Gaining Through Culture: India And The Globalised Economy
“Culture […] is who we are, shapes our identity is a means of fostering respect and tolerance among people, is a way to create jobs and improve people’s lives, is a way to include others and understand them, helps preserve our heritage and make sense of our future, empowers people [...] works for development.”
The economic and the cultural spheres of life are often seen as separate and unrelated and this misconception leads to an overlooking of the cultural aspects which impact the economy. As economist Francis Fukuyama notes, culture is found to affect economic performance through two channels; cultural traits that stimulate individual motivation, and traits that develop social capital in the population. From both these axes, India’s cultures, inclusive of our professional cultures, offer unique opportunities for the country on several international platforms.
To think of social capital, one of the most obvious sectors where culture is a strong driver of development is the creative economy. Figures published by UNCTAD in May 2013 show that world trade of creative goods and services totalled a record US$624 billion in 2011. Growth in developing-country exports of creative goods was even stronger, averaging 12.1 per cent annually over the same period. Writing for Livemint, Megha Patnaik notes how India’s large entertainment sector and diverse cultural traditions form a strong backbone of creative capital. The commercialization and monetization of creative works generate a chain of economic activity, and drive the production and consumption of goods and services. Intellectual property rights, such as copyright, are at the heart of this process. In India, gross value addition (GVA) from copyright-relevant industries was ₹89,000 crore in 2016-17, while employment in India’s copyright-relevant industries is approximately 1.1 million workers. India’s entertainment industry with all copyrights in place provides products rooted in and deriving from Indian culture and brings revenue and influence to the country.
Speaking of individual motivation, Harvard Business Review’s research found out our research puts hard numbers on the characteristic ways Indian leaders invest in people. Far more than their Western counterparts, these leaders and their organizations take a long-term, internally focused view. They work to create a sense of social mission that is served when the business succeeds. They make aggressive investments in employee development, despite tight labor markets and widespread job-hopping. And they strive for a high level of employee engagement and openness. Indian cultures with a strong communitarian ethos provide solid foundations for such conduct and are worthy of emulation.
A combine of social relevance and individual drive can be found in India’s vibrant local contexts which provide lessons in sustainability and innovation, with local innovators devising the most sophisticated of resources to be employed by the world at large. The National Innovation Foundation, in its report on grassroots technical innovations listed new techniques and startups devised and created by rural innovators. These included a hand-operated water lifting device, groundnut digger, paddy thresher, tree climber, multipurpose processing machine, modified boiler and biomass gasification system. All of these inventions emerged from the Indian cultural contexts where rural needs took center-stage
Such innovations did not just cut down costs and provide eco-friendly and energy conserving alternatives but also led to massive turnovers. For instance, the modified boiler, which recycles used steam, leading to lesser fuel and water consumption had a turnover of ₹1 crore. Several of these inventions have found international markets and clout, earning the country plaudits.
Very importantly, India’s diversities allow for greater, seamless collaborations. Inclusiveness is an important development tool and diversity is an asset for achieving social and economic development goals. Individuals from India’s several communities work in tandem across the country in professional settings while the diaspora forms networks of its own. As opposed to a world fractured by divides, the Indian ethic is firmly rooted in inclusivity and difference which drives growth. For instance, as scholar Dietrich Reetz notes how Indians es commonly speak more than one language daily and their highly diverse expat, diaspora and migrant communities provide them not only with global access, but also with global sources of income, with more than 30 million Indians accessing and transferring remittances from other countries.
It is thus extremely sensible and timely to think of culture when it comes to thinking of economic policy vis-á-vis the globalized world. This would include giving local contexts their due and grassroots innovators, the push and the promotion they are worthy of. Aiding India’s art and entertainment industries and positing our professional cultures as distinctive models to be analyzed and emulated will be steps in the right direction. All in all, culture is significant when it comes to thinking of India in the globalized economic domain and must be given its due— for bolstering our national image and for gaining international glory.
