bank. Retrieved
June 01, 2019, from http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/268021467831470443/pdf/
106337-PUB-REVISED-PUBLIC.pdf.
Nadkarni, M. (1997). Broadbasing process in India and Dalits. Economic and Political Weekly,
2160–2170.
Ryan, K. (2007). Social exclusion and the politics of order. Manchester: Manchester University
Press.
Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. New York: Anchor Books.
 Part I
Contextualizing Social Exclusion/
Inclusion
Inclusion Versus Marginalization:
Concepts and Measures

M. H. Suryanarayana

Abstract The concept of ‘inclusive growth’ has received wide currency ever since
the UNDP started advocating it as a development goal. Contemporary development
policy literature is replete with references to terms like ‘inclusion’, ‘exclusion’,
‘mainstreaming’ and ‘marginalization’ without a well-defined concept or measure
for each of these terms. Of course, these terms pertain to the different distributional
dimensions of the development process. This paper proposes a conceptual frame-
work to define these dimensions in an integrated framework. It defines empirical
measures for the corresponding outcomes to facilitate policy formulation, monitor-
ing and evaluation. Finally, it provides an empirical illustration with reference to the
Indian experience.

Introduction

Contemporary policy debates touch upon issues related to deprivation, inclu-

sion/exclusion and marginalization without a well-defined concept and measure.
It is the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) which started advocating
‘inclusive growth’ in pursuit of development. However, the UNDP could not propose
any concept or measure to facilitate policy formulation, implementation, monitoring
and evaluation. It called it a ‘Million Dollar Question’.
The challenges a policy maker faces in such a context are many. How do I formulate
a policy to address the issues related to inclusion and marginalization? How do I
monitor its implementation? How do I evaluate its outcome?
This paper presents a concept, measure and examines inclusive/exclusive profiles
with reference to different social/regional strata in a country like India.
This write up is based on the author’s experience and writings based on the attempt
to address the following questions.
How do we define economic progress and inclusion in a plural society character-
ized by social/regional stratification? How do you define and measure mainstream

M. H. Suryanarayana (B)
Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai 400065, India
e-mail: surya.igidr@gmail.com

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 13

M. Sekher and R. Carciumaru (eds.), Including the Excluded in South Asia,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-32-9759-3_2
14 M. H. Suryanarayana

progress in such a context? When there are different social groups/regions, and wel-
fare schemes exclusively meant for some select social groups/regions are pursued,
how would one (i) define the extent of progress of each group/region as a whole
in an absolute sense as well as relative to the mainstream; and (ii) verify how far
such programmes have enabled the deprived in these groups/regions to catch up with
better-off in their own strata as well as with those in the mainstream. To address
these multiple objectives, the study examines (1) average progress, absolute as well
as relative, made by each social group/region, (2) mainstreaming/marginalization of
the deprived in each of the social groups independently and also in a collective sense.
The paper is organized as follows: Section ‘Inclusive Growth: A Concept
and Measure’ presents a concept and micro and macro measures of inclusive
growth. Section ‘Inclusive Growth: An All-India Perspective’ provides an empirical
illustration for India as a whole. Section ‘Inclusiveness: Rural/Urban All-India’
illustrates the application at the rural/urban sector level. Section ‘Mainstream-
ing/Marginalization: Conceptual Outline’ proposes the concept of marginalization
and mainstreaming with empirical illustrations for India.

Inclusive Growth: A Concept and Measure

One may conceptualize the term ‘inclusive growth’ as follows: It refers to a growth
process that has benefited even those sections which are deprived of both physical and
human asset endowments and hence, generally belong to the bottom rungs of income
distribution and are incapable of participating or benefiting from the growth pro-
cess. Contemporary policy emphasis is on redistributive options to realize inclusive
growth. Such a strategy would not be sustainable. To be sustainable, it should encom-
pass the three dimensions of the economy: participation in production (employment),
income generation and consumption expenditure.
How would a policy maker proceed to define and monitor inclusion in these three
dimensions? For lack of comprehensive up-to-date data on all the three dimensions,
this section would present evidence in the form of reduced form estimates of outcomes
for the income and expenditure dimensions, that is, (i) elasticity of mean consumption
with respect to mean income (η); (ii) elasticity of median consumption with respect
to mean income for the different sub-periods under review; and (iii) the ‘inclusive
coefficient (ψ)’ (Suryanarayana 2008). The first two measures provide a macro profile
while the third a micro profile.
These measures are as follows:
i. Elasticity of mean consumption with reference to mean income (η) would indicate
if economic growth is really broad-based and inclusive. If growth in income
was restricted to the rich only, mean consumption would not increase at a rate
corresponding to the average income growth rate because marginal propensity to
consume is less than one. Hence, η would be less than unity.
Another random document with
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to factions as irreconcilable as Montagues and Capulets, had broken
into civil war on the advent of Queen Joanna as regent; the powerful
family of the Agramonts welcoming her eagerly; while the
Beaumonts, their rivals, out of favour at Court and wild with
jealousy, called hourly upon Charles to avenge their wrongs and his
own. His mother’s will, leaving Navarre to her husband during his
lifetime, had, they declared, been made null and void by the King’s
subsequent remarriage. Not only was it the duty of a son to resist
such unlawful tyranny, but it was folly to refuse with imprisonment
or a poison cup lurking in the background.
The latter argument was convincing; but never was rebellion
undertaken with a heavier heart. The Prince of Viana was a student
and philosopher who, like the Clerk of Oxenford, would have
preferred a shelf of Aristotle’s books at his bed’s head to the richest
robes, or fiddle, or psaltery. The quiet of a monastery library, with its
smell of dust and parchment, thrilled him more than any trumpet-
call; and he would gladly have exchanged his birthright for the
monk’s garb of peace. Fortune willed otherwise, laying on his
shoulders in pitiless mockery the burden of the man of action; and
the result was the defeat that is the usual reward of half-heartedness.
His uncle’s Court at Naples proved a temporary asylum for him in
his subsequent enforced exile; and also the island of Sicily, where he
soon won the affection of the people, and lived in happiness, till
Alfonso’s death awoke him rudely from his day-dreams. He was
overwhelmed by fear for his own future; though, had he been a
different man, he might have wrested away the sceptre of Sicily. In
Aragon itself public opinion had been growing steadily in his favour,
and not only in Navarre were there murmurs at his absence, but up
and down the streets of Barcelona, where the new King was far from
popular, and his haughty Castilian wife an object of dislike.
Prudence dictated to King John a policy of reconciliation; and after
prolonged negotiations the exile returned; but the cold forgiveness
he received from his father and stepmother for the wrongs they had
done him was in marked contrast to the joyous welcome of the
nation. No outward ceremony of a loving father pardoning a prodigal
son could mask the lack of confidence that still denied the Prince his
recognition as rightful heir, and drove him to enter into a secret
alliance with Henry IV. of Castile.
 As a result of these negotiations, a marriage was arranged between
Charles and the Infanta Isabel. That the suggested bride was only ten
and the bridegroom nearing forty was a discrepancy not even
considered; and the messengers, who went to Arévalo to report on
the appearance of the Princess, returned to her suitor, as the
chroniclers expressed it, “very well content.” Far different were the
feelings of the King of Aragon, when he learned of the intended
match from his father-in-law, the Admiral of Castile. Isabel had been
destined for his favourite son, and, in spite of the conspiracy to
which he had lent his aid, this alliance still held outwardly good. It
did not need the jealous insinuations of his wife to inflame afresh his
hatred of his first-born; and the Prince of Viana soon found himself
in prison, accused of no less a crime than plotting against his father’s
life.
Unfortunately for King John, popular belief ran in a contrary
direction, and his son’s release was soon demanded by all parts of the
kingdom. In Barcelona, the citizens rose, tore down the royal
standard and took the Governor prisoner. Revolt flamed through the
land; but even more alarming was the sudden declaration of war by
Henry IV., who, taking advantage of the King of Aragon’s
embarrassments, hastily dispatched a force to invade Navarre, where
the Beaumonts were already in the field.
It was a bitter moment for King John. Realizing his critical
position, he agreed to his son’s release; and Charles of Viana passed
in triumph to Barcelona. For once, almost without his intervention,
Fortune had smiled on him; but it proved only a gleam before the
final storm. Three months after he had been publicly proclaimed as
his father’s heir, the news of his sudden illness and death fell on his
supporters with paralysing swiftness.
Nothing, on the other hand, could have been more opportune for
King John and his Queen; and their joy can be gauged by the haste
with which they at once proclaimed the ten-year-old Ferdinand heir
to the throne, demanding from the national Cortes of the three
kingdoms the oath they had so long denied his elder brother. Yet
Queen Joanna’s maternal ambitions were not to be satisfied by this
easy assumption of victory. Charles of Viana dead was to prove an
even more potent foe than Charles of Viana living.
 Gentle and unassuming, yet with a melancholy dignity that
accorded well with his misfortunes, he had been accepted as a
national hero by the impulsive Catalans; and after death they
translated the rather negative qualities of his life into the attributes
of a saint. Only the halo of martyrdom was required to fire the
general sympathy into religious fervour; and this rumour supplied
when it maintained that his tragic end had been due to no ordinary
fever, but to poison administered by his stepmother’s orders.
The supposition was not improbable; and the inhabitants of
Barcelona did not trouble to verify the very scanty evidence for the
actual fact. They preferred to rest their accusations on the tales of
those who had seen the Prince’s unhappy spirit, like Hamlet’s father,
walking abroad at midnight demanding revenge. Soon his tomb
became a shrine for pilgrims, and there the last touch of sanctity was
added. He who in life had suffered acutely from ill-health became in
death a worker of miracles, a healer whom no absence of papal
sanction could rob of popular canonization.
The effect upon the public mind was to fan smouldering rebellion
into flames; and when Queen Joanna, having gained the recognition
of her son as heir to the throne by the Aragonese Cortes at Calatayud,
proceeded with the same object to Barcelona, the citizens rose and
drove her from their gates. Only the timely intervention of some
French troops, which Louis XI. had just hired out to King John,
saved her and Ferdinand from falling into the hands of their furious
subjects.
This foreign assistance had contributed not a little to the bitterness
of the Catalans, for the French King had secretly encouraged their
turbulence and disaffection, promising them his support.
“As for peace he could hardly endure the thought of it,” wrote
Philip de Commines of his master, Louis XI. That monarch, like King
John of Aragon, had studied the art of “making trouble,” and in this
truly mediæval pursuit excelled all rivals. It suited his purpose
admirably that his ambitious neighbour should be involved in civil
war, just as it fitted in with his schemes that his troops should
prevent that conflict from going too far. The question was all part
and parcel of his policy of French aggrandizement; the ultimate
object of his design nothing less than the kingdom of Navarre, that
semi-independent state, nominally Spanish, but projecting in a
tantalizing wedge across the Pyrenees.
With Charles of Viana the male line of Evreux had come to an end,
and the claims on Navarre had passed to his sister Blanche. On
Blanche’s death, and Louis in his schemes leapt to the possibility of
such a fortunate accident, the next heir would be Eleanor, her
younger sister, wife of a French Count, Gaston de Foix. It would be
well for France to establish a royal family of her own nationality on
the throne of Navarre. It would be even better for that family to be
closely connected with the House of Valois; and, calculating on the
possibilities, Louis gave his sister Madeleine in marriage to the
young Gaston de Foix, Eleanor’s son and the heir to her ambitions.
It only remained to turn the possible into the certain: to make sure
that Blanche’s claims should not prejudice those of her younger
sister. At this stage in his plans Louis found ready assistance in the
King of Aragon, who included in his hatred of Charles of Viana a still
more unnatural dislike of his gentle elder daughter, whose only sins
were that she had loved her brother in his misfortunes and proved
too good a wife for Henry of Castile.
Thus the tragedy was planned. Blanche must become a nun or pass
into the care of her brother-in-law in some mountain fortress of
Navarre. Then the alternative was whittled away. Nunneries and
vows were not so safe as prison walls and that final silence, whose
only pleading is at God’s judgment-bar. Eleanor, fierce and vindictive
as her father, was determined there should be no loophole of escape,
no half-measures by which she might miss her coveted inheritance.
John of Aragon went himself to fetch his elder daughter to her
fate, assuring her of his intention of marrying her to a French prince,
once they had crossed the Pyrenees; but his victim was not deceived.
Powerless to resist, as she had been in bygone days to help her
brother, Blanche made one last desperate appeal before the gates of
the castle of Orthez closed for ever behind her. On the 30th of April,
1462, she wrote a letter to Henry IV. of Castile, ceding to him her
claims on Navarre, and beseeching him by the closeness of the tie
that had once united them, and by his love for her dead brother, to
accept what she offered and avenge her wrongs.
It was in vain. Even before Charles of Viana’s death, Henry IV.,
repenting of his rash invasion of Navarre, had come to terms with
the Aragonese King, regardless of his ally’s plight; while just at the
climax of Blanche’s misfortunes, an event happened in Castile that
was to make all but domestic affairs slide into the background.
In March, 1462, Queen Joanna gave birth to a daughter in the
palace at Madrid. The King had at last an heir. Great were the
festivities and rejoicings at Court, many the bull-fights and jousts in
honour of the occasion. Below all the sparkle of congratulation and
rejoicing, however, ran an undercurrent of sneering incredulity. It
was nearly seven years since the Queen came a bride to Cordova, and
for thirteen before that had Henry been married to the virtuous
Blanche of Navarre, yet neither by wife nor mistress had he been
known to have child.
“Enrique El Impotente,” his people had nicknamed him, and now,
recalling the levity of the Queen’s life and her avowed leaning
towards the hero of the famous “Passage of Arms,” they dubbed the
little Princess in mockery “Joanna La Beltraneja.”
Was the King blind? or why was the handsome Beltran de La
Cueva created at this moment, almost it seemed in celebration of the
occasion, Count of Ledesma, and received into the innermost royal
councils? There were those who did not hesitate to affirm that Henry
was indifferent to his own honour, so long as his anxiety for an heir
was satisfied.
Whatever the doubts and misgivings as to her parentage, there was
no lack of outward ceremony at the Infanta’s baptism, in the royal
chapel eight days after her birth. The Primate himself, the
Archbishop of Toledo, performed the rites, and Isabel, who with her
brother Alfonso, had been lately brought up to court, was one of the
godmothers, the other, the Marquesa de Villena, wife of the
favourite. Two months later, a Cortes, composed of prelates, nobles,
and representatives of the Third Estate, assembled at Madrid, and, in
response to the King’s command, took an oath to the Infanta Joanna
as heir to the throne; Isabel and her brother being the first to kneel
and kiss the baby’s hand.
The Christmas of 1462 found Henry and his Queen at Almazon;
and thither came messengers from Barcelona with their tale of
rebellion and the fixed resolution they had made never to submit to
King John’s yoke. Instead the citizens offered their allegiance to
Castile, imploring help and support in the struggle before them.
 Henry had been unmoved by Blanche’s appeal, for he knew the
difficulties of an invasion of Navarre, but the present project
flattered his vanity. He would merely dispatch a few troops to
Barcelona, as few as he could under the circumstances, and the
Catalans in return would gain him, at best an important harbour on
the Mediterranean, at worst would act as a thorn in the side of his
ambitious neighbour. He graciously consented therefore to send
2500 horse, under the leadership of one of the Beaumonts, as
earnest of his good intentions; but almost before this force had
reached Barcelona, those intentions had already changed, and he had
agreed to the mediation of the King of France in the disputes
between him and the King of Aragon.
Louis XI., “the universal spider,” as Chastellain called him, had
been spreading his web of diplomacy over the southern peninsula. By
the Treaty of Olito, signed by him and King John in April, 1462, he
had promised to lend that monarch seven hundred lances, with
archers, artillery, and ammunition, in return for two hundred
thousand gold crowns to be paid him on the reduction of Barcelona.
Whether he would ever receive this sum was perhaps a doubtful
matter; but Louis had accepted the pledge of the border counties of
Roussillon and Cerdagne, that commanded the eastern Pyrenees,
should the money fail, and would have been more annoyed than
pleased by prompt repayment. According to his own calculations he
stood to gain in either case; and in the meantime he was well content
to increase his influence by posing as the arbiter of Spanish politics.
After a preliminary conference at Bayonne, it was arranged that
the Kings of Castile and France should meet for a final discussion of
the proposed terms of peace on the banks of the Bidassoa, the
boundary between their two territories. It is a scene that Philip de
Commines’ pen has made for ever memorable; for though he himself
was not present he drew his vivid account from distinguished eye-
witnesses on both sides. Through his medium and that of the
Spanish chroniclers we can see the showy luxury of the Castilian
Court, the splendour of the Moorish guards by whom Henry was
surrounded, the favourite Beltran de La Cueva in his boat, with its
sail of cloth-of-gold dipping before the wind, his very boots as he
stepped on shore glittering with precious stones. Such was the model
to whom Castilian chivalry looked, the man, who with the
Archbishop of Toledo and the Marquis of Villena dictated to their
master his every word.
It is small wonder if Louis XI. had for the ruler of Castile “little
value or esteem,” or that Commines himself, summing up the
situation, caustically dismisses Henry as “a person of no great sense.”
There could not have been a stronger contrast between the two
kings: Henry with his pale blue eyes and mass of reddish hair, his
awkwardly-built frame, overdressed and loaded with jewels,
towering above his meagre companion; Louis, sardonic and self-
contained, well aware of the smothered laughter his appearance
excited amongst Castilian courtiers, but secretly conscious that his
badly cut suit of French homespun and queer shaped hat, its sole
ornament an image of the Virgin, snubbed the butterfly throng about
him.
“The convention broke up and they parted,” says Commines, “but
with such scorn and contempt on both sides, that the two kings never
loved one another heartily afterwards.”
The result of the interview, May, 1463, was soon published. In
return for King John’s future friendship, and in compensation for
her expenses as an ally of Charles of Viana, a few years before, Castile
found herself the richer for the town of Estella in Navarre, a gain so
small that it was widely believed the Archbishop of Toledo and his
fellow-politicians had allowed themselves to be bribed.
If the Castilians were bitter at this decision, still more so were the
Catalans, deserted by their ally and offered nothing save the
unpalatable advice that they should return to King John’s allegiance.
The messengers from Barcelona quitted Fuenterrabia as soon as they
heard, openly uttering their contempt for Castile’s treachery.
“It is the hour,” they exclaimed, “of her shame and of her King’s
dishonour!”
They could not realize to the full the truth of their words, nor to
what depths Henry was shortly to fall and drag the fortunes of his
country with him.
 CHAPTER III
THE REIGN OF HENRY IV.: CIVIL WAR AND
ANARCHY
1464–1474

Henry IV. had been merely a figurehead at the meeting of

Fuenterrabia, a rôle to which with his habitual lethargy he had no
objection. When, however, he attempted to obtain possession of the
town of Estella and failed to do so in spite of Villena’s outwardly
strenuous efforts, he began at last to suspect that he had been also a
dupe, and that French and Aragonese money had bribed his
ministers to his own undoing.
He could not make up his mind to break openly with the Marquis
and his uncle, the Archbishop of Toledo; but a perceptible coldness
appeared in his manner where they were concerned, in contrast to
the ever-increasing favour that he now bestowed on Beltran de La
Cueva, Count of Ledesma. The latter’s share in the conferences had
been mainly ornamental. Indeed his talents had lain hitherto rather
in the ballroom or the lists than in the world of practical politics; but
success had stirred his ambitions, and especially his marriage with
the daughter of the Marquis de Santillana, head of the powerful
family of Mendoza. With this connection at his back he might hope
to drive Villena and his relations from Court, and with the Queen’s
aid control the destinies of Castile.
In the struggle between the rival favourites, the Princess Isabel
was regarded as a useful pawn on their chess-board. She and her
brother had been summoned to Court at Villena’s suggestion that
“they would be better brought up and learn more virtuous customs
than away from his Majesty’s presence.” Whether irony were
intended or no, Henry had accepted the statement seriously; and
while Alfonso was handed over to a tutor, his sister joined the
Queen’s household.
There were hopes at this time of another heir to the crown; and the
King, foreseeing in the prospect of a son the means to raise his fallen
dignity, was anxious to gratify his wife’s wishes. When she pleaded
therefore for an alliance with her own country, to be cemented by the
marriage of her brother Alfonso, then a widower, with the twelve-
year-old Isabel, he readily agreed. The scheme was the more pleasing
that it ran counter to the union of Isabel and Ferdinand of Aragon,
still strongly advocated by King John. Villena, who had been bribed
into assisting the latter negotiation, received the first real intimation
that his ascendancy was shaken, when he learned that the King and
Court had set off to the south-western province of Estremadura
without consulting him.
Through the medium of the Queen and Count of Ledesma, the
Portuguese alliance was successfully arranged; and Alfonso V. was so
impressed by the young Princess that he gallantly protested his wish
that the betrothal could take place at once. Isabel replied with her
strange unchildlike caution, that she could not be betrothed save
with the consent of the National Cortes, an appeal to Cæsar that
postponed the matter for the time being. Perhaps she knew her
brother well enough to doubt his continued insistence that “she
should marry none save the King of Portugal”; or she may thus early
have formed a shrewd and not altogether flattering estimate of the
volatile and uncertain Alfonso.
In the meantime the Marquis of Villena was plotting secretly with
his brother, the Master of Calatrava, the Archbishop of Toledo, the
Admiral of Castile, and other nobles how he might regain his old
influence. After a series of attempts on his rival’s life, from which
Beltran de La Cueva emerged scatheless with the additional honour
of the coveted Mastership of Santiago, he and his fellow-conspirators
retired to Burgos, where they drew up a schedule of their grievances.
Secret measures having failed they were determined to browbeat
Henry into submission by playing on his well-known fears of civil
war.
The King’s hopes of an undisputed succession had been shattered
by the premature birth of a still-born son; and thus the question of
the Infanta Joanna’s legitimacy remained as a convenient weapon for
those discontented with the Crown. Nor had the gifts and honours
heaped on Beltran de La Cueva encouraged the loyalty of the
principal nobles. The new favourite was rapacious and arrogant,
while even more intolerable to courtiers of good family and wealth
was the rise of an upstart nobility, that threatened to monopolize the
royal favour.
Louis XI. was astute enough to develop such a policy to his own
advantage; but the feeble Henry IV. was no more able to control his
new creations than their rivals. Almost without exception they
betrayed and sold him for their own ends, poisoning his mind
against the few likely to remain faithful, and making his name odious
amongst his poorer subjects by their selfishness and the corruption
of their rule.
The conspirators of Burgos were thus enabled to pose as the
defenders of national liberties; and their insolent letter of censure
took the colouring most likely to appeal to popular prejudice.
Complaints of the King’s laxity in religious matters, of the unchecked
violence of his Moorish guard, of the debasement of the coinage, and
of the incompetence and venality of the royal judges—these were
placed in the foreground, but the real crux of the document came
later. It lay in two petitions that were veiled threats, first that the
King would deprive the Count of Ledesma of the Mastership of
Santiago, since it belonged of right to the Infante Alfonso, and next
that the said Alfonso should be proclaimed as heir to the throne. The
illegitimacy of the Princess Joanna was openly affirmed.
Henry received this letter at Valladolid, and, calling together his
royal council, laid it before them. He expressed neither resentment at
its insolence nor a desire for revenge; and when the aged Bishop of
Cuenca, who had been one of his father’s advisers, bade him have no
dealings with the conspirators save to offer them battle, he replied
with a sneer that “those who need not fight nor lay hands on their
swords were always free with the lives of others.”
Peace at all costs was his cry, and the old Bishop, exasperated,
forgot prudence in his anger. “Henceforth,” he exclaimed, “you will
be thought the most unworthy King Spain ever knew; and you will
repent it, Señor, when it is too late to make amends.”
Already knights and armed men were flocking to the royal
standard, as they heard of the rebels’ ultimatum. Many of them were
genuinely shocked at the attack on the dignity of the Crown, but for
the greater number Henry’s reckless prodigality of money and
estates was not without its attractions.
The King, however, proved deaf alike to warnings and scorn. After
elaborate discussions he and the Marquis of Villena arranged a
temporary peace, known as the Concord of Medina del Campo. Its
terms were entirely favourable to the conspirators, for Henry,
heedless of the implied slur on his honour, agreed to acknowledge
Alfonso as his heir, on the understanding that he should later marry
the Infanta Joanna. With incredible shortsightedness he also
consented to hand his brother over to the Marquis; and on the 30th
of November, 1464, the oath to the new heir to the throne was
publicly taken. This was followed by the elevation of the Count of
Ledesma, who had resigned the Mastership of Santiago in favour of
the young Prince, to the rank of Duke of Alburquerque.
The question of the misgovernment of the country and its cure was
to be referred to a committee of five leading nobles, two to be
selected by either party, while the Prior-General of the Order of San
Geronimo was given a casting vote. This “Junta of Medina del
Campo,” held in January, 1465, proved no lasting settlement, for the
King’s representatives allowed themselves to be won over to the
views of the league, with disastrous results for their own master.
“They straitened the power of the King to such an extent,” says a
chronicler, “that they left him almost nothing of his dominion save
the title of King, without power to command or any pre-eminence.”
Henry was roused at last, but it was only to fall a victim to fresh
treachery.
Two of the most prominent members of the league in its
beginnings had been Don Alonso Carrillo, Archbishop of Toledo,
uncle of the Marquis of Villena, and the Admiral of Castile, Don
Fadrique Enriquez. The former had little of his nephew’s suave
charm and adaptability, and his haughty, irascible nature was more
suited to the camp than the Primacy of the Castilian Church.
“He was a great lover of war,” says Pulgar in his Claros Varones,
“and while he was praised on the one side for his open-handedness
he was blamed on the other for his turbulence, considering the
religious vows by which he was bound.”
 At the time of the Concord of Medina del Campo, he and the
Admiral of Castile had professed themselves weary of the consistent
disloyalty of their colleagues, and had returned to Court with the
King. They now denounced the “Junta” and advised their master to
revoke his agreement to the Concord, and to demand that the Infante
Alfonso should be instantly restored to his power. As might be
expected, the league merely laughed at this request. They declared
that they held the young Prince as a guarantee of their safety, and
that, since the King had determined to persecute them, they must
renounce his service.
Not a few of those at Court suspected the Archbishop and Admiral
of a share in this response, but Henry refused to take a lesson from
the ill-results of past credulity. Instead he submitted entirely to his
new advisers, surrendering at their request two important
strongholds. This achieved, Don Fadrique and the Archbishop
deserted to the league without further pretence; and when the royal
messengers discovered the latter in full fighting gear, on his way to
one of his new possessions, and ventured to remind him that the
King awaited him, that warlike prelate replied with an air of fury:
“Go, tell your King that I have had enough of him and his affairs.
Henceforward he shall see who is the true Sovereign of Castile.”
This insult with its cryptic threat was explained almost
immediately by messengers hurrying from Valladolid, who brought
word that the Admiral had raised the standard of revolt, proclaiming
in the market-place, “Long live the King—Don Alfonso!”
From defiance in words the rebel leaders proceeded to show their
scorn of Henry IV. in action. On June 5th of the same year, they
commanded a wooden scaffold to be set up on the plain outside the
city of Avila, so that it could be clearly seen from all the surrounding
neighbourhood. On it was placed an effigy of the King, robed in
heavy black and seated in a chair of state. On his head was a crown,
before him he held a sword, and in his right hand a sceptre—
emblems of the sovereignty he had failed to exercise. Mounting the
scaffold, the chief members of the league read aloud their grievances,
declaring that only necessity had driven them to the step they were
about to take. Then the Archbishop of Toledo removed the crown
and others of the league the sword and sceptre. Having stripped the
effigy of its royal robes, they threw it on the ground, spurning it from
them with their feet.
Immediately it had fallen and their jests and insults had died away,
the eleven-year-old Alfonso ascended the scaffold, and when he had
been invested with the insignia of majesty, the nobles knelt, and
kissed his hand, and took the oath of allegiance. Afterwards they
raised him on their shoulders, shouting, “Castile for the King, Don
Alfonso!”
Messengers soon brought Henry news of his mock dethronement;
and reports of risings in different parts of the land followed in quick
succession. Valladolid and Burgos had risen in the north; there were
factions in the important city of Toledo; a revolt had blazed up in
Andalusia, where Don Pedro Giron, Master of Calatrava, had long
been busy, sowing the seeds of disaffection.
“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall the earth
receive me,” exclaimed the King when he was told, and he found a
melancholy satisfaction in quotations from Isaiah concerning the
ingratitude of a chosen people. The tide had, however, turned in his
favour. Even in Avila, amid the shouts of triumph and rejoicing,
when Henry’s effigy was thrown to the ground, some of those present
had sobbed aloud with horror. More practical assistance took the
shape of an army that rapidly collected in response to Henry’s
summons, “eager,” as the chronicler expressed it, “to come to blows
with those tyrants who had thus dishonoured their natural lord.”
Villena who much preferred diplomacy to the shock of warfare had
in the meanwhile induced his master to agree to a personal
interview, with the result that the King broke up his camp,
compensating his troops for their inaction by large gifts of money.
The league, it was understood, would return to Henry’s allegiance
within a certain time; but its leaders had fallen out amongst
themselves, and at length Villena thought it as well that he and his
family should seek advantageous terms on their own account.
He demanded with incredible insolence that Henry should give his
sister Isabel in marriage to Don Pedro Giron, Master of Calatrava. In
return the Master would pay into the impoverished royal treasury an
enormous sum of money, amassed by fraud and violence, besides
entering the royal service with the 3000 lances, with which he was
just then engaged in harrying the fields of Andalusia. By way of
securing future peace, the Infante Alfonso was to be restored to his
brother, and the Duke of Alburquerque and his brother-in-law, the
Bishop of Calahorra, banished.
For all his folly and weakness, it is difficult to believe that Henry
would consent to such terms, but so low were the straits in which he
found himself that he immediately expressed his satisfaction,
sending word to Don Pedro Giron to come as quickly as he could.
Isabel on her part was aghast and, finding entreaties and
remonstrances of no avail, she spent days and nights upon her knees,
praying that God would either remove the man or herself, before
such a marriage should take place. Her favourite lady-in-waiting,
Doña Beatriz de Bobadilla, moved by her distress, assured her that
neither God nor she would permit such a crime, and, showing her a
dagger that she wore hidden, swore to kill the Master, if no other way
of safety should present itself.
Help, indeed, seemed far away, for the bridegroom, having
obtained from Rome a dispensation from his ill-kept vow of celibacy,
was soon on his way to Madrid at the head of a large company of
knights and horsemen. His only reply to those who told him of the
Infanta’s obstinate refusal of his suit was that he would win her, if
not by gentleness then by force.
At Villa Real, where he halted for the night, the unexpected
happened, for, falling ill of an inflammation of the throat, he died a
few days later.
“He was suddenly struck down by the hand of God,” says Enriquez
del Castillo; while Alonso de Palencia describes how at the end “he
blasphemously accused God of cruelty in not permitting him to add
forty days to his forty and three years.”
Both the King and the Marquis of Villena were in consternation at
the news. The latter had begun to lose his influence with the league,
who justly suspected him of caring more for his own interests than
theirs; and, while he bargained and negotiated with a view to
securing for himself the Mastership of Santiago, a position that he no
longer considered belonged to the young Alfonso “of right,” the
Archbishop of Toledo and the Admiral were bent on bringing matters
to an issue by open war.
 Henry was forced to collect his loyalists once more; and on the
20th of August, 1467, a battle took place on the plain of Olmedo, just
outside the city. The King’s army had the advantage in numbers;
indeed he had been induced to advance on the belief that the enemy
would not dare to leave the shelter of their walls, and by the time
they appeared it was too late to sound the retreat. Conspicuous
amongst the rebels were the Infante Alfonso clad, notwithstanding
his youth, in full mail armour, and the fiery Archbishop of Toledo in
his surcoat of scarlet emblazoned with a white cross. The latter was
wounded in his left arm early in the fight but not for that ceasing to
urge on his cavalry to the attack. On the other side the hero of the
day was Beltran de La Cueva, whose death forty knights had sworn to
accomplish, but whose skill and courage were to preserve him for
service in a better cause.
Alone, amongst the leading combatants, Henry IV. cut but a poor
figure, for, watching the action from a piece of rising ground, he fled
at the first sign of a reverse, persuaded that the battle was lost. Late
that evening a messenger, primed with the news of victory,
discovered him hiding in a neighbouring village, and he at last
consented to return to the camp.
The royalists succeeded in continuing their march, but since the
enemy remained in possession of the larger number of banners and
prisoners, both armies were able to claim that they had won.
The battle of Olmedo was followed by the treacherous surrender to
the league of the King’s favourite town of Segovia. Here he had left
the Queen and his sister; but while the former sought refuge in the
Alcazar, which still held out for her husband, Isabel preferred to
remain in the palace with her ladies-in-waiting. She had not suffered
such kindness at the hands of Henry IV. as would make her rate
either his love or his power of protection highly; and, when the rebels
entered the town she surrendered to them with a very goodwill.
Henceforward her fortunes were joined to those of Alfonso; but
death which had saved her from marriage with a man she loathed,
was soon to rob her of her younger brother. It is difficult to form a
clear estimate of either Alfonso’s character or abilities from the
scanty references of the chroniclers; but already, at the age of
fourteen, he had proved himself a better soldier than Henry IV.; and
we are told that those who knew him personally judged him more
upright. The news of his death, on July 5, 1468, was therefore
received with general dismay. His death had been ostensibly the
result of swollen glands, but it was widely believed that the real cause
of its seriousness was a dish of poisoned trout prepared for him by a
secret ally of the King.
With his disappearance from the political chess-board, the whole
balance of affairs in Castile was altered; and Isabel emerged from
comparative obscurity into the prominent position she was
afterwards to hold. Would she take Alfonso’s place as puppet of the
league? or would she be reconciled to her elder brother? In the latter
case, how would the King decide between her claims and those of
Joanna “La Beltraneja”? These were the questions on whose answers
depended the future of the land.
The principal members of the league had no doubts at all as to her
complete acquiescence in their plans, and in the town of Avila they
made her a formal offer of the throne, inviting her to assume the title
of Queen of Castile and Leon. Isabel received the suggestion with her
usual caution; for though but a girl of seventeen, she had few
illusions as to the glories of sovereignty. She knew, moreover, that
several prominent insurgents had taken the opportunity of
reconciling themselves at Court, while the Marquis of Villena, now
acknowledged Master of Santiago, was once more hand in glove with
the King. She therefore replied that while her brother lived she could
neither take the government nor call herself Queen, but that she
would use every effort to secure peace in the land.
 ALFONSO, BROTHER OF ISABEL OF
CASTILE

FROM “ICONOGRAFIA ESPAÑOLA” BY

VALENTIN CARDERERA Y SOLANO

This answer deprived the league of any legitimate excuse for

rebellion; and they therefore sent letters to the King, declaring their
willingness to return to his service, if he would acknowledge Isabel as
heir to the throne. The Marquis of Villena also pressed the
suggestion, thinking by this means to re-establish his influence
completely; since his enemies, the House of Mendoza, and especially
its cleverest representative Pedro Gonsalez, Bishop of Siguenza, who
had been promoted from the See of Calahorra, had taken up the
cause of Queen Joanna and her daughter.
 Henry, anxious for peace, no matter what the price, fell in with
Villena’s schemes. On the 19th of September, 1468, a meeting was
held at the Toros de Guisandos near Avila; and there, in the presence
of the Papal Legate, Henry swore away for a second time the honour
of his so-called daughter, and recognized Isabel as legitimate heir to
the throne and Princess of Asturias. By the terms of an agreement
previously drawn up, he also promised that his sister should not be
compelled to marry against her will, while she in return agreed to
obtain his consent; furthermore he declared that he would divorce
and send back to her own land his wife, whose lax behaviour had
now become a byword.
Isabel’s own position had materially improved; and there were no
lack of suitors for this eligible heiress. Amongst them was a brother
of Edward IV. of England, but whether the Duke of Clarence or
Richard of Gloucester, the chroniclers do not say. The English
alliance was never very seriously considered, whereas a veritable war
of diplomacy was to be waged around the other proposals.
The Infanta’s chief adviser at this time was the Archbishop of
Toledo, though it does not appear that she was as much under his
thumb, as Enriquez de Castillo would have us believe. There is
evidence of considerable independence of judgment both in her
refusal of the crown on Alfonso’s death, and in her willingness to
meet her brother at the Toros de Guisandos, in spite of the
Archbishop’s violent opposition. Throughout the negotiations, the
Archbishop had been on the watch for evidence of some hidden plot,
and only Isabel’s tact and firmness had induced him to accompany
her to the meeting.
Nevertheless it was natural that a girl of her age should rely
considerably on the judgment of a man so well versed in the politics
of the day, especially as the alliance that he urged appealed in every
way to her own inclinations. Ferdinand of Aragon, the Archbishop’s
protégé, was her junior by eleven months; a slight disparity in
comparison with the age of former suitors such as Charles of Viana,
Alfonso of Portugal, and the Master of Calatrava, all her seniors by at
least twenty years.
In modern reckoning, Ferdinand would be called a boy, but his
childhood had been spent amidst surroundings of war and rebellion,
from which he had emerged as his father’s right hand; and John II.,
in token of his love and confidence, had created this son of his old
age King of Sicily to mark his dignity and independence. Shrewd,
practical, and brave, Ferdinand united to a well-set-up, manly,
appearance all those qualities that Henry IV. so conspicuously
lacked. It was little wonder then if he found grace in the Infanta
Isabel’s eyes, not only as an eligible husband, but as a fitting consort
with whose help she might subdue the turbulence of Castile.
It can be imagined that Ferdinand found no grace at all in the eyes
of the Marquis of Villena, to whom opportunities for turbulence were
as the breath of life, and whose affection for the House of Aragon had
never been sincere.
Policy dictated to him a counter-alliance and at first the
importunate Alfonso of Portugal won support. Villena had re-
established his old influence over his master, and at this time formed
an ambitious scheme, by which his son should marry the Infanta
Joanna; the idea being to draw up a new settlement, settling the
crown on his own descendants, if Isabel and her Portuguese husband
had no children.
At Ocaña, where Henry IV. and his sister held a meeting of the
Cortes in 1468, a magnificent embassy appeared from Alfonso V.,
with the Archbishop of Lisbon at its head, seeking the betrothal of
their master to the Infanta Isabel.
“They thought it an easy matter to bring about the marriage,” says
Alonso de Palencia; but they were destined to return to their own
land, with their mission unfulfilled. Isabel had never been attracted
to the Portuguese King; and her coldness was hardened into
antipathy by the Archbishop of Toledo, who sent her secret warnings
that the alliance was a plot to ruin her prospects. Once married, she
would become a foreigner in the eyes of Castile, and while her
children could not hope to succeed to the throne of Portugal, since
Alfonso had already an heir, the Infanta Joanna would be preferred
to her in her own land. Isabel, moved both by these arguments and
her own feelings, thereupon gave a secret promise to marry her
cousin Ferdinand, returning a steady refusal to her brother’s
persuasions and threats.
Henry now made an attempt to capture her, with a view to
imprisoning her in the Alcazar at Madrid; but the attitude of the
principal knights of Ocaña, who loved neither Villena nor the
Portuguese, was so threatening that he quickly changed his manner.
Assuring the Archbishop of Lisbon that some other means would be
found to placate the Princess, whose opposition would only be
increased by violence, he sent him and his fellow-ambassadors away,
not altogether despairing but with their confidence somewhat
shaken.
In the meanwhile the fires of rebellion were alight once more in
Andalusia and burnt so furiously, that it was felt only the King in
person could hope to allay them. With great reluctance he left his
sister in Ocaña, but he dared not risk further unpopularity by using
force. At the Master of Santiago’s suggestion he demanded that she
should promise to take no new steps about her marriage until his
return, thinking in this way to place her in an equivocal position.
Either she would refuse, in which case she would stand self-
convicted of some secret plot, or she would take the oath,
condemning herself as a perjurer if she broke it.
Isabel, appreciating the situation, gave her promise. Even the
Master of Santiago, for all his vigilance, did not know that her
consent to the Aragonese alliance was of previous date, and therefore
arrangements concerned with it could be argued not to fall under the
heading “new.” As soon as Henry IV. and his favourite had gone
southwards, she herself left Ocaña, with the ostensible object of
taking her brother Alfonso’s body to be buried in state at Avila, and
from there went to Madrigal her birthplace, where her mother was
living. It was her hope that here she would be able to complete her
negotiations with King John and his son, undetected; but she found
the Bishop of Burgos, a nephew of the Master of Santiago, in the
town ready to spy on all her actions.
The King had by now planned for his sister a new match, with
Charles, Duke of Berri, brother and heir-presumptive to Louis XI.
Not only would this alliance cement the customary friendship of
Castile and France, but Isabel’s close connection with the French
throne would remove her very thoroughly from the danger zone of
Castilian affairs. When the Cardinal of Arras arrived in Andalusia he
was therefore encouraged by Henry to go to Madrigal in person and
urge the Duke’s suit.
Nothing doubting the success of his mission, for he was a man
famed for his oratory, the Cardinal, having gained admittance to the