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Staggering Forward: Narendra Modi and India's Global Ambition
Analysing Prime Minister Narendra Modi's foreign and military policies in the context of India's socio-political and economic milieu, which has evolved between 1991 and 2014, this book offers a critical perspective that helps to understand the country's present national security strategy.
- GenresIndia
541 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 15, 2018
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July 12, 2021
In a recent article political analyst Gurcharan Das noted: India historically had a weak state, though one counterbalanced by a strong society – the mirror image of China. India’s history is one of political disunity with constant struggles between kingdoms, unlike China’s history of strong empires. The type of despotic and intrusive governments that emerged in China and divested people of their property and their rights have never existed in India.
Narendra Damodardas Modi was elected with a whipping majority in 2014 in part because the people believed he would make the country advance on all these fronts. But he was sidetracked; his government got mired in the Hindu fringe politics instead, and failed to initiate any kind of system transformation. Contrary to expectations, Modi also retained the rickety administrative structure — centred on generalist civil servants working in silos, immersed in the minutiae of cross-cutting laws, rules, regulations and procedures — that have hindered the nation’s progress.
Modi’s humble background and the time he spent in the RSS has led to the prime minister’s views and values resonating with those of this ‘social service’ organization. It has imbued in him discipline and conservative notions of order and influenced his attitude and approach to government and governance.
Under Modi’s watch, hitherto secondary issues such as, the ban on cow slaughter have turned into a national preoccupation, and beef-eating has become a spurious test of national identity and the reason for the social and cultural differentiation of the Muslims in the country, who are ethnically indistinguishable from the majority community. Moreover, RSS ideas of a stable society premised on an established hierarchy predispose Modi to act and react in external situations and crises in ways deferential to the powerful, which may explain, for instance, his inclination to accommodate the superior US and China while berating a plainly inferior Pakistan. In Modi’s thought universe, the internal affects the external and vice versa.
How such factors possibly shape his thinking on national security and foreign and military choices have been explored in this book.
The author divides his book into six chapters:
1. ‘Alpha Male’ Leaders and ‘Country First’ Power Politics
2. Impact of Modi’s Persona on Government
3. Creeper-vine Foreign Policy
4. Adversarial Geopolitics: BRIS and Mod Quad
5. Affirmative Inaction
6. Perennial Security Muddle
Chapter 1 fleshes out the up-and-coming international context of the ‘alpha male’ political strongmen that have come to the fore the world over, and how their ‘country first’ bent of mind has affected regional and international relations and the global order, and how Modi has contributed to this milieu.
Chapter 2 scrutinizes Prime Minister Modi’s political persona and disposition from a psychological angle and traces how his early-life factors and socialization in the RSS may have made him more of an ‘establishmentarian’ than a revolutionary, how this may have influenced his thinking and outlook and impacted his government’s attitude, policies and manner of functioning and his outlook on international relations. This includes his admiration for hierarchy, which has translated into being over-respectful of powerful states like the US and China and less lenience towards weaker states.
The same factors can clarify why many of the most volatile socioeconomic troubles he confronted when entering government, such as the millions of unskilled youth chasing after too few jobs and the incessantly woeful agricultural sector, have worsened.
Chapter 3 explores the reasons for the continuation by Modi of India’s creeper-vine foreign policy that winds itself around some great power patron or the other in order for the country to rise. It deconstructs his surprisingly obsequious stance vis-à-vis the US and the West as the central pillar of his foreign policy and approach to the world, ignoring a long history of Washington deliberately and with forethought hindering and obstructing India strategically and undermining its national security interests.
Consistent with this approach, Modi grimaces on even the slightest unsettling of the existing global and regional orders, even though as a revisionist power seeking to change the rank ordering of nations, India’s interests are better served by dismantling the status quo and building new regional and international systems. In support of policy and posture bending towards America is a new policy ecosystem in Delhi that is in place, headed by the Indian chapters of reputed Washington think tanks.
These also feature senior civilian and uniformed officers and bureaucrats seeking immigrant status (Green Cards) and other considerations for progeny and family members at all levels of the government and the military, happy to finesse and push a US-friendly policy line. This new phenomenon will be scrutinized.
In Chapter 4, two new geopolitical groupings—BRIS (Brazil, Russia, India, South Africa, i.e., BRICS minus China) and Mod Quad (India, Japan, Australia, the South East Asian nations, i.e., the Quadrilateral minus the US)—are mooted as means to run off the thrall of the proto-hegemons, the United States and China, and the reasons why this makes geopolitical, economic and military sense analysed. This slant to gain India political–military traction will be contrasted with Modi’s preference to ride US coat-tails and seek accommodation with China.
Chapter 5 delves into the failure of the Indian government, with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in the van, to work in a coordinated fashion for timely delivery on promises and development projects announced by the prime minister during his foreign trips and when hosting foreign leaders in Delhi. We will see how tardy implementation and affirmative inaction has sapped goodwill and hurt India’s credibility and standing in the neighbourhood, in Central Asia and in Africa, and why in trying to please the US Delhi has eroded India’s clout in Moscow, strained relations with Iran, lost India its special place in Myanmar, and generally harmed the country’s freedom of strategic action.
There’s also a short case study about the deal for the ShinMaywa US-2 amphibious aircraft hanging fire even though it is critical to building a strong relationship with Japan and a comprehensive Indian aerospace industry with global supply chain links. What it highlights is Modi’s reserve to get an indolent and rules-bound bureaucracy to deliver the outcomes he desires, and to bring in answerability and a high rewards, harsh punishment regime to motivate civil servants.
A common thread running through chapters 3, 4 and 5 is how the BJP government’s fixation with Pakistan continues to skew India’s external orientation while China benefits from Delhi’s apprehension and pusillanimity.
Chapter 6 inspects some continuous but varied national security problems, other than deconstructing in some detail Modi’s ‘Make in India programme’. In this context are analysed
a) The Tejas LCA programme,
b) The prospective acquisition of a single-engine fighter plane, and
c) The Indian Navy’s Project 75i conventional submarine project.
In the strategic sphere, revisions in the nuclear doctrine and posture will be suggested with an eye to blunting China’s all-inclusive military edge with a nuclear first use strategy. And there will be brief analyses of, among other military issues, the costs of the army’s preoccupation with counter-insurgency operations, the air force’s future air order-of-battle (ORBAT) and the navy’s emphasis on aircraft carriers.
The concluding chapter summarizes the main themes and concludes that Modi’s performance in government has not matched the prime minister’s outsized poster persona and promises.
What is particularly surprising considering his big talk is how, in the external realm, Modi has stayed with the small stakes game anchored in short policy horizons that the previous governments had locked the country into. Continuing to lean overmuch on the United States, and keying on Pakistan and Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir rather than on the primary threat from China, is the sort of foreign policy a lesser state would follow for marginal gains.
His choice of incremental rather than radical change has disappointed many of his supporters. Continuing retrospective taxation, in particular, has undermined his image.
Therefore, India has belied hopes, piled on dissatisfactions, messed up on economic and strategic opportunities and underperformed in every sphere of national and international activity.
The world, therefore, while not having given up on India just yet, has moved on from the ‘India story’ which, along with the ‘China story’, was all the rage on either side of the new millennium. While China has advanced by leaps under the strategically driven Xi and an enabling system, with its economy generating wealth at a rate that sees it racing to replace the US at the top of the heap, India has meandered, its global impact far less than the sum of its small successes.
On the foreign and military policy fronts, there have been no surprises. The initial surge of international curiosity in Modi’s leadership and his foreign policy orientation was stoked by a flurry of foreign trips and summits in his first years in office. But his personalized diplomacy, complete with the unselfconscious hugging and embracing of sometimes startled, usually awkward Western leaders in frequent foreign tours, produced no signal departure from the policies of previous governments, nor any stellar results.
The exception was the Arabian peninsula where Sunni Saudi Arabia and the Gulf emirates and sheikhdoms have been receptive to Modi’s overtures because they hope to distance India, to the extent possible, from Shia Iran, safely invest in its growth and clean up their own image as purveyors of the corrosive Wahhabist brand of extremist Islam that spawned the Islamic State terrorist group in Iraq and the Levant by associating with a heterogeneous and democratic country.
The modern Indian state is a product of British rule, which, beginning in the mid-19th century, imposed a rule of law with unambiguous codes and directives. Though well-organized, that state was not accountable to its citizens. That changed in 1947, as independent India took those institutions of governance and made them accountable by developing into a vibrant, if untidy, democracy. In the 21st century, true to its history, India is rising economically from the bottom up. But a modern liberal state must have a strong executive to get things done and a strong society to hold the state accountable.
Many Indians yet hope that, in Modi, they to conclude have someone who can enhance the state’s capacity to act. However, reforming state establishments is much tougher than reforming the economy.
Modi recognised this problem when he promised “minimum government, maximum governance”. Modi vowed to create an enabling environment that would allow people to do business without stifling red tape and the notorious “inspector raj”.
So far, he has failed to deliver on that pledge.
Narendra Damodardas Modi was elected with a whipping majority in 2014 in part because the people believed he would make the country advance on all these fronts. But he was sidetracked; his government got mired in the Hindu fringe politics instead, and failed to initiate any kind of system transformation. Contrary to expectations, Modi also retained the rickety administrative structure — centred on generalist civil servants working in silos, immersed in the minutiae of cross-cutting laws, rules, regulations and procedures — that have hindered the nation’s progress.
Modi’s humble background and the time he spent in the RSS has led to the prime minister’s views and values resonating with those of this ‘social service’ organization. It has imbued in him discipline and conservative notions of order and influenced his attitude and approach to government and governance.
Under Modi’s watch, hitherto secondary issues such as, the ban on cow slaughter have turned into a national preoccupation, and beef-eating has become a spurious test of national identity and the reason for the social and cultural differentiation of the Muslims in the country, who are ethnically indistinguishable from the majority community. Moreover, RSS ideas of a stable society premised on an established hierarchy predispose Modi to act and react in external situations and crises in ways deferential to the powerful, which may explain, for instance, his inclination to accommodate the superior US and China while berating a plainly inferior Pakistan. In Modi’s thought universe, the internal affects the external and vice versa.
How such factors possibly shape his thinking on national security and foreign and military choices have been explored in this book.
The author divides his book into six chapters:
1. ‘Alpha Male’ Leaders and ‘Country First’ Power Politics
2. Impact of Modi’s Persona on Government
3. Creeper-vine Foreign Policy
4. Adversarial Geopolitics: BRIS and Mod Quad
5. Affirmative Inaction
6. Perennial Security Muddle
Chapter 1 fleshes out the up-and-coming international context of the ‘alpha male’ political strongmen that have come to the fore the world over, and how their ‘country first’ bent of mind has affected regional and international relations and the global order, and how Modi has contributed to this milieu.
Chapter 2 scrutinizes Prime Minister Modi’s political persona and disposition from a psychological angle and traces how his early-life factors and socialization in the RSS may have made him more of an ‘establishmentarian’ than a revolutionary, how this may have influenced his thinking and outlook and impacted his government’s attitude, policies and manner of functioning and his outlook on international relations. This includes his admiration for hierarchy, which has translated into being over-respectful of powerful states like the US and China and less lenience towards weaker states.
The same factors can clarify why many of the most volatile socioeconomic troubles he confronted when entering government, such as the millions of unskilled youth chasing after too few jobs and the incessantly woeful agricultural sector, have worsened.
Chapter 3 explores the reasons for the continuation by Modi of India’s creeper-vine foreign policy that winds itself around some great power patron or the other in order for the country to rise. It deconstructs his surprisingly obsequious stance vis-à-vis the US and the West as the central pillar of his foreign policy and approach to the world, ignoring a long history of Washington deliberately and with forethought hindering and obstructing India strategically and undermining its national security interests.
Consistent with this approach, Modi grimaces on even the slightest unsettling of the existing global and regional orders, even though as a revisionist power seeking to change the rank ordering of nations, India’s interests are better served by dismantling the status quo and building new regional and international systems. In support of policy and posture bending towards America is a new policy ecosystem in Delhi that is in place, headed by the Indian chapters of reputed Washington think tanks.
These also feature senior civilian and uniformed officers and bureaucrats seeking immigrant status (Green Cards) and other considerations for progeny and family members at all levels of the government and the military, happy to finesse and push a US-friendly policy line. This new phenomenon will be scrutinized.
In Chapter 4, two new geopolitical groupings—BRIS (Brazil, Russia, India, South Africa, i.e., BRICS minus China) and Mod Quad (India, Japan, Australia, the South East Asian nations, i.e., the Quadrilateral minus the US)—are mooted as means to run off the thrall of the proto-hegemons, the United States and China, and the reasons why this makes geopolitical, economic and military sense analysed. This slant to gain India political–military traction will be contrasted with Modi’s preference to ride US coat-tails and seek accommodation with China.
Chapter 5 delves into the failure of the Indian government, with the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in the van, to work in a coordinated fashion for timely delivery on promises and development projects announced by the prime minister during his foreign trips and when hosting foreign leaders in Delhi. We will see how tardy implementation and affirmative inaction has sapped goodwill and hurt India’s credibility and standing in the neighbourhood, in Central Asia and in Africa, and why in trying to please the US Delhi has eroded India’s clout in Moscow, strained relations with Iran, lost India its special place in Myanmar, and generally harmed the country’s freedom of strategic action.
There’s also a short case study about the deal for the ShinMaywa US-2 amphibious aircraft hanging fire even though it is critical to building a strong relationship with Japan and a comprehensive Indian aerospace industry with global supply chain links. What it highlights is Modi’s reserve to get an indolent and rules-bound bureaucracy to deliver the outcomes he desires, and to bring in answerability and a high rewards, harsh punishment regime to motivate civil servants.
A common thread running through chapters 3, 4 and 5 is how the BJP government’s fixation with Pakistan continues to skew India’s external orientation while China benefits from Delhi’s apprehension and pusillanimity.
Chapter 6 inspects some continuous but varied national security problems, other than deconstructing in some detail Modi’s ‘Make in India programme’. In this context are analysed
a) The Tejas LCA programme,
b) The prospective acquisition of a single-engine fighter plane, and
c) The Indian Navy’s Project 75i conventional submarine project.
In the strategic sphere, revisions in the nuclear doctrine and posture will be suggested with an eye to blunting China’s all-inclusive military edge with a nuclear first use strategy. And there will be brief analyses of, among other military issues, the costs of the army’s preoccupation with counter-insurgency operations, the air force’s future air order-of-battle (ORBAT) and the navy’s emphasis on aircraft carriers.
The concluding chapter summarizes the main themes and concludes that Modi’s performance in government has not matched the prime minister’s outsized poster persona and promises.
What is particularly surprising considering his big talk is how, in the external realm, Modi has stayed with the small stakes game anchored in short policy horizons that the previous governments had locked the country into. Continuing to lean overmuch on the United States, and keying on Pakistan and Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir rather than on the primary threat from China, is the sort of foreign policy a lesser state would follow for marginal gains.
His choice of incremental rather than radical change has disappointed many of his supporters. Continuing retrospective taxation, in particular, has undermined his image.
Therefore, India has belied hopes, piled on dissatisfactions, messed up on economic and strategic opportunities and underperformed in every sphere of national and international activity.
The world, therefore, while not having given up on India just yet, has moved on from the ‘India story’ which, along with the ‘China story’, was all the rage on either side of the new millennium. While China has advanced by leaps under the strategically driven Xi and an enabling system, with its economy generating wealth at a rate that sees it racing to replace the US at the top of the heap, India has meandered, its global impact far less than the sum of its small successes.
On the foreign and military policy fronts, there have been no surprises. The initial surge of international curiosity in Modi’s leadership and his foreign policy orientation was stoked by a flurry of foreign trips and summits in his first years in office. But his personalized diplomacy, complete with the unselfconscious hugging and embracing of sometimes startled, usually awkward Western leaders in frequent foreign tours, produced no signal departure from the policies of previous governments, nor any stellar results.
The exception was the Arabian peninsula where Sunni Saudi Arabia and the Gulf emirates and sheikhdoms have been receptive to Modi’s overtures because they hope to distance India, to the extent possible, from Shia Iran, safely invest in its growth and clean up their own image as purveyors of the corrosive Wahhabist brand of extremist Islam that spawned the Islamic State terrorist group in Iraq and the Levant by associating with a heterogeneous and democratic country.
The modern Indian state is a product of British rule, which, beginning in the mid-19th century, imposed a rule of law with unambiguous codes and directives. Though well-organized, that state was not accountable to its citizens. That changed in 1947, as independent India took those institutions of governance and made them accountable by developing into a vibrant, if untidy, democracy. In the 21st century, true to its history, India is rising economically from the bottom up. But a modern liberal state must have a strong executive to get things done and a strong society to hold the state accountable.
Many Indians yet hope that, in Modi, they to conclude have someone who can enhance the state’s capacity to act. However, reforming state establishments is much tougher than reforming the economy.
Modi recognised this problem when he promised “minimum government, maximum governance”. Modi vowed to create an enabling environment that would allow people to do business without stifling red tape and the notorious “inspector raj”.
So far, he has failed to deliver on that pledge.
December 4, 2018
Book Name: Staggering Forward: Narendra Modi and India's Global Ambition
Author: Bharat Karnad
Genre: Non- fiction, Political
Publisher: Penguin Viking
Introduction: Prime Minister Modi's first term, however, raises troubling questions. How has his strongman persona and social background impacted policymaking? Has the country's role in the region, in Asia and the world changed, become more meaningful? What has been the effect of Modi's India First foreign policy on neighbours, and with respect to raising India's stock in the world and showing the Indian military has teeth?
Analysing Prime Minister Modi's foreign and military policies in the context of India's evolving socio-political and economic milieu, this book offers a critical perspective that helps explain why India has not progressed much towards becoming a consequential power. .
My opinion: Frankly I wasn't much used to this kinda book, still I dared to read it- 500 pgs long book! At first at left lost & confused but as soon as 20-30 pages were done, my curiosity to read more started to increase! Definitely I am a political reader, I mostly read Dr. B.R Ambedkar (best reads ever), so is the reason I was much comfortable with this book too. What's better when you get to read about all the Global tactics, Indian defence services, Current affairs & most of all to read about our PM- Narendra Modi (talk of the town). This book is combination of everything one must know if interested in overall Indian social & political systems. It's a must read & highly recommend! Cover is stunning & hypnotic.
.
Pros: So yes, finally I am done than earlier- because the writing was so strong, bold, straight forward & gripping. Bharat has done a great job because it needs guts to write & to point out on such political & social topics. More of all it's not just a political stuff but I got to know alot about our PM too! Also, the book is full of knowledge & yes it's worth reading. Felt gald to read this one.
Cons: Well no such cons, but I admit this book is not for beginners, you need solid roots to understand, well everyone should give it a try.
Rating: 4🌟
Author: Bharat Karnad
Genre: Non- fiction, Political
Publisher: Penguin Viking
Introduction: Prime Minister Modi's first term, however, raises troubling questions. How has his strongman persona and social background impacted policymaking? Has the country's role in the region, in Asia and the world changed, become more meaningful? What has been the effect of Modi's India First foreign policy on neighbours, and with respect to raising India's stock in the world and showing the Indian military has teeth?
Analysing Prime Minister Modi's foreign and military policies in the context of India's evolving socio-political and economic milieu, this book offers a critical perspective that helps explain why India has not progressed much towards becoming a consequential power. .
My opinion: Frankly I wasn't much used to this kinda book, still I dared to read it- 500 pgs long book! At first at left lost & confused but as soon as 20-30 pages were done, my curiosity to read more started to increase! Definitely I am a political reader, I mostly read Dr. B.R Ambedkar (best reads ever), so is the reason I was much comfortable with this book too. What's better when you get to read about all the Global tactics, Indian defence services, Current affairs & most of all to read about our PM- Narendra Modi (talk of the town). This book is combination of everything one must know if interested in overall Indian social & political systems. It's a must read & highly recommend! Cover is stunning & hypnotic.
.
Pros: So yes, finally I am done than earlier- because the writing was so strong, bold, straight forward & gripping. Bharat has done a great job because it needs guts to write & to point out on such political & social topics. More of all it's not just a political stuff but I got to know alot about our PM too! Also, the book is full of knowledge & yes it's worth reading. Felt gald to read this one.
Cons: Well no such cons, but I admit this book is not for beginners, you need solid roots to understand, well everyone should give it a try.
Rating: 4🌟
January 1, 2019
It's a book with radical ideas.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews