"India's role in world economy and politics has rapidly expanded in the last 20 years, but much of Indian civil society takes little interest in these important developments. The Voluntary Associations Network of India (VANI) has created a resource book that analyses "India's Global Footprint" in fields such as trade, investment, and development cooperation, and looks at the country's role in international forums (BRICS, G20)
This second issue of "Perspectives Asia" provides a forum for the voices of authors from various Asian countries to express their thoughts on possible development models for the region. How can we achieve prosperity for all, without doing long-term damage to nature or threatening the subsistence of entire populations?
In this issue, our authors report on conflicts stemming from coal and copper mining in Afghanistan, India, and Myanmar. The articles on Cambodia and on Inner Mongolia in China illustrate how the traditional economic models and ways of life of indigenous populations suffer from the unrestrained exploitation of raw materials.
India’s global role, or rather perceived potential, is receiving unprecedented attention. But does India have the trappings of a big power and are its institutions ready to play a proactive role in the changing geo - economic, environmental and political context? How has Indian civil society responded to the developments over the past decade? This scoping paper by Benny Kuruvilla attempts to answer some of these questions
