Conceptions of Space in India's Look East Policy

Abstract

There are three possible future articulations of India's Look East policy, each underpinned by a different conceptual orientation. Firstly, the Look East policy might be conceived as an extended security trajectory to project India's legitimate power and resist growing Chinese domination of the region. A second vision sees the Look East drive primarily as a strategy of economic cooperation based on globalisation and the pursuit of similar liberal policies by all the major states of the region. The third vision argues for a communitarian reading of the Look East venture, interpreting it in terms of sub-nationalisms and soft border exercises. While power, prosperity and community can be desired in equal measure, their policy implications vary, resulting in uneasy compromises, awkward bottlenecks and policy indecisions. Till India decides which image of space it wants to pursue, the power, market and community visions of the Look East initiative would keep playing against each other, generating complementarities as well as frictions.HOW A REGION is conceptualised determines to a significant degree a state's foreign policy towards it. Regions are configured primarily in terms of space. A region, in brief, connotes a particular kind of space, with its distinctive features and possibilities. A region usually embodies multiple notions, or rival conceptions of space. Accordingly, the meaning of a region not only changes over time but also varies across the notion of space underlying it. In simple terms, a region can be characterised or defined by three conceptions of space, although these definitions are often overlapping and are never exclusive in character. These concepts are region as power, as market and/or as community. In this study, we attempt to come to terms with the conceptual mapping of India's Look East policy.

The Ethical Dimension in Political Market Orientation: A Framework for Evaluating the Impact of India’s Look East Policy on Regional Income Convergence

“…On the foreign front, the macro-level SO of the LEP provided the basis for the consolidation of India's ties with its neighbours, with a particular emphasis on economic growth. However, for foreign regimes, India's failure to spell out its interests, concerns and strategic stakes resulted in considerable confusion, especially in Southeast Asia (Chatterjee 2007). Despite these limitations, we argue that the LEP's grounding in the ethical dimension in PMO and its explicit reference to the importance of stakeholders in the implementation of the development agenda throughout the 2000s, indirectly resulted in a modest increase in incomes per capita in the NER.…”

Borderland City in New India

“…Atal Vajpayee, the former Prime Minister of India (1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004) and former Minister for External Affairs, proposed the rally. Vajpayee was a keen proponent of stronger connections between India and ASEAN members to improve economic prospects, to hedge Chinese influence, and to better secure the borderlands (Chatterjee, 2007;McDuie-Ra, 2009b;Yahya, 2003). Prior to the start of the first ASEANIndia rally a conference was held at the Indian Institute of Technology in Guwahati.…”

Emerging donors: the promise and limits of bilateral and multilateral democracy promotion

“…Cooperation) and the G20 (Golub 2013;Flemes 2013), and its 'Look East Policy' demonstrate India's expansionary foreign policy (Jaffrelot 2003;Chatterjee 2007;Sikri 2009;Scott 2009). Indeed, according to former prime minister Manmohan Singh 'India is deeply conscious of its role in the international arena and we have been seeking a restructuring and reform of the global polity that will allow us to play a commensurate role' (Lamont et al 2009).…”