View from India: “There is no other word for it – Imperialism!”

It will be a huge mistake for India to treat the trade negotiations with US President Donald Trump just as a trade negotiation. The “concede to America lobby” in India, which is surprisingly ideologically strong in elite circles, is spectacularly misreading the moment. They start with obvious truisms. India and America can be extraordinarily productive partners. India needs vigorous domestic economic reform. And we have to realise that there is a capitalist reset underway and we will need to adapt. Just look at the fact that many countries are rushing for a deal. We do not want to be left out, stresses ‘Indian Express’.

But these truisms disguise the most spectacular fact about the moment: It is a profoundly imperial moment. Trump is not simply resetting capitalism into a new form. If the objective of the reset of capitalism was protectionism for the sake of industrial policy, re-embedding capitalism in new social relations favourable to labour, regulating immigration, countries like India could deal with it, and even ought to make intelligent concessions to enable it. But the reset that Trump is demanding is very different. It would be foolish to rush headlong into enabling it without resistance.

Consider this thought experiment. Suppose a powerful country wants to both impose tariffs and achieve bilateral balance of trade. Suppose, further, that there was no reciprocity in the tariffs. The powerful country rather implausibly complained that it has been exploited by the rest of the world. It now wants to reverse that trend. How? By imposing asymmetric tariffs. This power is asking everyone to lower their tariffs to zero, while itself continuing to impose tariffs, almost as if this were a 19th-century imperial tariff regime. Further, this power gets you to buy particular goods it wants to sell, not as part of a give and take, but basically under threat. This government reserves the rights to its own industrial policy, unhealthily subsidised agriculture, but wants you to upend your entire agriculture policy.

Imagine, further, that this power constantly seeks to interfere in plausibly defensible regulations in all countries. It does not want to leave them alone, but insists that the regulation of technology, content moderation, should be according to its values. Imagine, further, that this power was interested in extractive mercantilism for which it will not hesitate to use its military might. Imagine, further, that this power no longer thinks that advantages accrue to it because of the credibility of its monetary system. It seeks to retain the privileged status of its currency, not by making its institutions attractive, but by trying to coerce others through tariffs. It now maintains its exorbitant privilege by more threats.

To add to this volatile mix, it encourages what is, from a developmental point of view, the most useless and insidious form of speculation: Cryptocurrency. It also creates a system where the rulers directly benefit from the system. It further undermines the credibility of the global system by basically saying that anyone who gives bad news about the economy will be penalised.

But its ambition goes further. It is constantly meddling in other countries’ affairs in the most damaging way possible. It claims to eschew democracy promotion, but does something worse: Meddle in the rule-of-law processes of other countries. It imposes stiff penalties on one country simply because that country was following the rule of law and defending its democracy against those who plotted a coup. It wrecks every international institution that could provide global public goods. But worse, it sanctions international officials who were simply doing their job and penalises them.

Imagine, further, that this power is unwilling to stop one of the most horrendous moral catastrophes of the 21st century, which is being carried out with its support. Not only is it unwilling to stop it, it is penalising, across the world, people who might be moved and outraged by this catastrophe. All countries want to get ahead. But imagine, further, that this country wants to retain supremacy, by force of arms if necessary. Imagine, further, that this country treats its longstanding allies like pieces of dirt. It drips with contempt for them. This is not a power with whom even an alliance is possible. It will accept only vassals.

Now what would such a country be called? There is no other word for it: Imperialism!

It’s mind-boggling that we have to hesitate to use this word. It is also a mistake to think this is just about managing the ego of one leader. There is no pushback in the system to this imperial project. Great powers are always imperialist. Weaker powers always have to adjust. That is a debate for another occasion. But Trump is imperialism on steroids. The reset of capitalism is not in favour of mitigating environmental risk, more social protection or even coherent industrial policy.

If this is a reset, it is towards a more coercive domestic political system, accelerating oligarchy, increasing discretion, throwing capitalism into a more speculative tailspin, and outright coercion of others. Our pro-America lobby is loudly proclaiming that this model is working.

India and America should, at their best, stand for shared political values — zones of liberty, constitutionalism and open society. But capitulating to this emerging American imperial state, under the euphemisms of reform, realism, or capitalist reset, is an affront to both India’s dignity and its interests. And it will be terrible for the future of the world.

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