South Asia's economic and strategic relevance has grown significantly in recent years. While scholars often note India's economic story and South Asia's struggle with terror, the region offers much more that is of enormous intellectual interest.

Among the essential questions of politics, economics, and security in South Asia today are:

• Is democracy still to be viewed as a political framework within which economic development ought to be pursued?
• In India, export-based, high-tech services have led the boom, and are now wrestling with an international economic downturn. What are the larger lessons of a services-led economic transformation?
• Has the equality principle of democracy undermined India's caste system, or have caste inequalities changed the script of Indian democracy, forcing it to differ significantly from the Western democratic experience?
• Serious regional disparities mark virtually the entire region. In India, compared to the northern and eastern states, the southern and western states have not only boomed economically, but their human-development performance has been markedly superior. In Pakistan, Punjab continues to be far ahead of the other regions. How does one explain such variations?
• The shadow of security over politics and economics is now dark and deep. Why has terrorism taken such roots in Pakistan? Might it spread to India in a significant way?
• The security situation in Afghanistan is now at the center of international attention. How does one understand the security problems of Afghanistan?
• Why do South Asian democracies find it so hard to develop more robust human rights regimes?
• Why have South Asian societies struggled so hard to establish reliable legal regimes? Do their cultural and sociological norms seriously clash with the rule of law?
• Some of the world's most respected non-governmental organizations have been working in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and India. What can we learn about what kinds of NGOs succeed and what types fail?
• How should we understand the way that India’s democratic longevity has, of late, coexisted with extreme party fractionalization?

Meeting monthly and supported by Brown, Harvard, and MIT, the Joint Seminar will invite not only academics and students but also public figures—from politics, business, journalism, security, and the NGO sector—to engage in a sustained conversation over the course of the academic year.

The conveners of the joint seminar are Ashutosh Varshney, Professor of Political Science, Brown University; Patrick Heller, Associate Professor of Sociology, Brown University; Prerna Singh, Assistant Professor of Government, Harvard University; and Vipin Narang, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology beginning in the 2010–2011 academic year.

Current Academic Year

• 2009–2010 Seminar Schedule