What to Read in Indian Express Editorial( Topic and Syllabus wise)

Editorial 1: They Mapped the Path of Growth

Context:

The 2025 Nobel Prize in Economics has been jointly awarded to Joel Mokyr, Philippe Aghion, and Peter Howitt for their pioneering work in understanding the long-term drivers of economic growth. Their contributions have helped explain why some societies sustain innovation and prosperity while others stagnate.

Joel Mokyr’s Contribution:

• Joel Mokyr, a historian of economics from Northwestern University, has explored the deep historical causes behind the sustained rise in productivity since the Industrial Revolution.
• His research emphasizes that economic growth is not merely a result of technological invention but also of the “culture of growth”, a societal mindset that values knowledge, experimentation, and innovation.
• Mokyr examined the period between the 17th and 19th centuries when Europe underwent a transformation unlike any other region.
• He argued that the Scientific Revolutionand Enlightenment created an environment where curiosity, empirical thinking, and open intellectual exchange flourished.
• This intellectual shift laid the foundation for the Industrial Revolution and, consequently, the modern economy.
• According to Mokyr, previous societies often produced brilliant inventions but failed to sustain innovation because their cultures discouraged questioning tradition or experimenting with new ideas.
• Europe’s “Republic of Letters” is a network of scholars, inventors, and thinkers changed that. It fostered a decentralized flow of information and encouraged competition in ideas, making progress cumulative and self-reinforcing.
• Mokyr described this process as “useful knowledge accumulation.”
• As scientific understanding deepened and communication networks expanded, technological advances accelerated.
• Over time, this led to sustained productivity increases and the steady rise in living standards.
• His work thus connects historical, social, and intellectual factors to long-term economic outcomes showing that ideas, not just capital or labor, drive progress.

Aghion and Howitt’s Model:

• While Mokyr focused on the historical roots of growth, Philippe Aghion (INSEAD, College de France)and Peter Howitt (Brown University) developed a theoretical framework, called the Schumpeterian model of growth, formalizes how innovation operates within an economy.
• Building on Joseph Schumpeter’s idea of “creative destruction,”Aghion and Howitt’s model explains how old technologies and firms are continuously replaced by newer, more efficient ones.
• This constant churn, though disruptive, is essential for sustained growth.
• Their model shows that economic progress depends on incentives for innovationand the capacity of new firms to challenge incumbents.
• Aghion and Howitt emphasized that innovationis not uniform across sectors or societies; it depends on competition, access to finance, education, and openness to new ideas.
• When firms innovate to gain a competitive edge, they not only improve their own productivity but also push the overall economy toward higher efficiency and output.
• Empirical evidence from the U.S. supports their theory. Despite periodic slowdowns, American dynamism measured through firm entry and exit rates has historically correlated with productivity surges.
• However, declining entry rates in recent decades raise concerns about reduced competition and slower innovation.
• Their model provides a framework to understand such trends and design policies that encourage entrepreneurial risk-taking and knowledge diffusion

Connecting History and Economy:

• The combined work of Mokyr, Aghion, and Howitt bridges history and modern economic theory. Mokyr’s research explains how societies came to value knowledge and innovation, while Aghion and Howitt show how innovation translates into measurable growth within market systems.
• Together, their insights illustrate that sustained prosperity requires both a supportive intellectual environment and institutional frameworks that reward creative enterprise.
• Their findings highlight that innovation-driven growth is neither automatic nor guaranteed. It requires the right mix of competition, openness, education, and institutions that protect intellectual property while preventing monopolistic dominance.
• Economies that stifle competition or restrict knowledge exchange risk stagnation, no matter how advanced they appear technologically.

Policy Implications:

• The Nobel laureates’ work offers valuable lessons for policymakers. In today’s world of rapid technological change, ensuring sustained and inclusive growth demands:
• Encouraging Innovation: Governments should support R&D, foster start-ups, and create incentives for risk-taking
• Balancing Competition and Protection: Over-consolidation of markets can stifle creativity; hence, antitrust policies and open access to finance are crucial.
• Investing in Human Capital: Education systems should emphasize creativity, critical thinking, and adaptability.
• Maintaining Openness: Global collaboration in science and technology, as seen during earlier periods of transformation, remains vital for continued progress.
• Ultimately, the laureates reaffirm that innovation is not just a product of technology but of culture and policy. The sustained path of global growth depends on how societies value learning, accept change, and enable individuals to create, compete, and cooperate.

Way Forward:

Mokyr mapped the cultural and historical preconditions for innovation, while Aghion and Howitt built the economic mechanism explaining how innovation drives growth. Their combined scholarship provides a comprehensive explanation for why humanity has moved from subsistence economies to sustained prosperity.

 

Editorial 2: RTI is Dead, Long Live RTI

Context:

Enacted after years of grassroots struggle led by the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS) in places like Beawar, Rajasthan, the RTI Act empowered citizens to demand accountability and transparency from public authorities. As the Act completes two decades, India finds itself at a critical juncture where the very essence of this hard-won right is being undermined by recent legislative changes, notably through the Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA), 2023.

Background:

• Beawar, often called the “RTI City,” has played a defining role in India’s transparency movement.
• The seeds of the RTI struggle were sown here in the 1990s, when ordinary citizens demanded access to government records to expose corruption and ensure fair wages under public works programmes.
• On October 12, 2025, Beawar not only celebrated 30 years of its struggle but also 20 years of the RTI Act as a moment of pride for people who could truly say they had “created history.”
• The local municipality, recognising this legacy, passed a resolution to construct an RTI Memorial and Museum at Chang Gate, where the first protest demanding transparency was held in 1996.
• This initiative, led by the MKSS and the School for Democracy, seeks to preserve the movement’s history and serve as a living space to promote constitutional values and people’s participation in governance.

The Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA):

• Ironically, as India commemorates the RTI’s success, the Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA) poses an unprecedented threat to it.
• While ostensibly designed to protect citizens’ privacy in the digital age, Section 44(3)of the DPDPA amends the RTI Act in ways that could render it ineffective.
• The amendment bars the disclosure of “personal information” under the pretext of privacy, without distinguishing between personal dataand information related to public duties or public interest.
• Earlier, Section 8(1)(j)of the RTI Act struck a delicate balance between the right to privacy and the right to information.
• It exempted personal information from disclosure only if it had no relation to public activity or interes
• Furthermore, it empowered authorities to disclose such information if a larger public interest warranted it.
• The DPDPA, however, removes this crucial public-interest override, replacing it with a blanket exemption on personal information.
• This change effectively shields public officials and entities from scrutiny.
• Without access to names, designations, or roles of those responsible for administrative decisions, citizens will be unable to expose corruption, misuse of funds, or abuse of power.

Curtailing the Citizen’s Right to Know:

• One of the most democratic features of the RTI Act was its equality clause, which stated that “information that cannot be denied to Parliament or a State Legislature shall not be denied to any citizen.”
• This clause placed the ordinary citizen on equal footing with elected representativesin accessing information.
• The DPDPA amendment has deleted this provision, eroding a principle that symbolized participatory democracy.
• Further, the DPDPA introduces punitive measures fines up to ₹250 crore for unauthorized disclosure of personal data.
• Such provisions can have a chilling effect on journalists, researchers, and activists, discouraging legitimate investigation into public affairs.
• The law, originally intended for large data-handling corporations, has been extended indiscriminately to all citizens, thereby curbing freedom of expression and investigative work.
• The backlash against these amendments has been widespread. Over 150 Members of Parliament, 2,500 journalists, and numerous civil society organizations have raised objections and submitted representations to the government.
• Despite this, there has been little effort to engage in meaningful democratic consultation.
• Activists argue that the amendments not only violate the spirit of the RTI but also undermine constitutional values of transparency and accountability.

Way Forward:

The RTI Act has been instrumental in exposing corruption, reforming governance, and empowering citizens. It is through RTI that India’s poor and marginalized have claimed their entitlements, be it ration cards, pensions, or wages. Weakening it under the guise of data protection threatens to reverse these democratic gains.