The answer to the question “Does democracy depend on globalisation?” can be found in another question: “Have the prospects of democracy around the world improved with globalisation?”. Despite the initial democratic expansion following globalisation in the early 21st century, experts have identified a recent trend of democratic backsliding. Nativism, ultra-nationalism and racism now challenge democracies internally, suggesting the link between democracy and globalisation may have been overstated. India has benefited from globalisation but does not promote democracy abroad. Rather, Indians view their parliamentary democracy as indigenous despite it being a remnant of British colonial rule. Valuing it for its efficacy in governing their diverse country, Indians do not attempt to impose democracy upon others.
Balancing realpolitik and economic reforms
The foreign policy of India, a country with a 5,000 year-old civilisation, is based on realpolitik, not similarity of values or systems. During the Cold War, the country embraced democracy without capitalism, something rare for an ally of the West. India has historically traded globally but has been inward-looking and wary of global trade in the post-colonial era. It links economic growth to social development more than to wealth generation, which validates protectionism and indigenisation.
India wants to reap the benefits of globalisation and free trade, but it has been slow and gradual in opening its economy. It has initiated major economic reforms, beginning in 1990–91. But opening the economy to foreign investment, reducing tariffs and removing import restrictions has been piecemeal.
India’s share of global trade has risen as it has signed free trade agreements with several Asian countries. GDP growth stood at 3–3.5 per cent per year during most of the Cold War, but for two decades after the 1990–91 economic reforms it hovered around 7 per cent or higher. The economic boom lifted millions out of poverty: GDP has grown from $270 billion in 1991 to $3.4 trillion today. India now has the world’ fastest-growing emerging economy and between 2008–2014, its GDP growth rate was closer to 8 per cent.
Also read: India keeps making the same foreign policy mistakes. World doesn’t think we’re being moral
India’s paradox: protectionism amidst global integration
Even though India has benefitted from integration with the global economy, it has become more protectionist over the last decade than it was even in the 1990s and early 2000s. The reforms of 1990– 91 were never followed by a second generation of factor market reforms relating to land, labour and capital. Between 2014 and 2021, import duties rose from 13.5 per cent to over 18 per cent.
India’s policies attract charges of hypocrisy or schizophrenia. The country seeks foreign investment but wants control over that money; it seeks state-of-the-art technology and to be a part of global supply chains but it would like transfer of that technology to build India’s industrial base. Even as India benefits from a globalised world, its leaders continue to debate the value of globalisation and argue that it needs to re-examine the trade deals it has signed. In the words of Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar, India seeks to “engage America, manage China, cultivate Europe, reassure Russia, bring Japan into play, draw neighbours in, extend the neighbourhood, and expand traditional constituencies of support.” There is no mention of globalisation or democracy in this global agenda.
Seeking recognition and influence on the global stage
India’s citizens and leaders seem to think that their country deserves to be an important and powerful actor on the global stage, a claim that comes from a belief in its civilisational legacy and geostrategic location. For them, the most critical aspect of its civilisational greatness is that it is recognised by others. India expects its position in the international geo-economic order to reflect this vision. India’s participation in existing global geopolitical and geo-economic institutions – like the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank – at the same time as it helps found other groupings – like the BRICS – reflects its dichotomous policy. India wants to remain part of the existing post-Second World War order while seeking to change it from within to make it reflect a new reality.
Shaping the future of globalisation and democracy
The challenge faced by India is that, instead of growing its economic might to ensure a seat at the global high table, it expects an invitation simply based on its right to be there. Rules-based global trade does not align with such a supposition.
The path that India – the world’s most populous democracy and state – chooses will impact the future of democracy and globalisation. Indians, and many others around the world, view the country as an example of a rare post-colonial country that has consistently remained a democracy, built its economy and educated its people, without a military coup or civil war. But that example only shows that a commitment to democracy is not necessarily bound to the idea of globalisation.
Aparna Pande is the director of the Initiative on the Future of India and South Asia at the Hudson Institute. She tweets @Aparna_Pande. Views are personal.
This article was originally published in History Hotspot’s September 2024 issue.
Lets tackle this point by point
1. “Rules-based” world order. Do all countries have to follow the rules? Surely, the author’s host country doesn’t. It has imposed unilateral economic sanctions on like half the world for whatever reasons it feels like. To secure it’s hegemony. If the rot is at the top, don’t blame others for not following the rules. Just calling it a rules-based world order doesn’t make it so.
2. “without growing economic might”. So being the 4th largest economy in the world is not enough? Only a per capita income parity is a benchmark you follow? That doesn’t seem to be valid when talking about pollution, greenhouse emissions, plastic waste created. Why not talk per capita then?
Please stick to the country you live in now. You have enough problems there to tackle. When you can manage to reduce the mass shootings to less than 1 per day in some far distant future, then maybe think about lecturing the world on how to run their countries. And then think some more. and still, just shut up.
Putting India down once people leave Indian shores, whether students or those employed by Western Universities/companies is fashion these days. Also, most of these are seemingly written for cash/favours/other quid pro quos. It’s a failure of the Nation, that it couldn’t convert its citizens to be patriotic…. external lures overtook them. Hence no respect for mother land. Hope they respect their mother/father’s atleast.
Poor-socialist countries who are allergic to free market but dream of becoming rich and developed, act important, will obviously be stopped by watchmen guarding the tables. Domestic audience are told by the leaders that country is well on the path to becoming a five-star country, but the West belittles our country which is inept even at street infrastructure. The founding fathers pushed the country on the path of socialist hell is the bitter truth that we will have to live and die with. I wish socialism didn’t exist.