What is the significance of the caste system in india

We argue that in the context of status representation, caste identity as opposed to religion, national and regional identities would be the most prominent identity in explaining the differences in status perception, due to the inherent associations of caste and status.

Thus, according to social identity theory, individuals would strive to maintain a positive image of their caste identity. We further argue below that caste identity will especially be more salient for high caste individuals.

A strong caste identity could provide feelings of belongingness or self-esteem, thereby relying on some caste norms. Particularly, it is known that high caste individuals see caste identity as a more stable construct wherein this identity is inherited at birth.

High caste individuals also develop feelings of temporal continuity, positive distinctiveness, and heightened self-esteem from essentialisation of their caste identity Jaspal, In fact, in a study conducted by Cotterill et al. Furthermore, when members of higher castes essentialise their caste identity Mahalingam, they permit themselves to stigmatize members of the lower castes.

The low caste members or the Dalits on the other hand, do not believe that their caste identity is inherited and therefore do not essentialise it. They may thus enhance their self-efficacy, through the possibility of social mobility, based on the idea that caste identity can be seen as less permanent Mahalingam, We thus argue that caste identity is more salient amongst high caste individuals due to the belief they have about being privileged to have inherited this positive image of high caste at birth.

Low caste individuals would not have a salient caste identity because they believe that this identity is not essentialised and belonging to this group has negative consequences. Social identity effects are based on the protection of self-concepts Tajfel and Turner, and thus any threat to this self-concept would be associated with strong identity effects.

Research has shown that highly identified group members would find ways to protect their in-group identity see Spears et al. However, Branscombe et al. For instance, they suggest that those who are highly identified with their in-group are more likely to show defensive responses than those who are not so highly identified.

We can assume that high caste individuals who legitimize their inherent high caste would also show strong high caste identity. So, what specifically could elicit an identity threat related to caste? We claim that norms and expectations that are associated with caste membership, when questioned, could fundamentally be a source of threat.

In fact, it is most commonly seen that a person engaging in any sort of norm violation especially of the higher caste is ostracized and devalued Mahalingam, One of the most deeply rooted caste norms relates to marriage. Branscombe et al. For many years, the high caste members in general had greater status in the society, and viewed themselves as living to higher moral standards and values, as compared to low caste individuals Mahalingam, It is generally believed that high caste individuals hold qualities related to wisdom, intelligence, honesty, austerity, and morality while low caste individuals possess qualities of dullness, stupidity, immorality, impurity, and other negative qualities Deshpande, These ancient established norms carried over into modern day Indian society and thus certain norms were explicitly attached to a caste type.

Marriages between high and low caste persons are especially harshly punished and sometimes lead to public lynching of couples or their relatives, murder of the bride, groom or their relatives , rape, public beatings and other sanctions NYU , p. In fact, in Northern India, inter-caste marriages frequently result in family members choosing to kill the couple Flintoff, ; Goli et al. When a norm is violated, members often perceive this deviant behavior as potentially threatening to the group identity, and therefore deal with the deviance in order to reduce the threat Jetten and Hornsey, However, research has shown that the tendency for a group to defend the threat depends on the extent to which an individual is identified with the group Marques and Paez, It can thus be understood that high identifiers would show greater motivation to engage in in-group protection to defend the threat Doosje et al.

We argue that high caste individuals would be high identifiers with their caste, and low caste individuals would be low identifiers with their caste. However, we claim that in-group identity protection will be seen in the form of black sheep effect and not as in-group favoritism.

In certain situations, in-group members are known to exclude undesirable members from the in-group in order to maintain a positive and distinctive social identity Marques and Paez, For instance, research by Otten claims that an aggressive social interaction between a victim and a perpetrator would lead to generally biased responses that could either lead to in-group favoritism or black sheep effect; the latter effect being most likely to occur in situations.

More specifically it is said that in-group favoritism is particularly observed when the deviant behavior of the perpetrator was ambiguous or unintentional Duncan, ; Sagar and Schofield, Wang et al. Thus, there is some evidence indicating that aggressive, intentional, and unambiguous interactions would lead to more in-group derogations. Furthermore, this pattern of in-group derogation tends to be more distinct among individuals who are highly identified with their group Biernat et al.

Furthermore, Castano et al. Research by Stamkou et al. Thus, in general, norm-deviating in-group members are seen as more negative than non-deviating members Marques et al. Also, according to the threat classification by Branscombe et al. We would thus argue that high caste individuals who are also high identifiers with their caste would devalue another in-group member committing norm transgression that is aggressive and intentional and would find the transgression morally unacceptable in order to protect their threatened social identity.

Elaborating on the black sheep effect, according to subjective group dynamics theory SGD; Marques et al. This motivation then results in positive evaluations of in-group conformers and negative evaluations of in-group deviants Marques et al.

In a similar vein, Stamkou et al. Likewise, according to relational models theory RMT, Fiske, , , a derogation of in-group member in order to protect a group identity and integrity is explained by a transgression of moral norms regulated by specific in-group relations.

In our context it particularly refers to moral motives for unity and hierarchy. Unity is aimed at caring for and supporting the integrity of in-group by avoiding or eliminating threats of contamination.

When a group member commits a moral violation, the whole group feels contaminated and shamed until it purifies itself. Hierarchy in turn is aimed at maintaining linear orderings of social status where subordinates are motivated to respect and obey, and superiors to guide, protect, but also take moral responsibility for the actions of their subordinates for review of all moral motives see Rai and Fiske, Thus, high caste individuals who break the strongly ingrained high caste norm of morality, purity, self-control, and pastoral care must expect group aversion or even a punishment.

We were therefore interested in identity threat in the form of caste norm violation, and the ensuing cognitive representations of caste and status, which could be identity-maintaining. We assume in this context only the caste-based identity will be activated whilst other identities, such as religion, national and regional affiliation, will not play a role. One of the most common social problems of the caste system was the discrimination of low caste members as explained earlier.

A reservation system was introduced wherein a certain number of seats were reserved for members of the lower castes at places of higher education and government jobs. However, this legislation was soon met with a lot of resistance from the high caste community who felt that the system was not meritocratic, and provided an unjust advantage to the low caste members e.

It was argued that social identity would play an integral role in the way people represent status. Therefore, the aim of this study was to examine the role of caste-norm inconsistent violating vs. Furthermore, we also wanted to examine how high caste and low caste individuals make moral judgments in situations of norm violation vs. We predict that caste identity threat would be most salient for high caste individuals because these individuals in general have higher levels of caste identity.

In general, we predicted that high caste individuals would show a black sheep effect when caste norm violations are introduced. Moreover, we expect that this black sheep effect is mediated by high caste identity and not mediated by regional, religious or national identity. In this study, we used vignettes describing a social conflict situation which comprised norms of violence and morality, as reflecting common norms in the Indian context.

The social conflict situation always entailed an intentional aggressive interaction between a victim and a perpetrator. Participants read two stories that depicted two protagonists as either a victim or perpetrator.

The protagonists were either of high or low caste which was depicted using implicit stimuli of names and faces pre-tested. They then had to choose and pick, as a response, one out of nine pictorial depictions that represented the protagonists in the story on a vertical line with varying degrees of status distance.

At the end of each story participants also had to rate the moral acceptability of the behavior that took place between the protagonist and the victim. This procedure was chosen based on the general idea that status judgments are supported by an automatic simulation of vertical location von Hecker et al. We assume that abstract concepts such as status can be mentally represented in an embodied way Niedenthal et al.

The paradigm used here involves such status representations via the vertical dimension. In this study, we interpret black sheep effect in the form of status evaluations wherein the in-group member is not necessarily excluded but devalued in status instead.

That is, when the perpetrator is portrayed as someone from their in-group high caste , they would then derogate that individual by representing him as having lower status.

Low caste individuals on the other hand would not differ in the way they represent status regardless of the condition, that is, they would generally show the trend of depicting a perpetrator as having greater status than a victim regardless of whether the perpetrator is of high or low caste 3. Finally, we also predict that high caste identity will also mediate the relationship between caste affiliation and social outcomes of caste like endorsement of affirmative action. One hundred and two South Indians from various parts of Chennai, India, were recruited in person by choosing a convenience sampling technique.

The participants were approached from various parts of the city and explained the study with examples and in the local language — Tamil. As a cover story, they were informed that the survey was part of a large research project that would help in understanding the Indian society better. The test materials were administered using paper and pencil. The researcher stayed in the area until the participants had completed the survey and they answered questions if necessary.

Descriptive details of participant demographics are outlined in Table 1. All participants completed the demographic questions and were then instructed that they would be reading a few stories and were required to answer a few questions based on them. Participants were then randomly assigned to one of the two conditions.

Participants then read the stories pertaining to each condition and answered questions on status representation and moral acceptability for each story. This was then followed by answering questions on attitudes toward affirmative action, about their national, regional, caste and religious identities and, finally, the manipulation check.

At the end of the questionnaire all participants were debriefed. Names and faces were pre-tested, from which four names and faces emerged; two belonging to low caste and two belonging to high caste from South India.

The names contained the first name and a surname, indicative of a certain caste. The length of the name was not controlled since certain surnames are more indicative of the caste than others. The low caste names included Selvaraj Mani and Kannan Pandian.

Education: Public universities have caste-based reservations for students coming from underprivileged backgrounds. A person from this background can secure a seat in a top tier college with par or below par academic scores based on reservation. However, impoverished Brahmans are disadvantaged with this reservation system. While the lower caste applicant can even bypass the exam for getting a seat in the university. Jobs: A significant amount of public sector jobs are allocated based on caste reservation.

Impoverished communities from Brahman backgrounds get affected significantly because of this reservation. According to Ambedkar, the annihilation of the caste system can be done by supporting these actions: Intercaste Marriage: Cross caste marriage can possibly eradicate the upper and lower caste mentality.

Around a quarter of the population on matrimonial sites are open to intercaste marriages at the moment. Independent India's constitution banned discrimination on the basis of caste, and, in an attempt to correct historical injustices and provide a level playing field to the traditionally disadvantaged, the authorities announced quotas in government jobs and educational institutions for scheduled castes and tribes, the lowest in the caste hierarchy, in In , quotas were extended to include a grouping called the OBCs Other Backward Classes which fall between the traditional upper castes and the lowest.

In recent decades, with the spread of secular education and growing urbanisation, the influence of caste has somewhat declined, especially in cities where different castes live side-by-side and inter-caste marriages are becoming more common.

In certain southern states and in the northern state of Bihar, many people began using just one name after social reform movements. Despite the changes though, caste identities remain strong, and last names are almost always indications of what caste a person belongs to. In recent years, there have been demands from several communities to be recognised as OBCs - in there were violent protests by the Jat community in Haryana and the Patel community led huge protests in Gujarat in demanding access to caste quotas.

Both are prosperous and politically dominant communities, but they support their demand for caste quotas by saying large numbers in their communities are poor and suffering. Some say the caste system would have disappeared by now if the fires were not regularly fanned by politicians. At elections, many caste groups still vote as a block and are wooed by politicians looking for electoral gains. As a result, what was originally meant to be a temporary affirmative action plan to improve the lot of the unprivileged groups has now become a vote-grabbing exercise for many politicians.

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