Policy Brief No.167: Great Power Competition, Stillborn Democracies and the Rise of Neo-Authoritarians: The Case of India

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This Policy Brief considers the case of India, which is instructive in understanding how a state-oriented world organisation can fuel geopolitical competition, impede the goal of achieving substantive democracy, and facilitate the rise of neo-authoritarians. Over the course of the last century, important voices from around the world warned of the destructive potential of nationalism and the way nation states were being constituted. They contemplated a wholly different way of organising the world system. The prescience of their concerns is painfully evident today as we witness the world hurtling down the path of illiberalism, climate calamity, and endless wars, with global bodies seemingly helpless in moderating the capitalist imperative of growth, the rise of populist demagogues, or ruinous interstate competition.