Consent and Community

A particular conceptualization of the local community has acted as a core constituent of the anti-politics watershed machine. Ideas of community as homogenous and un-stratified have vitally underpinned notions of local bodies that are suitable exemplars of this community spirit, while drawing a sharp and, as we have seen, often unsubstantiated contrast with the much reviled panchayats. In watershed development policies, and more generally in contemporary natural resources governance discourse (see Leach et al 1997), ‘consensual communities’ hold the key to the apolitical character of participatory decision-making that is prized above all else. This chapter will take a closer look at how the idea of consent becomes transformed as an active ally in the depoliticization project. The word ‘project’ is not used lightly, not just because it does not necessarily succeed, but also because not all actors are equally pledged to it in the first place. This follows Tanya Murray-Li on the point of her divergence from scholars who emphasize the ‘effective achievement of depoliticization’ (2007, 10).

While we know that the theoretical sway of new institutionalist and communitarian ideas have yielded the apolitical formulation of communities that we are regularly confronted with, it is not as easy to identify the precise origins of the apolitical use of the idea of consent. In fact, here there is a perplexing conundrum at play.