Dr.Rao VBJ Chelikani
I. The Return of Realism: Are we witnessing a return to disorder in international relations? The post–World War II order is clearly under strain. Core principles, like the prohibition of force under the UN Charter, are increasingly violated, with states favoring unilateral military action over negotiation, mediation, or adjudication. Power politics has re-emerged as the dominant logic. Mr. Dmitry Peskov, an aide to President Vladimir Putin, recently remarked, "We have all lost what we call international law… Even if it exists de jure, it no longer exists de facto. Since returning to power, Donald Trump appears to be reshaping the global order unilaterally and individually. Meanwhile, many states across Europe, Africa, Asia, and Latin America increasingly assert absolute sovereignty, often disregarding international commitments. States are again displaying hegemonic ambitions, whether through slogans like "Make America Great Again", "Make India Great Again", "One China", or visions of a "Greater Russia". Historically rooted powers such as Iran, Greece, Italy, Germany, Egypt, and Turkey may also revive civilizational narratives to justify geopolitical ambitions.
Under the banner of "strategic autonomy", states are obsessed with national interests at the cost of the general interest and human responsibilities. At the same time, the race for nuclear proliferation and long-range ballistic missile programmes sustains a fragile world of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD), where nine states are accumulating nuclear stockpiles and twenty other countries are on the way. All countries, rich and poor, are allocating a high percentage of their budgets to defense preparations.
Modern conflicts, however, are no longer limited wars; they are often "total wars", causing massive civilian harm, displacement, and infrastructure destruction. Civilian populations are participating in conflicts. Yet cases such as Vietnam, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and Iran demonstrate that superior military force alone cannot secure victory. Even after a clear defeat, can a country be occupied permanently and governed peacefully? Conflicts today disrupt global supply chains, energy security, and the economic stability of all countries.
After giving up discussions on a New International Economic Order, we have settled down to the 'Washington Consensus', which promised economic interdependence and reduced conflict. Instead, we are facing transnational challenges like terrorism, cybercrime, climate change, and pandemics, which highlight the limits of unilateral national actions.
Another emerging trend is the personalization of political power. Leaders increasingly act as sole decision-makers, weakening institutional accountability. This has even revived practices like targeting political leaders during conflicts. Many developing states, including India, are drifting toward authoritarianism, with weak accountability mechanisms. Democratic institutions, parliaments, and civil society are often being sidelined.
The futile claim of a state‘s absolute sovereignty, which was upheld for the first time in 1648 with the Treaty of Westphalia in Europe—the integrity of its territories and its total control over the destinies of its populations—is no longer tenable. States increasingly accept constraints through groups, blocs, treaties, and regulatory regimes. The circulation of social media and digital currencies largely escapes traditional state control.
There are still a good number of failed states, called either the 'poorest states‘ or the rogue states or terror states, claiming absolute state sovereignty, while European nations have reconciled themselves to limited sovereignty within the European Union. Modern states must balance sovereignty with accountability, ensuring both negative obligations, like protecting freedoms, and positive duties, like promoting welfare, education, and economic justice.
The Indian Constitution, inspired by the Irish model, is the clearest example, along with Spain, with its Directive Principles of State Policy (Part IV). In South Africa, Brazil, and Germany, they are justiciable internally.
II. India’s Foreign Policy: Article 51 of the Indian Constitution encourages the promotion of international peace and respect for international law. Historical foreign policy principles of peaceful coexistence, nonviolence, and peaceful dispute settlement align with it. It is traced back to Panchsheel and the NonAligned Movement. In this increasingly globalized world, India‘s current claim that it is acting autonomously and entirely in terms of its strategic interests in a given context is opportunistic and does not serve its long-term interests and goals.
1). The cornerstone of our foreign policy in the long term should be to promote people-to-people relations and direct cooperation in many areas, and not state-to-state, diplomat-to-diplomat, or political head-to-political head friendships, with their handshakes and hugging. To achieve people-topeople relations, we should start with Parliamentto-Parliament and civil society to civil society organizations. But, at present, Parliament has no say in many ongoing inter-state relations; there is no prior parliamentary approval or ratification. Maybe the exceptional US President Donald Trump inspires other political leaders to continue this practice.
The situation is further worsening since, on February 16th, the Indian Central Cabinet Secretariat made it clear in a communication that bilateral agreements with foreign countries, which have no serious financial or security implications, will no longer require prior ministerial Cabinet approval. It is sufficient to report to the Cabinet within six months after signing the agreements, as listed in the annexure to a note. Until now, every MOU or agreement with a foreign country, by procedure, needed to go before the Cabinet for preapproval. Now, MEA departmental vetting is enough.
2). Making a radical departure from Bismarckian traditions, we should abolish the profession of diplomacy and close all the 138 embassies and other diplomatic missions that India maintains abroad at great cost in foreign currency, and explore other direct channels of audio and visual communication and commutation to enhance cultural and economic cooperation.
3). All political relations with other states should be governed by international rules, regulations, and laws, abandoning state-to-state bilateral accords and bloc- and group-based geopolitical strategies. We should work with all states in all regions through multilateral agencies operating under the UN, with additional personnel not necessarily being diplomats.
4). Any issue or dispute pending should be proposed to be solved through the mediation of the UN and other multigovernmental organizations. India should seriously consider putting an end to all existing tensions and disputes in terms of borders and river water distribution by referring them to mediation and arbitration or to international judicial bodies. These have been pending for the past 75 years, and the diplomats, during all this time, have been trying to build confidence-building measures to begin negotiations. So far, not a single issue has been settled.
5). We are in an endless race for more and more sophisticated arms for defense preparedness, with increasing annual budget allocations, which are never sufficient. Starting with 'no first strike‘ bilateral agreements with Parliament-to-Parliament engagement, especially with neighboring states. India should give up the ambition of leading the Global South, which is a contradictory term. On the other hand, it should update and re-propose a resolution of Rajeev Gandhi to the UN General Assembly as a Universal Declaration of Spatial, Nuclear, Chemical, and General Disarmament Agreement, and another resolution for the creation of a standing UN force ready to intervene under Chapter VII of the UN Charter.
6). The Indian state, like all other states, can concentrate all its tax money and income thereby saved, which can be spent on the social and human development of all Indians. Thereafter, it would be possible to offer a universal and participatory social security system for all human beings and their friendly animals born on this planet. Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam.
III. The People Above the State
Historically, states have acted as if they 'own' their populations. True democracy, however, places sovereignty with the people, a principle articulated during the American and French Revolutions. The UN Charter extended this idea globally, emphasizing the rights of peoples rather than states. However, even though the UN and the Charter speak in the name of the people, the agents who signed the Charter and make the UN function are political states, and not civil societies, as members. The states gradually transformed the UN into a full-fledged intergovernmental body and not an international body. The financial contributions to run the organization are also calculated according to economic capacity, measured by Gross National Income, thus allowing the rich states to call the shots. Soon, the UN became a super-bureaucracy, as most of the top posts are filled by top national bureaucrats.
However, the system functioned well when Europeans and North Americans, who very often are bi-national or even pluri-national, were involved, and with the headquarters mostly being in Geneva, Rome, Vienna, Paris, and New York. For example, Jews, who are brilliant and proved competent to hold many posts by merit, possessed several nationalities. Similarly, Indians, who are numerous in UN jobs, claim to come from many nationalities. Further, a crop of activists from international civil society organizations and eminent cosmopolitan individuals with no attachment to any state or ideology have been associated with UN agencies.
But these cosmopolitan aspects started becoming scarce in UN agencies as developing countries became a majority and insisted on strict national quotas, since UN jobs are lucrative compared to their national jobs. Despite these limitations, on the whole, the spirit of UN functionaries remains largely international and humanistic. The UN has advanced key principles such as the Right to Development (1986) and the Right to Peace (2016) for all people. These affirm that states must prevent conflicts and promote human welfare individually and collectively.
Ultimately, legitimacy for the UN derives from "We, the people", not from governments alone. Since the Vietnam War, Bertrand Russell‘s Tribunal, and the Helsinki Accords, there has been strong world public opinion in favor of pacifist movements.
IV. How to Restore and Reinforce the Present World Order?
The United Nations Organization, whose main handicap lies in its Security Council, has five permanent members with veto powers. This veto authority has often led to political deadlocks, especially when conflicts involve or affect the interests of these powerful nations or their allies. Additionally, the UN depends heavily on the political will, funding, and military contributions of its five member states. Peacekeeping missions are often under-resourced and restricted by limited mandates that prevent them from taking strong enforcement actions.
The organization also respects national sovereignty, meaning it cannot easily intervene in internal conflicts without the consent of the state involved. These constraints, combined with complex modern conflicts involving non-state actors and internal and civil wars, make conflict prevention extremely challenging. As Mike Watz, the US Representative to the UN, also demanded, the UN must return to its core and original mission of maintaining regional and international peace and security. During the last 25 years, UN expenditure has quadrupled without a corresponding improvement in global stability.
A. First of all, in the case of all kinds of disputes between two states, under Chapter VI, the 11- member Security Council can take decisions to recommend measures for the pacific settlement of disputes, such as encouraging negotiation, suggesting mediation or arbitration, or calling for judicial settlement. When these recommendations are not followed by any state, Chapter VII of the UN Charter envisages that the Security Council take enforcement measures with respect to all threats to peace, breaches of the peace, and acts of aggression. These include non-military actions, such as sanctions and economic restrictions under Article 41, and military action under Article 42, involving air, sea, and land forces, blockades, and military operations directly or through NATO. There are instances where the USA acted with the mandate of the Security Council. These decisions are binding upon all members of the UN. There are already many instances of UN-backed coalitions of force, starting from Korea in 1950. Sometimes, the UN can intervene without the full consent of a country‘s government to save lives and stop human suffering. The UN has the means to effectively implement the above measures with the help of the UN Secretary-General, ICJ, IMF, the World Bank, and the Blue Helmets, which are functioning very effectively.
B. In 2026, we need not re-invent the UN. The undue exercise of veto power, continuing even after the Cold War, is making the UN ineffective, and the situation will not improve by admitting India as one more permanent member with veto power. It is already thoroughly representative of the six regions into which the whole world is classified by the UN. i) On the initiative of India, the General Assembly should pass a resolution to further enlarge the Security Council by three, instead of one, representative states from each of the six regions of the world, and by appealing to the five permanent members not to use veto power except in matters directly pertaining to their security. ii) If the majority of members can pass a resolution to persuade, and even threaten with noncooperation in consular, diplomatic, and economic matters in cases where a state abuses its veto power. When a vast majority of the 195 states in the General Assembly resolve to condemn a vetoexercising state, the political leadership of that country will be in trouble before its electors. iii) If a state is defiant and uses violence, the UN General Assembly could pass a resolution, even by a simple majority, appealing to all members to noncooperate in consular, diplomatic, and economic matters with it; the government of that country will surrender within 24 hours. There is no single state or group of states that can survive without trade relations.
C. India can initiate the call for an Emergency Special Session to pass, under the Uniting for Peace Resolution (as in 1950 by passing Resolution 377), asking the Director-General of the UN and the Security Council to increase diplomatic pressure on conflicting parties by: a) recommending economic sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and arms embargoes; b) helping to initiate or support a peacekeeping framework and approve funding for certain operations, such as the UN Emergency Force (UNEF) in the 1956 Suez Crisis; c) setting up independent inquiries and fact-finding missions to document violations and build international awareness and accountability; d) exercising budgetary power by funding peacekeeping missions, supporting humanitarian programs, and allocating resources to crisis areas; e) coordinating with other UN bodies and intergovernmental bodies like the IMF and the World Bank; f) requesting legal opinions from the ICJ and referring investigations of human rights violations to the UN Human Rights Council; and g) finally, suggesting military action under Chapter VII.
0 Comments