This book offers a reading of Bhimrao Ambedkar’s engagement with the idea and practice of socialism in India by linking it to his lifelong political and philosophical concerns: the annihilation of the caste system, untouchability and the moral and philosophical systems that justify either. Rather than view his ideas through a socialist lens, the author suggests that it is important to measure the validity of socialist thought and practice in the Indian context, through his critique of the social totality. The book argues its case by presenting a broad and connected overview of his thought world and the global and local influences that shaped it. The themes that are taken up for discussion include: his understanding of the colonial rule and the colonial state; history and progress; nationalism and the questions he posed the socialists; his radical critique of the caste system and Brahmancal philosophies, and his unusual interpretation of Buddhism.

Presenting a new approach towards the social history of working classes in the imperial context, this book looks at the formation of working classes in Scotland and Bengal. It analyses the trajectory of labour market formation, labour supervision, cultures of labour and class formation between two regional economies - one in an imperial country and the other in a colonial one. The book examines the everyday lives of the jute workers of the imperial nexus, and the impact of the 'Dundee School' of Scottish mechanics, engineers and managers who ran the Calcutta jute industry. It goes on to challenge existing theories of imperialism, class formation and class struggle - particularly those that underline the exceptional nature of the Indian experience of industrialization - and demonstrates how and why Empire was able to provide an opportunity to test and perfect ways of controlling the lower classes of Dundee. These historical debates have a continued relevance as we observe the impact of globalization and rapid industrialization in the so-called developing world and the accompanying changes in many areas of the developed world marked by de-industrialization. The book is of use to scholars of imperial history, labour history, British history and South Asian history.

Political Philosophy of M. N. Roy M.N. Roy may be best remembered as a philosopher of Radical Humanism. He propounded his new philosophy as a solution for the political, cultural and moral crisis which confronted mankind since 1945. His philosophy was in the nature of a 'Third Force' , as he believed that Communism, as it unfolded itself in the Soviet Union in the Stalinist era, was the greatest menace to human potentialities. He elaborated his schemes of 'Radical Democracy' and 'Humanist Politics' as integral parts of Radical Humanism to philosophically reconstruct a socially-cohesive state structure. The edifice of his philosophy rested on four laudable pillars viz. Rationalism, Humanism, Freedom and Materialism and spiritualism and no longer regarded man as a mere ' economic animal'. His philosophy asserted the supremacy of man in a socio-political system that transcended national boundaries. The study attempts a critical appraisal of Radical Humanism avoiding the adulation of a disciple and the approach of an uncharitable critic. It is an updated study, based on the author's three research dissertations besides other relevant literature. The first six chapters unfold the story of the evolution of Roy's philosophy and the seventh is a critical evaluation of the basic postulates of Radical Humanism. The study endeavors to get under the skin of real Roy, the visionary, who through his condemnation of orthodox Marxism as practiced in the Soviet Union had almost predicted its impending failure that actually happened in 1989. The study would be useful to academics, research scholars, general readers and post-graduate students of social sciences. The pro-Marxist and anti-Marxist intelligentsia should find the work objectively analytical.

In 1948, philosopher Richard Weaver argued that ideas have consequences. This book explores three diverse consequences flowing from one ideacommunism. In Soviet Russia, the idea became dogma, a type of secular religion. The Soviet Secular Religion skewed all the efforts of central planners in a pre-determined direction, with debilitating effects, from the reign of Lenin to Stalin and Brezhnev. SSR empowered Mikhail Gorbachev in his attempts at reform, even while it constrained those efforts, and blinded him to the unfolding collapse of the system. Formed soon after the Bolshevik Revolution, the Communist Party of India had its own theoreticians and leaders, and a diversity of opinions. But their reliance on Moscow's authority to maintain consensus meant for them dependence; in short, the CPI became a pawn of the Kremlin. Russian interests often conflicted with those of South Asia, confounding the CPI's chances for success. Moreover, the People's Republic of China promoted competing ideas, and the Moscow/Peking split prompted a mirroring, and fatal, schism within the CPI. In the United States, anti-communism fueled Containment, the Cold War paradigm. The most dangerous aspect of this conflict of ideas, a threat that was truly existential, was always 'The Bomb' (or rather, tens of thousands of them). American nuclear policy may be divided into three eras. In the 1940s and 50s, anti-communist ideology dominated political discourse, and the U.S. sought a preponderance in arms. Around 1960, rationality became the vogue, ushering in the era of Detente. Finally, ideology returned with the election of 1980, shaping policies that helped end the long confrontation of ideas. Where Soviet dogma obsessed over production, the American Ideology is engrossed with consumption. The book's afterword argues that American economic planners are unconsciously biased, in a manner similar if antipodal to that of Soviet economists. Something like a Gorbachev moment, where skewed indicators show progress even as the system collapses, is not impossible for the United States.