Sumit Ganguly Research Collection

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Conflict and Crisis in South and Southwest Asia
(M.I.T. Press, 1996) Ganguly, Sumit
South and Southwest Asia are fraught with a range of conflicts. The central inter-state conflict in the region is, of course, the Indo-Pakistani dispute over Kashmir. Virtually all the other conflicts in the region are intra-state conflicts, but with important regional dimensions. They are, starting from the western periphery of South and Southwest Asia, the impact of the disintegration of Afghanistan on Pakistan and the Sindhi-muhajir conflict in Sindh. Conflicts within India include the separatist insurgencies in Kashmir and Punjab, and problems caused by the Uttarkhand movement in Uttar Pradesh, the Naxalite movement in Andhra Pradesh, the Jharkhand movement in Bihar and West Bengal, the Gorkhaland movement in West Bengal, the Bodo tribal movement in Assam, the nativist movement in Assam, and the Naga-Kuki conflict in Nagaland. In addition to these regionally based movements and conflicts, India is also contending with Hindu-Muslim religious and caste-based conflicts. In Bangladesh, the Chakma hill tribes movement in the Chittagong Hill Tracts is the focal point of the country's principal internal conflict. Hindu-Muslim tensions have also resulted in violence in Bangladesh. In Sri Lanka, the principal conflict is a particularly violent one revolving around Tamil-Sinhalese differences.
Introduction: Government Policies and Ethnic Relations in Asia and the Pacific
(M.I.T. Press, 1997) Brown, Michael E.
Ethnic problems are widespread in contemporary world affairs. They are troublesome at best; politically, economically, and socially disruptive as a general rule; and horrifyingly violent at worst. In this book, we seek to advance understanding of ethnic problems by analyzing government policies with respect to ethnic groups, ethnic issues, and ethnic conflicts in Asia and the Pacific. Our contention is that government policies almost always have a significant impact on the course and trajectory of ethnic relations in the country in question. Through neglect, by accident, and by design, they can push countries in the direction of instability, conflict, and inequity, on the one hand, or stability, harmony, and justice, on the other. However, the extent to which and the ways in which government policies can affect ethnic dynamics have not received much focused attention in research and scholarship on the subject, and government policies have not been examined from a broad comparative perspective.
India vs. Pakistan: Revisiting the Pacifying Power of Democracy
(M.I.T. Press, 1997) Ganguly, Sumit
At the end of the Cold War, South Asia remains one of the most conflict-ridden regions of the world. In addition to the various insurgencies and civil wars that have wracked the subcontinent, the two major powers in South Asia, India and Pakistan, have fought three wars: in 1947—48, 1965, and 1971. More recently, in 1987 and 1990, India and Pakistan have teetered on the brink of war, and border skirmishes are common. The central dispute in the region, the Indo-Pakistani conflict over the state of Jammu and Kashmir, continues to animate national elites and mass populations in both states. Since 1989, India has been suppressing an insurgency in Kashmir—an insurgacy that, despite formal denials from Islamabad, Pakistan has been aiding since at least early 1990. While Pakistan's involvement in the uprising has renewed Indo-Pakistani tensions, it is unlikely that either side will deliberately precipitate a fourth war in die region; nevertheless, another war could ensue from a spiral of hostility and mutual misperception, such as occurred in 1987 and 1990.
Ethnic Preferences and Political Quiescence in Malaysia and Singapore
(M.I.T. Press, 1997) Ganguly, Sumit
Few multiethnic, postcolonial states have successfully formulated and implemented policies to stave off violent interethnic conflict. The reasons underlying the shortcomings of public policy in multiethnic states are complex. Significantly, however, the vast majority of these states emerged from colonial rule with weak and poorly developed political institutions. The existence of well-developed political institutions can enable a state to channel, mediate, and limit political demands that the forces of modernization unleash. Robust political institutions do not, of course, guarantee ethnic peace. Institutions, unless maintained, can decline and lose their utility.
Introduction: Fighting Words: Language Policies and Ethnic Relations in Asia
(M.I.T. Press, 2003) Ganguly, Sumit; Brown, Michael E.
This book is based on three premises. First, ethnic problems are important policy problems. Very few countries are ethnically homogeneous, which means that most countries have to contend with ethnic problems of one kind or another.l These problems often have tremendous political, economic, social, and military consequences. They can disrupt political and economic development in countries that are struggling to advance. When ethnic problems turn violent, countries can be ripped apart, entire regions can be destabilized, and the humanitarian consequences can be staggering. Second, language is an important issue in many ethnic settings. Language is a critical marker for many groups—defining the boundaries of the group and determining membership in the group. In multiethnic settings, language policies have far-reaching effects in the educational, economic, and political arenas. Languages policies are therefore contentious issues in multiethnic countries. Third, although ethnic problems and conflicts are influenced by a wide range of factors, they are shaped to a significant degree by the decisions and policies of political leaders and governments. Government policies must be taken into account if we are to understand the dynamics of ethnic problems and if we are to develop effective responses to these problems.
India's Rise in Asia
(Rowman and Littlefield, 2008) Ganguly, Sumit
The last decade has witnessed a dramatic transformation of India's foreign and economic policies. These changes have fundamentally enhanced India's profile in Asia and beyond. India has forged significant ties with the economically dynamic parts of Southeast Asia, signed an important free trade agreement with Singapore, become a member of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), and has broadened its relationship with Japan. Through the forging of multiple bilateral and multilateral ties, it is seeking to assert itself as a significant actor in the region.
India and Bangladesh
(Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005) Ganguly, Sumit
This paper will assess the "quality of democracy" in India and Bangladesh. It argues that the democratic successes and failures in these two countries are in large measure a function of the sociopolitical milieu within which the democratic transitions took place in both states. It will also argue that despite a range of striking shortcomings India has made significant progress in a number of arenas toward enhancing the quality of its democracy. Bangladesh, on the other hand, has failed to make similar progress. Instead, there is much evidence that suggests that the quality of democracy in Bangladesh is actually declining.
Avoiding War in Kashmir
(Foreign Affairs, 1990) Ganguly, Sumit
Will the current simmering conflict over Kashmir lead to another subcontinental war? This complex question has plagued India-Pakistan relations since both countries gained independence in 1947, and over the past year tensions in the area have risen sharply. Continuing border skirmishes threaten an already precarious situation, in which international and domestic politics are intertwined with the passions of rival ethnic, religious and partisan interests.
Behind India’s Bomb
(Foreign Affairs, 2001) Ganguly, Sumit
The Indian nuclear tests of May 11 and 13, 1998, shook an unsuspecting world. Long at the forefront of the movement for universal nuclear disarmament, India had continually chastised the five declared nuclear powers (the United States, Russia, China, France, and the United Kingdom) for not moving to eliminate their nuclear arsenals as called for by the 197o nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. After demonstrating its own nuclear capacity in 1974, India had refrained from testing for more than two decades. And apparently, neither the emergence of a government in New Delhi led by the right-of-center Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) nor the Indian elites' deep reservations about the global nonproliferation regime had disturbed this quiescence. Indian decision-makers had indicated that they would not carry out nuclear tests until they had completed a lengthy "strategic review' of security threats and how best to cope with them.
Pakistan’s Slide into Misery
(Foreign Affairs, 2002) Ganguly, Sumit
Late this summer, General Pervez Musharraf-Pakistan's self-appointed president and chief executive-delivered yet another devastating blow to the country's democratic prospects. At an August 21 press conference, Musharraf announced 29 new amendments to the constitution that vastly strengthened the powers of the military and the executive. Among other prerogatives, these amendments gave the president (who will be Musharraf for at least the next five years, thanks to the fraud-ridden "referendum" held in April) the power to dismiss Pakistan's legislature-effectively making all of parliament's actions subject to his approval. Another innovation, the National Security Council, formally institutionalized the already pervasive role of the military in the country's politics.
Ascending Major Powers
(Yale University Press, 2017) Ganguly, Sumit; Thompson, William
We live in an era of structural change. The global system leader's position has declined relative to what it once was. States that were once impoverished are climbing their way up the economic income ladder. One or two of them are large enough, it would appear, to eventually challenge the world's lead economy position. But such a challenge is not likely in the immediate future. It will require a great deal more economic development, for one thing. China and India still possess low-income economics, and they need to continue moving toward high-income economies, Not many countries have been successful in this type of transition. Stalling in the middle-income level may be just as probable as ascending ultimately to the top of the system. Along the way, however, a variety of facilitative and constraining factors will be likely to make some difference. Leading candidates for contributing to successful ascents, for instance, are political leadership and state strength.
The Indian State’s Capacity to Get Things Done
(Yale University Press, 2017) Ganguly, Sumit; Thompson, William
Long impoverished, India is on the rise in economic and military terms. Its gross domestic product is expanding faster than population growth, and India is becoming one of the world’s largest economies. Defense and foreign policies tend to expand in response to capability improvements. Indian foreign policy and military concerns, long centered on South Asia, have grown to encompass a much wider proportion of Indo-Pacific Asia. Indian ambitions have also expanded: a popular question is whether or when India will ascend to the world’s power elite and be accorded great power status.
India, Human Rights, and ‘Asian Values'
(Rowman and Littlefield, 2007) Ganguly, Sumit
In the 1980s, a number of statesmen and states in Asia argued with some force that Western conceptions of human rights had little or no applicability in Asia. Instead they contended that Asians had a markedly differing conception of human rights, one that did not focus on the rights of the individual but on those of the community. One of the most forceful advocates of this position was Lee Kuan Yew, the founder of the modern city-state of Singapore. His views found much resonance across other parts of southeast and east Asia as national leaders from Malaysia to the People's Republic of China (PRC) voiced similar arguments.
Pakistan: Neither State nor Nation
(Cambridge University Press, 2010) Ganguly, Sumit
Pakistan, one of two states that emerged from the breakup of the British Indian Empire, had been created as the putative homeland for the Muslims of South Asia. From its very genesis, the precise social and political dimensions of the state have been contested.l If it is the "home-land" of the Muslims of South Asia then what status should it accord to its religious minorities, as well as to sub-state nations? How should it accommodate the demands of linguistic, sectarian, and regional minorities? Beyond the shared Islamic faith, what other attributes could serve as the constituent elements of nation building? And even if Islam constituted the unifying basis of the state, what role would it play in the everyday life and practices of its citizenry?
India since 1980- Ch. 1: Four Revolutions and India's Future
(Cambridge University Press, 2011) Ganguly, Sumit; Mukherji, Rahul
For the better part of the past three decades the Indian polity has been in the throes of four revolutionary changes. They are in the realms of political mobilization, secularism, foreign policy, and economic policy making. These transformations have not moved in tandem but have overlapped with one another. Nevertheless, they collectively represent a steady and potentially fundamental remaking of many features of the Indian political landscape.
Piety and Politics: Religious Leadership and the Conflict in Kashmir
(Georgetown University Press, 2011) Ganguly, Sumit; Swami, Praveen
In 1912 the revivalist poet Maqbool Shah Kraalwari published Greeznama, an extended lament about the subversive syncretism of the Kashmiri peasantry: They regard the mosque and the temple as equal, seeing no difference between muddy puddles and the ocean, They know not the sacred, honourable or the respectable (Kraalwari 1912, 5). Less than a century ago, the landscape Kraalwari described has disappeared: as the ugly shrine-land conflagration that set the state ablaze in 2008 demonstrated, mass politics in Jammu and Kashmir appears to be driven almost exclusively by questions of religious identity. Yet the fact remains that clerics and religious authority have had only a peripheral role in this political mobilization—and, as our survey of some religion-linked crises in Jammu and Kashmir will show, in earlier ones, too. We are confronted by the apparent paradox of a religion-driven politics that has almost no space for religious leaders. It is all the more intriguing if one considers the central place of religion in the making of the Kashmir conflict itself. In this chapter, we examine three contrasting crises in an effort to find an answer to this question. Much of the work on religion and politics in Jammu and Kashmir has focused on the two-decade-long insurgency that began in 1988.
How Rivalries End- Ch. 1: The Problem of Rivalry De-escalation and Termination
(University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013) Ganguly, Sumit; Rasler, Karen; Thompson, William R.
The demise of the Cold War caught many, if not all, observers and participants alike by surprise. For much of the time between the end of World War II and the late 1980s/early 1990s, analysts and policymakers alike assumed that the East-West structural cleavage in world politics would remain unvarying. This cleavage was so paramount that it permeated and influenced world politics at all levels. In fact, for many observers every competition appeared, rightly or wrongly, as if it were a proxy struggle for the U.S.-Soviet rivalry. Then, abruptly, the central cleavage no longer existed. As a consequence, analysts and decision makers alike lost their conceptual anchor for deciphering how the world worked. The "world still worked," but a basic key to unlocking the secrets of how it worked had disappeared for good.
The Kashmir Conundrum
(Foreign Affairs, 2006) Ganguly, Sumit
Over the past several years, India's economic growth, diplomatic influence, and overall prestige have increased sharply. The country's new international profile adds a fresh dimension to its ongoing clash with Pakistan over Kashmir. So far, the conflict has not hindered India's rise. But the prospects that the two sides will reach a settlement on their own are dim.
An Unworthy Ally
(Foreign Affairs, 2015) Ganguly, Sumit; Fair, C. Christine
Ever since 9/11, the United States has provided Pakistan with a steady supply of security and nonsecurity assistance. U.S. officials have justified these generous transfers—worth more than $30 billion since 2002—on the grounds that they secure Pakistan’s ongoing cooperation in Afghanistan, bolster Pakistan’s ability to fight terrorism, and give the U.S. government influence over the country’s ever-expanding nuclear weapons program. Failing to deliver this support, the argument runs, could dramatically weaken the will and capacity of Pakistan’s security forces and possibly even lead to the collapse of the Pakistani state. In that event, Pakistan’s nuclear know-how, material, or weapons could well fall into the hands of nefarious actors.
The Path of Least Resistance
(Foreign Policy, 2014) Ganguly, Sumit
In a speech to Mumbai college students in November 2010, while on a state visit to India, U.S. President Barack Obama declared, “The United States does not just believe, as some people say, that India is a rising power; we believe that India has already risen.” He was not alone in expressing such gusto about the country’s prospects. A spate of books, both popular and academic, had been highlighting the country’s imminent economic success. Indeed, India seemed on the verge of genuine great-power status, due in no small part to liberalization of the country’s economy. Market reforms begun in the 1990s had soon led to an average growth of about 8 percent annually. India was held aloft with China as an emerging economic powerhouse. And if the rising tide did not lift all boats, it did create a viable middle class in a country long divided between a small elite and a desperately poor majority.

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