The 2014 national elections in India were repeatedly described as a political watershed. Not only did a single party capture a majority of seats for the first time in thirty-four years, but for the first time ever, this party was not the Indian National Congress. Instead, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), led by the controversial hardliner Narendra Modi, secured a stunning victory. The BJP's singular breakthrough only served to remind observers of the central role coalition governments have played in the governing of the world's largest electoral democracy. Indeed, the BJP under Modi continued this trend, and governs at the helm of a coalition rather than on its own.
Coalition politics is thus clearly a crucial subject for any understanding of India's political present and future as much as of its recent past. In Divided We Govern, Sanjay Ruparelia provides valuable theoretical and empirical contributions to this...
