India's coalitional diplomacy within the WTO has earned it wide appreciation. What accounts for the success of India's coalitional diplomacy? (UPSC CSE Mains 2018 - Political Science and International Relations, Paper 2)
- Coalition diplomacy developed when Individual states find themselves incapable of making their perspective understand to the International organisation like UN and GATT (General Agreement on trade and tariff). It predates the WTO. First such grouping was Cairns Group of non-subsidizing agricultural producers that first came together a month before the launch of the Uruguay round. Under the leadership of India, the Like Minded Group (LMG) initially brought together countries that opposed the placement of labour standards on the negotiating agenda in the 1996 Singapore Ministerial Conference.
- The LMG “was attempting to restrike the balance of negotiating power in the WTO in favour of the growing majority of developing countries by bringing the negotiating process more into the open, where the large and rich countries would have to leave their backroom machinations behind. On many occasions, India has had to subordinate its own national interest in the interest of that solidarity. Among all the large, developing countries it is India that has consistently worked with the Africans, with the ACP (African, Caribbean and Pacific), with these smaller countries all across the world. For example, G20 made side payments to members of LMG at the time of the Uruguay round.
- Leaders offered concessions in the form of preferential market access for LDCs (Least Developed Countries), and also regional trade arrangements (economic and political) with various members, such as the IBSA (India, Brazil, and South Africa) initiative and India’s Africa Forum. India many times on its own cost has represented the African members’ issues for example during the Doha round India not only helped the AU (African Union) to form a coalition but also helped Tanzania and Uganda on a personal level.
The main reason for the success of India’s Coalitional Diplomacy are:
- The earlier record of India: Whether it was against the Anti-apartheid regime of South Africa or the Colonial powers in Trusteeship Council India always took a stance against it and supported the cause of LDCs. India also played a vital role in providing a platform to LDCs through NAM.
- India’s trade methodology is based upon People to People partnership and not like taking over the whole project as China has been doing in recent past. This further increases India’s standing in the eye of LDCs (mostly in African nations) and they support India for the leadership post in Coalitional Diplomacy.
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