1. TO TARGET THE SYSTEM

A. Why?

There is little doubt that the poorest find it difficult to obtain justice whether in terms of wages, hours of work, possession and use of lands, availability of credit, etc. The attempt to decentralise through the Panchayat Raj has not really helped the poor; it has given power and legitimisation at the local level to the dominant role played by the upper classes and in many places to criminal elements. The recent statement of the Prime Minister to forbid convicted criminals from standing for elections is an effort to cope with part of the problem. Consequently, even officials committed to implementing anti-poverty programmes find it difficult to implement them since they have to cope with the power and political structures which permeate down to the village level. There is no longer a poor man or woman ..... they are either "Congress poor" or "Janatha poor" or "BJP poor".... When funds trickle down through the political system the "syphoning effect" is even higher than when they flow through the bureaucracy.

A structural analysis of society brings out the exploitative nature of society and the nexus between the dominant elements in the political, economic and social sub-systems who join together to protect their interests at the expense of the poor. Laws to protect their rights are not implemented, corruption and delays reduce the benefits they should receive through Government programmes, traditional feudal relations continue to dominate; the poor receive scant respect in Government offices, loans - many of them for urgent consumption needs - are unavailable from official sources, and they have to approach other farmers who provide them at exhorbitant rates of interest or on mortgage of their labour and often on lease of their marginal lands. The poor have little faith in the law and order system which, they know from experience, tilts in favour of the powerful especially in the rural areas.

As evidence that the system cannot effectively support the poor, NGOs point to the New Economic Policy which favours increasing liberalisation, privatisation and the domination of market forces, as a result of which resources meant for the poor are diluted and the direct attack on poverty which featured in the 5th and 6th Plans has given way to the trickle down approach of the earlier Plans which failed to make a significant dent on poverty.

Others point out that political processes (which in the final analysis have a value only because they empower the people and which power in turn influences these processes) no longer work or at best are sabotaged. They hold that the political system is today governed by two basic features.

1) distribution of doles. 2) a struggle for power. If one adds to this scenario the general sense of insensitivity for public opinion (the poor do not enter the picture), the distortion of political processes is serious. It is now assumed that public opinion, normally so crucial to healthy political processes can be purchased or manipulated. It can be purchased at election time and manipulated at all times through the press, publicity, TV, AIR and regular dollops of consumer goods. What can one expect of such a political system even when it is decentralised? Unless there are radical changes towards a more egalitarian structure, feudal and even criminal elements will rapidly gain control of the lower level institutions, like the mandals, as is already evident in many states.

B. How?
A structural analysis of this system makes one angry and committed to redress the wrongs committed, but what is the strategy to be adopted? "Society has to be restructured totally; there is no other way", reply some NGOs. But does this involve violence? A few NGOs say "yes" and are ready to accept the consequences including death. Others are willing to talk radically but stop short at placing their lives at risk.Yet others leave the poor to bear the burden of their radical talk. Participants in the exercise of structural analysis of the causes of poverty get angry, and are rearing to change the system; but they soon become frustrated when they discover that they  cannot even change their own organisations, leave alone society at large. Several religious personnel have had this experience.

 MYRADA believes that it is necessary to go through an exercise of analysing the causes of poverty if we are to go beyond the symptoms of injustice and understand the causes of the injustice in the system. This exercise, however, should be supported by a field experience, preferably outside MYRADA, where human nature is seen at its worst and best; where one meets with stark suffering which demands full time work like a disaster (man-made or natural) or brutal repression. Such an experience may not help the participants to understand the causes of injustice but it surely helps them to share and feel the consequences with those who suffer them.

 Together, these experiences strengthen commitment; but it has to be balanced with the realisation that the strategy to bring about structural change is a long term one and has to be broadbased. To be successful, such a strategy requires that we analyse the strengths and weaknesses of all those involved, that we realise that any hastening of the process could result in more suffering than the poor previously experienced. An analysis of society therefore is necessary, but to conclude that only a structural revolution in the short run is the solution is naive to say the least. From the history of South American countries we find that their revolutions only replaced on elite with another; the poor were always left out.

What then in MYRADA’s approach towards the system? As part of our Development Professional Training Programme, we expose our staff in groups to the exercise of structural analysis and follow it up whenever possible with an actual field experience of a movement or a crisis which helps to give them a feel of such situations where injustice and suffering are operationally evident.

We also help them to realise that a strategy for action cannot be worked out as a consequence of a class room exercise which also operates on the macro level and removed from actual field situations. The tools for structural analysis are useful but they are to a degree, abstract. If carried to a particular village the exploiter is no longer a faceless "caste" or "class" or just "A" in an analytical framework. He or she is a name. The relationships are no longer only those of power, they are far more complex - one of blood, of groupings, of political alliances which may link one group of the poor with one part of the powerful. These relationships raise a whole new set of parametres which must be taken into account when strategies are evolved. Further, the exercise on the board does not tell us the varying strengths and weaknesses of the characters involved, the extent of their goodwill or malice. An assessment of these factors is the macro level which is removed from the actual situation will not only be a fruitless exercise, but will above all relegate the people who are the prime movers and actors to a secondary role on whom a strategy is imposed.