Manoranjan Mohanty was a Professor of Political Science and Director, Developing Countries Research Centre at University of Delhi where he taught Comparative Politics, Chinese Politics and Research Methodology. Currently he is a Distinguished Professor at the Council for Social Development, New Delhi (www.csdindia.org) where until recently he edited the CSD-Sage journal Social Change.

He is a social scientist, China scholar and a peace and human rights activist with research interest in the study of Political Economy of China, India and global transformation. He is an Emeritus Fellow of the Institute of Chinese Studies, (www.icsin.org),  its founding member and former Chairperson. He is also the Emeritus Chairperson, Development Research Institute,  Bhubaneswar, the research wing of Gabeshana Chakra (www.gabeshanachakra.org) of which he was the founder-president. 

Prof. Manoranjan Mohanty (b.1942) is a teacher, researcher and writer. A Political Scientist, China Scholar and Peace and Human Rights activist he has many books and research papers on theoretical and empirical dimensions of social movements, human rights, development studies and global transformation. After retiring from University of Delhi he has been with the Council for Social Development (CSD) and is the Editor of the CSD Journal, Social Change published by Sage.

He is also Chairperson, Development Research Institute, Bhubaneswar, Honorary Fellow, Institute of Chinese Studies (ICS), Delhi and Fellow at Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies, UC, Santa Barbara.

A Ph D. from University of California, Berkeley, he was, till 2004, Professor of Political Science and Director, Developing Countries Research Centre (DCRC) at the University of Delhi where he taught Comparative Politics and Chinese Politics since 1969. He is a former Chairperson and Director of ICS and a former Editor of China Report. He has had visiting assignments in several universities and research institutes in India and abroad including UC, Berkeley, Institute of Far Eastern Studies, Moscow, Oxford University, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen, University of Lagos, UC, Santa Barbara and New School, New York. He has been on the editorial board of many social science and China studies journals in India and abroad. He has been a part of the founding and evolution of institutions such as the ICS, Delhi, the DCRC at Delhi University and Gabeshana Chakra and the Development Research Institute in Odisha. He has also been a part of the People’s Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR), Delhi and the Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy (PIPDPF) since their inception. He was part of the founding process of the Boao Forum for Asia in China and REGGEN, the Third World Sustainable Development Network in Brazil. mm@csdindia.org mmohantydu@gmail.com

He has had academic assignments in many institutions abroad including in California, Beijing, Moscow, Lagos, Copenhagen and Oxford. He has done extensive research on modern China and India including on the Chinese Revolution, the Political Economy of China, People’s Movements in India and Poverty in Odisha.

He has authored, among others, The Political Philosophy of Mao Zedong (1978, 2009, Hindi edition 1979, 2010)); Red and Green: Five Decades of the Maoist Movement in India (2014 incorporating Revolutionary Violence published in 1977); Contemporary Indian Political Theory (2000); Ideology Matters: China from Mao Zedong to Xi Jinping (2016, Hindi edition 2021) . His publication based on a thirty-year study of China’s reforms with focus on Wuxi is China’s Transformation: The Success Story and the Success Trap (Sage: 2018), Hindi edition Cheen ka Kayapalat (Sage Bhasha,2020).

He has been a part of a number of national and international research projects and academic initiatives leading to research papers and edited or coauthored volumes such as Chinese Revolution: Comparative Perspectives (1993); People’s Rights: Social Movements and the State in the Third World (1998); Class, Caste and Gender (2004); Grass-roots Democracy in India and China (2007); Weapon of the Oppressed: An Inventory of People’s Rights in India (2009); India: Social Development Report 2010 (2010); A Fistful of Dry Rice: Land, Equity and Democracy: Essays in Honour of D Bandyopadhyay (2012); Building a Just World: Essays in Honour of Muchkund Dubey (2015); Exploring Emerging Global Thresholds: Towards 2030 (2017); China at a Turning Point: Perspectives after the Nineteenth Party Congress

(2019); and Migration, Workers and Fundamental Freedoms: Pandemic Vulnerabilities and States of Exception in India (2021).

He has contributed to many Handbooks and Encyclopaedias the latest being the essay, Inequality: Perspective from the Global South in Oxford Handbook of Global Studies (2020).

He has published books and articles in Odia as well.

He has been an active member of the People’s Union for Democratic Rights, Delhi since its inception and also of Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy. He is part of the Bandung Spirit Network (www.bandungspirit.org) and a founding member of the Global University of Sustainability (http//:our-global-u.org).

mm@csdindia.org
mmohantydu@gmail.com

  • China at a Turning Point: Perspectives after the 19th Party Congress (ed. New Delhi: Pentagon, 2019)
  • China’s Transformation: The Success Story and the Success Trap (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2017) (An in-depth study of socio-economic and political process of reforms since 1979 with focus on a case study of Wuxi)
  • Exploring Emergent Global Thresholds :Towards 2030 Orient BlackSwan,2017) ( MM’s Paper in the volume: Development as Civilisational Movement: Counter-hegemonic Trends in Asia, Africa and Latin America) Editors: Richard Falk, Manoranjan Mohanty and Victor Faessel
  • Building a Just World: Essays in Honour of Muchkund Dubey (New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2015) ( MM’s paper in the volume: China, India and the Emerging Process of Building a Just World) Editors: Manoranjan Mohanty, Vinod C Khanna and Biswajit Dhar
  • Red and Green: Five Decades of the Indian Maoist Movement (Kolkata: Setu Prakashani, 2015) Part one carries the full text of Revolutionary Violence published in 1977)
  • Ideology Matters: China from Mao Zedong to Xi Jinping (New Delhi: Aakar,2014),
  • A Fistful of Dry Rice- Land, Equity and Democracy (New Delhi: Aakar,2012), (MM’s paper in the volume: From Kalahandi to Kalinganagar and Lalgarh) Editors: K B Saxena, Manoranjan Mohanty and Sumit Chakravartty)
  • Weapon of the Oppressed- An Inventory of People’s Rights in India (Coauthor, Daanish, 2011), Authors: Manoranjan Mohanty, K B Saxena, Gilbert Sebastian and Prashant Trivedy.
  • India Social Development Report 2010 (Ed., OUP, 2010), (MM’s Introduction entitled, Social Development in India- the story of the marginalized, and a co-authored paper on land and poverty in three States)
  • Grass-roots Democracy in India and China (Co-ed, New Delhi: Sage, 2007), (MM: Introduction and a paper coauthored with Mark Selden entitled, “ Reconceptualising Local Democracy: Reflections on Democracy, Power and Resistance in the Indian and Chinese countryside)  Editors: Manoranjan Mohanty, Richard Baum, Rong Ma, George Mathew
  • Class, Caste, Gender (Ed., Sage, 2004), (MM’s Introduction and a paper entitled, “Social Movements in Creative society”)
  • Contemporary Indian Political Theory (New Delhi: Sanskriti, 2000),
  • People’s Rights: Social Movements and the State in the Third World (Co-ed., New Delhi: Sage, 1998)
  • Chinese Revolution: Comparative Perspectives (Ed., New Delhi: Ajanta, 1993),
  • The Political Philosophy of Mao Tse-tung (Macmillan, 1978 and Aakar, 2014)
  • Inequality in the Perspective of the Global South, Oxford Handbook of Global Studies (2019)
  • ‘Panchasheel, Bandung and the Global South’’ in Darwis Khudori ( ed.) Bandung Legacy and the Global Future ( New Delhi: Aakar, 2018)
  • Dialectical Materialism and Creative Theory: Insights from Randhir Singh in Dhananjay Rai (ed), Politics: Tributes to Randhir Singh ( New Delhi: Aakar, 2017)
  • Introduction in Nagbhushan Patnaik, Indian Revolution (Delhi: Vani Prakashan, 2017 in Hindi, 2018 in English) ( Statement at the Court, 1976)
  • “Township and Village Enterprises in China’s Success Story: Lessons for India”, Seventh V B Singh Memorial Lecture (Lucknow: Giri Institute of Development Studies, July 2016)
  • Introduction, Selected Works of Randhir Singh (New Delhi: Aakar, 2016)
  • “Bandung, Panchasheel and Global Swaraj” in Darwis Khudori (Ed), Bandung at 60: New Insights and Emerging Forces (Jakarka: Pustaka Pelajar, 2015),
  • “Reconceptualising Social Development” in Ash Narayan Roy et al (ed), Development, Decentralisation and Democracy (New Delhi: Orient Bolackswan, 2015),
  • “Clouds in Half the Sky: Women’s Prospects under Reforms”, China Report, Vol 51 No. 1 (February 2015),
  • “Federalism as Self-Determination in the 21st Century” in Identity and Struggle: Telengana and Adivasis (Hyderabad: MRK Publications, 2015),
  • “Political Discourse on Public Sector Reforms in India and China” in Kjeld-Erik Brodsgaard (Ed), Public Sector Reforms in China ( London: Routledge, 2014),
  • “Persisting Dominance: Crisis of Democracy in a Resource Rich Region”, Economic and Political Weekly, Special Issue on Odisha (4 April 2014)
  • Odisha Daridra Kahinki (Why is Odisha poor?)(coauthor with Bijaya Bohidar)(Cuttack:, Odisha Book Store, Cuttack, 1993)
  • Uddipta Odisha , Ebe bi Daridra Kahinki? (Awakened Odisha, why still poor?), (Cuttack:Odisha Book Store, 2015)
  • Odishare Shramik Andolan (Workers Movement in Odisha ) (ed. Jeevan Sangram Trust, 2018)
  • His comments, articles and interviews on current issues in English and Odia frequently appear in newspapers and journals in India and abroad.
  • Swaraj, Jiefang and Ubuntu in 21st Century
    Land, Labour and Social Development in Odisha