A road blockage like no other: reimagining structuralism through the 'Dilli Chalo' Protest

This week’s topics: Structuralism and Critical International Theory

A road blockage like no other: reimagining structuralism through the 'Dilli Chalo' protest

Source: www.news.abplive.com

In this week’s blog post in the series on theories and International Relations, ‘Structuralism’ and Critical International Theory will be discussed. I saw much correspondence with this theory when reading about the millions of Indian farmers marching towards Delhi, as a result of the new farming and regulation laws, in which were bringing a significant change and threatened the livelihood of millions of farmers across India. I saw this protest as a true up rise against societies structure- these farmers wished to enforce their free will and object the strict structure in which was being enforced upon them. Structuralism suggests agencies deny human beings any autonomy over their actions (Bieler and Morton, 2018), instead the state and structure of society decides and determines our actions by imposing a structure in which benefits the society in which the state which to uphold, e.g., capitalism. Such lack of autonomy enforced by the state thus fuelled the ‘Dilli Chalo’ protest march. 

Source: www.India.com

This protest was unique in its method, as the protestors impacted the functioning of society, by blocking some of Delhi’s major highways.The new laws stated that farmers would only be able to sell to corporations, meaning they were open to exploitation, as in the past, farmers had sold crops at auction at their state’s Agricultural Produce Market and would be entitled to a Minimum Support Price- ensuring fair and equal pay. It seems this new structure benefits larger corporations of the world, as profit is merely going to larger corporations in which already exploit for produce.  If the new structure is to be undertaken, farmers not only will become more vulnerable, but also subject to lower earnings - this will thus lead to unemployment, more debt, and less rights for farmers to express their concerns in court, with people worrying suicide rates of farmers will increase significantly.

Source:www.dhakatribune.com

Such a view also mirrors back to Critical International theory , which states 'practical political action' is essential in 'challenging, confronting, and disrupting existing relations of power (Duvall and Varadarajan,2003). In India it is clear, that such laws will not be accepted, thus protesters  are enforcing their own 'practical political action' to challenge such new laws, this is thus the "politics of social existence". Such protests have proven powerful and have 'disrupted the existing relations of power', now India's highest court has suspended the controversial bill which enforces the new laws, meaning the farmers have taken back their autonomy.