The Making of Indian Diplomacy: A Critique of Eurocentrism
Deep K. Datta-Ray
Abstract
This book Indian diplomacy overturns much of the accepted wisdom about India’s Ministry of External Affairs being simply a derivative of European colonial models, in the process shedding new light on the nature of the Indian state. The book argues on the basis of observed practices, and informal interactions and interviews with ministers and diplomats, that the core of Indian diplomatic practice is to be found in the national epic, the Mahabharata, whose influence he traces from pre-Mughal times to the present. Moreover, the durability of the Mahabharata’s influence on Indian diplomacy was sec ... More
This book Indian diplomacy overturns much of the accepted wisdom about India’s Ministry of External Affairs being simply a derivative of European colonial models, in the process shedding new light on the nature of the Indian state. The book argues on the basis of observed practices, and informal interactions and interviews with ministers and diplomats, that the core of Indian diplomatic practice is to be found in the national epic, the Mahabharata, whose influence he traces from pre-Mughal times to the present. Moreover, the durability of the Mahabharata’s influence on Indian diplomacy was secured by India’s most significant relationship of the modern political era, that between Mohandas Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The epic inspired Gandhi’s innovative conception of terminating violence nonviolently, or satyagraha. His influence over Nehru ensured that satyagraha would shape the new post-colonial nation’s diplomacy, testimony to which, and arguably its greatest achievement, is India’s nuclear diplomacy. This investigation of Indian diplomacy reveals its non-Western rationale, while its presence at the heart of a state presumed Western at inception reveals new possibilities about how to conceptualise post-colonial India, its purpose and role on the world stage. While nation-states authorised by nationalism remain hostage to the past, the Indian state’s arena for action is very much the present, as its rational objective of non-violently terminating violence.
Keywords:
diplomacy,
India,
Nehru,
Mahabharata,
Ministry of External Affairs,
Gandhi,
Satyagraha,
violence
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2015 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780190206673 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2016 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190206673.001.0001 |
