•Shubhomoy Bhattacharjee: In your first book, Saving capitalism from the capitalists, you wrote about where exactly the government and the market rule interface. Also, you argued that in a developing country there is a crab mentality. Could you elaborate?

The point of the book, Saving capitalism from the capitalists, was really about the Left and the Right’s diagnosis of the problem. Marxists when they look at the big business would say that big business has captured the government. And those on the Right would have a different perspective altogether. Marx would, therefore, say do away with the business, and the Rights would suggest doing away with the government. Clearly, neither of the solution works because one needs both business and government to get along with each other. What we had tried to argue was that the way to get the right combination was through competition between the governments. A number of countries, when faced with opportunities of the outside world, have opened up. They have reduced the licence raj like India. The other aspect of the same debate is what happens within the economies themselves. It is important in a developing economy that all people see the opportunity that reforms bring in. In an uneven economy, with great disparities, many people cannot see that opportunity — say access to education. So, the ability to benefit from these opportunities is very uneven and many people face tremendous cost and only few benefit from it. This is the crab analogy. So, the message is reforms can succeed if you take everybody along with you and if you have broadened the axis.

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