Speaking to the State: Audit Experiments on Language in Southern India

• In Event: Identity and Discrimination in South Asian Politics

Abstract

How do elites, bureaucratic and political, use state machinery to influence the linguistic choices of citizens in multilingual contexts? To address this question, I study whether language affects state responsiveness, understood as the everyday provision of public services and goods, and if so whether language can be leveraged to incentivise elites to provide equitable service to traditionally discriminated against groups. I do so through two audit experiments that vary language and dimensions related to language: 1: On nationalized (public banks) in the Kannada language dominant state of Karnataka; employees of such banks are bureaucrats hired and deployed by the national government; 2. On councilors (urban local politicians) in the Tamil language dominant state of Tamil Nadu. I argue that bureaucrats (representing the national elite) favor non-local languages whereas politicians (representing the local elite) favor local languages, indicating competing signals on language use for local citizens. This is evinced in a narrower outcome of responsiveness, task completion, but also in a battery of psycho-social outcomes; thus, language is associated with instrumental goods but also psycho-social payoffs. I also argue that the strategic use of the favored language (indicating assimilation into the national language or the local language) can help bridge the discrimination gap amongst individuals of non-corresponding linguistic groups.

Author

• Deepika Padmanabhan, Yale University