During the early 1980s, I worked in a community center that looked after the welfare of an inner-city neighborhood in Mumbai. My clients were the poorest of the poor: pavement dwellers who lived on the sidewalks. We offered these families health services, enrolled their kids in school, and organized childcare for them. But every 15 days, public officials came and broke up their makeshift homes because it was illegal to squat on sidewalks. All we could do was give our clients a safe place to hide their belongings until the officials passed. Being young and hot-blooded, a small group of us took the local government to court. At that time, India had a chief justice of the supreme court who regarded even a postcard from a poor person as a legitimate opening to a public interest suit. And so the suit commenced with relative ease. Our small group was very excited that we might actually change the policies that kept pavement dwellers impoverished. To my surprise, however, my employer severely reprimanded me for this action and stripped away many of my discretionary powers. This organization, the Nagpada Neighborhood House, was one of the oldest and most prestigious nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)…