Does India Negotiate?

Abstract As a key state in the international system, India’s positions and contributions on issues like climate change, global health, humanitarian crises, and nuclear disarmament significantly affect how these issues are addressed. Scholarly work mapping India’s multilateral behaviour has extended from covering the United Nations to a wide range of fora where India is seeking to shape issues that affect its security and development. Yet, the literature on Indian multilateralism lags, focusing disproportionately on India’s ostensibly obstructionist tendencies without adequately contextualizing why India behaves this way. There has been no serious exploration of how India concretely negotiates multilateral issues. In this book, Karthik Nachiappan investigates how India negotiates international rules covering issues like climate change, nuclear disarmament, tobacco control and international trade. By unpacking these negotiations, he shows that India’s multilateral persona is more nuanced than is generally understood. When interests converge, Indian negotiators are willing to shape and ratify international agreements, conceding when necessary to cut deals and make compromises.