Law and Corporate Malfeasance in Neoliberal India

Abstract

Critical sociolegal scholars highlight how the law favors powerful actors in handling the socioenvironmental devastation affecting marginalized populations. What receives scant attention is how the neoliberalization of the world economy has further enabled powerful capitalist firms to shape the legal path in their own favor and to the detriment of the marginalized. Union Carbide’s 1984 Bhopal catastrophe killed 25,000, injured 600,000, and left prolonged consequences. This paper advances our understanding of the political economy of law by analyzing the handling of death and devastation in Bhopal. Drawing data from 60 interviews with Bhopal victim activists and archives, it advances the argument that the law mirrors the interests of the neoliberal actors of capital. Findings suggest that the law has not only proved unable to safeguard the weakest elements of Bhopal society, but also the pursuit of legal solutions under neoliberalism is incapable of addressing the long-term harms affecting marginalized Bhopalis.