India's Foreign Policy and Regional Multilateralism

Arndt Michael

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781137263117
• eBook ISBN: 9781137263124
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Asian Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The book provides a novel analytical perspective on regional multilateralism in South Asia and its neighbouring regions and covers the genesis, evolution and status quo of the four major regional organizations.

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Regional Multilateralism and Norm Localization

Although multilateralism in the form of regional cooperation, or simply regional multilateralism, has been successfully initiated and implemented in numerous regions of the world, similar developments cannot be observed in South Asia, which is still ‘the least integrated region in the world’ (World Bank, 2007). At present, there are four large regional organizations¹ in South Asia and its neighbouring regions. In South Asia itself, regional multilateralism began in 1985 with the official launch of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). In 1994, the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral-Economic Cooperation (BIMST-EC) was founded. The Indian Ocean Rim-Association for Regional Cooperation (IOR-ARC) was formed in 1997, and in 2000, the Mekong–Ganga Cooperation (MGC)² came into existence. India has been a founding member in all four of them.

At the time of writing, three of these four regional organizations are regarded as failures. In 2005, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh summarized the essence of 20 years of SAARC cooperation: ‘The honest answer is that regional economic cooperation in South Asia has fallen far short of our expectations and the dreams of our founding fathers. It remains far behind the more successful examples in both Asia and other regions of the world’ (Manmohan Singh, 2005). In 2007, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Myanmar Nyan Win concluded that ‘there has been a general perception that, despite seven years of efforts by MGC countries to move forward in areas designated for cooperation, there has been very slow progress’ (Win, 2007). And in 2009, the then Indian Minister of External Affairs Shashi Tharoor commented on the IOR-ARC that after 12 years of cooperation, ‘[IOR-ARC has not] done enough to get beyond the declaratory phase that marks most new initiatives’ (Tharoor, 2009). Only BIMST-EC constitutes a regional organization which exhibits a modest level of success.

Two counter-examples of successful and thriving processes of regional multilateralism are the European Union (EU) and the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN):³ Since its inception in the 1950s, the EU has gradually evolved into a full-fledged economic and political union in which a number of member countries have now commenced to actually forgo parts of their state sovereignty by adopting a common currency and harmonizing parts of their respective foreign and security policy. In Asia, ASEAN—‘one of the most successful regional organizations in the developing world’ (Acharya, 2001, p. 208)—has gradually evolved into a visible and vocal organization in the region, effectively following its own ‘ASEAN way’ of institutional–organizational minimalism and an informal, non-legalistic method of cooperation.⁴ ASEAN has taken tentative steps to transform itself into a security community (Acharya, 2001), and since 1 January 2003, the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) is operational.

Several schools in the field of international relations attempt to explain processes of regional integration. However, the main body of literature has traditionally focused on developments in Europe⁵ and Southeast Asia.⁶ Since the first early deliberations on regional cooperation in South Asia took place, numerous studies have addressed the historic development, economic prospects,⁷ or security-related aspects,⁸ and the main body of literature on South Asian regionalism has, as the years progressed without tangible results, especially analysed reasons for the apparent failure of regional cooperation in the region. In general, the reasons cited for this failure can be summarized and grouped into seven different analytical categories.

(1) Political conflicts between the countries of South Asia. In South Asia, a common civilizational heritage, a common shared legacy of British colonial domination, and common identical problems of social and economic backwardness highlight an underlying streak of ‘unity’ of the region. At the same time, sharp divisions and manifold interstate conflicts exist which make cooperation very difficult.⁹ These political conflicts especially exist in the spheres of territory, terrorism, sharing of natural resources, and refugees: The Kashmir crisis¹⁰ between India and Pakistan has been the source of four major wars between the two countries. Sri Lanka and India differ over alleged Indian involvement with Tamil separatists in Sri Lanka. The border situation between Nepal and India has remained problematic, and there are also unresolved political disputes between India and Bangladesh over alleged illegal migration from the Chittagong Hill Tracts and illegal migration into Assam, about the demarcation of boundaries and the problem of sharing water of the Ganges river. Especially, the India–Pakistan conflict¹¹ seems irresolvable, and due to the existence of nuclear weapons in the two countries there is the possibility of a spillover on the global level.

(2) Balance of power equation.¹² Besides these interstate problems, the general balance of power situation in South Asia is regarded as a major contributing factor for the failure of cooperation. India eclipses every nation state of South Asia: India’s sheer size and population, in addition to its unmatched military resources in the region, constitute an asymmetry in political, economic, and social terms. Besides, India practically shares borders with all countries in South Asia, and India’s centre position and her resources make her the unquestionable focal point in South Asia.

(3) Different political systems and different levels of democratization.¹³ Since 1947, several different political designs have existed in the region (democracies, dictatorships, autocratic regimes, kingdoms), and only since 2008 has there been a time in which, from a formal standpoint, all countries, including Pakistan and Nepal, at present, possess democratic regimes; yet it is uncertain whether democracy will prevail in the long run in all countries.

(4) Different domestic decision-making structures.¹⁴ Besides the differences in political systems, the decision-making structures in the individual countries differ markedly and concomitantly in the manner in which foreign policy decisions are taken. Also, the degree to which opposition groups or civil society actors can influence the discourse on foreign policy varies greatly.

(5) Communal violence.¹⁵ The recurring phenomenon of communal violence between Hindus, Muslims, and also Christians has been a source of great conflict and violence and has led to fault lines, not only within the countries of South Asia, but at the same time also transcending the borders of the respective nation states.

(6) Nationalism.¹⁶ The two-nation theory—formally proclaimed for the first time in 1940—argued that the Hindus and Muslims of South Asia were two separate nations.¹⁷ This idea contributed to the partition of British India into the two separate states of Pakistan and India and has been fanning nationalist sentiment until today. Hindu nationalism is a constant in the political and social arena in India. Also, suppressed Bengali nationalism led to the creation of Bangladesh in 1971. Besides, Sri Lanka suffered from decades of civil war between the Sinhalese and the Tamils.¹⁸ In the north of South Asia, the situation between Afghanistan and Pakistan has been a constant area of tension with regard to the Pashtun area.

(7) Socio-economic development.¹⁹ The countries of South Asia exhibit starkly differing socio-economic developments. In the 2011 Human Development Index (HDI), the countries are ranked between 97 and 172: Afghanistan, 172; Bangladesh, 146; Bhutan, 141; India, 134; the Maldives, 109; Nepal, 157; Pakistan, 145; Sri Lanka, 97 (Human Development Index, 2011). According to the World Bank,²⁰ the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2007 was as follows (in US$ billions): Afghanistan, 11.6; Bangladesh, 67.7; Bhutan, 1.1; India, 1171; the Maldives, 1.1; Nepal, 10.2; Pakistan, 143.6; Sri Lanka, 32.4.

These seven categories covering interstate as well as intrastate problems clearly demonstrate that South Asia suffers from major fault lines in the political, sociocultural and economic sectors. Still, an explanation for the failure of regional cooperation which uses arguments derived from the above falls short of providing satisfactory answers to the following set of questions:

(1) Why has India, despite the Indo-centric character of South Asia, entered into four regional (economic) arrangements in the first place? Because of the hegemonic position that India undoubtedly occupies, the economic advantages of regional cooperation can be reaped by exclusively entering into bilateral agreements with every country, rather than participating in regional multilateral agreements.

(2) Why have the other countries of South Asia until now not taken a conscious decision to cooperate in the South Asian regional organization, intentionally excluding India, in order to form a counter-weight to the asymmetrical power structure in the region?

(3) Why do all four regional organizations (SAARC, IOR-ARC, BIMST-EC, and MGC) exhibit comparable deficiencies and have failed to achieve a greater level of integration?

(4) Why have the four regional organizations overlapping membership, i.e., why are several countries of South Asia party to geographically and thematically similar regional arrangements (e.g., SAARC and BIMST-EC)?

(5) Why have South Asian regional organizations not followed the path of ASEAN, by either emulating the institutional framework or adopting the successful elements of ASEAN cooperation?

(6) Why is there such an apparent gap between rhetoric in favour of regional cooperation and institutional reality in South Asia and neighbouring regions?

Especially, the often-cited balance-of-power structure in South Asia does not adequately account for India’s decision to become a member in four different regional organizations already, or for the existence of these four regional organizations. Arguing that India’s hegemonic position in South Asia has stymied regional cooperation does not capture the intricacies and complexity of India’s foreign policy norms and culture. It is undeniable that the rhetoric in favour of regional cooperation is a constant in Indian foreign policy circles. On the other hand, arguing that either Pakistan alone or the Indo-Pakistan conflict have been mostly responsible for the lack of progress in SAARC since 1985 cannot explain why the same problems of institutional stasis and lack of achievement are, e.g., visible in the IOR-ARC and BIMST-EC, the two organizations in which Pakistan has not been admitted into.

Considering the above, few studies on South Asian regionalism have attempted to provide a theoretical backdrop that addresses the particular situation in South Asia,²¹ and there is hardly any literature on regional multilateralism in the Indian Ocean Rim, the Bay of Bengal or the Mekong–Ganga. Also, there is, at present, no theoretical approach enabling a comparative study of the development, design, and shortcomings of all four organizations in the founding of which India was involved. The present study attempts to fill this gap in the existing scholarship on South Asian regional cooperation by using a novel analytical perspective and providing an alternative explanation for the development and institutional set-up of the regional architecture that has been implemented in the four regions at hand.

The focus of the present examination is the genesis and evolution of regional multilateralism from a normative standpoint by using the vantage point of India’s foreign policy and the latter’s ‘cognitive prior’, i.e., Indian foreign policy ideas, norms, and values, and the particular ‘Indian way’ of responding to and implementing an external international norm. The global norm which serves as the analytical point of reference for the present study is regional multilateralism.²² The study will examine the process of the localization (Acharya, 2004, pp. 239–75) of regional multilateralism and its implementation in four specific regions, namely, South Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal, and the Mekong–Ganga area. ‘The framework of localization […] is helpful in understanding why any given region may accept a particular norm while rejecting another, as well as variation between regions in undergoing normative change’ (Acharya, 2004, p. 269). The focus of norm localization is thus the analysis of transnational or international ideas and the question of why these find greater acceptance in one region or setting than in another. This issue is of great relevance for developments in international politics, since successful norm diffusion can greatly impact the behaviour of states.

In providing a theoretically informed analysis of regional cooperation by using a specific local/regional lens, this study responds to Peter Katzenstein’s critique that theoretical analyses on Asian regionalism have so far ignored ‘local, national, or regional political contexts central to those writing on Asian regionalism’, and especially ideational forces originating from within the region (Katzenstein, 1997, p. 6). With this approach—at the interface of international relations, comparative politics, political ideas, and political economy—the idiosyncrasies of regional cooperation in the South Asian region can be portrayed in a new scientific manner, and policy recommendation can be given about the future prospects of cooperation in those organizations and regions.

Theoretical underpinning: norm diffusion in international relations and norm localization

Norms, depending on the theoretical perspectives, are ‘standards of behaviour defined in terms of rights and obligations’ (Krasner, 1983, p. 2); they can be defined as ‘shared expectations about appropriate behaviour held by a collectivity of actors’ (Checkel, 1999, p. 83) or ‘intersubjectively shared, value-based expectations of appropriate behaviour’ (Boekle et al., 2000, p. 4). International relations (IR) theory distinguishes between different types of norms: regulative norms, which order and constrain behaviour, and constitutive norms, which create new actors, interests, or categories of action.²³

International norms often carry social content: they are often independent of power distributions and they provide states/agents with an understanding of...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures and Tables
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• 1 Regional Multilateralism and Norm Localization
• 2 India’s Cognitive Prior: Ideas, Norms, and the Evolution of India’s Foreign Policy
• 3 Regional Multilateralism in South Asia
• 4 Regional Multilateralism Beyond South Asia
• 5 Conclusions: Competing Regionalism and Panchsheel Multilateralism in South Asia and Beyond
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index