India's states and the making of foreign economic policy: The limits of the constituent diplomacy paradigm

Publius: The Journal of Federalism

Volumn 33, Issue 4, 2003, Pages 63-81

  Jenkins, Rob ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LONDON   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 5644229892     PISSN: 00485950     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/oxfordjournals.pubjof.a005013     Document Type: Review

References (54)

1. This term was coined by Anthony Giddens in his BBC Reith Lectures for 1999. These were subsequently published as Runaway World: How Globalization is Reshaping our Lives (London: Profile Books, 1999).
2. nd ed. (Cambridge: Polity, 1999). Hirst and Thompson identify the work of Kenichi Ohmae as a paradigmatic example of this school of thought. See Kenichi Ohmae, The Borderless World: Power and Strategy in the Interlinked Economy (London: Fontana, 1990); and Kenichi Ohmae, The End of the Nation State: The Rise of Regional Economies (New York: Harper Collins, 1995).
3. nd ed. (Cambridge: Polity, 1999). Hirst and Thompson identify the work of Kenichi Ohmae as a paradigmatic example of this school of thought. See Kenichi Ohmae, The Borderless World: Power and Strategy in the Interlinked Economy (London: Fontana, 1990); and Kenichi Ohmae, The End of the Nation State: The Rise of Regional Economies (New York: Harper Collins, 1995).
4. nd ed. (Cambridge: Polity, 1999). Hirst and Thompson identify the work of Kenichi Ohmae as a paradigmatic example of this school of thought. See Kenichi Ohmae, The Borderless World: Power and Strategy in the Interlinked Economy (London: Fontana, 1990); and Kenichi Ohmae, The End of the Nation State: The Rise of Regional Economies (New York: Harper Collins, 1995).
5. Giddens places Hirst and Tompson, Globalization in Question, in this camp, but it would also include Linda Weiss, The Myth of the Powerless State (Cambridge: Polity, 1998) and more recent hooks, such as Alan Shipman, The Globalization Myth (Cambridge: Icon Books, 2002).
6. Giddens places Hirst and Tompson, Globalization in Question, in this camp, but it would also include Linda Weiss, The Myth of the Powerless State (Cambridge: Polity, 1998) and more recent hooks, such as Alan Shipman, The Globalization Myth (Cambridge: Icon Books, 2002).
7. Giddens places Hirst and Tompson, Globalization in Question, in this camp, but it would also include Linda Weiss, The Myth of the Powerless State (Cambridge: Polity, 1998) and more recent hooks, such as Alan Shipman, The Globalization Myth (Cambridge: Icon Books, 2002).
8. Theorists such as Anne-Marie Slaughter have argued, based on cases of central regulatory agencies conducting negotiations with their counterparts from other nation-states, that "the State is not disappearing; it is disaggregating into its component institutions." Anne-Marie Slaughter, "Governing the Global Economy through Government Networks," The Role of Law in International Politics, ed. Michael Byers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 178.
9. John Kincaid, "Constituent Diplomacy in Federal Politics and the Nation-State: Conflict and Cooperation," Federalism and International Relations: The Role of Subnational Units, eds. Hans Michelmann and Panayotis Soldatos (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), pp. 55-76; see also John Kincaid, "Constituent Diplomacy: U.S. State Roles in Foreign Affairs," Constitutional Design and Power-Sharing in the Post-Modern Epoch, ed. Daniel J. Elazar (Lanham, MD: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and University Press of America, 1991), pp. 107-142.
10. John Kincaid, "Constituent Diplomacy in Federal Politics and the Nation-State: Conflict and Cooperation," Federalism and International Relations: The Role of Subnational Units, eds. Hans Michelmann and Panayotis Soldatos (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), pp. 55-76; see also John Kincaid, "Constituent Diplomacy: U.S. State Roles in Foreign Affairs," Constitutional Design and Power-Sharing in the Post-Modern Epoch, ed. Daniel J. Elazar (Lanham, MD: Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and University Press of America, 1991), pp. 107-142.
11. John Kincaid, "Roles of Constituent Governments," (paper for the Forum of Federations seminar on "Foreign Relations of Constituent Units," Winnipeg, Canada, 11-12 May 2001).
12. Ibid., 3.
13. Rob Jenkins, Democratic Politics and Economic Reform in India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
14. Aseema Sinha, "Ideas, Interests and Institution in Policy Change: A Comparison of West Bengal and Gujarat," Regional Reflections: Comparing Politics Across India's States, ed. Rob Jenkins (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004).
15. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, "Economic Performance and States in Post-Reforms Period," Economic and Political Weekly 35, 6 May 2000, pp. 1637-1648.
16. Rob Jenkins, "How Federalism Influences India's Domestic Politics of WTO Engagement (And is Itself Affected in the Process)," Asian Survey 43 (July/August 2003): 598-621.
17. Aseema Sinha, Divided Leviathan: The Regional Roots of Developmental Politics in India (typescript, forthcoming from Indiana University Press), p. 36.
18. N. Chandrababu Naidu (with Sevanti Ninan), Plain Speaking (New Delhi: Viking, 2000).
19. rd Annual International Studies Association Convention, New Orleans, 24-27 March 2002).
20. For his use of the term "perforated sovereignty," see Ivo D. Duchacek, "Perforated Sovereignties: Towards a Typology of New Actors in International Relations," Federalism and International Relations: The Role of Subnational Units, eds. Hans Michelmann and Panayotis Soldatos (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), pp. 1-33.
21. For his use ot the term "multilayered diplomacy," see Brian Hocking, Localising Foreign Policy (London: Macmillan, 1993), and "Patrolling the Frontier: Globalization, Localization and the Actorness of Non-Central Governments," Paradiplomacy in Action, eds. Francisco Aldecoa and Michael Keating (London: Frank Cass, 1993), pp. 17-39.
22. For his use ot the term "multilayered diplomacy," see Brian Hocking, Localising Foreign Policy (London: Macmillan, 1993), and "Patrolling the Frontier: Globalization, Localization and the Actorness of Non-Central Governments," Paradiplomacy in Action, eds. Francisco Aldecoa and Michael Keating (London: Frank Cass, 1993), pp. 17-39.
23. Sridharan, "Federalism and Foreign Relations," pp. 8-9.
24. Ibid., 3.
25. Ibid., 5.
26. Ibid., 16.
27. Ibid., 10.
28. Lloyd I. Rudolph and Susanne Hoeber Rudolph, "Iconization of Chandrababu: Sharing Sovereignty in India's Federal Market Economy," Economic and Political Weekly 36, 5 May 2001, pp. 1541-1552.
29. Stephen Krasner, "Abiding Sovereignty," International Political Science Review 22 (July 2001): 229-251.
30. Rob Jenkins, "The Emergence of the Governance Agenda: Sovereignty, Neo-Liberal Bias and the Politics of International Development," The Companion to Development Studies, ed. Vandana Desai (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001).
31. I am grateful to Varya Shaw, of Birkbeck College, University of London, for this reading of Krasner.
32. See The Hindu, 27 December 1998.
33. Rudolph and Rudolph, "Iconization of Chandrahabu," p. 1546.
34. Ibid., 1544.
35. Another policy domain in which the Government of India has reasserted its regulatory supremacy, having previously delegated authority to the states, concerns the granting of certain mining leases. See "Mining Rights to States in Aravali Withdrawn," Hindustan Times, 6 March 2003.
36. Rudolph and Rudolph, "Iconization of Chandrababu," p. 1547.
37. The United Kingdom's Department for International Development (DFID) stated in July 1999, for instance, that it saw "good prospects for DFID to form effective partnerships with progressive state governments." DFID, India: Country Strategy Paper (London, DFID: July 1999), p. 1.
38. Interview with two senior Indian Administrative Service officers, one formerly on assignment in New Delhi, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, 13 February 2002.
39. But substantive issues have become matters of concern as well. For instance, provisions in the World Bank-funded Velugu program in Andhra Pradesh were of interest to officials in the Union Ministry of Rural Development. These concerned the norms to be followed in implementing participatory development schemes as well as the criteria to be used in selecting projects, triggering disbursements, and auditing programs. These are all subject to various central guidelines, and officials in New Delhi discussed these in detail with World Bank representatives prior to the negotiations with the Government of Andhra Pradesh. Interviews with a senior Indian Administrative Service officer and a mid-ranking officer of the Andhra Pradesh Administrative Service, both knowledgeable about high-level discussions on rural development policies, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, 13 and 14 February 2002.
40. For a considered analysis, see Arun Ghosh, "Bureaucratic Centralization: The Eleventh Finance Commission Adds a Nail to the Coffin of Federal Finance," Frontline 18, 3-10 February 2001; http:// www.frontlineonnet.com/f11803/18031040.htm.
41. See World Bank News Release No: 2002/238/SAR, http://lnweb18.worldbank. org/news/press release.nsf/673fa6c5a2d50a67852565e200692a79/ 3a68a0a566257e1385256b7c007240f9?OpenDocument. Accessed on 15 November 2002.
42. This dependence has been observed by civil society groups, such as the Federation of Farmers' Associations of Andhra Pradesh, whose president emphasized the central government's usurpation of power in the area of agriculture in a press release entitled, "Appeal to Political Parties: Don't Create Misapprehension about Biotechnology" (Hyderabad, February 2002).
43. Some states-West Bengal, Punjab, and Tamil Nadu, among them- have taken the Government of India to court, demanding that the legally mandated federal division of powers be reinstated. This would, in effect, require the Government of India to renounce its commitments under the Agreement on Agriculture, on the ground that it lacks the authority to ensure their fulfillment.
44. This was a point of public debate as far back as the run-up to the completion of the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations. See, for instance, "Will Indian Silk Producers be Outsold in a Free Trade Era?" Economic Times, 29 October 1994.
45. V. Sridhar, "Storm in Tea Country," Frontline 17, 19 August-1 September 2000; http:// www.frontlineonnet.com/f11717/17170460.htm.
46. R. Krishnakumar, "The Battle of Koorachundu," Frontline 17, 23 December 2000-5 January 2001; http://www.frontlineonnet.com/f11726/17260980.htm.
47. Indeed, one student of Indian politics has observed that even this form of "executive federalism," to say nothing of "legislative federalism," has "neither been consolidated nor institutionalised, " arguing that "the conference of Chief Ministers continues to be an ad hoc arrangement that is convened according to the Prime Minister's convenience on specific issues." See the comments by Balveer Arora in Roundtable on Mechanism of Intergovernmental Relations (New Delhi: Institute of Social Sciences, 2002), p. 14.
48. Julius Sen, "Lessons Not Learned: India's Trade Policymaking Process from Uruguay to Doha," The Domestic Politics of The WTO: Democratic Institutions and National Trade Policymaking, ed. Rob Jenkins, forthcoming.
49. It is worth noting the structural similarity between this ambiguity (concerning the WTO's significance for the sovereignty debate) and the ambiguity inherent in the idea of constituent diplomacy, as evidenced by the contradictory uses to which the idea was put by hyperglobalists and skeptics in their disagreement over state sovereignty.
50. Krasner, "Abiding Sovereignty."
51. Narendar Pani, among others, has noted the numerous ways in which India's trade negotiators would have benefited had they viewed things from the perspective of state governments. This does not imply that states have collectively evolved a coherent position beyond subsidy-preservation demands of the sort embodied in the objectives for a "Development Box." See N. Pani, "Do States Have a Role in the WTO?" Economic Times, 16 June 2000.
52. The further political implications of this dynamic, in the context of civil society activism on Public Distribution System issues in Maharashtra, is discussed in Rob Jenkins and Anne Marie Goetz, "Civil Society Engagement and India's Public Distribution System: Lesson's from the Rationing Kruti Samiti in Mumbai" (paper presented at the World Bank World Development Report 2004 Workshop, Eynsham Hall, Oxfordshire, 4-5 November 2002).
53. See www.righttofood.com. Accessed on 10 January 2003.
54. One analysis that has charted the demise of Russia's version of constituent diplomacy is Pran Chopra, "A Tale of Two Federations" (paper presented at the Roundtable on Mechanisms of Intergovernmental Relations in India, 22 April 2002, New Delhi). Chopra argues that one of Putin's first acts was to reverse the process, begun by Yeltsin, in which the former president had, in his 1996 re-election campaign, "promised to give the federating units 'as much sovereignty as they could eat' in exchange for their votes" (p. 3). Putin's approach undid much of the decentralization that had taken place under Yeltsin, but by no means all of it. The government has faced difficulties on issues such as the assignment of powers over conferment of land ownership; see W.J. Tompson, "Russian Federation: Government Moves on Long-Awaited Land Reform," Eastern European Newsletter, February 2001, pp 18-20.