The Many Splendored World 

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India’s World, we must remember, is not just about India! It’s about the world too! India’s international relations and the unambiguous pursuit of its national interests must be anchored deep in an appreciation of other countries–their histories, political evolution, economic trajectories, and their internal and external contradictions. Understanding other societies and developing a comprehensive knowledge of the world is a precondition for successful Indian grand strategy, irrespective of its means and goals.  

There is one new and distinctive feature of emerging India’s engagement with a changing world. It is about the systemic effects of India’s rise. The claim here is not about India’s exceptionalism, but India’s size. Its large population (nearly 18 per cent of the world) and the massive untapped potential for economic growth mean India’s rise will have significant effects on the global economy, world’s resources, climate, geopolitics, and international order.  

We have seen this come into sharp view with China’s transformation since the late 1970s. As India and the world shape each other as never before, any grand strategy should factor in the complexities of the two-way interaction.  

If its rise is not in a static but a dynamic system, New Delhi should be prepared for other sovereigns to react and adapt–positively or negatively–to the continuing improvement in India’s relative global standing. Assessing the effects of India’s actions and the nature of response to it must be an important element of India’s awareness of the world.  

Equally important is to avoid the temptation to see the rest of the world through the limiting bilateral prism. India’s world is not a sum of its bilateral relations. India’s partners and adversaries have relations with each other. And they inevitably change over time–note the continuous and often spectacular churn in the relations between America, Europe, Russia, China, and Japan over the last century. That essential feature of the world is not about to disappear.  

Change in the distribution of power among the major actors is unending and inevitable. Most of the time that change is incremental and peaceful, but at some moments it is quick and violent. This change is also intricately tied to the domestic political, social and economic evolution of the great powers. A good grasp of the internal dynamics of key states in the neighbourhood and beyond is critical for a productive Indian engagement with the world.   

Empathy and an appreciation of the strengths and weaknesses of New Delhi’s interlocutors–both friends and foes–are necessary for India to go up the international hierarchy. After all, no nation, however big and powerful, can compel other sovereign actors to obey its diktat. Navigating the world of multiple sovereigns, demands a conscious check on self-referential thinking and xenophobia.   

Knowing about the many splendoured world–with all its wonderful stories–has joys of its own; not only for scholars of India’s international relations, but also to the growing millions of Indians who now cross our frontiers for travel, tourism, study and business. Deeper study of the world at a moment of intensifying India’s engagement with it, then, is both urgent and important.  

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