Fishing for autonomy The making of Indian fisheries science

A troubled relation exists between the realms and practices of ‘science’ and ‘politics’ across the world in the 21st century, and presents itself as a struggle for autonomy between these realms, even within ‘applied’ state-funded scientific fields such as fisheries science. This study of fisheries science asks, “can science ever be far from politics, and should it?"
Disciplinary actions, both internal and external aimed at curtailing autonomy, have existed across organisations, in various nations and across periods of time. Such practices as well as resistances to them have shaped these very fields today. How can we historically and sociologically understand struggles for autonomy of and within Indian fisheries science? This thesis interrogates the unexamined claim to modernity seen in contemporary struggles for autonomy within scientific organisations. It takes fisheries science and the historical shaping of the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) in India as the empirical grounds for constructing its case.
The manuscript shows the value of engaging Bourdieu’s field theory with postcolonial science studies. This thesis deploys this framework to make visible the ways in which power and dominance operate through diverse practices within Indian fisheries science. The thesis argues that autonomy of the field and of its practitioners is neither an objective phenomenon nor a wholly subjective experience. Rather, India’s institutionalised fisheries science, may be seen as a historical enactment of politics by other means; a multiplicity of postcolonial practices which both limit and encourage autonomy of individuals and the field itself.