Director
Prof. Mohanakumar S.
Prof. Mohanakumar is economist by discipline and profession. He is a dedicated teacher, social scientist and environmental activist. His areas of specialisation include political economy of agrarian change, labour and public policy. He graduated in Economics from the University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram and took M.Phil in Applied Economics from the Centre for Development Studies (affiliated Centre of the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi). He completed PhD in economics from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. He has master’s degree in Population Sciences from IIPS, Mumbai and had a post-doctoral training at York University, Toronto, Canada. Before joining the PPRI as director on August 22, 2024, he worked as professor and director (i/c) with Institute of Development Studies, Jaipur, Rajasthan.
Relevance of Public Policy Research
Public policy formulation in most developing countries is far removed from ideal situation. Policy documents prepared in a sub optimum bureaucratic environment without taking people into confidence and without indicating the economic and social implications of alternatives forgone often generate unfavourable and hostile reactions and cause considerable wastage of public resources. One way to overcome this is to institutionalise policy formulation by putting in place systematic arrangements. Governments in most developed countries have formed or financed institutions and think tanks that are exclusively devoted to public policy research.
In India, a few such institutions are functioning at the national level. But a lot more is desired in the field of public policy research. At the state level, it seems that the need for institutional arrangements for public policy research is yet to be recognized. Nonetheless, research is most relevant to policy making when it is conveyed through comprehensive scientific assessment and analyses. The way in which research agenda are constructed, the methods used to engage in research, the actors who convey the findings, and in what fora are important considerations in determining the relevance of research to policy. Research results presented in a comprehensive scientific framework that bear the hallmarks of usable knowledge, conveying information about consequences will be most relevant to policy makers.
The context of Kerala
The unique development experience of Kerala known as ‘Kerala model of development’ has attracted world-wide attention for its outstanding social attainments. Kerala has almost become a laboratory for policy experiments. In fact other Indian States and even some of the developing countries look forward to the experiences of Kerala to draw lessons and guidance. It may be unrealistic to assume that the policies pursued by Kerala in the past have been fool proof. Of late, doubts have been expressed about the sustainability of the Kerala model of development. A model that is not sustainable is a tragedy. Several vital issues relating to climate change, cropping pattern, service delivery, service induced growth model, growing inequality, decentralized planning, fiscal consolidation, resource mobilization, rational democratic practice, gender justice, transport policy and so on cry out for solutions in the state.
Though Kerala has specialized research institutions in many areas of development, there seems to be very little inter-institutional interaction so as to evolve comprehensive policy prescriptions aimed at addressing the development problems of the state. This often results in duplication of work and wastage of considerable time and public resources. At the same time, there are several vital areas where study and documentation are quite inadequate. As a consequence of all these, policy formulation at the state level is not properly informed by the findings of these research institutions. It is against this backdrop that the ‘Public Policy Research Institute’ (PPRI) envisaged in the Kerala budget 2012-13 assumes significance.