Post Independent India’s Unique Contribution to International Relations

Oct. 29, 3:30 p.m. in the JMC Library (332 Case Hall)
Presented by Mohammed Ayoob, University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of International Relations, Michigan State University

This lecture argues that modern India has made a distinctive contribution to the discipline of International Relations through the development of an identifiable tradition of international thought that may legitimately be described as an Indian School of International Relations. Rather than viewing India’s contribution as limited to concepts such as non-alignment or Panchsheel, the lecture contends that these ideas formed part of a broader and more coherent intellectual framework whose principal architect was Jawaharlal Nehru.

The lecture challenges the conventional portrayal of Nehru as merely the principal maker of India’s foreign policy or as an idealist whose ideas were discredited by the Sino-Indian War of 1962. It argues instead that Nehru should be recognized as a major twentieth-century international thinker who sought to reconcile realism with ethical restraint, national interest with international legitimacy, and power with moral purpose. The organizing principle of his thought was strategic autonomy, understood not as neutrality or equidistance between rival power blocs but as the preservation of independent judgment in the conduct of foreign policy.

Finally, the lecture reassesses the major strategic crises of 1962 and 1971, arguing that they did not represent the collapse of Nehru’s vision but rather demonstrated the flexibility of strategic autonomy under changing geopolitical circumstances. It concludes that the continuing emphasis of contemporary Indian foreign policy on strategic autonomy now termed multi-alignment reflects the enduring influence of this intellectual tradition pioneered by Jawaharlal Nehru. Recognizing the Indian School enriches both the history of International Relations and the discipline’s understanding of non-Western contributions to international thought.