South Asia’s Limited Progress toward Peaceful Change

Abstract

Abstract This chapter argues that there has been some positive movement toward peaceful change in post–Cold War South Asia in comparison with the Cold War era. During the Cold War, India’s material preponderance in the region and its neighbors’ response were exacerbated by identity-driven conflict and problems of state survival. In the post–Cold War period, mutual insecurity has subsided somewhat, partly as a result of India’s transformation into more of an opportunity than a threat. Democracy, economic interdependence, and institutions are yet to deliver significant levels of peaceful cooperation in the region, however. Most often, the region’s states have seen ongoing democratization marked by instability; vastly more trade with extraregional than intraregional economies; and a regional institutional architecture—the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC)—whose already modest aspirations are circumscribed by India–Pakistan tensions and structural economic barriers. Peaceful change in South Asia will depend significantly on an uptick in India–Pakistan relations, or, given low levels of trade complementarity and China’s growing encroachment into the region, an acknowledgment that “South Asia” is unlikely to function as the central regional container for the pursuit of peaceful change.