Book Review: Chris Ogden, New South Asian Security: Six Core Relations Underpinning Regional Security
| Date | 01 January 2018 |
| Published date | 01 January 2018 |
| Author | Mithila Urmila Bagai |
| DOI | 10.1177/0020881717728767 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
Book Reviews 81
The BID is an interesting concept liable to generate interest, but the discussion
was very limited. It is hoped that Kathleen will add more to many of the new
concepts developed in this book in her future research. To conclude, the all-
encompassing approach of the book is its merit and therefore, a suggested reading
for the beginners as well as for scholars of border studies.
Dhananjay Tripathi
Assistant Professor, Department of International Relations,
South Asian University, New Delhi, India
E-mail: dhananjay@sau.ac.in
Chris Ogden, New South Asian Security: Six Core Relations Underpinning
Regional Security (Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan, 2016), 183 pp., `750.
DOI: 10.1177/0020881717728767
It is norms that define the security practices of a country and Chris Ogden in this
seminal piece of work intends to put forth the shared beliefs and commonalities
that can help in achieving stability and security in the South Asian region. The book
gains greater eminence at a time when the USA is growing more inwards and is
receding from its global hegemonic role of being a provider of public goods.
It, then, befalls on two rising powers, India and China, to resolve their mutual
conflicts, shed historically hostile norms that have been guiding their foreign
policy and assume leadership roles to achieve a prosperous and developed
regio n or to realize the dream of an Asian century. Ogden correctly chooses four
countries—two growing powers, India and China, and two failing states, Pakistan
and Afghanistan—that will set the future course of South Asian region. The former
will elevate the region with their growth and development, whereas the conflicts
and contradictions in the latter will vitiate that success.
The introductory chapter sets the theme of this slim volume that the six key
bilateral relations between four countries—India–China, Pakistan–Afghanistan,
Pakistan–India, Afghanistan–China, Pakistan–China and India–Afghanistan—has
been looked from a constructivist paradigm, and constitutive norms—the ones
that define identity and regulative norms—that regulate/constrain behaviour have
been used to analyse their conduct in foreign affairs.
Chapter 1, ‘India–China Relations: Norms, Perceptions and Geo-Politics’, by
David Scott, a prolific writer on China, juxtaposes the convergence of global
norms between the two rising powers India and China with their contradictions at
the regional level. Though India and China have shared norms of making the world
multipolar, reducing US hegemony, wanting democratization in international
institutions, making global governance more representative, asserting ‘differentia ted
responsibilities’ in climate change forum and demanding fair and just trade regu-
lations for developing countries at the WTO, but the readers will agree that its
realist and nationalist aims guide China more than the utopian ideas of achieving
global justness and fairness. The norms at the closer home get markedly different.
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