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Why is SAARC gridlocked and how can it be revitalised?

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In Brief

On 8 December 2010, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) celebrated its twenty-fifth Charter Day. SAARC is not only growing but increasingly being accepted at multilateral forums as representative of its member states.

For instance, SAARC was recently accepted as an observer at the United Nations Climate Change Conference at Cancun. But unfortunately, unlike its older cousins the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), SAARC has never managed to fully take off and continues to be a nominal entity.

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While it is common to lay the blame at the door of Indo-Pakistani rivalry, the reasons for SAARC’s failure are in fact deeper and structural in nature. A constellation of geographical, ethnic, historical and political factors have gridlocked SAARC. The gridlock will persist unless India adopts proactive confidence-building measures.

India can, and should, act.

 

Myriad hindrances to regional cooperation

 

A key reason for SAARC’s failure is that one of its members is much larger than all of its other members put together. India accounts for at least three-fifths of SAARC’s area, population, GDP (on a purchasing-power parity basis), foreign exchange and gold reserves, and armed forces. The enormous resource and power differentials naturally translate into an acute sense of insecurity in the neighbourhood. Furthermore, SAARC’s second largest country — Pakistan — is not that small either, which results in polarisation instead of regional harmony. Also, because of its enormous geographical expanse, India shares a land and/or maritime boundary with all other SAARC countries, while they (except for Pakistan and Afghanistan) do not share boundaries with each other and have India as their sole South Asian neighbour. International borders in South Asia are still not all settled beyond dispute, and conventional conflicts are not decreasing in shared border areas. So India, as the largest SAARC country, finds itself entangled in conventional conflicts with almost all other SAARC countries, which further accentuates their sense of insecurity.

The insecurity of smaller countries engenders demand for external intervention in South Asian conflicts. South Asia’s strategic location in the middle of Southeast, Central and West Asia, and at the centre of the Indian Ocean, ensures an adequate supply of such intervention.

But geography is not the only culprit. Differences in political systems also make regional cooperation difficult. Except for India, none of SAARC’s members have a stable, secular democracy. Unfortunately, the convergence of political systems is unlikely in the near future. The problem was aggravated in the past because of India’s pro-democracy rhetoric. In recent times, however, this problem has to some extent changed because on the one hand India has toned down its rhetoric, and on the other democracy has begun to put down roots in SAARC countries such as Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives and Nepal, while Sri Lanka is actively encouraging its Tamil minorities to participate in the democratic process.

Furthermore, historical differences add to the intractability of disputes among SAARC’s members. Countries that came into existence after the bloody Partition of British India continue to define their relationships in terms of their unfortunate formative experiences and unresolved Partition disputes. Inter-state conflicts in SAARC are relatively unmanageable, also because the majority ethnic communities in each of India’s neighbours are minorities in India. The last problem is aggravated by the Islamic rhetoric of Pakistan’s foreign policy.

 

How to revitalise?

 

In short, the extreme power differential coupled with divisive political, ethnic and historical factors have engendered intense distrust within SAARC. The smaller countries try to bandwagon with external powers or to balance between India and outside powers. Unsurprisingly, regional cooperation is not only hampered by local factors but is also thwarted by external powers that exploit local fault lines. Is there a way out?

There are two alternatives. First, like-minded SAARC countries could form a sub-group and move along. But cooperation within any sub-group that includes India will be limited by the very factors that limited cooperation within SAARC, whereas any sub-group that does not include India will suffer from a lack of contiguity and capacity constraints.

Second, one or more members can take initiatives to reduce the trust deficit and to rejuvenate SAARC. India is the only SAARC country that can viably afford unilateral measures. This is true not only because of its large economy, but also because of the multiple levels on which it operates. If, for example, Bangladesh unilaterally reduces tariffs on imports its domestic industries will suffer in the short run. However, if India took such a step, its industries would not be affected. If such a step helped to reduce regional tensions, India would get an additional bonus from being able to concentrate on its global agenda, which in turn would reduce the cost of its unilateral measures. Such additional payoffs are not available to other SAARC countries, even if they could afford unilateralism.

In short, India can, and therefore should, bear the cost of rejuvenating SAARC. Otherwise India will remain tethered to South Asia by regional conflicts.

Vikas Kumar is an independent researcher based in Bangalore.

This article is an abridged version of an article that was first published here on the Clingendael Asia Forum.

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