India’s Multivectored Alignment in the East: Aims, Objectives, and Rationale in Perspective

Abstract

India has emerged victorious in being part of many multilateral, regional and bilateral engagements of politico-strategic, economic and cultural import in East Asia ever since the launching of the Look East Policy (LEP) in 1992 in the wake of the collapse of the bipolar international system. In November 2014 Narendra Modi rechristened the ongoing engagement as Act East Policy (AEP). Does AEP signify more than just a name change? If so, what are the variables/drivers that contributed to such renaming of an ongoing policy? The argument is that both LEP and AEP are by-products of two distinct phases of unfolding contemporary history. The bipolar international system of cold war period produced India's nonalignment and the post-cold war period of 'uni-polar moment' marked by the collapse of the Soviet Union led to the launching of LEP. Many scholars of International Relations observed and documented the fading away of the uni-polar moment and the emergence of the multi-polar international system and power configuration. This paper argues that AEP is India’s response to the emerging multi-polar world order within the ambit of the country's strategic doctrine.