Post-Colonialism and the Political Imagination

Abstract

This article considers the rise and fall of political anthropology in the context of the global shift from colonial to post-colonial rule. Classical political anthropology peaked in the 1960s and has remained obstinately out of fashion ever since, not least because of the narrow acultural view of politics associated with it. Neither recent anthropological interest in power, nor more broad theoretical attention to the issue of post-colonialism, seem to have helped bring the phenomenon of post-colonial politics into clearer theoretical light. Taking its cue from Malinowski's late interest in questions of transculturation, the article argues for the gains of a radically empirical approach to post-colonial politics, an approach which would acknowledge the diversity of post-colonial experience and the unpredictable contours of what different people take politics to be. The article uses recent anthropological examples from South Asia, concentrating on issues of democracy democracy and representation, to illustrate what such an approach might look like.