Abstract
AbstractIndia celebrated when in 2014 the United Nations adopted the 21st of June as International Yoga Day. In recent years India’s leaders have increasingly focused on its diaspora, multicultural ethos, and its ancient practices like yoga, through official campaigns and foreign visits. Particularly since Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, there has been an increased activism to draw attention to and employ India’s soft power. The article traces the evolution of India as a soft power since its emergence as an independent country. It explores how this soft power has shaped India’s foreign policy and behavior. India’s soft power assets are not of recent origin, but there is an increasing activism to use those assets effectively. Has India evolved as a soft power? What are the characteristics of India’s soft power? How is India’s current political dispensation different from the earlier ones in applying soft power in foreign policy? The article addresses these questions by applying Nye Jr’s concept of soft power and aims to contribute to the debate on soft power by focusing on cultural diplomacy of a rising power. It demonstrates that though soft power resources, including culture, are not new, the increasing awareness and activism of India’s political class to use those resources to realize foreign policy goals is recent. The focus on soft power, particularly cultural diplomacy, and its use in foreign policy, has become increasingly visible in recent years. This article also argues that the increasing acceptability of its culture and values opens up possibilities for India to realize foreign policy goals. It will, however, be a daunting task for members of the Indian political class to use soft power effectively unless they address internal and external constraints. This article is published as part of a collection on soft power.
Highlights
India celebrated when in 2014 the United Nations adopted the 21st of June as International Yoga Day
This article presented a broad picture of India as an evolving soft power and argued that though many of its soft power resources including culture are not new, the increasing awareness of its political class to use those resources to realize foreign policy goals is recent
Though there were attempts to use the soft power tools in the post-independence period and more increasingly after the advent of globalization in 1990s, the focus on soft power and its use in foreign policy has become increasingly visible in recent years
Summary
Modi came to power in New Delhi in May 2014. His policy to use soft power was different from his predecessors in various ways. Some of the major innovations distinguishing Modi from his predecessors include: addressing Indian diaspora during foreign visits, hosting foreign leaders in different locations of India, crafting policies such as “Make in India”, and frequently alluding to Indian culture and tradition in speeches. Modi used the policy of foreign aid and soft loans to promote India’s policies in developing countries During his visit to Fiji in November 2014, first by an Indian prime minister in 33 years, Modi offered two lines of credit totalling US$75 million for the sugar industry and a grant of $5 million for village, small and medium industries. In June 2016, he along with Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani inaugurated $290 million Salma Dam, known as Afghan-India Friendship, in Herat province of Afghanistan
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