Highlighting the shifting dynamics of geopolitics, India’s external affairs minister S Jaishankar on Sunday identified the shift in US policy and China’s ascent as the twin pillars defining the current world order.
A repositioning which is a posture of choice and, in a way, it has deliberately become a lonelier power. The second feature of the landscape is, of course, the rise of China. China, which sees itself as a unique country that is in a way both its self-perception, in many ways, also the reality. “Amongst the emerging and middle powers, to the extent that they don’t have direct clashes of interest, they have an interest in strengthening their interstate cooperation, but it is also natural that they would have cooperation with the US and China. Let’s look at some examples of this kind of cooperation… One is the Quad… “The International Solar Alliance or the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure, both of which India initiated and which have been very successful… It’s a sort of strategy of advancing by hedging.
Because the main multilateral body, the United Nations, is very visibly gridlocked.”, one will then have to look at what the consequences of this are for multilateralism, which is already under visible pressure.
Jaishankar was speaking at the the Munich Leaders Meeting in Delhi on Sunday where he referred to “radical repositioning of the United States” due to which it has in a way “deliberately become a lonelier power”. He said the sharp competition in the global landscape is not limited to US and China is but has has led to “weaponisation of any leverage that any country has”. And we are looking at very sharp competition,” he said. Jaishankar said the emerging and middle powers will have interstate cooperation and also with the US and China. In the field of connectivity, we have the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, the International North–South Transport Corridor, and the polar route, the Northern Sea Route,” he said. He also made reference to accelerated emergence of multipolarity and said, “The idea that countries will have relationships with players which may not always be easy to harmonize, but nevertheless are a reality, is a compulsion for countries.
“No one in the room would disagree with the fact that the landscape today is primarily marked by a radical repositioning of the United States. So you have this situation where a number of countries, not necessarily the leading countries… they come together where their interests require them to do so: they find working arrangements, develop an agenda, develop organizations, develop habits of cooperation, and this is today’s evolving global order,” he said.
