“The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt.” -Bertrand Russell.

Independent political units are analogous to independent economic agents interacting in a marketplace for their own benefit and in the aggregate end up in reaching the collective good.

The similarity did strike me, but there’s a crucial difference between the two situations. In a marketplace, you are allowed to do whatever you please as long as you don’t infringe on anyone’s rights (with the exception of a few antitrust laws etc.). A large company can’t just go out and capture/destroy the competition. You win a larger market share simply by being more productive and efficient.
Political units are allowed a wider range of tactics. A large country can dominate a smaller one by force, either destroying its resources (to weaken it and reduce competition) or capturing resources from it. Being destructive is actually a legitimate tactic; I think this changes the rules of the competition significantly.

Atanu’s response: I would distinguish between political units and military units. Political units — states — have militaries but that does not mean that political units are congruent with military units. Militaries are not economic agents and they do not interact in a marketplace. Political units can and do interact in what can be called a “political marketplace.”

Indifference too is dangerous, and inertia, stupidity, laziness lead to indifference to every issue, important or otherwise. These also are in a strange way the result of a general attitude of indifference in one.

India is poor because it’s only just starting to function as a unit. Till recently, India was several independent political units, each working for its own benefit, often at the cost of its neighbours. It takes more than a few decades to undo centuries of internal squabbling. Progress, however inefficiently, is being made. True, it’d be made a lot faster if people were rational, but I think it’d be faster still if people weren’t greedy.

Atanu’s response: I beg to disagree with you on this point. I think our inability to “do no harm” arises from our incomplete understanding of what will cause harm. Most people end up doing harm when they mean well. It is not evil intentions that cause the most harm. It is good intentions incorrectly executed that causes the harm.

About the “independent political units” matter: I am not sure that there is anything wrong in having a collection of independent political units working for their own benefit. Independent political units are analogous to independent economic agents interacting in a marketplace for their own benefit and in the aggregate end up in reaching the collective good. Cooperation emerges as a result of competitive behavior because the economic agents calculate (correctly) that if they cooperate, they will be better off than if they were to not cooperate. It is important to realize that in a marketplace, people do not squabble; they try to trade with each other. Squabbling is something people do when they compete with each other to get away with whatever they can from a pile of goodies that is up for grabs. In India, or anywhere else, where there is “free stuff,” (such as what is stolen by the government and then made available to favored parties) there is squabbling and internal strife.

e.g. X is an entertaining and apparently empathetic speaker who is vocally loyal to his community, so the electorate assumes he will govern well too. Because I once got good grades in an engineering school, an employer assumes I will be a good employee too.

I am probably just restating the Peter Principle, but my optimism is that people can LEARN to judge others by the domain and say “you are a great stock analyst, and I will buy the stock you recommend, but your advice on what car would be best for me will have to stand on its own merit.”

While there are many complex dimensions to people we seen in Parliament or Vidhan Sabhas, we must accept the fact that Indians don’t vote keeping in mind the larger interests of the nation. For example, how can you explain the leftists in power from those very states where they have pushed them to economic disasters?

On the whole, it wouldn’t be fair to call them stupid; I personally believe that calling for a greater development or perhaps asking for a greater say in the developmental process is tinged with urban bias. 15 years Laloo got elected ( by rigging or extra constituional means doesn’t matter here)- repeatedly people voted him to power on the premise that roads would be as smooth as Hema’s cheeks.

Before I end, it is indeed disheartening to see the extreme form of political naivette coming in the mainstream press; either in the English Media or it’s regional cousins. Swami Vivekananda’s call for a greater enlightment has more meaning now.