EVENTS

Abstract

The presentation offers a critical comparative analysis of India-China relations at the sub-regional level that remains an understudied aspect in both research and policy. It situates their evolving dynamics within the rubric of the massive state-led developmental thrust that India’s Northeast and China’s Western border regions are currently witnessing. The presentation argues that India and China’s parallel moves in the sub-region have tended to be studied as isolated cases with little attempt at comparison. This has been a curious omission at a time when processes of sub-regional integration are rescaling in India and China and call for the need to disaggregate our understanding beyond solely national frames of reference. Even less understood is the nature of India-China interactions at this level and the implications their concurrent moves hold for the dyad. The presentation attempts to fill this gap by interrogating the capacity of border narratives in India and China to move beyond linear modes of problem solving and shift the focus to local sites, towards issues that have a direct bearing on those living on the frontiers.

About the Speaker

Dr. Nimmi Kurian is an Associate Professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, and Indian Representative at India China Institute, the New School, New York. Her work includes comparative research on the India-China borderlands, subnational economic diplomacy, approaches to regionalism and trans-border resource governance.