ISSN (Print) - 0012-9976 | ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

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Foundation of India–China Relations

The Fractured Himalaya: India  Tibet • China 1949–1962 by Nirupama Rao, New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2021; pp 640, `999.

Nehru, Tibet and China by A S Bhasin, New Delhi: Penguin Viking, 2021; pp 368, `399.

Contested Lands: India, China and the Boundary Dispute by Maroof Raza, Westland
Non-fiction, 2021; pp 208, 
`699.

The Long Game: How the Chinese Negotiate with India by Vijay Gokhale, Vintage Books, 2021; pp 200, `699.

Forgotten Kashmir: The Other Side of the Line of Control by Dinkar P Srivastava, HarperCollins, 2021; pp 304, `699.

Does China's Belt and Road Seek Global Dominance?

The author argues that Asia, with China in the lead, will constitute a new emerging global order.

Climate Change after the G-20 Summit

Global climate policy should now move away from its sole focus on reduction of emissions of carbon dioxide, which is a symptom of the problem, to discussing its causes and strategies. This article argues that, with the largest emitter opting out, the key issue is the broader response from the late developers, in particular India, reframing both the design and implementation of the climate regime.

Ratification Politics: Climate Change Is a Social Problem

Should India ratify the Paris Agreement when the United States does not consider it a treaty with legally binding commitments and the executive agreement can be easily reversed, as happened with the Kyoto Protocol? And, should India now take a strategic perspective to reframe international cooperation and focus on the carbon budget to allow for the convergence of standards of living?

Paris Agreement on Climate Change

The success of the Paris Agreement will depend on how soon the countries whose emissions have peaked achieve zero-emission levels; and how China, India and other developing countries define their urban future. It will also depend on developing a common understanding of whether technological changes alone will suffice and come quickly enough to meet the world's huge and growing need for energy, transportation, food, buildings and goods within a reframed urban transition.

Fresh Thinking Needed

The promise of inclusive and sustainable development can only be achieved if key policy decisions are rethought with clear priorities – on urbanisation and economic growth – with the transformations kept within ecological limits. A discussion on Ramaswamy R Iyer’s article “Environment and Development: Some Thoughts for the New Government” (EPW, 21 June 2014).

Global Sustainable Development Goals

Preparations for the Rio+20 United Nations conference on sustainable development have begun, but the first round of preparatory meetings did not address important issues such as sustainable resource use, production and consumption.

Global Vision for Rio+20 and Beyond

The various mechanisms evolved through global negotiations to deal with shared environmental problems, such as climate change, fall short because they are not located within a larger debate on dealing with human well-being and instead focus only on limiting damage. The United Nations is best placed to support a common understanding on patterns of resource use that are in principle common for all by generating strategic knowledge, also leading to deepening coherence of the global agenda.

Post-Copenhagen Climate Agenda

The climate negotiations in this month will set the post-Copenhagen agenda, and the strategic issue for developing countries is whether to focus on the new architecture of monitoring, reporting and verification or on developing a new framework that redefines the principle of common but differentiat

The G-8 and India's National Action Plan on Climate Change

The Hokkaido communique on climate change of the Group of Eight countries does not lay down targets for emissions reductions in the developed countries. Yet the G-8 asks developing countries to take more meaningful mitigation actions. How does India's new national action plan propose to deal with climate change and how is it different from the approach being suggested by the G-8?

Sustainable Development Perspective of Climate Change

Global environmental problems like climate change should be conceptualised as problems of consumption and not production patterns. A consumption rather than a production-based vision for environmentally sustainable economic growth would make the design and implementation of climate protection, as well as other environmental problems, more effective. Moreover, implementation in the context of international burden sharing, where benefits are not equally shared, requires a very different organising framework that is not based on cost-benefit analysis and commitments to reduce emissions determined in international negotiations, but rather on political justice and transfer of technology.

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