The world is still shaped by the West

From the Indian side I think there's a clear sense that the power of the West remains very strong. If you look at the world -- the institutions, the regimes, the rules, the practices -- the narratives of the world are still largely shaped by the West. The West underwrites international systems in many ways. It governs the global Commons also in many ways, but having said that, what has been visible particularly in the last years and in the case of China perhaps even before that, there is a rebalancing underway. The rebalancing was accelerated by the 2008 global financial crisis and what was initially seen as an economic rebalancing is actually until they became a much larger strategic, cultural rebalancing as well. And if there is a single way by which you could capture that the fact today, it’s that the G20 has replaced the G7 as the primary body for global deliberations.

Now while I say that the West still retains great dominance over the international system, we see a much more divided West and part of the reason is - the United States is the glue that holds the West together and I use West in the largest, most expansive sense of the term. I would call Japan as part of the West, or perhaps Korea also, I use not really a geographical or ethnic definition but I capture the alliance constructs or the OECD part of it as well. So today as the world is getting more multipolar, the West is also getting more multipolar and that's a very interesting dynamic when you look at the West.

Now I see two propositions, one that the West needs India because India is an additional engine of growth that the market access is important, that India's human resources will become more relevant to the world, that we will move to a multipolar world, and therefore it's important to manage the multipolarity by having good relations with multiple worlds. The fact that in many areas there would be burden sharing of some kind. For example, in Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief operations in our part of the world and then on global issues, it's important to work with a country like India and I think nothing illustrates that more than climate change and what happened at Paris.

However, I would make the converse argument that India needs the West for a variety of reasons but I would give you the simplest, historical argument for it which is that every major growth story in the last 150 years has actually, paradoxically, happened with the support of the West. So, whether it is the rise of Japan, whether, even the rise of the Soviet Union, the rise of Korea, of the ASEAN, of China, all these would not have been possible had they not been done in tandem with the Western interests and thinking of that period.

The direction of the global economy would also make a stronger argument for this body because as we move into a more knowledge economy world, one of greater technology interdependence, clearly an important factor would be the flow of talent in the world and there India has a somewhat unique position vis-à-vis with the economies of the West. So the question is, is it likely that there is actually a new compact between India and the West because if this rebalancing has to be reflected in a different equilibrium, in different equations, in new methods of working with each other, is there actually a sense of how to work that out. So that brings me then to the next question what does it take us to get to that new compact? And obviously the first point there is to have the realisation that there's a need for a new compact. I think that realisation is today strong in the United States. I see that, to a certain extent, in Japan. I see that, less in Europe but moving in the right direction. So even the awareness aspect of it clearly needs more work for this to develop further.

Now when I say what does it take, I would say that awareness first of all needs to translate itself into a recognition of the need for a new balance, which means you really have different kinds of collaborations, different conversations and in all of this obviously, India would hedge enough to make sure that it will always have a strong bargaining hand vis-à-vis the West. 

There are other aspects of what it takes and one of them is also an understanding of a changed India. A changed India that democratisation over the last 70 years in India has had its own impact, that if you look today at India the politics of India, the social aspects of India, bluntly put, the old elite is now out of business and really you have a new set of people there with different thoughts, with their own sense of roots who relate to the world obviously differently from the people who dominated the Indian political scene before them.

A third aspect of it, certainly from the Indian point of view, would be, how do you build bridges and there the role of the diaspora would be very important. But increasingly, what we can see is that the treatment of the diaspora abroad becomes a factor in India's responses to a particular country or society. So, I see that really not just as a conversation between India and its diaspora but also a factor in our relations with other countries and other partners. And in a sense, that's a two-way factor because the diaspora also relates much more to development in home country than many other diasporas do. 

From the Indian point of view, looking ahead, our sense is the theories of the decline of the West are grossly overstated. That if you look at technology, defence budgets, the will to exercise power, the new instruments of pressure that have appeared on the international scene in the last 10 years, in all of this actually the West very much maintains its leads.

Edited excerpts from External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar’s speech at the Atlantic Council, Washington, October 1