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Биниш
Аспирант второго курса. Российский университет дружбы народов.
Мораль во внешней политике Индии
Binish
Second year PhD student at Peoples Friendship University of Russia.
Morality in Indian foreign policy
What is Foreign Policy?
The term foreign policy is described as '' one could say it is an adjunct of domestic policies aimed at protecting and advancing the country's national interests on the international platform''. Same as in foreign policy, the sovereign state chooses self-serving strategies for safeguarding its national interests via relations with other sovereign countries while achieving its own goals. The foreign policy of India has clearly defined moral objectives, such as reducing poverty, promoting prosperity, peace, and promoting safety and harmony in the country, and throughout the entire globe.
Principles of Indian Foreign Policies
It is essential to consider world situation, where nations have two alternatives: Firstly, the state must have a military, armed forces and armaments to maintain the law and order and internal and external security of the state, secondly, the peaceful means to tackle state security because the race for armaments as means of security will lead to the world in endangers. Above all India considers a neutral approach towards the peaceful co-existence of the world and more fruitful results for human kind. Both philosophically and historically India has a traditional outlook towards peace approach of being free from any kind of damage, harm and prejudice. In this globalised universe, Indian foreign policy is based on moral virtue. After independence Indian foreign policy has been constructed upon the five principles, followed as mutual honour for other states' sovereignty and integrity of the territory; nonviolence or nonaggression; nonintervention in the domestic affairs; equitableness and common interest;
and harmonious coexistence. In this discourse principles of Indian foreign policy has been displaying the neutral, moral and an ethical foundations of it, which followed: Anti-Colonialism, Equal Sovereignty, Non-Aligned, Panch-Sheel and Gujral Doctrine.
Indian ancient philosophy
The Mahabharata, a philosophical foundation of Indian political history, teaches to the king his "rajadharma" duty to protect the morality, justice and security of the people and the welfare of the society. The Mahabharata (a moral code of righteous conduct - According to Hindu philosophy, In Hindu the human life should be governed by an ideal), among the greatest epics of the India, which includes commitment, selfless, liberty, determination, emancipation, duties, impartiality, self-determination, justice, integrity, and preference, As well as in relation to the philosophical debates and their ethical and political implications for in the contemporary era as well. Approximately 2,000 years ago, the Mahabharata was initially written in Sanskrit, it's an ancient most important prime literary language of India, and attributed to a poet named Vyasa or Vedavyasa. Spirituality and morality are considered the guardians of the world, and the state will be governed by dharma ( truth, cosmic law, justice and social duty). Although because in dharma, self-interest is transcended, adherent is never a priority; it is always implicated about the common greater good; whether they are members of a state or not. Furthermore in Hindu philosophy the ruler itself is bound by an ethical rules of dharma so that the state will be safe from the threat of anarchy. As a consequence, the ruler is an avatar (incarnation) of God and therefore he should follow the moral ways to conquer the hearts of the peoples and guide them with the same.
Buddhist philosophy and morality
Buddhism has such a wide variety of traditions that there is no one text could provide a comprehensive history or overview of Buddhist philosophy. Siddhartha Gautama is the Founder of Buddhism philosophy and became known as the Buddha (born in 623B.C.), achieving awakening at Bodh Gaya, India. The word ''Buddha'' basically, a entitle of honour which solely express '' a person having attained enlightenment '' or '' Someone who has woken up'' to the truthfulness. The unique quality of a Buddha, in comparison to other enlightened beings (kwon as arahants), is one who, he or she uncovers and inculcates the path to enlightenment . Buddha ( means enlighten one ) is neither a supernatural being nor a God although he is not portrayed as a Dharma master or prophet, also Buddha is some-
one who is discovering the dhamma and achieving enlightenment entirely through his personal efforts as a human.
As a whole, Buddhist philosophy stressed the transience of reality and the lasting nature of liberation (which is called moksa). Among Buddhist philosophical the main consideration are those that relate to metaphysical, epistemological, ethical, and hermeneutical and the core of this philosophy is the fact that nothing last forever. The ethics and morality which are a part of Buddhist philosophy has always guided Indian politics and foreign policy, as a source of authority and legitimacy, governments have identified moral Buddhist teachings as a source of influence on them and as a source of authority. Even though Buddha completely against of Brahmin dominance in the Hindu social order and he opposed the system which is based on caste (the Hindus can be classified into four main groups: Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras), for him four classes are equal for each other. Resulted it comes to morality and equality for the human being and applies to social and political order. The question has appeared why a parson would had to change his life and start living selflessly. It is because when Buddha saw the old people, sickness in the society, death, ascetics, pain, and deceases then he decided to bring peace and happiness to the troubled world where we live in and for him happiness comes when we follow moral virtue and an ethical code of conduct.
Ethical thoughts of Chanakya's rajaniti (politics)
There was a comparison drawn in Hindu political thought between Niccolo Machiavelli and kautilya of Maurya ( From 317 to 293 B.C., Kautilya served as a minister in the Chandragupta Mauryan kingdom, widely renowned as Vishnugupta and Chanakya), the author of the renowned text, on ancient Hindu Sanskrit treatise entitled Arthasastra containing a mixture of statecraft, political science, economics, and military strategy ( generally, Arthasastra refers to the sastra (science) of artha (treasury of the territories with human population- but actual means as ''the science of government or political science''). While Machiavelli was a completely amoral writer, despite being essentially a moralist, Kautilya appeared such as realist politician. The moral base of Kautilya's philosophy reveals that government should be run on an ethical code of conduct. Despite he has realist views when it comes to statecraft, we can always see the need for an ethical base in his philosophy.
Human rights and the treatment of the invaded ruler and his ministers are also very important to Kautilya, because he believes that the invaded ruler and his ministers should be treated with respect based on human
^rSf rights. In spite of Kautilya's harsh reality, however, he demonstrates a profound knowledge and considerate of justice for criminal and justice in war. This is quite astonishing for a realist man, like Kautilya who shows mercy to those defeated in a war and advocates they be treated humanely and with justice. The moral virtues of Kautilya are best described as rajadhar-ma ( kingly duties), hence he found his political power through dharma or virtue. He describes that state always has a virtuous aspiration; which is to maintains the disciplinary enforcement of the state and the svami the ruler must have guided by the dharma or moral virtue. Furthermore ruler must not use his authority in order to gain personal welfare nor for his people. According to Kautilya a true rule must have control over human nature: such as lobha (avarice), karma (lust), mana (vanity), harsa ( levity) krodha (anger), and mada (insolence). Consequently ruler should be conducted throughout an ethical person to maintain political regime within the territory and as well as with the other states.
Ashoka's Mauryan foreign policy and morality
Many people nowadays talk about co-existence, peace, and nonviolence, but many people are unaware that Ashoka was the first among other ruler to adopt an moral principles into his political framework as the landmark for the administrative and national policies. Ashoka (Ashoka the Great, the son of Bindusara) ruled almost the entire Indian subcontinent from 304 BC to 233 BC and owned the Maurya Empire. Under Ashoka reign the Mauryan Empire attained its greatest geographical extent and power, yet during his early reign the remarkable transformation of the kingdom did not occur through violent means.
He achieved his goals through his embrace of Buddhism as well as his messages of ethics, tolerance and nonviolence throughout the sprawling empire. Ashoka experienced these changes after he conquered Kalinga in a bloody war that Maurya's victory was overwhelming and brutal causing colossal death and suffering, however, Ashoka's deep grief and catastrophe over the deaths and destructions and such a deep sense of pain in Kalinga's conscience that he instantaneously surrendered his desire to be a Dig-Vijaya (it's a military annexation and armed conquest) and made it his main objective to achieve Dhamma-Vijaya (victory of morality). Asoka maintained public order through Maurya's large and powerful army and expanded friendly relations with countries across the world. Furthermore his vision about soft power in modern times is an example of the spreading of his interpretation of "spiritual imperialism", Ashoka appointed moral ministers in remote lands. According to Ashoka's philosophy righteous-
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ness is incapable of attained by all alone separately or absence of an etho-logical branch of knowledge, and ensuring that injustices are avoided and control is maintained over one's own, therefore morality was used as a strategy to unite a large and diverse empire. The Ashokan period portrays the highest point of a virtuous or righteous government regulation in Indian political narration and shouldn't be neglected because these are the rulebook for coming Indian political leaders, how to continue the moral politics in global relations and world politics.
Political theory of Mahatma Gandhi on Morality
The nature of Indian foreign policy and international relations have been influenced by the great Indian nationalist, reformer, lawyer, social activist and philosopher Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (consider as a father of the nation). The place of responsibility to shape the destiny of India by making it an individual responsibility was crucial to his nation's fate and gave us a new way of thinking about the moral project, in which he enlightened us about the role of truth in politics. Gandhi renowned because of his teaching of peaceful and nonaggressive protestation (satyagraha) for the purpose of accomplishment of social as well as political advancement. As Gandhi argued, an ethical stance in politics was both a means of seeking truth and of knowing oneself in ever-greater depth. For Gandhi, violence is the most obvious proof that a legitimate political power has failed. Gandhi's political theory emphasizes the role of internal moral power in shaping politics, rather than from of an arbitrary position of rational violence. The following comment was made by him on January 13, 1930 at the All-India National Education Conference: "There are some people in the world who do not believe that morality and politics are interrelated. We don't care what our leaders are like.. It would have insignificant if Swaraj did not aim and have the intention to civilise and humanise us, purifying us and harmonize and symmetrize our civilization. Civilisation as a whole is based on giving paramount importance to morality in all our decisions, public or private, is because of righteousness occupies a central position in our culture.
An example of Ahimsa in Gandhian philosophy could be viewed as a right action that cultivates a strong connection towards the truthfulness. Truth can only be achieved in a human being if they have moral virtue in themselves, because anyone who does not have an abundance and profound wisdom of humility in self will not discover the truth . Gandhi always follow the thesis that '' good ends can be achieved only with good means'' because "As part of nonviolence requirements, we must use pure means to achieve pure and noncorrupted ends". For him the means should
be pure then only we will be having good ends, because the ends depend on the means. Gratitude is the basis for any political action in the Gandhi-an philosophy, where whenever political action is taken, it demands humanitarian approach. For this reason, Gandhi's theory of political life is a useful alternative to modern understandings of judicial arbitration and legal justification in global political relations. Consequently, such global relation can be more productively handled and a better understanding of political life can be gained in Gandhian philosophy of moral politics.
After independence India's foreign policy
Jawaharlal Nehru was the first Prime Minister, he delivered his Tryst with Destiny (was an English-language speech) speech on the eve of newly independent India in the Parliament of the Indian Constituent Assembly. He is widely recognized as giving one of the great speeches of the 20th century. A milestone in history began "at the midnight on August 15, 1947, India and Pakistan, both at the same time separated and gained independence from the British Empire, signalling the culmination of the largest empire in the historical description."... After independence the main task for India is to stablished and maintain its internal and external affairs with the rest of the world.
For independent India Nehru has shown a strong and positive vision towards international relations and the main two backbone of his conception foreign policies development was anti-colonialism and anti-racialism, which indicate an ethical base of Indian foreign policy toward the world. Basic feature of any foreign policy is to promote the peace and goodwill among the nation he went further asserted on to declare that its self-interest to engage in generosity and collaboration with all nations and to work for the continuation of international peace. Since independence India follows the nuclear disarmament approaches to create a zone free from weapons of mass destruction and supports the UN Organisation's needs for sake of safeguarding and preservation world peace and public security. The Nehru's vision of communication had proved one of the the greatest moral importance and helpful towards the international community because its relevance, Nehru did not wanted to join any power block as well as power politics, considering the Indian point of view, joining either power alliance (The United States or the Soviet Union) is a disadvantage for its own development, therefore, Nehru implemented a non-alignment policy, Hence Nehru considered as the architect of modern India and it's cardinal values were composed of some pillars of Nehru's legacy, those are Secularism, Nation-building, Democratic institution-Building, Demo-
cratic Socialist Economics, egalitarianist, and an ethical Foreign Policies such as (Panchsheel and Non-alignment,).
Indian policies regarding nuclear weapons
Nehru received an advise by Homi Jehangir Bhabha (a physicist from India, is commonly referred to as the inventor of the nuclear program in India) and decided to produce a nuclear device by 1963 the instance demand of political and militarily necessity because in the year 1962 a small border conflict between China and India began the Sino-Indian one-month long war India experienced humiliation and territorial gains by China. However, India obeyed an ethical and moral ideology where the militaries should be disbanded. As a consequence India had realised the immediate need of sufficient military and need of modern weapon to protect its territorial integrity and sovereignty in the not so ethical world. Hence, India initiated its nuclear weapons development after the China invaded Indian in1962.
Among the most important lessons that India learned from our 1962 debacle is that it should never let its guard down and must have the military and logistic capabilities to face any surprise or threat from the world but it does not mean that India will increase the desire for uncontrollable weapons; it merely underlines their concern to avoid any possible form of political blackmail by any nuclear sufficient state further still India is not leaving it's moralistic view of the world. Therefore, Operation Smiling Buddha the first nuclear weapons test conducted in India, having its core ideology toward peaceful coexistence in the world the test was called a "peaceful nuclear explosion". India did not wanted to be a nuclear power, but forced into doing it because in 1990 again its security environment become deteriorated, on the one hand geographically and geopolitically India has tremendous threat from China and on the other hand there is Pakistan. For geo-strategic reasons and the foreseeable future, India had to focus on their nuclear sufficient state status not for war but for security. During the 1998 nuclear tests, India opened up the possibility of being recognized as a responsible nuclear power and as for India, there is a ''No First Use Policy'', in another words it demonstrates that India have promised to the world that nuclear weapons will never be used by them in a conflict or against any other non-nuclear weapon state.
Influence of soft power in Indian foreign policy
The concept of power at the level of global affairs has predominantly been determined and measured in tangible terms as ''hard'', frequently in terms of forces and commercial. Coercion often used, such as military ca-
pacity, application of force , economic sanctions and incentivised expenditures are known as hard power. As distinguished from unlike coercive power, which has an coercive nature, on the other hand soft power involves positive persuasion and attraction. Though power is a debatable concept, not a single definition of power is acceptable by the whole world. Numerous thinkers borrowed the explanation conceived by Max Weber, (a famous German sociologist, historian, and political economist) according to him, power is the capability to exert influence over others (Weber 1922).
In late 1980, American scholar and frequent policy maker Joseph Nye had formulated the concept of ''soft power''. Essentially, he categorized soft power into three broad following categories: culture, political values, and foreign policy. However, at the same time Kenneth Waltz masterpiece '' theory of international politics ( Waltz 1979) published, simultaneously Robert O. Keohane and Joseph Nye released a book '' Power and Interdependence: World politics in Transition''. In the complex interdependence globalised world neo-liberalist argued that the state is not the only important player and in addition to the role of the military, security was not the only concern and the army did not represent a sufficient power resourcefulness. Furthermore in the context of power international relations, realism is not an insufficient and inappropriate approach; it is alone and precisely not sufficient. Therefore, soft power in an interdependence complex world become important for any foreign policy to maintain healthy relations in order to achieve peaceful coexistence and better future of human kind. International relations is an anarchical realm; there is no single world government that exists to provide full controlled order to this anarchy and to mitigate this one can use soft power as a tool and the vision of ''Soft power'' is a strong card of Indian foreign policy and its biggest instrument was its diaspora, culture, civilisations, democratism, it is a independent press, free judicial system, progressive civic community and value for individual equities. Furthermore there are many aspects of India's soft power capability such as - Bollywood movies, its food and handicraft, lots of other factors, contribute to India's soft power potential over centuries where India has volunteered refuge and cultural and religious freedom. democratic credentials, secular values, pluralistic credentials, a significant pool of skilled English-speaking professionals, handicraft and its political legitimacy, which is lied at the core of ''soft power'' of any state. As mention above we can say India has been using its ''soft power'' before the concept of ''soft power '' has been introduced in international relation. A concept of soft power has more to do with the moral foundation of international affairs than it does with any kind of traditional main actor of any
state or influential actor of international relations.
Indian and world peace
In nature and connection with an ethical values, India has always faith in global peace, therefore it has strong believe in global peace community and organisation such as United Nation Organisation and its different branchias and organs. Staffmembers at the United Nations are held to high standards of an ethical conduct when they exemplify honesty, truthfulness, impartiality, and incorruptibility. Since India is a founding member of the UN, In addition to supporting the principles and objectives of the UN, as a fastest developing nation. India shows its faith in its foreign policy and belief that United Nations principles and international norms remain the most effective way of confronting issues associated with the program of sustainable development and sustainable economic growth, protection of environmental conditions, elimination of poverty, change in earth's climate, peacekeeping and peace-making, antiterrorism, arms reduction, fundamental and individual rights, immigration, good health condition, and universal pandemics. When it comes to Indian Contribution in Peacekeeping, India has served in UN peacekeeping for a very long time, contributing more personnel than any other country, which serves as a testament to its an ethical foreign policy towards peace and stability. More than 49 missions were carried out by Indian peacekeepers, the highest number among all participating countries, and more than 168 Indian peacekeepers have given their lives. As well as providing force commanders for UN missions, over the ages, it has become a tradition throughout the world that Women from India are comprehensively participating although carefully taking up multiple positions and posting in UN peacekeeping missions.
Contemporary India's Foreign Policy
In an unethical arena, Indian diplomacy has been carrying a moralising tone to its foreign policy. Since ancient times, in India ethics and morality have been the hallmark of public as well as political life of the people. Due to its an ethical foreign policy, India holds an important and prominent place in the changing global environment compared to other nations, although the country is still struggling with the 19th century problems such as conventional security, energy security, economic growth, nuclear capability, non-proliferation, international terrorism, ecological issues and global health and challenges to overcome from the impact of the pandemic of covid-19. Although, it is important for India's foreign affairs in this contemporary world to be closely aligned with its fundamental security and
■ developmental priorities and further India wanted to spared its moral base
of foreign policy to entire universe for its peace.
In conclusion, I would like to draw attention to among the most important factor of the foreign policy of Indian that have been taches to the universe a moral code of conduct which can be also applicable in politics and in external affairs. At present violence, terrorism, human rights abuses, discrimination, poverty, destitution and running for the armaments are common concerns in many parts of the world. Considering the present-day crisis faced by the world today, moral teachings continue to have great relevance. To keep peace and happiness in our society and in the global community, we must be united and follow an ethical code of conduct among the countries relations with each other. We can end up this paper at the quote of that there is no permanent friends but permanent interest, which we can achieve through moral teachings of a state in the globalised world and as Gandhi said ethics tells us what it ought to be and how human being should act in society with the awareness of the essential unity of humanity.
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