The Global Politics of the Modern: India and the Three Worlds of the Cold War

FAIN: FT-59527-12

David C. Engerman
Brandeis University (Waltham, MA 02453-2728)

This project explores the full global dimensions of the Cold War by integrating the perspective of the global south. Specifically, it traces India's efforts, under leaders from Jawaharlal Nehru to Indira Gandhi, to navigate between divergent US and Soviet visions in pursuit of Indian dreams of economic and political modernity. Five chapters on different forms of aid--from agriculture to industry and atomic energy, from economic expertise to military supplies--shed light on the complex relationship between India, as aid recipient, and competing donors. Examining new archival sources on Soviet and American efforts to bring India into closer alliance, the project also incorporates the Subaltern School's critiques of postcolonial state-building. It builds on scholarship from various subfields of history, political science, and economics to present a new approach to understanding the global implications of American-Soviet conflict in the latter half of the twentieth century.