ABSTRACT
Fertile Subjects: Global Reproductive politics at the intersections of caste, class and gender sets out the significance of (a focus on) the ‘reproductive body’ in making visible a politics which has been absent in more general political theorisations on the state and political processes. In India, political theory on state power has primarily focused on the building of modern institutions and processes such as with political office, political parties and coalitions, elections, voting and so on, and on disembodied actors. While the connections of these political actors and institutions with caste and kinship has been the subject of analyses, less focus has been placed on gender, sexuality and procreation as subjects of political inquiry. Drawing on anthropological and feminist work on gender and the ‘body’ as well as theoretical work on caste and kinship in India the chapter develops a critical understanding of reproductive politics as experiential and lived and of the reproductive body as subject and object, caught in different though inter-related flows of power. The chapter also provides background information on the social and health systems in Rajasthan as well as a discussion on the methodologies employed in the field research and data bases consulted.
