Topic: Developed/Developing Countries, Diaspora and International Institutions
Q1. How do you think India's economic interests are hampered by the aggressive stance of the developed countries at the WTO? Suggest a way forward. (15 Marks)
Model Structure
Introduction
Despite being a global organisation consisting of 164 countries which aim to promote free, fair and open trade in the world, instances such as the Doha round has shown the rift between developed and developing countries.
Main Body:
Aggressive stance of the developed countries at the WTO and hampering India's economic interests:
- Pressurizing Opening up domestic sectors: India has for long justified protection of its domestic farm and livestock sector, as subsistence of around 60 per cent of the country’s population depends on it.
- Issue of agricultural subsidies of developed countries: While developing countries, including India, demand the elimination of distortionary agricultural subsidies given by developed countries, developed countries are not willing to give up their agricultural subsidies.
- The case IPR: Developed countries like the U.S. and Europe do not support the fine-tuning of TRIPS in favor of developing countries like India by allowing compulsory licensing in certain cases.
- Since the developed countries own most of the new upcoming technologies, they advocate TRIPS-Plus provisions in order to mint more profits.
- However, it will result in Increased prices of medicines, agricultural inputs etc, thereby impacting social development in developing countries like India.
- Trade in services: India favours more liberal commitments for cross-border supply of services (Preferably Mode 4 for the supply of services).
- But, the interest of the EU and the US lie more in Mode 3 services supply. Hence they focus more on liberalisation in trade of goods only.
- Mistrust regarding Special & differential treatment: Developing countries, including India, claim that the developed countries were not negotiating in good faith, while developed countries argue that the developing countries were unreasonable in their proposals.
- Opposition to Indian agri-subsidies: Developed countries like the United States accuses India of subsidising farmers heavily to keep prices low.
- Issue of amber box subsidies.
- Non Tariff Barriers: Developed countries like the EU use Sanitary & Phyto-sanitary measures to protect their own domestic sector.
- For example, opposition to Indian Mangoes.
- Challenging the local support to domestic sectors: The support given to local industries is often protested by the developed countries at the WTO forum.
- For example, India’s support of the domestic solar industry was challenged by the U.S. in the WTO.
- Bottlenecks to dispute resolution: The US has been blocking appointments complaining the Appellate Body failed to follow the rules in the Dispute Settlement Understanding.
- Accusation on developing countries: The US President recently said that India and China are no longer "developing nations"and were taking advantage of the status from the WTO.
- This might create a general consensus among other WTO members against countries like India.
- Protest against export subsidies: On the basis of the US’s complaints, WTO’s dispute settlement panel ruled that India’s export subsidy schemes, including the provision for special economic zones, violated core provisions of global trade norms.
Way Forward
- Reform in resolution mechanism: There is a need to change the decision-making architecture of the WTO to ensure timely consensus-based completion of negotiations
- Penal powers to WTO: WTO should be empowered to apply penalties to curb instances of willful non-compliance with its directions by developed countries.
- Settling the dispute settlement: Dispute settlement mechanism appointment process should be independent of the political control of countries like the USA.
- Alternative dispute redressal: Multilateral dialogues to resolve disputes outside the WTO dispute settlement mechanism should be promoted.
- Adopting changing trade realities: There is a need to bring more areas like digitalization, e-commerce, services trade, digital tax etc., under negotiations and upgrade trade rules as per current changing trade realities.
Conclusion
- A rule-based and equitable WTO benefits all countries. Hence the need of the hour for India is to step up and lead the developing countries to save the multilateral trading system from the current crisis caused by the domination of a few powerful countries.
Q2. Analyse, with illustrations, the significance of the Indian diaspora in extending the soft power of the country. (10 Marks)
Model Structure
Introduction
- Indian diaspora – the biggest in the world at 18 million - is an important part of the societies in host countries around the world, from the UK to Mauritius and the USA to Japan. OR
- Diaspora refers to a large group of people who share a cultural and regional origin but are living away from their traditional homeland.
Main Body
Significance of Indian Diaspora
- Diaspora has helped in the export of India’s cultural products like Indian cuisines, Indian movies, Yoga etc.
- For example, the Popularity of chicken tikka masala in the UK, Bollywood in the USA and Tamil movies in Malaysia.
- Indian diaspora helps to influence host countries’ foreign policy vis-a-vis India.
- E.g., the Indian diaspora successfully lobbied for the India-USA Civil Nuclear Agreement in the USA.
- Indian diaspora has deepened the connection between host countries and India through the creation of economic interdependencies.
- For example, the migration of less-skilled labour to West Asia has helped build infrastructure in host countries while bringing down disguised unemployment in India.
- The old Indian diaspora is a source of cultural connections between India and small island countries across the Indo-Pacific and beyond.
- E.g., in countries like Fiji, Mauritius, Seychelles, Guyana etc.
- The diversity of the Indian diaspora reflects the plurality at home, projecting India as a peaceful and plural society.
- E.g., Indian-origin Sikh, Hindu and Christian as defence minister in Canada (Harjit Sajjan), Prime minister in the UK (Rishi Sunak) and Prime minister in Ireland (Leo Varadkar), respectively.
- Indians, as CEOs, doctors, and law-abiding citizens in other countries, promote positive stereotypes about Indians as they act as India’s cultural ambassadors.
However, there are certain limitations of diaspora as a source of soft power, such as:
- The vulnerability of diaspora in Gulf countries due to poor and unregulated service conditions and lack of citizenship requires a protective role from the Indian state.
- The internal politics of the host countries can undermine the potential of the Indian diaspora as a source of soft power.
- E.g., the reversal of globalisation and the rise of anti-migrant politics in Western countries, such as the issue of H1-B visas in the USA.
- Indian diaspora has been used as an instrument to undercut India’s soft power as well.
- For example, the politics in Canada around farmers’ protests in India or Punjab Referendum 2020 in the UK.
Conclusion
- Diaspora’s contributions to India’s soft power can help the country build robust international relations and project its influence worldwide.
- India’s soft power can also help the diaspora, as seen in the rescue of Indian students during the Ukraine crisis. Given their prominent role, interests and well-being of the diaspora should be of special concern to India.
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Q3. It has been 2 years since covid-19 pandemic started and threats of new variants are still present. Do you think that WHO performed its role and handled the pandemic efficiently? (15 Marks, 250 Words)
Model Structure
Introduction
- The World Health Organisation is a specialised UN agency to enhance cooperation among countries on international health issues.
Main body
- WHO is a three-tiered structure including-
- World Health Assembly which is the supreme decision-making body,
- Executive Board comprising technical experts, and
- Secretariat as its administrative and technical organ.
- Even with more than 60 per cent of the global population being vaccinated, the threat of covid has not subsided due to the emergence of variants. Role of WHO in handling covid pandemic include-
- Arguments against WHO role-
- It declared covid as a pandemic and Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) only when global cases increased significantly,
- No urgency showed in investigating the causes of its origin by sending an expert team to China,
- A committee recommended for including the coronavirus family in the list of diseases requiring research in 2015 but it was neglected by WHO,
- Did not back the call of nations on travel restrictions which led to quick spread globally,
- Failure in acknowledging human to human transmission of the virus.
- Arguments against WHO role-
- In favour of WHO role-
- Big contribution in promoting vaccine development and medicine availability.
- Timely information dissemination to prevent rumours and panic.
- Many countries were able to contain the spread by following its advice and procedures.
- Worked with alliances like GAVI to ensure vaccine availability in all countries.
Conclusion
WHO has only recommendatory powers and cannot sanction its members or make binding decisions. There is no single document to define its functions and there are many grey areas. This has impacted its functioning, resulting in various outbreaks. It is time to empower it in line with bodies like the WTO to ensure binding decisions and accountability.
Q4. Discuss the functioning of the International Court of Justice and the limitations on its functioning which make it less effective. (15 Marks)
Model Structure
Introduction
- The International Court of Justice (ICJ) was established in 1945 and is one of the principal organs of the UN. It was formed to settle legal disputes between states and also gives advisory opinion on matters referred to it by the UN.
Main Body
- It consists of 15 judges appointed for a term of nine years by the UN General Assembly and the Security Council by absolute majority. Its functions include-
- It is a global court with only those states as parties which are United Nations members.
- The judgment of ICJ is final and binding without any appeal. In case of new discovery of fact, there is a scope of revision and interpretation.
- The ICJ functions as a full court but when requested by the parties, there may be established temporary chambers for specific cases.
- If either state which is a party to any dispute fails to carry out directions of ICJ, the matter may be put before the Security Council.
- In case of advisory proceedings when asked by the UNGA or UNSC, the opinions are advisory and not binding.
- But many times the impact of ICJ ruling has not been effective due to reasons like-
- ICJ lacks jurisdiction to prosecute people accused of war crimes or those crimes which are against humanity. Because it is not a criminal court, it also lacks any prosecutor to initiate proceedings.
- It is a generalistic court with jurisdiction limited to general matters as compared to specialist tribunas like the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.
- ICJ is not mandated to deal with alleged human rights violations and it cannot receive applications from States for transnational crimes.
- ICJ cannot act suo moto and hears a dispute only when asked by more than one state. It has jurisdiction based on consent and not compulsory jurisdiction.
- It is ineffective when it comes to cases like court of last resort or appellate courts.
Conclusion
The ICJ is an important and competent institution which is reflected in it being an important organ of the UN. It has worked tremendously in the past to ensure contribution to international law is as per the mandate and steps can be taken to ensure that this continues in the future.
Q5. What is global governance? What are the benefits and discuss the ways to further strengthen global governance. (15 Marks)
Model Structure
Introduction
- Global governance involves a set of rules framed and governed by global institutions based on a consensus and common sense which helps govern issues and devise a fairer world.
Main Body
- There is a network of procedures, policies and initiatives involved which helps synchronize global action plans and address the ensuing challenges. All these procedures help in provisioning of public goods, services, ensuring quality and delivering justice at inter-state and intra-state level for better stability and anticipation.
- This is because of the benefits involved in global governance as highlighted by the Global State of Democracy Report. These benefits which help strengthen global governance include-
- Fulfilling sustainable development goals and sub targets through universal and accessible citizen-centric services.
- Better networking among individuals, states, corporations and global institutions for building partnerships and achieving a common good.
- Strengthening global governance and rules-based regime by making institutions like the UN, WTO etc. more robust.
- Common but differentiated responsibilities is a reasonable idea which can very well help address global issues and ensure justice. This is possible by fostering global governance.
- Governments and their decisions can be called legit or illegit based on the rules and procedures followed. This is ensured by parameters of global governance which are not followed by countries where rule of law is absent.
- Global governance can be improved in many ways like-
- By inculcating responsible, accountable and inclusive practices through checks and balances among pillars of democracy so that there is no abuse of power.
- To keep a check on authoritarian tendencies, free and fair elections is a prerequisite as it gives voice to opposition and small regional parties which enhances cooperative and competitive spirit.
- Better involvement of people, private sector and civil society for participatory democracy.
- Corruption is a very big obstacle to development and addressing it by use of artificial intelligence, big data etc can help detect and prevent corruption.
- Supporting free and independent media to ensure freedom of press, fighting disinformation and prevent government institutions from using authoritarian means.
Conclusion
- Global governance has been for a while but has recently developed as an individual idea. It needs to be further strengthened to streamline regional and global efforts through regional and global bodies like ASEAN, EU etc and UN, WTO etc respectively.
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