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INDIAN SOFT POWER INDEX: RUSSIA 2017-18 Collaborator: 1 ABOUT INDIA FOUNDATION India Foundation is an independent research centre focussed on the issues, challenges and opportunities of the Indian polity. The Foundation believes in understanding contemporary India and its global context through a civilizational lens of a society on the forward move. Based on the principles of independence, objectivity and academic rigour, the Foundation aims at increasing awareness and advocating its views on issues of both national and international importance. It seeks to articulate Indian nationalistic perspective on issues. India Foundation’s vision is to be a premier think tank that can help understand the Indian civilizational influence on our contemporary society. With a team of dedicated professionals based at its office in New Delhi, the Foundation works with partners and associates both in India and overseas to further its stated objectives. ABOUT THE CENTER FOR SOFT POWER Soft power is defined as the ability of nations to shape the preferences and influence the behaviour of other nations through appeal and attraction as opposed to coercion. It represents one of the newest frameworks through which India can understand and influence its role in the international order. In this backdrop, it is timely to engage in discussions on the need for an India-centric discourse on soft power; how to maximise and deploy soft power assets, particularly in the view of furthering national, regional and global goals, and India’s rise as a soft power nation. 2 As such India Foundation’s Center for Soft Power represents the first center in India that specifically focuses on the field of soft power research, initiatives and leadership. Its aim is to give an impetus to the study of Indian soft power, a field of increasing importance to India in this globalised world. The Center is established in collaboration with Indic Academy, an institution focussed on bringing about an intellectual, cultural and spiritual renaissance based on our civilisational thought. 3 AUTHOR AMAN NAIR Aman Nair is a Junior Research Fellow at India Foundation’s Center for Soft Power. He has graduated with a degree in Public Policy, Economics and International Relations from Sciences Po, Paris. His areas of research include North East India, India’s Soft Power and India’s policy in Asia and Europe. He will be studying Law at Cambridge University from 2019. Contributors SUDARSHAN RAMABADRAN Sudarshan Ramabadran is currently the Senior Research Fellow and Administrative Head of India Foundation’s Center for Soft Power. An alumni of the Asian College of Journalism, his research areas include Public Diplomacy, Soft Power Relations, Security and Strategy. SHREYA CHALLAGALLA Shreya Challagalla is a Research Fellow at India Foundation. Her fields of research include India’s soft power, the confluence of cultures and the Indian diaspora. She graduated with a degree in International Studies and Journalism and New Media from FLAME University, Pune. She was previously associated with the Observer Research Foundation where she authored a paper titled, “The Diaspora and India’s Growth Story”. She regularly writes for The Statesman. 4 BORIS RAGOZIN Dr. Boris Ragozin is a practicing Ayurvedic doctor and the Head of the Department of Ayurveda, Institute of Oriental Medicine, Peoples' Friendship University of Russia. He is an active participant in scientific and practical conferences and congresses of national and international levels. He has repeatedly participated in presentations and seminars on Ayurveda and Yoga therapy in India, England, Israel, Lithuania, Germany and Turkey, as well as in Moscow and other cities of Russia. SANTHOSHKUMAR M Santhoshkumar is a researcher at the Center for Soft Power. He is a BSC Electronics graduate from PSG CAS, Coimbatore. He is currently also preparing for the UPSC Civil Services Exam. PAVITHRA SRINIVASAN Pavithra Srinivasan is a Research Fellow at India Foundation. A post graduate in Economics from Ethiraj College Chennai, she is an accomplished Bharatanatyam artiste with several awards and has travelled to many countries for performances and workshops. She recently inaugurated the cultural evening at World Hindu Congress 2018, Chicago and published a 15 episode series on Youtube on “Bhagavad Gita for the Children and the Young”. She is the Founder/Teacher at Arsha Kala Bharati where she teaches Natya, Yoga and Vedic heritage. 5 INTRODUCTION 6 WHAT IS SOFT POWER? oseph Nye, in his seminal paper (Nye, 1991) put forward one of the most intriguing questions facing the field of JInternational Political Theory for the best part of century. In a world that was no longer dominated by the mechanisms of the Cold War, how do nations conceptualize the idea of ‘influence?’ In the United States, the Cold War was almost singularly defined at the foreign policy level by an arms and technology race. Simultaneously, this fixation with military assets capability found itself dominating the academic level. Often so at the detriment of an innumerable number of non coercive elements of foreign policy (Cull, 2008; 2012). Nye noted that in the face of this evolving world order, the United States would need to adopt a newer strategy so as to ensure that America’s influence permeated globally, and in a way that was both long lasting and ensured a level of peace Nye posited that while earlier conceptions of influence had been limited to those forms of influence that stemmed from coercion, there was in fact an entirely separate kind of influence that was a product of attraction (Jr, 1991). And it was this form of influence borne out of attraction that produced a more stable and long lasting form of influence. Nye, Joseph S. Bound To Lead: The Changing Nature Of American Power. New Ed edition. New York: Basic Books, 1991. Cull, Nicholas J. The Cold War and the United States Information Agency. 1 edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009 | Cull, Nicholas J. The Decline and Fall of the United States Information Agency: American Public Diplomacy, 1989–2001. 2012 edition. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. 7 "A country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics because other countries – admiring its values, emulating its example, aspiring to its level of prosperity and openness – want to follow it. In this sense, it is also important to set the agenda and attract others in world politics, and not only to force them to change by threatening military force or economic sanctions. This soft power – getting others to want the outcomes that you want – co-opts people rather than coerces them." – Joseph Nye, (Nye, 2005) Nye defined the ability for a state to exert this influence through attraction, onto another state as Soft Power. It includes the ability to affect others though persuasion, agenda framing and positive attraction using culture, values and foreign policy. In other words, soft power is the ability to affect the behaviour of others by influencing their preferences. Soft power is not restricted to culture alone. It can include any element of a country that is (or seems) attractive to other people, communities or countries. SOFT POWER STRUGGLES IN THE INDIAN CONTEXT While the term Soft Power may only have been coined in the past few decades, the strategy of using the non coercive elements of one’s society to influence global outcomes has been at the forefront of India’s soft power strategy since its independence. If one was to go further beyond that, then it is clear that India, or rather Bharath, has played a crucial role Supra 1 Nye, Joseph. Soft Power: The Means To Success In World Politics. New York: PublicAffairs, 2005. 8 in determining the cultural landscape of the entire globe for centuries. Despite the apparent cultural influence that India has had on the rest of the world, recent studies such as the 2018 Soft Power 30 report have shown that India is not one of the dominant soft superpowers currently. This seemingly that points to a disconnect between India’s various intangible exports and how it is being received. While individual elements of India’s culture such as its food, and Bollywood, have made a distinct mark on the global landscape, these are limited to impacts at the individual level. And while this is of extreme importance, one struggles to see how exactly this influence at the individual level translates into the ability for India to attract other countries at the governmental level. Keeping this in mind, the aim for India’s Soft Power strategy going forward should be more than the simple export of its culture. It should be targeted in such a way that its influence is manifested at the among the most powerful and decision making sections of foreign countries. McClory, Jonathan. “The Soft Power 30.” Portland Communications, February 7, 2018. https://softpower30.com/wp- content/uploads/2018/07/The-Soft-Power-30-Report-2018.pdf. 9 THE INDIAN SOFT POWER INDEX 10 AIM OF THE INDEX he aim of The Indian Soft Power Index is to create a report that is able to determine India’s soft power Tresources, as well as its actual soft power, in any given country. It is created with the express purpose of understanding the variations in how effective India’s soft power has been. It is also intended to help provide information as to the potential for India’s soft power in a country, thereby helping policymakers form an effective soft power strategy. Where the Index defers from other attempts to calculate and quantify soft power is in this way: Unlike other general studies into soft power, CSP’s Index aims at looking at the concept through a uniquely Indian perspective. It will do so by examining not only aspects of culture and foreign policy that are common globally, but also those aspects that are distinct to India.

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