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GS Paper: GS2-19.Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests, Indian diaspora.

  • Day 4| Daily Answer Wars| CD WarZone

    Topics for Today’s question:

    GS-2         Effect of policies and politics of developed and developing countries on India’s interests; Important International institutions

    Question:

    Q. Highlighting the weaknesses shown by the UN-led multilateralism, give arguments in support of a ‘reformed multilateralism.’ (10 Marks)

     

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  • UK’s Rwanda asylum seeker deportation plan is lawful, court rules

    rwanda

    Britain’s plan to send migrants to Rwanda is lawful, London’s High Court ruled, in a victory for PM Rishi Sunak who has made a high-stakes political promise to tackle the record number of migrant arrivals.

    Immigrant’s crisis in UK

    • Since 2018, there has been a marked rise in the number of refugees and asylum seekers that undertake dangerous crossings between Calais in France and Dover in England.
    • Most such migrants and asylum seekers hail from war-torn countries like Sudan, Afghanistan, and Yemen, or developing countries like Iran and Iraq.
    • The Britain that has adopted a hardline stance on illegal immigration, these crossings constitute an immigration crisis.
    • The Nationality and Borders Bill, 2021, which is still under consideration in the UK, allows the British government to strip anyone’s citizenship without notice under “exceptional circumstances”.
    • The Rwanda deal is the operationalization of one objective in the Bill which is to deter illegal entry into the United Kingdom.

    What is the Rwanda Deal?

    • The UK and Rwanda Migration and Economic Development Partnership or the Rwanda Deal is a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the two governments.
    • Under this deal, Rwanda will commit to taking in asylum seekers who arrive in the UK on or after January 1, 2022, using illegally facilitated and unlawful cross border migration.
    • Rwanda will function as the holding centre where asylum applicants will wait while the Rwandan government makes decisions about their asylum and resettlement petitions in Rwanda.
    • Rwanda will, on its part, accommodate anyone who is not a minor and does not have a criminal record.

    Rationale of the deal

    • The deal aims to combat “people smugglers”, who often charge exorbitant prices from vulnerable migrants to put them on unseaworthy boats from France to England that often lead to mass drownings.
    • The UK contends that this solution to the migrant issue is humane and meant to target the gangs that run these illegal crossings.

    What will the scheme cost the UK?

    • The UK will pay Rwanda £120 million as part of an “economic transformation and integration fund” and will also bear the operational costs along with an, as yet undetermined, amount for each migrant.
    • Currently, the UK pays £4.7 million per day to accommodate approximately 25,000 asylum seekers.
    • At the end of 2021, this amounted to £430 million annually with a projected increase of £100 million in 2022.
    • The Rwanda Deal is predicted to reduce these costs by outsourcing the hosting of such migrants to a third country.

    Will the Rwanda Deal solve the problem of illegal immigration?

    • This deal will be implemented in a matter of weeks unless it is challenged and stayed by British courts.
    • While Boris Johnson’s government is undoubtedly bracing for such legal challenges, it remains unclear if the Rwanda Deal will solve the problem of unlawful crossings.
    • Evidence from similar experiences indicates that such policies do not fully combat “people smuggling”.

    Criticisms of the deal

    • There are dangers of transferring refugees and asylum seekers to third countries without sufficient safeguards.
    • The refugees are traded like commodities and transferred abroad for processing.
    • Such arrangements simply shift asylum responsibilities, evade international obligations, and are contrary to the letter and spirit of the Refugee Convention.
    • Rwanda also has a known track record of extrajudicial killings, suspicious deaths in custody, unlawful or arbitrary detention, torture, and abusive prosecutions, particularly targeting critics and dissidents.

    Do any other countries send asylum seekers overseas?

    • Yes, several other countries — including Australia, Israel and Denmark — have been sending asylum seekers overseas.
    • Australia has been making full use of offshore detention centres since 2001.
    • Israel, too, chose to deal with a growing influx of asylum seekers and illegal immigrants from places like Sudan and Eritrea by striking deals with third countries.
    • Those rejected for asylum were given the choice of returning to their home country or accepting $3,500 and a plane ticket to one of the third countries.
    • They faced the threat of arrest if they chose to remain in Israel.

     

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  • End-to-end Encryption and related issues

    encrypt

    Apple recently announced that it will be increasing the number of data points protected by end-to-end encryption on iCloud.

    What is end-to-end encryption?

    encrypt

    • End-to-end encryption is a communication process that encrypts data being shared between two devices.
    • It prevents third parties like cloud service providers, internet service providers (ISPs) and cybercriminals from accessing data while it is being transferred.
    • The process of end-to-end encryption uses an algorithm that transforms standard text into an unreadable format.
    • This format can only be unscrambled and read by those with the decryption keys, which are only stored on endpoints and not with any third parties including companies providing the service.
    • This encryption has long been used when transferring business documents, financial details, legal proceedings, and personal conversations.
    • It can also be used to control users’ authorisation when accessing stored data, which seems to be what Apple intends to do.

    Where is it used?

    • End-to-end encryption is used to secure communications.
    • Some of the popular instant-messaging apps that use it are Signal, WhatsApp, iMessage, and Google messages.
    • However, instant messaging is not the only place where user data is protected using end-to-end encryption.
    • It is also used to secure passwords, protect stored data and safeguard data on cloud storage.

    Why are tech companies using it?

    • Preventing data breach: Tech companies often cite data breach issue.
    • Extra protection: Encryption puts extra layer of protection that would protect valuable digital information against hacking attacks.
    • Prevent snooping: It is also seen as a technology that secures users’ data from snooping by government agencies, making it a sought-after feature by activists, journalists, and political opponents.
    • Capital generation: It showcases any company’s position as a provider of secure data storage and transfer services.

    What does it mean for users?

    • End-to-end encryption ensures that user data is protected from unwarranted parties including service providers, cloud storage providers, and companies that handle encrypted data.
    • Encrypted data can only be decrypted by trusted devices.
    • No one else can access this data and it remains secure even in the case of a data breach in the cloud storage.

    Why are government agencies unhappy with it?

    • The FBI in a statement expressed displeasure at the idea of increasing use of end-to-end encryption by technology companies.
    • It said that while it remains a strong advocate of encryption schemes that give “lawful access by design”, that would enable tech companies “served with a legal order” to decrypt data.
    • Attempts by government agencies across the globe, in the past, to access encrypted data hosted and stored by tech companies have met with strong resistance.
    • Law enforcement agencies seeks to weaken encryption with backdoors.
    • Thus is considered ill-advised and could compromise the reliability of the internet.

     

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  • Price cap on Russia’s Oil and India’s contextual response

    cap

    Context

    • Recently, G7 proposal to impose a price cap on Russian oil came into effect. The proposal, which took months to fructify, seeks to achieve a delicate balance how to starve the Russian state of oil revenues so as to financially cripple its war against Ukraine, but without causing supply disruptions in the global oil market which would cause prices to spiral. The move, however, risks fracturing the global crude oil market.

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    What is Price cap on Russian oil?

    • The $60 per barrel and denial of infrastructure services to Russian oil: The $60 per barrel cap is intended to cut Russia’s oil revenues while keeping Russian crude on the market by denying insurance, maritime services, and finance provided by the Western allies for tanker cargoes priced above a fixed dollar-per-barrel cap.
    • Aim to hurt Russia’s oil revenue and create a pressure: The US-proposed cap aims to hurt Moscow’s finances while avoiding a sharp oil price spike if Russia’s oil is suddenly taken off the global market.
    • Impact on shipping: Without insurance, tanker owners may be reluctant to take on Russian oil and face obstacles in delivering it.

    cap

    Russian response to the price cap

    • Russia refused to abide by the measure: Russia has said it will not observe a cap and will halt deliveries to countries that do.
    • Retaliate by shutting off the shipments: It could retaliate by shutting off shipments in hopes of profiting from a sharply higher global oil price on whatever it can sell around the sanctions.
    • Russia said price cap will not hurt financing the war: Russia recently said that the cap would not hurt the financing of its “special military operation” in Ukraine.
    • Others buyers may bypass the restrictions putting countries interests first: Buyers in China and India might not go along with the cap, while Russia or China could try to set up their own insurance providers to replace those barred by US, UK and Europe. It is also possible that these countries will find creative ways to bypass the restrictions imposed by the G7.

    cap

    How impacts global oil supply chain?

    • Russian oil can now only be shipped using G7 countries infrastructure: Broadly speaking, Russian oil can now be shipped across the world using the infrastructure of the G7 countries tankers, insurers, etc only if it is sold at a price of $60 per barrel or less.
    • Higher price for buying oil from Russia: This makes buying oil from Russia at a higher price in the week prior to this announcement, Urals crude was trading in the mid-$60s range  a difficult proposition as most of the companies that offer shipping and insurance services are located in these G7 nations.
    • Countries wish to buy are at disadvantage but still not higher than brent crude oil: While Russia has refused to abide by this measure, and the cap will place countries that do opt for buying oil from Russia at a price higher than $60 at a disadvantage, it will still be at a considerable discount compared to Brent crude oil which is currently trading at around $81 per barrel.
    • Countries that continued trade despite of objections: So far, despite objections from western nations, countries like India and China have continued to trade with Russia.

    cap

    India’s response and the bilateral trade with Russia

    • India’s bilateral trade with Russia has surged to an all-time high: In fact, as reported in this paper, India’s bilateral trade with Russia has surged to an all-time high in the first five months of the year (April-August).
    • India putting its interests first and taking advantage of discounted price: Putting its interests first, India has raised its oil imports from Russia, taking advantage of the discounts being offered the country which used to import less than 1 per cent of its import requirement from Russia, now imports around a fifth from it.
    • As India is an oil importer, the trade at discounted price will give some relief in current account deficit and economic stability: After all, for an oil importer like India, which meets an overwhelming share of its requirements through imports, lower crude oil prices will moderate the price pressures in the economy and bring relief to the current account deficit, easing risks to macroeconomic stability.
    • India rejected the so-called moral duty: India has rejected any “moral” duty to join the price cap coalition.

    Conclusion

    • Attempts to use trade as a weapon will only distort the global market and hurt energy-poor consumers not responsible for the war. India’s response so far to the West’s retaliation against Russia for the war in Ukraine has been guided by its sovereign interests. This must continue to be the guiding principle.

    Mains Question

    Q. G7 recently imposed a price cap on Russian oil driven by US and west. In light of this Discuss how it disrupt the global oil supply chain and how India is responding?

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  • India and UNSC

    UNSCContext

    • There is greater support for India to be a permanent member of the UN Security Council and also a broad global consensus over the need to reform the Council, said External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. India has once again renewed its bid for permanent membership of UNSC.

    What is UNSC?

    • The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations (UN) and is charged with ensuring international peace and security, recommending the admission of new UN members to the General Assembly, and approving any changes to the UN Charter.
    • Its powers include establishing peacekeeping operations, enacting international sanctions, and authorizing military action. The UNSC is the only UN body with the authority to issue binding resolutions on member states.

    UNSCWhat is the composition of UNSC?

    • Presently there five permanent members (P-5) with veto and 10 non-permanent members without veto elected for tenure of 2 years.
    • India has been the non-permanent member multiple times. Presently India is serving its tenure that will end in December 2022.

    UNSCWho are P-5 members?

    • The victors of World War 2 – USA, RUSSIA, CHINA, UK, FRANCE.

    What are the hurdles that India facing?

    • Elite club: Most exclusive club in international relations. All other clubs have been breached. Until a quarter century ago, the nuclear weapon club had five members, the same five as the P-5.India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel have since joined the club. But UNSC is unbreachable till date.
    • All are reluctant: The inescapable fact is that none of the P-5 wants the UNSC’s ranks to be increased. One or the other of them might make some noise about supporting one or more of the aspirants. Each is confident that someone among them will torpedo the enlargement of the club. Declarations of support for India’s candidature need to be taken with a fistful of salt.
    • Veto issue: Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan bluntly told India not to expect to get the veto power. Though India has said it will not accept a seat without veto power.
    • China-Pakistan axis: China, which has historically blocked India’s aspirations to become a permanent member of the UNSC. Beijing has an “all-weather ally” in Islamabad, another neighbour who also strongly opposes India’s candidature to the UNSC.
    • Odd man out: Four out of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council have bilaterally expressed official affirmations of support for India’s candidature to a permanent seat in an expanded UN Security Council.
    • Coffee club opposition: Members like Italy, South Korea, Canada, Spain, Mexico, Turkey, Argentina, Pakistan, and others, who have together formed the Uniting for Consensus (UfC) movement. Also known as the Coffee Club, the movement argues that bids for permanent seats by India, Japan, Germany, and Brazil (G4 countries) must not be considered without first reaching an international consensus regarding the form and size of the new Security council.

    UNSCWhat are the Efforts taken by India?

    • Text based negotiation: External affairs minister is canvassing for the country’s candidature, meeting his counterparts from several countries. He has repeated the call, made often in the past, for a text-based negotiation on what has been euphemistically referred to as the reform of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), i.e., negotiation on a written document outlining the proposed reform instead of just holding forth verbally.
    • Woking together with G-4: INDIA, JAPAN, GEMANY, BRAZIL works together to get permanent UNSC seat however these efforts are opposed by coffee club.
    • Multilateral engagements: By expanding its footprint in multilateral organisations, India is gearing up to become a global rule-maker.
    • Distinguished group of experts suggested a few years ago that a new category of semi-permanent members should be created. Countries would be elected for a period of eight to 10 years and would be eligible for re-election. India ought to give serious consideration to this idea.
    • With or without veto: According to former foreign secretary Chinmaya gharekhan, if by some miracle we are offered or manage to obtain permanent membership without veto, we must grab it. Even a permanent membership without veto will be tremendously helpful in protecting our interests.

    Conclusion

    • Looking at the present geopolitical divide India’s dream of seat at the highest table is unlikely to get fulfilled in near future. India must analyse the utility of UNSC membership for securing its national interest. India should not give up anything in bargain against UNSC seat which harms its international interest.

    Mains question

    Q. India’s quest for UNSC is like “Sisyphus carrying the boulder  just to see how it falls”. In this context Analyse the utility of Permanent seat at UNSC.

     

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  • Sports as soft power

    soft powerContext

    • Increased interest, especially by smaller nations in the world, in investing more and doing well in elite sports in international sporting events boosts a nation’s chances of attaining soft power.
    • India’s medal tally at recent International sports events demonstrate the country’s soft power on the global stage and encourage working towards the status of a great “geopolitical actor”.

    What is soft power?

    • Origin:
      • As far back as the 4th century BC, Kautilya (chankyaniti) had propounded the concept of Saam(advice or cajole),daam(pay or bribe),dand(punish),bhed(exploit secrets) which acquired western touch and can be understood by Soft power, smart power, hard power, and sharp power respectively.
      • Joseph Nye introduced the concept of “soft power” in the late 1980s. For Nye, power is the ability to influence the behavior of others to get the outcomes you want.
    • Meaning:
    • Soft power is the ability of a country to persuade others to do what it wants without force or coercion.
    • Soft power is the ability to influence the behavior of others to get the outcomes you want.

    soft powerWhy Soft power is so significant?

    Use of ‘Soft Power’ includes the number of cultural missions such as language schools, Olympic Medals and the quality of a country’s overall growth. Soft power produces following things:

    • Familiarity: If people know more about your country, culture, sports, and its talents, businesses, and resources, then soft power is enhanced.
    • Reputation: For a nation to be attractive and a role model for others, its overall reputation must be strong and positive.
    • Influence: A direct measure of the perceived presence and impact that your country has in other countries
    • Business/Innovation/Sports: The attractiveness of a country’s economic model, its digital engagement with the world, performance in sports etc.
    • Government: Showcases the ability of country’s political leadership and what it delivers to its people in different arenas.
    • Multi-Alignment: As a country rises up the ‘Soft Power’ list, more and more outside parties align themselves with the common goals of that country.

    Why the Sports being used as a tool of soft power in modern international relations?

    Sport can be used as tool of soft power both internationally and domestically.

    • International platform: Sports provide a platform for countries to showcase their culture, values and tradition.
    • Puts a Better image of a country: Sports as a tool to achieve social, political, and financial goals, and improve the image of the country.
    • International exposure: The focus on culture and peaceful values in sports make it a useful tool for countries to use soft power to achieve international goals and improve their public diplomacy.
    • Reducing differences: Sports provides a platform for trust-building; and reconciliation, integration and anti-racism.
    • Learning from China’s Case:
    • Dongfeng Liu (International Professor of Sport Management) in his survey on China’s performance in the Olympics he found that a country’s Olympic achievement has a positive effect on its national soft power.
    • As china is a communist country and reputation about human rights is not good, so China uses its superiority in elite sports to build “people-to-people” relations with other countries. For example, athletes from African countries such as Madagascar are trained in swimming, badminton, table tennis, etc. in China, which helps Beijing create a positive impact on a wider population and result in better formal relations as well.
    • There is also China’s memorandum of understanding with countries such as Kenya so that Chinese runners can train with Kenyan athletes, as they are among the best in the world when it comes to long-distance running.

    soft powerIntrospection on India’s performance at recent International Sports events

    • It is being said that the golden period of Indian sports may have begun as at the Tokyo Olympics and then the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games (CWG) are examples of a good performance.
    • India’s medal tally in the Tokyo Olympics Games — seven — was its most decorated Olympic Games in Indian history.
    • At the Commonwealth games (CWG) 2022, Indian athletes won 61 medals, including 22 gold.
    • India has one of the world’s poorest population-to-medal ratios when it comes to the Olympics.
    • Ensuring competent coaches, and having adequate funding and more sports academics still remain major issues even decades later
    • India spends only three paise per day per capita on sports. In contrast China spends 1 per day per capita.

    What can be done to increase the country’s sporting performance and soft power?

    • Train Indian players overseas:
    • India should concentrate on forging MoUs with nations that excel in specific sports and train Indian players overseas.
    • For example, Australia and the United Kingdom can assist us in swimming given their standing here.
    • When it comes to running, negotiating collaborative training agreements with African countries such as Kenya would be ideal.
    • No Politics over assistance:
    • There should be no politics in seeking or even offering assistance.
    • For example China has requested Indian assistance in improving cricket development in China (Chongqing city).
    • Private Investment:
    • Private investment needs to be harnessed to develop infrastructure. The better a country performs in sporting events the greater a sports person’s interest in their sports atmosphere. This also creates a huge market for private players to invest in.
    • For example, leading corporate houses in India have already shown how their active participation and investment can improve sporting performance as a result of unique corporate sports programmes.
    • Public –private partnership at grass root :
    • The Government should also work on a public-private partnership (PPP) model to create basic sporting infrastructure.
    • As recommended by NITI Aayog, at the district level too so that talent can be captured at an early stage.

    Conclusion

    • Sports as a tool of soft power had always been a key element of leadership from the ancient times. Sports provide an international platform to develop an attitude of unity in a divided multi-polar modern world.

    Mains Question

    Q. Sports provide an international platform to develop an attitude of unity and influence others in a divided multi-polar modern world. Discuss in this context that soft power is not an end but a means to an end.

     

  • Global pandemic treaty to avert future mishap

    pandemic treatyContext

    • The outline of an essential global pandemic treaty.

    Purpose of the treaty

    • A pandemic treaty under the umbrella of the World Health Organization would build coherence and avoid fragmentation of response.

    Severity of this pandemic demands such treaty

    • COVID-19 would count as being among some of the most severe pandemics the world has seen in the last 100 years. An estimated 18 million people may have died from COVID-19, according various credible estimates, a scale of loss not seen since the Second World War.
    • Further, with over 120 million people pushed into extreme poverty, and a massive global recession, no single government or institution has been able to address this emergency singlehandedly.
    • This has given us a larger perspective of how nobody is safe until everybody is safe.

    Catchy line for value addition

    Nobody is safe until everybody is safe

    pandemic treatyThere is widespread inequity in healthcare

    • Gross inequity in distribution: Health-care systems have been stretched beyond their capacity and gross health inequity has been observed in the distribution of vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics across the world.
    • Irreversible consequences: While high-income economies are still recovering from the aftereffects, the socioeconomic consequences of the novel coronavirus pandemic are irreversible in low and low middle-income countries.
    • The monopolies: Held by pharma majors such as Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna created at least nine new billionaires since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and made over $1,000 a second in profits, even as fewer of their vaccines reached people in low-income countries.
    • Skewed distribution: As of March 2022, only 3% of people in low-income countries had been vaccinated with at least one dose, compared to 60.18% in high-income countries. The international target to vaccinate 70% of the world’s population against COVID-19 by mid-2022 was missed because poorer countries were at the “back of the queue” when vaccines were rolled out.

    https://www.civilsdaily.com/yojana-archive-the-pandemic-global-synergy/India’s lead role

    • Dynamic response: India’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and reinstating global equity by leveraging its own potential has set an example to legislators worldwide.
    • Vaccine diplomacy: India produces nearly 60% of the world’s vaccines and is said to account for 60%-80% of the United Nations’ annual vaccine procurement “vaccine diplomacy” or “vaccine maitri” with a commitment against health inequity.
    • We lead by example: India was unfettered in its resolve to continue the shipment of vaccines and other diagnostics even when it was experiencing a vaccine shortage for domestic use. There was only a brief period of weeks during the peak of the second wave in India when the vaccine mission was halted.
    • A classic example of global cooperation: As of 2021, India shipped 594.35 lakh doses of ‘Made-in-India’ COVID-19 vaccines to 72 countries a classic example of global cooperation. Among these, 81.25 lakh doses were gifts, 339.67 lakh doses were commercially distributed and 173.43 lakh doses were delivered via the Covax programme under the aegis of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.

    Why the treaty is needed for?

    • Data sharing: A treaty should cover crucial aspects such as data sharing and genome sequencing of emerging viruses.
    • Rapid response mechanism: It should formally commit governments and parliaments to implement an early warning system and a properly funded rapid response mechanism.
    • Health investments: Further, it should mobilise nation states to agree on a set of common metrics that are related to health investments and a return on those investments. These investments should aim to reduce the public-private sector gap.

    Conclusion

    • A global pandemic treaty will not only reduce socioeconomic inequalities across nation states but also enhance a global pandemic preparedness for future health emergencies. India must take the lead in this.

    Mains question

    Q. Nobody is safe until everybody is safe. What do you understand by this? Why there is need of global pandemic treaty?.

     

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  • Data diplomacy

    Context

    • The government has withdrawn the Personal Data Protection Bill from Parliament after several amendments were proposed by the Joint-Parliamentary Committee.

    Definition of data

    • Data is a collection of discrete values that convey information, describing quantity, quality, fact, statistics, other basic units of meaning, or simply sequences of symbols that may be further interpreted.

    What is Data Protection?

    • Data protection refers to policies and procedures seeking to minimise intrusion into the privacy of an individual caused by collection and usage of their personal data.

    What is data localisation?

    • Data localization or data residency law requires data about a nation’s citizens or residents to be collected, processed, and/or stored inside the country, often before being transferred internationally.

    What is Data Governance?

    • Data governance is a collection of processes, roles, policies, standards, and metrics that ensure the effective and efficient use of information in enabling an organization to achieve its goals. Data governance defines who can take what action, upon what data, in what situations, using what methods.

    Interesting facts

    • Over 90% of all the data in the world was created in the past 2 years;
    • The total amount of data being captured and stored by industry doubles every 1.2 years;
    • If you burned all of the data created in just one day onto DVDs, you could stack them on top of each other and reach the moon – twice.

    Data sovereignty of India

    • Definition: India has placed itself at the heart of the battle, its foreign policy vision fuelled by the principle of ‘data sovereignty’—a broad notion that supports the assertion of sovereign writ over data generated by citizens within a country’s physical boundaries.
    • Issues: The ideal of “data sovereignty”, and global attempts to leverage it, has come under heavy criticism from various stakeholders who are of the view that the concept violates the principle of “free and open internet”. They also argue that “data sovereignty” hampers innovation and economic growth, and is a ruse for authoritarian digital governance.

    India’s Data Diplomacy: Three Pillars

    • Pillar 1: India’s data for India’s development

    The flagship ‘Digital India’ programme clearly views data as the cornerstone of India’s socioeconomic future—one where the government leverages the Indian citizen’s data for the benefit of the people themselves, and not solely for profit-making.

    • Pillar 2: Cross-border data flows and digital trade

    In keeping with its foreign policy tradition of actively shaping debates on global trade rules, India has been an active participant in the ongoing contestation on regulating cross-border data flows.

    • Pillar 3: Securitising the economic

    The final pillar of India’s data diplomacy has been predicated ostensibly on safeguarding its citizens’ data from external threats.

    Why data is important?

    • Improve People’s Lives: Data will help you to improve quality of life for people you support: Improving quality is first and foremost among the reasons why organizations should be using data.
    • Make Informed Decisions: Data = Knowledge. Good data provides indisputable evidence, while anecdotal evidence, assumptions, or abstract observation might lead to wasted resources due to taking action based on an incorrect conclusion.
    • Stop Molehills from Turning into Mountains: Data allows you to monitor the health of important systems in your organization: By utilizing data for quality monitoring, organizations are able to respond to challenges before they become full-blown crisis.
    • Get The Results You Want: Data allows organizations to measure the effectiveness of a given strategy: When strategies are put into place to overcome a challenge, collecting data will allow you to determine how well your solution is performing, and whether or not your approach needs to be tweaked or changed over the long-term.

    Conclusion

    • The fulcrum of India’s data diplomacy should be predicated on the rule of law and the genuine protection of fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution. A commitment to the rule of law and accountability for all actors sets India apart from present adversaries like China and offers an opportunity to burnish its reputation globally.

    Mains question

    Q.Data is considered as new gold across the globe in this context analyse data sovereignty along with status of data diplomacy of India.

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  • A global order caught up in a swirl of chaos

    Context

    Adrift at the end of the 20th century, the world of the 21st century is proving to be highly chaotic.

    Lack of strong European leadership

    • Europe has been undergoing several major changes in recent months
    • Germany, which has steered European politics for almost two wdecades under Angela Merkel, now has a Chancellor (Olaf Scholz) who has hardly any foreign policy experience.
    • Without Germany’s steadying hand, Europe would be virtually adrift in troubled waters.
    • Emmanuel Macron may have been re-elected the President of France, but his wings have been clipped with the Opposition now gaining a majority in the French National Assembly.
    •  The United Kingdom is in deep trouble, if not disarray.
    • Consequently, at a time when actual and moral issues require both deft and firm handling, Europe appears rudderless.
    • Economic impact: Compounding this situation is the negative economic impact of the war in Ukraine.
    • What is evident already is that apart from the spiralling cost of energy, food and fertilizers, quite a few countries confront the spectre of food scarcity given that Ukraine and Russia were generally viewed as the granaries of the world.
    • Apart from this, nations do face several other problems as well, including, in some cases, a foreign exchange crisis.
    • The instruments employed by the West against Russia, such as sanctions, have not had the desired impact as far as the latter is concerned.

    Growing Russia-China closeness and its implications for Indo-Pacific

    • The situation in Europe is still to be decided, but what is also becoming obvious is that outside Europe, the conflict is beginning to take on a different dimension, leading to the emergence of new patchworks of relationships.
    • China’s growing influence in the Pacific region, including in the Indo-Pacific, and further strengthened by the entente with Russia, may hardly be a by-product of the Ukraine-Russia conflict, but it has induced fresh energy into a possible conflict between two rival power blocs.
    • Asia unwilling to take sides: Understanding the changing nature of relationships in Asia, and considering that most Asian nations appear unwilling to take sides in the event of a conflict, is important.
    • No unity of purpose: Unlike the unity and the strength displayed by European nations — there is no evidence of any such unity of purpose in the event that China was to launch a conflict with Taiwan.

    Challenges for India

    • India cannot ignore the situation created by the stronger bonds between Russia and China.
    • Uncertainty about Russia: India will need to determine whether Russia can be expected to play a role as a ‘trusted friend’ of India’s.
    • Again, it would be too much to hope that in dealing with China, India can expect the same kind of support it may need from the Quad.
    • China sidelining India: China, however, seems intent on establishing its dominance and also sidelining India in Asia, which New Delhi would have discerned in the course of the virtual BRICS Summit hosted by China in June.
    • Afghanistan challenge: Apart from China, India also urgently needs to come to terms with a Taliban Afghanistan.
    • Sri Lanka Challenge: At this time, the democratic upsurge in Sri Lanka presents India with a fresh set of problems.
    • In a situation where ‘rage’ and ‘anger’ are the dominant sentiments, there is every reason for concern that even governments that have maintained a ‘hands-off’ relationship could become targets of the new forces emerging in Sri Lanka.

    Major developments in West Asia

    • The Abraham Accords in 2020, which brought about the entente between the United Arab Emirates and Israel, has been the harbinger of certain new trends in the tangled web of relationships among countries of West Asia.
    • But even as the U.S.’s relations with Arab nations in West Asia appear to weaken, Russia and China are beginning to play key roles, with Iran as the fulcrum for establishing new relationships.
    • China continues to steadily build on its connections with the region, and with Iran in particular.
    • How India is dealing with the situation: India has been making steady progress in enlarging its contacts and influence in West Asia.
    •  While the India-Israel relationship dates back to the 1990s, the India-UAE relationship has blossomed in the past couple of years.
    • India-Iran relations, however, seem to have reached a stalemate of late.
    • Issues with I2U2: India has joined a U.S.-based group, the I2U2, comprising India, Israel the UAE and the U.S.
    • Details of the new arrangements are unclear, but it is evident that the target is Iran, as China is for the Quad, injecting yet another element of uncertainty into an already troubled region.

    Implications for nuclear deterrence

    • The argument being adduced is that a wide gap exists today in regard to China and India’s nuclear deterrent capabilities, and implicitly blames India for its voluntary ban on testing and its ‘no-first-use’ doctrine from making progress in this arena.
    • What is also implied is that India could overcome the lacuna by seeking the assistance of western nations which have such capabilities and knowledge.
    • Way forward for India: It is important for India to guard against such pernicious attempts at this time to undo its carefully negotiated and structured nuclear policy and doctrine, and be inveigled into any anti-China western move on this front.

    Conclusion

    Geopolitical experts in the West confine their findings at present solely to the impact of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, believing that this alone would determine not only war and peace but also other critical aspects as well. Significant developments are also taking place in many other regions of the globe, which will have equal if not more relevance to the future of the international governance system.

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  • With partners, India and Japan can form credible deterrence

    Context

    Last week’s report on Asian nuclear transitions by Ashley Tellis of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Japan’s debate on its atomic options underline the shared security challenges for Delhi and Tokyo.

    Common nuclear challenge for India and Japan and need for rethink

    • At the root of that common nuclear challenge is the continuing growth in Chinese military power and the rapid modernisation of Beijing’s nuclear arsenal.
    • 1] Modernising and expansion by China: China is modernising and expanding its nuclear arsenal as part of the general military transformation. Some estimates say China’s arsenal could grow to 1,000 warheads by 2030 from about 350 now.
    • 2] Muscular approach of China:  Xi Jinping’s China has taken a more muscular approach to its territorial disputes, including with India and Japan.
    • 3] Reluctance of the world to confront nuclear power: The Ukraine crisis has revealed that if a nuclear weapon power invades and seizes the territory of a neighbour, the rest of the world is reluctant to directly confront the aggression for fear of an escalation to the nuclear level.
    • Russia made this amply clear with its threat to use nuclear weapons if the US and NATO decide to join the war.

    Nuclear disarmament challenge

    • Indian and Japanese capacity to deter China is eroding steadily thanks to the problems with India’s minimum deterrence posture and the US nuclear umbrella over Japan.
    • India and Japan have long presented themselves as champions of nuclear disarmament.
    • Despite its call for total nuclear disarmament, India never agreed to give up its own nuclear weapons.
    •  Japan, as the world’s victim of nuclear bombing, had even a higher moral claim than India as the champion for the global abolition of nuclear weapons.
    • But Japan’s narrative is shaded by one reality—Tokyo’s reliance on the US nuclear umbrella.
    • Today neither Delhi nor Tokyo is ready to sign the 2017 Treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons.
    • It is the problem presented by the expanding Chinese nuclear arsenal and its growing sophistication.
    • Locked in a confrontation with the US, China is determined to raise its nuclear profile.
    • As China closes the economic and military gap with the US, there is a darkening shadow over the credibility of the US-extended deterrence for Japan.
    • This uncertainty is transforming the Japanese security debate.
    • For India, the question is whether its nuclear restraint and policy of minimum deterrence are enough to prevent China’s bullying.

    How Japan is responding to the challenge?

    • In Japan, former prime minister Shinzo Abe had called for a fresh look at Japan’s nuclear policy.
    • He was suggesting that Tokyo must consider “nuclear weapon sharing” with the US.
    • The model is Europe, where several countries including Belgium, Italy, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands have arrangements to participate in the US nuclear weapon deployment and use.
    • This proposal was rejected by the current prime minister.
    • While rejecting nuclear solutions to the problem of deterring China, Japan’s focus has been on raising the defence expenditure, developing sophisticated conventional weapons, beefing up the alliance with the US and widening the circle of Asian as well as European military partners,

    Suggestions in the report

    • Unlike Japan, India has no constraints on its nuclear weapons programme except the ones it has imposed on itself.
    • In the wake of the nuclear tests of 1998, India quickly announced a policy of minimum deterrence and a doctrine of no-first-use of nuclear weapons.
    • The big question is whether this conservatism in India’s nuclear posture can or should be sustained in the face of China’s military modernisation, nuclear expansion and strategic assertiveness.
    • Fresh debate on nuclear policies: The Tellis report, detailed and technical, should provide a basis for a fresh Indian debate about its nuclear weapons policies.
    • Revising US attitude to India’s nuclear weapons: Tellis also calls on the US to revise its attitudes to India’s nuclear weapons programme.
    • In the past, the US insisted on constraining India’s nuclear weapon programme.
    • Today a strong Indian nuclear deterrent against China is critical for the geopolitical stability of Asia and the Indo-Pacific and in the US interest.
    • Facilitating more sophisticated nuclear warheads: Tellis suggests that the US should be prepared to facilitate India’s development of more sophisticated nuclear warheads as well as improve the survivability of the Indian deterrent against the expanding Chinese nuclear arsenal.
    • The US should midwife an agreement under which France would help India accelerate the development of an Indian underwater deterrent based on ballistic missile carrying submarines (SSBN) as well as nuclear attack submarines (SSN),

    Conclusion

    Tellis is calling both Delhi and Washington to reconsider entrenched nuclear assumptions in the two capitals. While the resistance to his ideas will be strong, Delhi and Washington will have to respond, sooner than later, to the dramatic changes in the global environment triggered by the rise and assertion of China.

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    Back2Basics: Nuclear umbrella

    • At the dawn of the nuclear age, to encourage friendly countries to refrain from building nuclear weapons, the United States promised to protect them with U.S. nuclear weapons.
    • This arrangement came to be called the nuclear umbrella. The experts call it extended nuclear deterrence.
    • The umbrella covers the countries in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), Japan, South Korea, and Australia.
    • It is not a binding legal arrangement included in their security treaties with the United States.
    • It is an informal assurance reinforced by dialogue and, in the case of NATO, cooperative arrangements to deliver U.S. nuclear weapons if authorized by a U.S. president.