Author's Response: Foreign Policy, Ideology, and Domestic Politics in Modi's India

One of the most obvious things that sets Narendra Modi's government apart from its predecessors is its much-publicized attempt to uproot Jawaharlal Nehru's ideological legacies in both domestic and foreign policy. Practically every administration since Nehru has tinkered with his "idea of India" and departed from one or another of his policies. But none—including the governments led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) between 1998 and 2004—have tried wholly to demolish the ideological edifice India's first prime minister left behind nor sought to put in its place something completely different.¹ Quite deliberately, however, that is what Modi and his allies have aimed to do since May 2014, seeking to sweep aside Nehru's construction and build a "Naya Bharat" (New India) informed by Hindu nationalism.²

Modi and the Reinvention of Indian Foreign Policy deals with one aspect of this project: the high-profile effort to craft a "Modi doctrine" and a new philosophy of foreign policy. It also explores—as far as possible—how this new thinking has shaped the Modi government's handling of India's international relations so far. To do this, the book delves into Hindu nationalist political thought on India's place in the world and its proper role. It looks at what can be established about Modi's own thinking, shaped by years in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (loosely translated as the National Volunteer Organization) and the backrooms of the BJP, as well as more than a decade in office as chief minister of Gujarat. The second half of the book then turns to three dimensions that the Modi government has pursued in Indian foreign policy: the push for soft power, the effort to boost growth and investment, and the management of the various security challenges facing the country.

The book argues that despite efforts to construct new thinking on international relations intended to displace Nehruvianism with an alternative purportedly more appropriate to India, in Modi's first term (2014–19) many of the basic foreign policy settings stayed the same. His administration did succeed in modifying the country's foreign investment regime, for example, but failed to conclude any new free trade deals with other states or regional groupings. Similarly, it unveiled the ambitious Neighbourhood First policy to improve ties with other South Asian states but made little progress, given that relations with Pakistan deteriorated and China's growing economic power continued to be felt throughout the region. Where shifts did occur, movement was often incremental rather than sweeping, such as in the efforts to augment and extend preexisting defense and security ties with the United States and other like-minded nations in the Indo-Pacific. The exceptions to this rule lay mainly in the domain of soft power, where Modi's first government invested heavily in a variety of initiatives, including the global promotion of yoga and solar power and a series of interreligious and intercultural dialogues with various Buddhist and Muslim groups. But when it came to the acquisition or use of hard power, Modi's record is mixed. The defense budget increased after 2014, but not in line with economic growth and without marked improvements to military capabilities. Punitive strikes on targets in Pakistan took place after terrorist attacks, and India attempted to push back when China pressed on various areas, including in Bhutan in mid-2017. Whether these acts will be repeated is unclear, as is their deterrent effect on Islamabad and Beijing.³

The question—as Rajesh Rajagopalan rightly asks—is why did we not see bigger changes, given all the hype about making India a "leading power"?⁴ If the Modi government has indeed brought about a "paradigm shift," as a sympathetic study puts it, in the ways India thinks about international relations and the country's role in the world, why have the basic settings not altered?⁵ Rajagopalan's answer is seductive: it is difficult, he argues, to change India's foreign policy "because India's structural condition has remained fairly steady for decades." Relatively speaking...