“India is now at the stage where what we do will matter to the world. And what the world does will matter more to us.” — S. Jaishankar
The world is changing faster than at any time since the end of the Cold War. The post-1991 global order — built on American primacy, multilateral institutions, free trade, and liberal internationalism — is fracturing. New powers are rising. Old certainties are dissolving. The rules are being rewritten, and the authors are no longer the same ones who wrote the original text.
For India, this moment represents both a challenge and an extraordinary opportunity. The challenge: navigating a period of intense uncertainty without the comfort of established rules and reliable alliances. The opportunity: shaping the emerging world order from a position of growing strength rather than adapting to one designed without India in mind.
S. Jaishankar’s central argument in The India Way is that this is a time for choices — and the choices India makes now will define its place in the world for decades to come.
From the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 to the financial crisis of 2008, the world experienced what Charles Krauthammer called the “unipolar moment” — a period of unprecedented American dominance in which the United States shaped the global order largely on its own terms.
That moment is definitively over. The indicators are unmistakable:
The shift is not just about relative power — it’s about legitimacy. The Western-led international order increasingly struggles to command the consent of the non-Western majority.
The redistribution of global power is creating a genuinely multipolar world for the first time since the 19th century. Multiple centers of significant power — the United States, China, the European Union, Russia, India, and potentially others — are navigating a world without clear hierarchy.
For India, this multipolar world is simultaneously more complex and more congenial than the unipolar moment. More complex because there are no reliable rules, no dominant hegemon to provide order, and no clear alliances. More congenial because India’s voice, interests, and perspectives carry more weight in a world where power is distributed.
India’s strategic position is fundamentally shaped by its trajectory. From an economy of $480 billion in 1991 to approaching $4 trillion today, India has emerged as a genuine major economy — the world’s fifth largest and, on current projections, the third largest within this decade.
This economic growth has geopolitical consequences. India’s trading partners, investment relationships, and energy dependencies now span the globe. India’s domestic market has become genuinely important to multinationals. Indian professionals, businesses, and diaspora communities have established real presence and influence across the world.
The growth story is the foundation of India’s strategic ambitions. A rising India can make choices that a stagnant India could not.
Jaishankar makes an argument that sets India apart from most discussions of rising powers: India is not just a state with growing material power — it is a civilization with a distinctive philosophical tradition and world view.
This civilizational heritage provides India with:
India’s ability to speak to multiple civilizational traditions simultaneously — as both an ancient civilization and a modern democracy, as both a developing economy and a technological power — is a genuine strategic asset in a world where “Western” is increasingly contested.
Jaishankar’s core prescriptive argument is that India must respond to these changes with strategic deliberateness rather than reactive improvisation.
Strategic deliberateness means:
The opposite of strategic deliberateness is strategic drift — reacting to events, trying to maintain relationships by avoiding choices, and letting the world’s agenda determine India’s own.
Jaishankar’s implicit critique of parts of India’s post-independence foreign policy is that strategic drift characterized too many periods. The Indian Way must be more assertive, more interest-based, and more willing to make and defend choices.