CHAPTER 1

WAHEGURU PAL SINGH SIDHU, PRATAP BHANU MEHTA,and BRUCE JONES

A Hesitant Rule Shaper?

A Defining Period

India faces a defining period. As the world's biggest democracy with an economyamong the world's ten largest, India's status as a reemerging global poweris being not just recognized but increasingly institutionalized, with a seat onthe G-20, increasing clout in the international financial institutions, entryinto the club of nuclear-armed states, impending membership in the varioustechnology and supply control regimes, and impressive peacekeeping credentialsunder the United Nations. As India reasserts itself economically onthe global stage for the first time since the 1500s, it will inevitably wield greaterinternational political and, possibly, military influence.

At the same time, geopolitical shifts create simultaneous opportunities andchallenges: the opening with the United States, the rise of China, the globalfinancial crisis, the so-called Arab Spring, the mounting crisis between Iranand the West as well as key Gulf states, and the growing international tusslesover energy, climate, food, cyber security, rivers and the oceans. India hasexperienced rapid growth through participation in the multilateral order, andits development strategy and energy requirements make it dependent on stableglobalization. India has growing economic, trade, and energy stakes inliterally every corner of the globe. Much of that trade and energy flows via theIndian Ocean, where India is an established maritime player but also facesenormous new demands and challenges. At this stage in its history, India hascritical interests in just about every major multilateral regime and vital interestsin several emerging regimes. The boundaries between Indian self-interestand the contours of the multilateral order have blurred. In short, India mighthave no choice but to influence the evolving multilateral order if it is to sustainits own interests.

Does India have the will to shape the changing multilateral order? If so,does it have the people, the tools, and the ideas to do so? How much do India'stroubled neighborhood and complex domestic politics inhibit a forward-leaningstance on the multilateral order? Or do they demand it? How doIndia's elites—old and new—shape India's political options? How do the risingmiddle class and the growing urbanization influence India's multilateraloutlook?

Many commentators on India's posture with regard to the multilateralorder have argued that it has often been little more than a defensive crouch:that nonalignment was rooted in a geopolitical strategy, but Indian policyhas neither fully reacted to changing geopolitics and geoeconomics nor genuinelysought to shape the resulting global order. To some extent, this is acaricature, although, like many caricatures, it contains an element of truth.What is certainly true is that India's posture on the multilateral order has notchanged as quickly or as dramatically as the order itself.

Jawaharlal Nehru reportedly argued, as echoed by John F. Kennedy'sfamous charge to the American people, that states must ask not, what can theworld do for us, but what can we do for the world?2 This is the necessaryquestion for a power that would seek to shape the order in which it findsitself. The history of the multilateral order is one of change from withindriven by states willing to bear the costs. While India has been a key internationalactor since its independence in 1947, it practiced, according to oneobserver, "universalism of the weak." This was evident during the earlydecades in its leadership of the Nonaligned Movement (NAM) and the G-77countries and its championing of the cause of decolonization in Africa andAsia, which reflected a principled and ideological, but ineffectual, approachto multilateralism.

However, since the end of the cold war (which coincided with dramaticeconomic and political changes within India), New Delhi has exhibited "internationalismof the strong," which is apparent in its membership in the G-20,its quest for permanent membership in the...