Locating a shadowy state in queer, feminist politics

Abstract

In this commentary, part of a book forum on Srila Roy's (2022) book Changing the Subject: Feminist and Queer Politics in Neoliberal India, I argue that the feminist and queer movement, in response to the neoliberal turn in India, is not totally separate from the Indian state formations. In fact, a shadowy state emerges in the affective life of citizens as an expression of what Timothy Mitchell would have called “state effect.”