India as a Strategic Actor in the Indo-Pacific: Perspectives from US, UK, Europe and Russia

Architects of Indo-Pacific strategies, including the US and European countries, do not look at India in the same way. In fact some of these countries - including the US, UK and France - consider that India is key to their Indo-Pacific strategy, whereas others - like Germany - recognise the ASEAN as their key partner (the "centrality of ASEAN" is also highlighted by the EU, at the expense of India and others).

Equally, India does not share the views on the Indo-Pacific of all these actors. On the one hand, the country is part of the Quad, along with the US, on the other, it would like Russia to play a role in the Indo-Pacific. And if India, like most of its partners, seeks to limit the influence of China in the region, New Delhi is more prudent than some of them.

How far is the growing polarisation of international relations in the Indo-Pacific compatible with New Delhi's plurilateral trope? And to what extent the diverging view of India among western promoters of Indo-Pacific strategies will undermine these very strategies? Here are some of the questions, which will be discussed in this panel discussion.

Moderator

Christophe Jaffrelot

Christophe Jaffrelot is Avantha Chair and Professor of Indian Politics and Sociology at the King's India Institute and also the Research Lead for the Global Institutes, King’s College London. He teaches South Asian politics and history at Sciences Po, Paris and is an Overseas Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He was Director of Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI) at Sciences Po, between 2000 and 2008.

Panelists

Cleo Paskal

Cleo Paskal is an associate fellow in the Environment and Society Programme and the Asia-Pacific programme. She is research lead on Chatham House’s project on perceptions of strategic shifts in the Indo-Pacific from the points of view of the United States, the United Kingdom, India, Japan, Oceania and France. She is widely published in both academic publications and the popular press, and is a regular media commentator.

Garima Mohan

Dr. Garima Mohan is a fellow in the Asia program, where she leads the work on India and heads the India Trilateral Forum. Based in GMF’s offices in Berlin, her research focuses on Europe-India ties, EU foreign policy in Asia, and security in the Indo-Pacific. Prior to joining GMF, she was the acting team leader and coordinator for the EU’s Asia-Pacific Research and Advice Network (APRAN), which supports EU policymakers on issues concerning the Asia-Pacific. She also led the Global Orders program at the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin.

Natasha Kuhrt

Dr Natasha Kuhrt is a Lecturer in International Peace & Security in the Department of War Studies. After gaining a BA first class hons in Russian & German language and literature followed by an MA in Soviet Studies, at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies (University of London), she spent several years in publishing before obtaining a PhD at UCL on Russian Policy Towards China and Japan. Dr Kuhrt joined King’s as a visiting lecturer in the Law School in 2002, before going full time in the Department of War Studies in 2009.

Tanvi Madan

Tanvi Madan is a senior fellow in the Project on International Order and Strategy in the Foreign Policy program, and director of The India Project at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC. Madan’s work explores India’s role in the world and its foreign policy, focusing in particular on India's relations with China and the United States. She also researches the U.S. and India’s approaches in the Indo-Pacific, as well as the development of interest-based coalitions, especially the Australia-India-Japan-U.S. Quad.