I speak to Samanth Subramanian in the National (U.A.E.) about violence against women, drawing on research in "Indianomix".

http://www.thenational.ae/news/world/south-asia/violence-against-women-a-social-tinderbox-waiting-for-a-spark

I speak to the BBC World Service on whether I believe India's proposal for a database of sex offenders make sense (I don't.) Listen about 2 minutes in.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0129w2n

My appearance on NDTV Profit last night, looking back at the main economic news in 2012 and looking ahead to 2013.

http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/we-mean-business/will-2013-be-better-for-indian-economy/259694

Vivek Kaul in FirstPost picks "Indianomix" as a top ten pick for 2012, calls the book the "surprise package of the year"!

http://www.firstpost.com/living/top-10-in-indian-non-fiction-more-reasons-to-skip-chetan-bhagat-569641.html

Can economics help us understand violence against women in India?

Can economics help us understand violence against women in India?

Vivek Dehejia

In the aftermath of the Delhi rape case, and amidst the welter of moral outrage, hand-wringing, and public demonstrations, that, understandably, have followed in its wake, it’s important to take a step or two back and ask some deeper questions.

What is the root cause of violence against women? Is it misogyny that is deeply engrained in our still patriarchal culture? Is it the churning of a society in flux, as “old” India confronts “new” India, as some commentators have suggested? Does it have to do with a broken criminal justice system that fails to deliver justice? Is it a backlash against the increasing economic and social empowerment of women?

One of the basic lessons of social science is that a complex phenomenon such as violence against women rarely, if ever, has a unique explanation, a single driving causal mechanism. Rather, such phenomena are “over-determined”, plausibly explainable by a multitude of different hypotheses, which aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive nor exhaustive. In simple terms, all of the factors noted above are likely to be at work, and recent research bears on several of them.

In our new book, “Indianomix: Making Sense of Modern India”, my co-author and I devote a significant portion of one chapter to looking more deeply at the issue of violence against women and probing what the research has to say. The following is based, in part, on the research that we present in that chapter.

First off, there’s much, and legitimate, criticism of the quality of data that scholars have to work with. Rape and other violent crimes against women tend to go under-reported in India, as they do elsewhere, and this certainly “contaminates” (in a statistical sense) the quality of the data. Statistically, the correct response is not to discard such data as worthless, as some have suggested, but to “treat” (again, in a statistical sense) the data appropriately. For instance, in the face of systematic under-reporting of violence against women, statistics on the incidence of rape at any given point of time may be misleading; but its rate of change over time is still statistically meaningful. Thus, the fact that incidence of rape and violence against women show an increasing trend is worrisome.

On the other hand, though, an increase in the incidence of violence against women may also reflect increased reporting of such crimes and a more accurate classification – that is, a crime that was previously categorized as generic violence is now correctly categorized as, for instance, a rape. Some recent research, indeed, suggests that increasing political and economic empowerment of women has had exactly these effects, and so part of the increased reported incidence may actually reflect better reporting rather than an increase in the actual incidence. However, it remains for future research to parse the increase in reported crimes against women into these two components.

Another question that goes unasked in the predictable knee jerk reaction to a tragedy such as the recent one is to probe the deeper causes of the high incidence of violent crime, especially violence against women, in India. In the book, we explore one important hypothesis that comes out of academic research both in India and in other places such as China: that there is a robust statistical correlation between the skewed sex ratio (that is, more men than women) and the incidence of murder and other violent crimes including rape. By no means is it claimed that the sex ratio is the only variable that can explain crime; rather, it is one of a group of other important socio-economic factors.

The great difficulty with any statistical correlation is that it doesn’t necessarily imply a causal relationship, nor does it tell us the direction of causality, in case such a relationship exists. Does an adverse sex ratio cause violence? This would be if, for example, lots of single angry young men are roaming around and are violence-prone as a consequence. It’s noteworthy that in the Delhi rape case, the oldest of the alleged perpetrators is only 33 and the youngest is a juvenile and all but one of them is single. Of course, a single data point doesn’t confirm or refute a theory, but it certainly fits a suggestive pattern. It’s not just India where a skewed sex ratio is seen as an underlying driver of violence including against women. Some scholarship suggests that this explains the increase in violent crime in China, where the sex ratio is even worse than in India.

But in economics, things are rarely so simple. It could equally be that, in a society which already has a skewed sex ratio, families will prefer to have boys rather than girls, both because boys offer greater protection to parents when they grow up and because daughters will be at greater risk in a violent society. A statistical correlation by itself cannot discriminate between these two competing explanations.

What’s more, in the rarefied world of statistics, there are two other possibilities: first, that the correlation is “spurious”, and, second, that there is an “omitted variable” which is the underlying cause of the correlation. In the case of the skewed sex ratio and violent crime, one can safely discard the possibility of spurious correlation, since there are compelling causal mechanisms one can point to running in either direction. But one cannot dismiss the idea that a deeper force is at work which leads both to a skewed sex ratio and more violent crime. The natural candidates are patriarchy and misogyny that are deeply embedded in our culture and have been slow to change. Indeed, it is the fact of “son preference”, which is a product of a patriarchal society, that itself is the underlying cause of sex-selective abortion, which in turn is one, although not the only, driver of a skewed sex ratio.

Deeply held cultural values and beliefs – even hateful ones such as misogyny – are slow to change and difficult, if not impossible, to legislate away. The correct response is not despair, nor a knee jerk appeal to barbaric punishments such as the death penalty or “chemical castration” of convicted rapists. The copious mass of evidence from the United States does not unequivocally support the widely held idea that capital punishment serves as a deterrent to future crime.

The unglamorous but right answer is to alter the incentives that would-be rapists and other assailants face when they contemplate a sexual assault, tilting them away rather than toward such crimes. The fact that, as of last year, only about a quarter of cases against alleged perpetrators of rape resulted in conviction is a telling statistic. What is the use of ratcheting up punishment from life imprisonment to the death penalty if there is still a three in four chance of an alleged perpetrator walking away scot-free? Whatever one's view on the morality of capital punishment, the salient point is that its efficacy as a deterrent is in serious doubt given such grim statistics.

While the research on the deterrent effect of severe punishment is hotly contested, as noted above, what is incontrovertible is that a criminal justice system which would efficiently and fairly mete out justice under our existing legal system will go a long way toward reducing the incidence of such horrific crimes.

We need to draw the correct lessons from the recent tragedy and not allow our understandable anger and revulsion to point us toward superficially appealing but misguided solutions.

Vivek Dehejia is an economics professor at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. He is co-author, with Rupa Subramanya, of “Indianomix: Making Sense of Modern India”, just published by Random House India.

A fantastic review of "Indianomix" in Tehelka!

A fantastic review of "Indianomix" by Ashok Malik in Tehelka magazine. Calls it "remarkable", "never dull", "quintessentially Indian"! "In the end, this book is about two students of economics having fun. Read it, so will you."

http://tehelka.com/its-the-economy-stupid/

My appearance on NDTV Profit last night discussing the ongoing Walmart controversy in India and the political economy of lobbying.

http://profit.ndtv.com/videos/we-mean-business/video-walmart-lobbying-or-bribery-258905

Vivek Kaul of FirstPost speaks to me at length about "Indianomix," bringing out several themes of the book including luck and chance. Do read!

http://www.firstpost.com/india/its-luck-explaining-sonias-rise-bjps-2004-loss-and-cricket-debuts-562632.html

"India at LSE" speaks to me about the unfinished economic reform challenges in India.

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/indiaatlse/2012/12/19/top-10-challenges-for-india-in-2013/

Rupa Subramanya and I in conversation with Faisal Kidwai of Rediff.com discussing "Indianomix"!

http://www.rediff.com/business/slide-show/slide-show-1-interview-vivek-dehejia-rupa-subramanya-indian-economy-missing-women-bjp-and-cricket/20121217.htm

A great review of "Indianomix"!

http://www.sunday-guardian.com/bookbeat/an-ambitious-look-at-some-of-indias-biggest-problems

My appearance yesterday on NDTV's "Left, Right, & Centre" commenting on the most recent WalMart row in India.

http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/left-right-centre/wal-mart-row-storm-in-a-tea-cup/258074

My latest appearance on NDTV Profit, part of a distinguished panel discussing the economic reform agenda.

http://profit.ndtv.com/videos/we-mean-business/video-is-india-moving-towards-realising-its-full-economic-potential-257945

Indianomix available on Kindle!

While the paper edition of "Indianomix" is currently available only in India, there's good news for those who want to read it: it's available for immediate download in an electronic version for Kindle. You can get it from the respective Amazon websites.

Here's the link for Canada: http://www.amazon.ca/Indianomix-Making-Sense-Modern-ebook/dp/B00AKFIKGG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1355123742&sr=8-1

Here's a third exclusive excerpt from "Indianomix" in Wall Street Journal India.

http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2012/12/05/indianomix-mythical-or-modern/

A second exclusive excerpt from "Indianomix" appeared today in WSJ India!

http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2012/12/04/indianomix-heads-or-tails/

Sadanand Dhume takes on the "gilded age" analogy on the AEI blog, and refers to my work on the subject!

http://www.aei-ideas.org/2012/12/indias-ungilded-age/

First excerpts and coverage of content from "Indianomix" appears today!

The Wall Street Journal India publishes a first excerpt from "Indianomix" here.

http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2012/12/03/indianomix-what-if/

And in FirstPost, Vivek Kaul considers the question "Would India have grown faster if it wasn't a democracy?" drawing also on the same chapter in "Indianomix":

http://www.firstpost.com/economy/would-india-have-grown-faster-if-it-wasnt-a-democracy-542780.html

I speak to the Deseret News of Utah on Walmart coming to India.

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865567634/Walmart-comes-to-India-Can-mom-and-pop-stores-play-with-the-big-boys.html

Business Standard picks "Indianomix" as a top ten pick for December!

http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/BizStd.pdf

CNBC picks up my billionaires piece from India Ink!

http://www.cnbc.com/id/49611070

"Indianomix: Making Sense of Modern India" releasing next week!

"Indianomix: Making Sense of Modern India," by me and Rupa Subramanya, will be published by Random House India on December 6, 2012. For more information on the book check out the press release:

http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/Indianomix.pdf

And to avoid disappointment pre-order now from Flipkart and get a 25% discount!

http://www.flipkart.com/indianomix-8184001215/p/itmdf4gr4nesj9wg

I speak to the Canadian Press wire service about the Canadian PM's upcoming trade visit to India.

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/national-news/Photoops+business+IndoCanadian+community+during+Harper+trip/7478554/story.html

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/11/01/pol-cp-harper-india-trip-advancer.html

Being a wire service story, it appeared in many news outlets. The links above are two places it appeared.

My latest for India Ink, on the rise of billionaire wealth in India.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/indias-billionaire-wealth-sign-of-a-healthy-or-an-ailing-economy/

Chandrahas Choudhury, writing in Bloomberg Views, picks up my recent piece in the New York Times India Ink in his analysis of reactions to the PM's reform drive.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-25/singh-s-homespun-plea-for-liberalizing-india.html

My latest for India Ink, asking whether PM Singh has, in fact, gambled enough in his recent push for reforms.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/24/has-manmohan-singh-gambled-enough/

My review of Harsh Mander's collection of essays for today's Mint Lounge.

http://www.livemint.com/2012/08/31211635/Book-Review--The-columnist8.html

Vivek Kaul in an article on Manmohan Singh and economic growth for FirstPost draws on his interview with me from DNA a few weeks ago.

http://www.firstpost.com/economy/of-9-economic-growth-and-manmohans-pipedreams-419371.html

I have a long Q&A with Vivek Kaul in DNA on the evolution of the Indian political economy since 1991.

Here's a link to the web version:

http://www.dnaindia.com/money/interview_reform-by-stealth-the-originalsin-of-1991-has-come-back-to-haunt-us_1724348

But it looks better as a PDF, including with a caricature!

http://epaper.dnaindia.com/epaperimages//Mumbai//06082012//06082012-md-main-13.pdf

If the link above is stale, I've archived the PDF on my university webpage here:

http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/DNAAugust2012.pdf

My latest appearance on NDTV Profit, part of a panel debating "Can P. Chidambaram Deliver as Finance Minister?"

http://profit.ndtv.com/show/We-Mean-Business/Can-P-Chidambaram-deliver-as-Finance-Minister-/241576 

On NDTV Profit on July 23, 2012, I was part of a panel discussion, "Is the India growth story still intact?". Click on the link below for the video.

http://profit.ndtv.com/show/We-Mean-Business/Is-the-India-growth-story-still-intact-/240351

Testing the Google Feedburner app.

This is just a test of the "Follow by Email" tab, which allows you to follow the contents of this page via email. Thank you for following!

My latest for the NYT India Ink, I get to the bottom of the Indian PMO's misleadingly optimistic tweets on the FDI climate in India.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/17/from-the-prime-ministers-twitter-feed-a-puzzling-view-of-foreign-investment/

Academic links.

As my university webpage is undergoing a revamp, here are some links to items archived there.

My academic CV is here: http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/cv.pdf

Here is a link to the full version of my paper with Marcel Voia that is just out in the Journal of Globalization and Development: http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/DehejiaVoia.pdf

Here are links to three unpublished papers I wrote as a graduate student at Columbia:

"The Dynamics of Debt and Taxation: The Case of Endogenous Time Preference"
http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/DebtTax.pdf

"A Note on the Solow-Swan Growth Model with a Fixed Wage"
http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/SolowSwan.pdf

"Adjustment in Trade Models"
http://http-server.carleton.ca/~vdehejia/Trade.pdf

From last month, here's a video of my conversation with Shekhar Shah on "Can India end poverty in a generation?". Recorded at the IDRC HQ in Ottawa and organized by Carleton University's India Centre.

https://vimeo.com/44190456

My latest for the NYT India Ink, my take on the controversy over the Time cover article calling the Indian PM an "underachiever."

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/11/manmohan-singh-overachiever/

My appearance on NDTV Profit, discussing "Can the PM Change his 'Underachiever' Image?"

http://profit.ndtv.com/show/We-Mean-Business/We-Mean-Business-Can-Prime-Minister-change-his-Underachiever-image-/238875

Wherein I get to play judge ... for India Ink's "competition" on becoming the next Indian finance minister!

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/29/the-winner-of-the-india-ink-finance-minister-contest/

On NDTV Profit, I'm part of a panel discussion on "Whether India's PM Can Deliver on his Promise to get India back on a High Growth Trajectory."

http://profit.ndtv.com/video/We-Mean-Business-Can-PM-live-up-to-his-promise-of-bringing-India-back-on-growth-trajectory/237527

"Can India end poverty in a generation?" My conversation with Shekhar Shah, Director General, NCAER.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=losG4_9PlJ8

My take on the recent growth slowdown in India Ink.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/dont-count-india-out-just-yet/

My contrarian take on the rupee's decline for India Ink.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/24/who-cares-if-the-rupee-keeps-falling/

My review of Edward Luce's new book, "Time to Start Thinking," in today's Sunday Guardian.

http://www.sunday-guardian.com/bookbeat/inclined-to-decline-its-deja-vu-all-over-again-in-america

My latest for the Hindustan Times, on lessons of the "Greek tragedy" for India.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/ViewsSectionPage/ColumnsOthers/Leave-it-to-the-voters-please/Article1-856894.aspx

My latest for India Ink, on the global campaign for clean cook stoves. Sorry, Julia Roberts.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/23/the-cookstove-conundrum/

I tell the CBC/RCI that the Canadian government's plan to boost trade ties with India has more to do with diaspora politics than good economics.

http://www.rcinet.ca/english/column/the-indo-canadian-report-with-rashi-khilnani/15-17_2012-04-10-canadian-efforts-to-boost-trade-with-india/

Nikhila Gill and I continue our exploration of the poverty line and its uses in the NYT India Ink.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/10/who-deserves-welfare-in-india/

I make it to Outlook magazine in India's list of top 100 people to follow on Twitter.

http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?280458#.T3_3JXtslSM.twitter

Nikhila Gill and I analyze the poverty line debate in India for the New York Times' India Ink.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/04/what-does-indias-poverty-line-actually-measure/

My review of Christophe Jaffrelot's new edited volume on India in today's Sunday Guardian.

http://www.sunday-guardian.com/bookbeat/dissecting-the-great-indian-democratic-trail-since-1950 

My reaction to the budget in the NYT India Ink.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/16/budget-2012-analysis-did-mukherjee-deliver/ 

My take in the NYT an hour before the Union Budget comes down in India.

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/16/can-indias-mr-fix-it-spur-growth/ 

My latest for India Ink, "The Great Gatsby Comes to India."

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/the-great-gatsby-comes-to-india/

My latest for the Hindustan Times, "Can capitalism and morality be friends?"

http://www.hindustantimes.com/News-Feed/ColumnsOthers/Can-capitalism-and-morality-be-friends/Article1-806331.aspx

A video with highlights of the Caravan Conversation on FDI is now live on India Ink's webpage!

http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/13/the-retail-market-assessing-the-governments-plan/