Possible Histories: Federalism, Koselleck, and a Conceptual History for Late Colonial India

Sarath Pillai, University of Chicago

The interwar period in India is usually written about in tenors of rising nationalist consciousness and ever-growing demand for self-government. However, the 1920s and 1930s also witnessed a fundamental shift in Indian political and legal thought, with the rise and widespread acceptance of federalist ideas. If the model for the constitutional development of India thus far had been the Westminster, or parliamentary government, by the 1920s, there began a decisive turn toward an all-India federation, modeled on Germany and the United States. In this paper, drawing on the writings of Reinhart Koselleck and colonial archives, I present a conceptual history of this “turning point.” Along with the turn toward federalism, as we will see, a new political language evolved, wherein ideas like federation, all-India, and provincial autonomy came to be seen as “key concepts”—concepts that contained more expectations than experiences. In other words, federalism became an ideal for many Indians not because they could draw on a federal past in any determinate sense, but because they could anticipate a federal, yet unknown, future. In so doing, the paper argues that the late 1920s and early 1930s mark a “new time” (Neue Zeit) in India, wherein concepts like federation made possible new ways of inhabiting the present and imagining the future. A general aim of the paper is to invite attention toward the possibility of a conceptual history for late colonial India.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 164. Theory, History, and States