India IN Multipolar World PDF

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INDIA’S ROLE IN MULTIPOLAR WORLD AMISHA KEKEWADIA 18/1001 B. A. HONS. POLITICAL SCIENCE SEMESTER 5TH, 3RD YEAR

INDIA’S FOREIGN POLICY IN A GLOBALISING WORLD

A multipolar world is populated by many powers of roughly equal strength- no one or two powers dominate the international system. Classical realist theorists, such as Hans Morgenthau and E. H. Carr, holds that multipolar systems are more stable than bipolar systems, as great powers can gain power through alliances and petty wars that do not directly challenge other powers; In bipolar systems, classical realists argue, this is not possible. On the other hand, the Neorealist, such as Kenneth Waltz and Mearshiemer, hold that states in a multipolar system can focus their fears on any number of other powers and, misjudging the intentions of other states, unnecessarily compromise their security, while states in a bipolar system always focus their fears on one other power, meaning that at worst the powers will miscalculate the force required to counter threats and spend slightly too much on the operation. However, due to the complexity of mutually assured destruction scenarios, with nuclear weapons, multipolar systems may be more stable than bipolar systems even in the neorealist analysis. The one advantage that comes with multipolarity, is that we can form multiple alliances, and on the other hand, the addiction for power that also comes with it, is quite unhealthy. It certainly lacks clarity and predictability. As countries can do what is in their best interest, they can side with the strongest ally, can also break alliances as they deem it advantageous to them, or can be in temporary alliances. Balance of power can shift, sometimes violently, both within and between regions. But a multipolar world will increase the strategic choices that weaker states such as India will have. The chaos of such a system would

present great opportunities for weaker states such as India, but that chaos will also bring great dangers. India is most appropriately conceived of in the contemporary international system as an ‘emerging power’. The international system today is hegemonic because a single state has achieved an acute preponderance of capabilities. It will take at least 15 to 20 years for a balance to re-emerge in the system, which is precisely the period in which India will itself ‘emerge’. Hence, India’s emergence will be simultaneous with the relative decline of the United States. The bedrock of contemporary US power lies in the overwhelming superiority of its military capabilities. In relative terms, and therefore more importantly, no other power on the planet today can remotely match the capabilities that the US possesses. The global economic presence of the US is suggestive of a second sense of hegemony: the provision of global public goods. In the context of the world economy, the best example of a global public good are Sea Lanes of Communication (SLOCs), the sea routes commonly used by merchant ships. Free trade in an open world economy would not be possible without open SLOCs. Since the decline of British naval power after the Second World War, this role has been played by the multi-oceanic US Navy. Also the internet today relies on a global network of satellites, most of which are owned by the US Government. A third meaning of hegemony is ‘manufactured consent’, which is the notion that a dominant power deploys not only military power but also ideological resources to structure the behaviour of competing and lesser powers. Thus 20 years from now, another great power, most probably China, or may be a coalition of great powers including China, the European Union, Brazil and India, could well emerge just as US capabilities are declining in relative terms. On the other hand, history and theory are poor guides to prediction because they provide little to indicate how long a hegemonic order might last. American hegemony could, in actual fact, last a lot longer than anticipated.

GREAT POWERS AND THE OTHER STATES INDIA, CHINA AND UNITED STATES India’s positions on various multilateral issues converge and diverge with those of the United States and China. All three guard the state’s primacy on national

security matters and refuse to cede power to external transnational institutions. For example, all have stood in opposition to the International Criminal Court, been reluctant to join the convention on landmines, and hesitant to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty. And all three often defer more to domestic political considerations than international norms. The Indian-U.S. civil nuclear initiative laid bare India’s enduring problems on the nuclear front with China—Beijing’s opposition to the integration of India into the global nuclear order. Unlike China, India does not view sovereignty as an absolute principle nor does it oppose all interventions in the internal affairs of other states. India, however, is less certain about how China might use force beyond its borders as its military power expands and its clout in the multilateral system increases. After the collapse of Soviet power, New Delhi was quick to realise the importance of the US and did manage to change tracks to emphasise ties with the US over all the other major powers. Indo-US relations cannot improve simply because they are ‘natural allies’; that would be a rare beast in international politics. Nevertheless, in a hegemonic world India has little choice but to seek closer ties with the US, fighting others seeking a seat on the same bandwagon. India’s primary strategic concern should be to balance China. But balancing China is a process that is delicately done. India’s nuclear arsenal gives it a certain baseline power capability that China cannot afford to overlook; New Delhi should therefore be confident of handling its security concerns regarding China at the military level. At the larger strategic level, New Delhi needs to continue focusing on improving its economic power, which is the root of national power, and resolving old border disputes with China. But New Delhi also needs to pay greater attention to potential allies such as Russia, Japan, Vietnam and South Korea to balance China. Japan, in particular, is being driven by Chinese behaviour into revisiting its strategic posture. RUSSIA India and Russia had been friends for ages but at present, with the ground realities changing, this friendship has realistically evolved as the friends between two equals. During the recent years, India obtained the ultra-modern Sukhoi and MIG fighter planes from Russia, and other weapons in large amount besides the Admiral Gorshov warship. Joint production of ultra-modern fighter

aircraft and other weapons from Russia have been agreed to in the 2007 Defence Relationship Agreement. Though India has been buying defence supplies from USA, UK, and Israel, even after the Cold War years, Russia continues to be one of the largest arms suppliers to India. The defence relations between the two have strengthened Indo-Russian relations, even when India-US relations are getting stronger. JAPAN Unlike Russia and India, there is no history of common perceptions on global politics between India and Japan. During the Cold War, Tokyo and New Delhi found themselves on the opposite sides of the fence. Under Koizumi’s successor, Shinzo Abe, the process of reassertion intensified with the enunciation of an ‘Arc of Freedom and Prosperity’ in Asia, culminating in a joint naval exercise conducted by Japan, India, Australia, Singapore and the US in September 2007. Abe’s resignation soon thereafter and his replacement by Yasuo Fukuda have slowed down the process of Japan’s normalisation. Nevertheless, it is safe to say that the Yoshida Doctrine,18 the cornerstone of Japanese foreign policy during the Cold War years, ‘has faded, probably to disappear altogether’. As Tokyo weighs Japanese options, India needs to see Japan as a serious player and court rather than overlook Japan’s potential. Japan, of course, also needs to be more pragmatic about India’s role in Asia and the world, and more importantly, realise its own potential for a significant role in Asia and the consequences of such a role. That process appears to have started in Tokyo; New Delhi needs to follow suit. THE EUROPEAN UNION The EU economy is larger than the US economy. Nevertheless, it is far from clear that the EU will play a significant systematic role independent of the US. It therefore appears that for many years to come the EU will remain obsessed with its internal transformations. Nevertheless, the inspired experiment that has resulted in the impressive institutional, policy and even cultural architecture of the European Union is not, and perhaps never will be, the political norm for organising social life at local, national, regional or global levels. Most of the world is still in the throes of modernity: the state retains the lead role in the social drama. However, in the 2020–25 timeframe the EU will remain a hybrid entity in an international system of sovereign territorial states, and thus play at best a marginal role in great power politics.

BRAZIL One country that India does not often think of as a future peer competitor is Brazil. Like India, it has no doubts that it deserves a place at the high table of world politics. Although it has renounced the nuclear option, it remains obsessed with the notion of acquiring strategic autonomy. Nevertheless, there are also major differences with India that are worth noting. To a far greater degree than India, Brazil is suspicious of the Washington bandwagon. Since the Brazilian Declaration of 6 June 2003, India has calibrated its bilateral relationship with Brazil largely through the instrumentality of the India, Brazil and South Africa Dialogue Forum (IBSA), a new trilateral initiative involving three significant countries of the global South. As emerging powers, the IBSA Three are similarly situated in the international system and also have similar aspirations regarding a future global role for themselves. It is clear that the significance of IBSA in issues of international political economy will increase even further in the coming years. IBSA has strong legs: it is an initiative that aggregates power, enhances cooperation and builds community. It speaks to issues central to India’s future place and role in the world and will therefore remain important.

INDIA’S POSITION IN MULTIPOLAR WORLD In the first years after India gained independence in 1947, moralpolitik prevailed as Nehru raised India’s profile on the world stage. India actively participated in the global debates of the day and contributed to conflict reduction and peacemaking in the 1950s. During the 1970s and 1980s, India’s focus was on changing the world order through collective action undertaken by the so-called “Global South”—the nonaligned movement and the G77. Delhi denounced the global economic system as favoring the developed world and called for a new international economic order. India went on the defensive after the Cold War, fearing the world order might undermine its core national security interests. As the country’s economic strength increased and its great-power relations improved—especially the India-U.S. relationship—Delhi was brought into the global nuclear order in 2005–2008 thanks to the initiative of President George W. Bush. Although India has not formally been recognized as a nuclear-weapon

state, many of the penalties imposed on it for acquiring the weapons have been eliminated. India now sees itself as a “responsible” nuclear-weapon state. As a late developer and a new beneficiary of globalization, India seeks to limit the variety of new Western controls on India’s ability to export and build domestic economic prosperity. Instead, it is a rising power that is ready to engage the global order in pursuit of its national interests and emerging international responsibility. Indian economy grew at a satisfactory pace in the last 20 years (2000 – 2019). According to a report titled “World Economic Update: June 2020”, released by the IMF (International Monetary Fund), India’s real GDP growth rate would be – 4.5 percent in 2020, but it would revert back to a 6 percent growth in 2021. In this report, global growth is projected at – 4.9 percent, due to the pandemic. India's military-political relations and arms trade with the United States have been on a rapid rise in recent years. India's major trading partners are the European Union, China, the United States and the United Arab Emirates.’ India is also gaining influence within the multilateral trade negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). India is a founding-member of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and its successor, the WTO. India has continued its opposition to the inclusion of labour, environmental issues and other non-tariff barriers to trade in WTO policies. According to the 2017 PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report, India's GDP at purchasing power parity could overtake that of the United States by 2050. India has free trade agreements with several nations, including ASEAN, SAFTA, Mercosur, South Korea, Japan and few others which are in effect or under negotiating stage. Both the IMF and World Bank were set up as a result of the Bretton Woods Conference to regulate the international monetary and financial system. World Bank assistance in India started from 1948 when funding for the Agricultural Machinery Project was approved. World Bank resident mission was established in India in 1957. India also took its territorial dispute with Pakistan in Jammu and Kashmir to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in 1949 and was deeply disillusioned with the power politics in the UNSC. India faces territorial issues with some of its neighbors – People's Republic of China, Pakistan and Nepal. It also has border dispute with the Republic of China on Taiwan. India has resolved its un-demarcated border with Bhutan, which included multiple irregularities. India also resolved its border disputes with Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

The aspirations of the Chinese Navy to register its presence in the Indian ocean region, and then follow it up by projecting power as part of its ‘Far Seas’ operating philosophy can be seen in Hambantota, where China is in possession of Sri Lankan real estate, for developing a port and Special Economic Zone. Maldives, another island is caught somewhere in between, which has shared a strenuous relation with India in the recent past and has received generous aid from China, a feature of the so called ‘debt trap’ policy. Since the Maldives represents a buffer zone surrounding India’s maritime strategic space, China’s steady encroachment there is a serious cause for concern. Even in the South China Sea issue, when the world, especially the US and to a lesser extent, India and Japan, were upset and anguished, but the so-called affected nations in South-East Asia seem to have re-adjusted themselves to a ‘new normal’. New Delhi should look to operationalise logistical agreements with France and the United States, in order to upgrade naval relations and allow its own bases to be used for logistical support by the French and American navies. These logistical bases can enhance India’s capability to establish sea-denial in the Indian Ocean, demonstrating the breadth of Indian naval power. These moves should be accompanied with counter-theatre presence in the Western Pacific, and diplomatic outreach to South Asian nations that are being courted by China. India should look to develop interdependencies with neighbouring countries, both economically and strategically, which until now it has failed to realise. The void left by India has been dutifully fulfilled by China. Permanent membership on the United Nations Security Council remains one of the most important unmet Indian objectives in the global arena. India argued that the current structure of the Security Council, which reflects the balance among great powers at the end of the Second World War, is outmoded and ineffective. Although India’s principled case for permanent membership has gained much support, its campaign, along with those of Germany, Japan, and Brazil, has stalled. China is reluctant to let India and Japan take permanent seats and has been actively undermining the G4 effort to expand the Security Council—a stark reminder for India that international institutions cannot transcend great-power politics. The last two decades have also seen an explosion of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and civil society groups that are active on a range of issues and have strong contacts with international networks. While the NGO networks have often succeeded in crafting treaties like the Land Mines Convention and the Oslo Convention on Cluster Munitions, their uncompromising emphasis on principles has reduced the utility of the new instruments by forcing the major powers out of these conventions. As India emerges and becomes a state with system shaping capabilities, the world is entitled to ask questions. Imagine India as a leader of third world countries. It is going to be in India's interest to suggest to the rest of the world with due subtlety, of coursethat its emergence would also help resolve existing and emerging global problems instead of creating new ones. The newness quotient is Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s

‘economy first’ approach rooted in his desire to create external conditions necessary to ensure domestic economic progress. He has displayed dynamism while engaging all major powers, promoting and reintegrating India with the global economy, promoting greater cooperation with South Asian neighbours and renewing strategic connections in the Indian Ocean, the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa. Pragmatism in India’s foreign policy is seen in Indo–US relations reaching a new level or in cooperation with China on climate change while opposing its territorial claims in the South China Sea and One Belt One Road Project. To counter China, India has sought close strategic partnerships with the USA and its allies and main partners in AsiaPacific while retaining its strategic autonomy. A major challenge to India’s foreign policy is the downward spiral of relations with Pakistan.

CONCLUSION India has a middle power status and a rising power mindset. The emerging multipolar world manifests opportunities as well as challenges to India’s foreign policy. India now prefers multi alignment rather than Non- alignment. Ex, SCO, BRICS, QUAD, etc.A newfound pragmatism began to emerge and by the late 1990s India was willing to place its own national interest – both economic and security – ahead of broader ideas of global justice and equity. Today India is at the center of the international security architecture, and a key to the economic and technological debates of the age. By virtue of its economic growth, its world-class space program, and its contributions from medicine to IT, India has become indispensable to global needs and a shaper of the world economy, not just as a market, but also as an engine of growth and ideas.There is a growing convergence of views between India and the U.S. on the security and diplomatic architecture of the Asia- Pacific. India deals with China with confidence and candor. This is the new normal in the relationship. India and China engage, cooperate and compete simultaneously At the global level, we see a shift towards playing a leading world role, rather than a mere balancing one, with ambition, energy, and confidence. There is a realization in the government that, to become a truly great power, India will need to set the agenda on the burning international issues of the day, rather than merely shaping outcomes....