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How Does India's Look East Policy Look after 25 Years?
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Ollapally, Deepa M. |
| Copyright Year | 2018 |
| Abstract | T he long arc of India’s Look East policy has coincided with dramatic economic and strategic power shifts in Asia. Introduced in 1991 at the end of the Cold War, Look East is no longer just a policy instrument constructed to lift the country out of an immediate foreign and economic crisis. India’s re-engagement eastward initially was focused on developing trade and investment opportunities and finding new strategic partners in Southeast Asia, but it has evolved into a multilayered approach that now reaches all the way to Australia. The Look East policy today is also intertwined with the big ideas of the United States on Asia—the concept of the Indo-Pacific and the erstwhile rebalance strategy to counter the rise of China. There is a high degree of strategic uncertainty in Asia, ranging from concerns about U.S. alliance commitments and the nature of China’s ambitions to questions about what countries like India and Vietnam are willing to contribute to making sure that the regional order does not become fully China-centric. The environment is further complicated by the reality that most regional states cannot resist economic interdependence with China at the same time that they want strategic interdependence with the United States. Although none of them want to see a direct conflict between the United States and China, many do want the United States to assert its dominance. This has given rise over the last decade to some form of hedging or soft balancing against China by key regional states. India has been no exception, but for it the contradictions have become sharper than for others. On the one hand, India has no ally in the traditional sense. It has a near obsession with “strategic autonomy” and is the only regional actor that can envision itself as a peer-competitor of China in the future. On the other hand, China’s recent assertiveness in India’s neighborhood, especially the Indian Ocean, is coming well before India can effectively narrow the considerable economic and military power gap between the two countries. India’s Look East policy might then seem like a logical, multifaceted organizing principle to meet what appears to be a growing Chinese threat without tipping the balance decisively |
| Starting Page | 146 |
| Ending Page | 149 |
| Page Count | 4 |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| DOI | 10.1353/asp.2018.0031 |
| Volume Number | 25 |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://cpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/blogs.gwu.edu/dist/3/1216/files/2018/05/AsiaPolicy13.2_Ollapally_GrareBRRT_April2018-1lbzph1.pdf |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://doi.org/10.1353/asp.2018.0031 |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
