In the light of Nepal’s geostrategic location between India and China, its physical geography has been described through several discourses and rhetoric. The discourses produce meanings, and they directly affect the political behaviour of a state. One of the persistent discourses explaining Nepal’s geopolitical situation is “Nepal as a ’yam ‘between two boulders” by King Prithvi Narayan Shah. In that sense, the ‘yam’ theory postulates the geopolitical circumstances of Nepal. The research is guided by the primary question of whether the yam theory is still relevant for Nepal in the present context. Examining the importance of 'yam theory' in the geopolitical circumstances of Nepal, the study aims at discursively analyzing the origin and development of the yam discourse, its importance for understanding and comprehending the geopolitical nature of Nepal, and its essence present in the contemporary and evolving geopolitics. Methodologically, the study adheres to the practices in the discourse analysis process, focusing on the origin and development of the 'yam' theory. Adhering to the constructive and linguistic turn in IR regarding the conceptual framework of the study, the research takes the help of historical documents, journal articles, geopolitical review reports, and commentaries to analyse the yam theory’s geopolitical relevance and relate it to the present geopolitical situation of Nepal. This paper first introduces the scope and the rationale of the topic. Notably, the following section examines the origin of ‘yam’ rhetoric as a ‘discourse’ and development as a‘theory’. Following the arguments from the discursive analysis of ‘yam’, the article then traces its essence in the present geopolitical context for Nepal. In conclusion, this research article identifies the relevance of ‘yam’ for Nepal as the strategy for accommodation, balancing, neutrality and equiproximity.
The geopolitical variable alone is not sufficient to understand Nepal’s entry into NAM and its relevance. While very little literature has been produced on Nepal’s non-alignment, what exists is also limited to either speeches or statements delivered by Nepali leaders at the conferences Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Still, while scanning the perspective of Non-Nepali Cold War foreign policy analysts in the literature produced on Himalayan geopolitics, it can be clearly observed that Nepal’s voyage to non-alignment was driven by the Indian response to the bipolarity in Cold War. Such a perspective, however, dismisses the influence that MadhyamaPratipad (the concept of the middle path) had in the evolution of Nepal’s foreign policy priorities as a unified state in 1769. MadhyamaPratipad, here, should be understood as the cultural and civilizational philosophy, which Nepal has accommodated in its world view for centuries. Hence, Nepal’s shift to non-alignment was not abrupt and impulsive. Rather it was triggered by the MadhyamaPratipad, which was also realized by the founder of modern Nepal, Prithivi Narayan Shah. While non-alignment and MadhyamaPratipad differ in their approaches, their objectives remain the same: balancing. While non-alignment demands balancing by not being aligned to any security bloc, MadhyamaPratipad appeals to balancing by treading a middle path. Thus, this qualitative study argues how the historical experience of balancing made it easier for the Himalayan state to adapt to the non-aligned policy and posture. Accordingly, non-alignment to Nepal is not only a survival strategy but also a historical expression of its cultural and civilizational philosophy. Therefore, any attempt to understand Nepal’s foreign policy of non-alignment only from the grand narratives of geopolitics and changing dynamics in the regional and international security environment would not be sufficient to weigh the rationale and relevance of non-alignment for Nepal. Today, India’s perceptible shift to multi-alignment and China’s emphasis on the Xi Jinping Thought have already raised the question of the relevance of non-alignment for Nepal. The answers lie in Nepal’s historical experience of balancing.
What is ‘small’ in the small states? What is the geo-psychology of Nepal as a small state? Scholars have not been able to conclude what is ‘small’ in small states. The economy, population, territory, and military elements have been regarded as criteria responsible for the smallness of the small states. The study has investigated the psychological ‘self’ and ‘forced’ positioning as a small state. Further, the study argues that the smallness in Nepal is the psychological construction determined by the geographical positioning of the country as well as through social phenomena of interaction (cognitive process) and experiential form. The study forwards the argument that Nepal as a small state is the outcome of the geopolitical reasoning and geopolitical imagination of the ‘other’. The smallness of Nepal is intersubjective, a psychological construct, which was shaped through shared experience, particularly in relation to the neighbours. The study contests the traditional idea of quantitative analysis of smallness in a state, unfolding the collective national psyche of small states which are mainly impacted by geography and intersubjective interactions. Furthermore, the study’s conceptual framework is based on the idea of ‘geopsychology’, which takes ‘geography’ as a determining factor of state psychology. The qualitative study examines the origin of smallness in Nepal using secondary data sources from academic journals, books, reports, and online platforms.
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