The State as Guardian of the Social Order: Conservatism in Indian Political Thought and Its Modern Manifestations

Conservative Indian political thought, in addition to being alive and well in contemporary discourse, has a long lineage. We explore the intellectual roots of this tradition by examining older and more contemporary writings ranging from the Manusmriti and the Ramayana to those of Gandhi and Maududi and place them in contrast to those of more liberal thinkers like Ambedkar and Nehru. We find that, in particular, the conservative idea of the ‘limited state’ has an extensive history embedded in sub-continental religions, religious practices and social norms. Central to the concept of the limited state is the belief that the state is subservient to society, the belief that dharma is ontological prior to the state, the belief that the king or leader must preserve the social order and the belief that individual reform is the primary source of social change. An understanding of this set of beliefs, and the idea of the limited state more generally, is important not only for understanding India’s past, but also for insight into contemporary politics. We demonstrate the continued vitality of these concepts through an examination of recent National Election Studies (NES) and World Values Survey (WVS) data