PRAGOTI

''The massive unorganized sector, which contributes some 60% of GDP beyond the regulative and protective reach of the state, is one of the four most distinctive features of Indian capitalism. An audit of Indian labour must focus on the workers in this sector. A second feature is the unskilled nature of much work, with employers relying on casual labour and flexible employment practices, so attaching little importance to training and the development of skills. A third distinctive feature is the absolute poverty of workers. Fourth,most work may be unregulated by the state but the markets for their labour are far from ‘unstructured’. Work is organized through social institutions such as caste and gender. Capitalism is not dissolving this matrix of social institutions but reconfiguring them slowly, unevenly and in a great diversity of ways. Barbara Harriss White and Nandini Gooptu write in this article in the Socialist Register.