Subcontinental Drift: Domestic Politics and India’s Foreign Policy

T he International Relations scholarship in India has rarely paid heed to domestic politics as a variable in foreign policy analysis. Most such attempts have focused on anecdotal discussions; this is mainly to do with the securitised nature of the foreign policy discourse in India. Even in cases where the scholarship has tried to engage with domestic determinants, the focus has been on relations with, or policy towards, specific States or they are treatises on the contribution of statesmen. Consequently, other internal factors that have potentially influenced Indian foreign policy have received scant attention. This is where Rajesh Basrur’s Subcontinental Drift stands apart and reframes ‘a version of realism’, acknowledging ‘the importance of structure of the international system’ and incorporating domestic politics as a determinant of Indian policy-making (p.13). As a neorealist, Basrur introduces the ‘moral dimension’ as an intervening variable in his assessment (p.20) and endorses the view that ‘suboptimal outcomes are more likely under normal conditions, whereas structurally driven policy responses are the norm when the security threats are high’ (p.195). Basrur argues that ‘the problem of political uncertainty has been India’s constant companion’ (p.3), which he calls ‘subcontinental drift’ and classifies as voluntary and involuntary. The notion of involuntary drift is explained as a political scenario in which limited control is exercised by the political leadership due to the intervention of domestic players. He gives the example of relations with the United States and Sri Lanka to explain how domestic factors in both cases hindered or acted as material constraints on policy-making. For instance, Basrur notes, the ‘inordinate influence’ of smaller and regional parties in ‘hindering policy makers’ pursuit of security objectives’ in both cases (p.105). In this vein, Basrur traces the historical growth of India–US bilateral relations and argues that India is now a critical partner of the United States from being just an ‘obdurate proliferator of nuclear weapons’ (p.42). He notes that the shift in semantics occurred due to the growth of an encompassing security partnership that began with the Kicklighter proposals in 1991 that ‘recommended strategic dialogue, training and other exchanges between the two militaries’ (p.50) and reached a crucial juncture with the signing of the Indo-US nuclear deal in 2005. Basrur has Strategic Analysis, 2023 Vol. 47, No. 2, 183–185, https://doi.org/10.1080/09700161.2023.2190617