Abstract: The Doklam crisis was not a mere regional conflict between India and China. Internationally, it demonstrated the tensions and fault lines and indicated the emerging patterns of state behaviours. This paper analyses several issues which were flagged by this crisis. Firstly, how Doklam brought the questions about the identity of China to the forefront – the contrast between its record of unyieldingly and aggressively pursuing its territorial and economic interests and what it projects as its image – the ‘peaceful rise of China’. Secondly, the issue became a prestige issue for India and had implications for its claim as being a regional superpower and an aspiring global superpower. And lastly, the international response to Doklam showed the working of power configurations in the present day multipolar world: it carried the reverberations of the threat that Chinese economic expansion has caused to South East Asia or to the economic dominance of the US or Japan. However, the temporary settlement of the crisis also showed that though the economic rivalry between India and China might result in muscle flexing, yet both the neighbours are unwilling to sacrifice the idea of BRICS as the flagship of a multi-polar world order.
Keywords: Polarity, superpower, trade, BRICS, conflict.
Title: The Multipolar World and its Contradictions: Understanding the Power Dynamics in International Politics through a Study of the Doklam Crisis
Author: Dr. Ritambhara Malaviya
International Journal of Interdisciplinary Research and Innovations
ISSN 2348-1218 (print), ISSN 2348-1226 (online)
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