Books by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
https://www.routledge.com/Rising-India-Status-and-Power/Basrur-Sullivan/p/book/9780415786317
Whi... more https://www.routledge.com/Rising-India-Status-and-Power/Basrur-Sullivan/p/book/9780415786317
While India’s prospects as a rising power and its material position in the international system have received significant attention, little scholarly work exists on India’s status in contemporary world politics. This Routledge Focus book charts the ways in which India’s international strategies of status seeking have evolved from Independence up to the present day.
The authors focus on the social dimensions of status, seeking to build on recent conceptual scholarship on status in world politics. The book shows how India has made a partial, though incomplete, shift from seeking status by rejecting material power and proximity to major powers, to seeking status by embracing both material power and major power relationships. However, it also challenges traditional understandings of the linear relationship between material power and status. Seven decades of Indian status seeking reveal that the enhancement of material power is one of only several routes Indian leaders have envisaged to lead to higher status.
By arguing that a state requires more than material power to achieve status, this book reshapes understandings of both status seeking and Indian foreign policy. It will be of interest to academics and policy makers in the fields of international relations, foreign policy, and Indian studies.
This edited volume presents an alternative set of reflections on India's contemporary global role... more This edited volume presents an alternative set of reflections on India's contemporary global role to those narrated by mainstream, US-centric accounts within International Relations. Collectively, the contributors explore a spectrum of non-Western perspectives on India’s growing international influence. They deliver insights into a range of shared global issues, processes and institutions, including climate change, development cooperation, UN Security Council reforms, nuclear politics and the terms of world trade. Together, these readings provide a critical evaluation of India's success in reconciling a quest for recognition from established major powers with a desire to maintain relations of solidarity with developing country allies of the Cold War era.
Essential reading for anyone studying rising powers, BRICS countries, global power shifts and South–South linkages, this volume will appeal to students and scholars of world politics, international relations, international history and foreign policy.
Articles by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
St Antony's International Review, 2020
Area Studies is the typically interdisciplinary and close study of specific geographical areas of... more Area Studies is the typically interdisciplinary and close study of specific geographical areas of the world. In its more successful forms, it engages in knowledge production that is self-reflexive, methodologically and theoretically aware, and wary of the application of generalised models to localised conditions. Area Studies promises the deep empiricism that can access local-actor theorisations of the international and undo the Western-centrism of International Relations (IR). At the same time, IR’s recourse to Area Studies throws up perceptions of risk among some thinkers of the international: of fragmenting the discipline into regional or national silos and thereby producing new parochial formations, an alternate politics of domination and silencing, and ultimately, theoretical degeneration. It is the perception of these risks that I refer to in this short essay as ‘siloisation anxiety’ and to which I seek to respond by embracing an unlikely analytical resource and counterforce: exceptionalism. I make two analytical moves: framing exceptionalism first, as inherently extra-local and second, as a useful method of casing. Then, to illustrate my argument, I draw briefly on narratives of nuclear exceptionalism in South Asia and examine the relational work they do in framing the global in the local.
Contemporary Politics, 2019
As rising powers, China and India both perceive the United Nations as a primary venue for status ... more As rising powers, China and India both perceive the United Nations as a primary venue for status seeking, and both express pride in narrating the ways in which they have supported the UN Charter and the maintenance of international peace and security. Given the competitive dynamic between these two countries, we might expect this competition to extend to their activities in global governance. In this article we develop and apply the concepts of ‘status domain’ and ‘status good characteristics’ to examine the extent to which Sino-Indian status competition is exacerbated or mitigated in three status-bearing areas: UN peacekeeping operations, Security Council membership, and Security Council behaviour. We find that status competition between the two countries, at least within the UN, is not always the dominant outcome. International organizations that allow for separate status domains, and also for the expression of a shared global vision, can mitigate status competition between states.
Survival, 2018
Rahul Roy-Chaudhury and Kate Sullivan de Estrada
Bound by the strategic primacy of the Indian ... more Rahul Roy-Chaudhury and Kate Sullivan de Estrada
Bound by the strategic primacy of the Indian Ocean and by the constraints on its sea-power projection, India's interests sit uneasily with those of the other Quad powers.
Review of International Studies, 2018
China and India, as rising powers, have been proactive in seeking status as nuclear responsibles.... more China and India, as rising powers, have been proactive in seeking status as nuclear responsibles. Since the 1990s they have sought to demonstrate conformity with intersubjectively accepted understandings of nuclear responsibility within the global nuclear order, and have also sought recognition on the basis of particularistic practices of nuclear restraint. This article addresses two puzzles. First, nuclear restraint is at the centre of the pursuit of global nuclear order, so why have China and India not received recognition from influential members of the nuclear order for the full spectrum of their restraint-based behaviours? Second, why do China and India nonetheless persist with these behaviours? We argue that the conferral of status as a nuclear responsible is a politicised process shaped by the interests, values and perceptions of powerful stakeholder states in the global nuclear order. China's and India's innovations are not incorporated into the currently accepted set of responsible nuclear behaviours because, indirectly, they pose a strategic, political and social challenge to these states. However, China's and India's innovations are significant as a lens into their identity-projection and preferred social roles as distinctive rising powers, and as a means of introducing new, if nascent, ideas into non-proliferation practice and governance.
South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, Sep 2, 2014
Indian diplomacy has often been accused of carrying a ‘moralising tone’. This article examines th... more Indian diplomacy has often been accused of carrying a ‘moralising tone’. This article examines the roots of ideas of exceptionalism in Indian diplomacy, particularly those centring on India's moral leadership aspirations. By exploring the discourses, identities and institutions that shaped Indian diplomacy and diplomatic institutions in the decades before and after Independence, it shows how Indian diplomats drew lines of comparison between their nation and others, understood India's global standing, and conceived of special moral responsibilities for India in world politics. Since moral leadership aspirations persist as a component of Indian foreign policy today, a historical and institutional analysis of diplomatic self-understandings can be of contemporary relevance to scholars and practitioners seeking to understand India's increasingly influential global role.
International Affairs, 2017
Introduction to the Virtual Issue "India's odyssey through International Affairs"
International Affairs, 2017
In the post-Cold War era, a number of scholars have observed and encouraged greater ‘pragmatism’ ... more In the post-Cold War era, a number of scholars have observed and encouraged greater ‘pragmatism’ in India's foreign policy. A ‘pragmatic’ foreign policy has been understood as one that rejects India's earlier reliance on Nehruvian ‘idealism’ or ‘moral posturing’, and instead pursues power and material interests. In the wake of his election to power, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too, has been celebrated by scholars and the media as a pragmatic leader who will be able to dispense with earlier ideas and ideologies and bring about radical changes to Indian foreign policy. In this article, we problematize these ‘substantive’ readings of pragmatism. Instead we present an alternative, ‘procedural’ reading of foreign policy pragmatism that emphasises the selection and fusion—rather than the abandonment—of different ideas and ideological commitments in order to effect foreign policy change. By demonstrating procedural pragmatism at work in two case-studies under Modi's leadership—the resolution of India's territorial dispute with Bangladesh, and the establishment and public celebration of a UN-recognized International Day of Yoga—we show how Modi's pragmatic approach to foreign policy-making is responsive to both Hindutva (Hindu nationalist ideology) and entrenched foreign policy ideas in India. Our central argument is that Modi is neither unique nor uniquely pragmatic, and like many Indian leaders before him, his pragmatism cannot simply abandon ideas and ideology, but is compelled to respond to them in response to domestic and international political logics.
India Review, 2018
This article offers an alternative understanding of India’s postCold
War grand strategy by arguin... more This article offers an alternative understanding of India’s postCold
War grand strategy by arguing that policy issues should be treated as a continuum within which there may be strategic policy innovations, leading to both nuanced continuity and change in foreign policy. Our argument stands in contradistinction to the dominant scholarship in the Indian foreign policy literature, the “transformation scholarship” as we term it, which views policy issues as binary, finds a “new” emphasis on material interests since the end of the Cold War and advocates this
as both rational and commendable. Applying four key claims in the dominant transformation scholarship to two important Indian foreign policy issues, nuclear non-proliferation and climate change, we find that, rather than sweeping change in Indian grand strategy, as implied and advocated by transformation scholars, Indian grand strategy is in a state of flux, encapsulating some change but also much continuity.
International Affairs, 2017
India and Pakistan both faced widespread international condemnation following their 1998 nuclear ... more India and Pakistan both faced widespread international condemnation following their 1998 nuclear tests. Today the two countries stand apart in the global nuclear order. Pakistan remains a nuclear outsider, while India has been labelled a responsible nuclear state and permitted access to exceptional civil nuclear trading rights. This article offers an explanation for the divergent international responses to India and Pakistan's decision to become nuclear-armed states. Rather than presenting a materialist explanation for the differing responses of the international community in terms of geopolitical, strategic and economic factors, or a normative approach that focuses on shifting conceptions of India and Pakistan's identities as political systems, we focus instead on changes in individual and collective perceptions of India's trustworthiness. At the base of the starkly contrasting response to a nuclear India and a nuclear Pakistan, we argue, is an assessment that India can be trusted with nuclear weapons, while Pakistan cannot. We show how India made the journey from nuclear rogue to nuclear partner and demonstrate where Pakistan fell short. We conclude with some reflections on perhaps the most important question that can be asked of states and leaders in the nuclear age: who can be trusted with the possession of nuclear weapons?
Economic and Political Weekly, 2008
In the course of public contestation and debate, political parties in India have attempted to gar... more In the course of public contestation and debate, political parties in India have attempted to garner acceptance for their respective positions on the Indo-US nuclear deal by drawing on key historical norms. Notions of freedom, which have historically constituted a primary feature in Indian foreign policy discourse, continue to feature in foreign policy debate and form a focus of consensus and dissent even today, as they did during the dawn of independence.
Book Chapters by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
India Rising: Ideas, Interests and Institutions in Foreign Policy, 2020
Existing accounts of India’s relationship with the global nuclear non-proliferation regime have a... more Existing accounts of India’s relationship with the global nuclear non-proliferation regime have almost exclusively focused on the drivers of security and interests as they function at the level of the Indian state. This chapter argues that the key to understanding India’s engagement with the non-proliferation regime is an appreciation of salient international norms enshrined within and beyond the NPT, India’s response to these norms, and India's own historical efforts at normative innovation. The chapter’s main conclusion is that New Delhi’s search for international status as a nuclear responsible, in particular, has served to validate and strengthen several key norms of the global nuclear non-proliferation regime, despite India’s complicated position vis-à-vis the regime. India remains, however, far from functioning as a manager or norm-setter within the regime.
This chapter examines and evaluates some of the ways in which India discursively constructs itsel... more This chapter examines and evaluates some of the ways in which India discursively constructs itself as a prominent global power in the contemporary, post-Cold War era. India’s key challenge in engaging with the world is to reconcile a quest for recognition from established major powers with a desire to maintain relations of solidarity with developing country allies of the Cold War era. These tensions explain India’s ambivalent projection of self, and are apparent in the three central themes—synthesis, didacticism, and difference—that underpin the official foreign policy discourse pertaining to India’s global role. Ultimately, India aspires to appear as a recognisable but alternative global actor to the great powers of the twentieth century.
This chapter has two central aims – one conceptual, and the other empirical. Firstly, it draws on... more This chapter has two central aims – one conceptual, and the other empirical. Firstly, it draws on a range of critical literature on the subject of democracy promotion to argue that the promotion of what is presented as a singularly legitimate form of government—liberal democracy—can fundamentally challenge peaceful coexistence amidst diversity, both between states and among peoples. The second aim of the chapter is to examine whether there is a way around some of the problems identified by the critics of democracy promotion, by drawing on an as yet underexplored empirical case, that of India. A key question is whether the Indian approach can offer a counterbalance to the projects of democracy enlargement that clearly imperil peace between states and peoples. As the discussion that follows shows, the Indian mode of democracy promotion, as it has thus far evolved, suggests that such a way forward may well be possible.
Policy Reports by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
RSIS Policy Report, 2014
This policy report addresses the central question: is India a responsible nuclear power? It does ... more This policy report addresses the central question: is India a responsible nuclear power? It does so in two, inter-related ways. First, it asks whether India’s nuclear behaviour is commensurate with what we might expect of a responsible nuclear power. Second, it asks to what extent India has been accepted as
a responsible nuclear power by different groups of states within the international community.
This policy brief is the product of a knowledge exchange project funded by the University of Oxfo... more This policy brief is the product of a knowledge exchange project funded by the University of Oxford and jointly led by Raj Mohabeer, Officer in charge, Indian Ocean Commission, and Kate Sullivan de Estrada, Associate Professor, Oxford School of Global and Area Studies, University of Oxford
Book Reviews by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
Shortly before his election to the Indian premiership in May 2014, Narendra Modi proclaimed that ... more Shortly before his election to the Indian premiership in May 2014, Narendra Modi proclaimed that his ‘Hindutva face’would be ‘an asset when dealing with foreign affairs with other nations’. Reflecting on Modi’s first term in government, Ian Hall’s book sets out to examine this proposition.
Kate Sullivan reviews a new history that challenges enduring myths about Australia’s relations wi... more Kate Sullivan reviews a new history that challenges enduring myths about Australia’s relations with India
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Books by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
While India’s prospects as a rising power and its material position in the international system have received significant attention, little scholarly work exists on India’s status in contemporary world politics. This Routledge Focus book charts the ways in which India’s international strategies of status seeking have evolved from Independence up to the present day.
The authors focus on the social dimensions of status, seeking to build on recent conceptual scholarship on status in world politics. The book shows how India has made a partial, though incomplete, shift from seeking status by rejecting material power and proximity to major powers, to seeking status by embracing both material power and major power relationships. However, it also challenges traditional understandings of the linear relationship between material power and status. Seven decades of Indian status seeking reveal that the enhancement of material power is one of only several routes Indian leaders have envisaged to lead to higher status.
By arguing that a state requires more than material power to achieve status, this book reshapes understandings of both status seeking and Indian foreign policy. It will be of interest to academics and policy makers in the fields of international relations, foreign policy, and Indian studies.
Essential reading for anyone studying rising powers, BRICS countries, global power shifts and South–South linkages, this volume will appeal to students and scholars of world politics, international relations, international history and foreign policy.
Articles by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
Bound by the strategic primacy of the Indian Ocean and by the constraints on its sea-power projection, India's interests sit uneasily with those of the other Quad powers.
War grand strategy by arguing that policy issues should be treated as a continuum within which there may be strategic policy innovations, leading to both nuanced continuity and change in foreign policy. Our argument stands in contradistinction to the dominant scholarship in the Indian foreign policy literature, the “transformation scholarship” as we term it, which views policy issues as binary, finds a “new” emphasis on material interests since the end of the Cold War and advocates this
as both rational and commendable. Applying four key claims in the dominant transformation scholarship to two important Indian foreign policy issues, nuclear non-proliferation and climate change, we find that, rather than sweeping change in Indian grand strategy, as implied and advocated by transformation scholars, Indian grand strategy is in a state of flux, encapsulating some change but also much continuity.
Book Chapters by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
Policy Reports by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
a responsible nuclear power by different groups of states within the international community.
Book Reviews by Kate Sullivan de Estrada
While India’s prospects as a rising power and its material position in the international system have received significant attention, little scholarly work exists on India’s status in contemporary world politics. This Routledge Focus book charts the ways in which India’s international strategies of status seeking have evolved from Independence up to the present day.
The authors focus on the social dimensions of status, seeking to build on recent conceptual scholarship on status in world politics. The book shows how India has made a partial, though incomplete, shift from seeking status by rejecting material power and proximity to major powers, to seeking status by embracing both material power and major power relationships. However, it also challenges traditional understandings of the linear relationship between material power and status. Seven decades of Indian status seeking reveal that the enhancement of material power is one of only several routes Indian leaders have envisaged to lead to higher status.
By arguing that a state requires more than material power to achieve status, this book reshapes understandings of both status seeking and Indian foreign policy. It will be of interest to academics and policy makers in the fields of international relations, foreign policy, and Indian studies.
Essential reading for anyone studying rising powers, BRICS countries, global power shifts and South–South linkages, this volume will appeal to students and scholars of world politics, international relations, international history and foreign policy.
Bound by the strategic primacy of the Indian Ocean and by the constraints on its sea-power projection, India's interests sit uneasily with those of the other Quad powers.
War grand strategy by arguing that policy issues should be treated as a continuum within which there may be strategic policy innovations, leading to both nuanced continuity and change in foreign policy. Our argument stands in contradistinction to the dominant scholarship in the Indian foreign policy literature, the “transformation scholarship” as we term it, which views policy issues as binary, finds a “new” emphasis on material interests since the end of the Cold War and advocates this
as both rational and commendable. Applying four key claims in the dominant transformation scholarship to two important Indian foreign policy issues, nuclear non-proliferation and climate change, we find that, rather than sweeping change in Indian grand strategy, as implied and advocated by transformation scholars, Indian grand strategy is in a state of flux, encapsulating some change but also much continuity.
a responsible nuclear power by different groups of states within the international community.
2017 marks the 70th anniversary of the independence of India: a country described as the most important swing state in the international system. India’s status as a rising power has been some decades in the making. However, the rise of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has presented cause for reflection on what his leadership means for India’s foreign policy and, by extension, for the world.
In conjunction with the launch of the special issue of International Affairs, ‘India’s rise at 70’, the panellists and authors of the special issue debate stasis and change in Indian foreign policy under Modi and describe the broader implications of his premiership.
This event will be followed by a reception.
This event marks the beginning of a new partnership with Oxford University Press, International Affairs’ new publisher.
Participants
DR KATE SULLIVAN DE ESTRADA, LECTURER IN MODERN INDIAN STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
PROFESSOR MANJARI CHATTERJEE MILLER, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, BOSTON UNIVERSITY
PROFESSOR IAN HALL, DIRECTOR, GRIFFITH ASIA INSTITUTE, GRIFFITH UNIVERSITY
CHAIR: JAMES HANNAH, ASSISTANT HEAD, ASIA PROGRAMME, CHATHAM HOUSE
https://www.chathamhouse.org/event/india-s-rise-70
The afternoon begins with the The Dasturzada Dr. Jal Pavry Memorial Lecture from Professor Stefano Guzzini (DIIS, Uppsala, PUC-Rio) on the theory, history and definitions of geopolitics.
A panel chaired by Professor Andrew Hurrell (Oxford) follows on the same subject featuring Professor Patricia Owens (Sussex), Professor Michael Williams (Ottowa) and Dr Jean-François Drolet (Queen Mary, London) exploring such topics as the sociological underpinnings and regional variation of geopolitics.
Finally, the lectures conclude with a panel on current geopolitical issues with the cases of Turkey, Brazil, India, Germany and Russia highlighted by panelists Professor Pinar Bilgin (Bilkent), Mr Braz Baracuhy (Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Dr Kate Sullivan (Oxford - @23mins 42secs), Professor Hanns Maull (SWP, Berlin) and Professor Neil MacFarlane (Oxford).
http://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/podcast-series/the-return-of-geopolitics.html