Postscripts on Independence

Review

‘In this theoretically-informed and empirically rich study on post-independence foreign policy of India and South Africa, Vineet Thakur breaks down several walls. This is IR from the Global South as its very best—critical, comparative and concerned with everyday life.’

— Peter Vale, Director of the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study; Nelson Mandela Professor Emeritus and Professor of Humanities, University of Johannesburg

‘This meticulously researched, theoretically provocative and cogently argued book is a significant contribution to burgeoning literature on non-Eurocentric or “Global” IR. Vineet Thakur provides refreshing insights on the question of why and how diversely located, newly independent post-Colonial India and South Africa sought an alternative normative-pragmatic reading of the “world order” through an emphatic assertion of their own location, agency and autonomy in it. Deploying an illuminating comparative perspective, this brilliant study graphically reveals how foreign policy also acts as a discursive site where nation and national identity are simultaneously represented and constructed, sought and sighted, revealed and reimagined.’

— Sanjay Chaturvedi, Professor of Political Science Centre for the Study of Geopolitics, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India

‘This welcome addition to our understanding of foreign policy from a Global South perspective not only provides a rich comparative study on India and South Africa, but also engages with alternative interpretations of power, agency and world order, and interrogates foreign policy as a site of national identity construction. Thakur is undoubtedly one of the most exciting new voices to emerge in the field of IR.’
— Karen Smith, Associate Professor, University of Cape Town, South Africa