The Economics of Starvation: Laissez-faire ideology and famine in colonial India

Rune Møller Stahl

The Economics of Starvation: Laissez-faire ideology and famine in colonial India

3 Citationer (Scopus)

Abstract

Stahl investigates the role of liberal economics in the formulation of the disastrous famine policy of the British colonial administration in nineteenth-century India, where millions of Indians starved to death in a series of famines. The chapter examines the influential debates around the Great Famine of 1876–1878. Despite widespread critique from the public in India and Britain, the colonial administrators abstained from active policies to help the famine victims. They did so out of a fear of interfering with self-regulating market forces and creating long-term dependence on public aid. The hegemonic position of free trade ideas and economic liberalism allowed for proponents of a hard laissez-faire line to mobilize considerable intellectual resources, from Adam Smith to Ricardo, to overcome humanitarian critiques.

Originalsprog	Dansk
Titel	The intellectual history of economic normativities
Redaktører	Mikkel Thorup
Forlag	Palgrave Macmillan
Publikationsdato	1 jan. 2016
Sider	169-184
Kapitel	11
ISBN (Trykt)	9781137594150
ISBN (Elektronisk)	9781137594167
Status	Udgivet - 1 jan. 2016

Adgang til dokumentet

https://www.academia.edu/8003313/The_Economics_of_Starvation_-_Laissez-Faire_ideology_and_famine_in_Colonial_India

Andre filer og links

http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/978-1-137-59416-7_11

Citationsformater

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