Politics of Dialogue

Offering a detailed analysis of post-colonial South Asia, The Politics of Dialogue discusses the creation and impact of borders and the pervasive tension between the new nations. Neither all-out war nor complete peace, this fragile condition makes political leaders and strategists feel claustrophobic - a war produces an end result but peace allows the rulers to carry out their policies for governing along their preferred path of development. The book shows how cartographic, communal and political lines are not only dividing countries, but that they are being replicated within countries, creating new visible and invisible internal frontiers. It argues that, in a situation where geopolitics constrains democracy, the political class becomes incapable of coping with the tension between the inside/outside, eg democracy appears as an internal problem and geopolitics appears as a problem related to the 'outside'. Contents: Introduction; Peace as a political question of our time; In the time of the partitioned nations; The ineluctable logic of geopolitics; Autonomy and the requirements of minimal justice; Governing through peace accords; Two ceasefires, one story; Friends, foes and understanding; The non-dialogic world of the humanitarian; Received histories of war and peace; Epilogue: ten principles; Bibliography; Index.