Scholars have touted our age as the “Asian century,” with the emergence of two Asian giants in the world economic order, China and India. Over the last three decades, they have been classified as the world’s two fastest-growing economies. By 2007, their joint contribution to global economic growth was already close to that of the United States.
In 2024, Asia accounted for nearly 60 percent of global growth, and China surpassed the United States in its contribution to global manufacturing output — nearly 28 percent of the total, compared with the US share of 17.3 percent. Meanwhile, India ranked in fifth place for manufacturing after Japan and Germany, albeit trailing far behind its Asian neighbor with less than 3 percent of world output.
There is an ongoing reconfiguration of the US-dominated world order in the shadow of military conflicts, economic recessions, and most recently trade wars. Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has been combined with attacks on Lebanon, Yemen, Iran, and most recently Qatar. India and Pakistan also fought a limited war in May of this year.
At the same time, the United States has launched a tariff war against many different countries from the Global North and Global South alike. This has pushed a block of emerging economies to move closer in cooperation against the bullying tactics of the Trump administration. China has even called for a remolding of global governance norms and the rewriting of UN policy documents. In this process of global contestation, how has India been faring?
The Indian government claims that India’s global diplomacy under Narendra Modi has made the country a leader on the international stage. For Modi’s supporters, these alleged triumphs offered relief amid palpable discontent on the home front as a result of increasing taxation, stagnant incomes, and rising household indebtedness. Skewed and unequal economic growth has largely benefited India’s rich and the urban population, while the middle and…
Auteur: Shinzani Jain
