Regime Capability and Relational Stakes in the Emerging World Order

Against the background of an emerging new world order in the 21st century, this paper offers a conceptual frame on the critical role that regime capability can play in modulating the relational stakes of a country. The text in that context offers the case of Nepal as also a few other countries to assess and explain the role and impact of political stability in enhancing relational dividend as well as the pace of democratisation and development. A three-fold typology of governance regimes-survival, subsistential and self-sustaining-is also presented to validate the arguments. The methodology used here is broadly comparative and empirical using ideas conceptualised to facilitate comparison, explanation and elaboration of the arguments forwarded in the course of discussion.

Unleashing Nepal’s Demography as Soft Power

For small powers like Nepal, enhancement of soft power to achieve national interests and economic aspirations is important. For this, however, the aspect of Nepal’s demography has not been considered as a source for advancing Nepal’s soft power. Owing to the same research gap, this study emphasises how Nepal’s demographics can be a significant facet to enhancing Nepal’s soft power. With the same objective, this paper has essentially explored the unexplored territories of demography, migration and also women’s contributions to Nepal’s economy to boost up Nepal’s soft power ambition. Stressing on the changed narrative away from the conventional notion of “yam between two boulders”, the study introduces the idea of “Global Nepali” as a component to enhance Nepal’s soft power, considering the changing demography of Nepal. Also, by shedding light on the contribution of Nepali women in Nepal’s economic growth and its potentiality to advance Nepal’s soft power, this study reiterates that the soft power of a country like Nepal lies in the hearts of its people and what they have to offer to the world.

An Intellectual in the Corridors of Power

Introduction: A reviewer of my book Yadu Nath Khanal: Jivani ra Vichar (Yadu Nath Khanal: Life and Thoughts) wrote: “Prithvi Narayan Shah unified Nepal, Bhanubhakta Acharya standardised Nepali language and Yadu Nath Khanal intellectualised Nepal’s foreign policy”. Indeed Professor Yadu Nath Khanal made outstanding contributions in explaining Nepal’s foreign policy to the international community in modern terminology. His thoughts on Nepal, Nepali literature and Nepal’s foreign policy are compiled in a book Nepal’s Non-Isolationist Foreign Policy (Kathmandu: Satyal Prakashan, 2000) that has 100 articles divided into five sections. Professor Khanal was a scholar, literary critic and successful practitioner as well as a thinker of Nepal’s foreign policy. But above all, he was an intellectual par excellence. I will begin this biographical sketch of Professor Khanal with his birth and academic career and conclude it with an extract from Professor Kamal P. Malla (1936-2018), himself a great scholar, who described Professor Khanal as “an intellectual in the corridors of power”.

Nepal’s Role in Strengthening SAARC

This study seeks to examine the overall efforts undertaken by Nepal to activate the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), particularly after the indefinite postponement of its 19th Summit that was scheduled to take place in Islamabad, Pakistan, on November 9-10, 2016. As a strong proponent of regionalism and regional cooperation, Nepal’s position has always been making the regional body vibrant and result-oriented; and Nepal has been relentlessly working for the same since its very inception. Much has been written about SAARC and Nepal, still very little literature is available that sincerely digs out the concrete efforts made by Nepal to strengthen the SAARC process. Therefore, this study tries to fulfill this gap. Additionally, this aims to make policy prescriptions for the revival and strengthening of SAARC. The study consists of both primary and secondary data collected from books, seminar papers, policy briefs and newspapers. It applies both qualitative and quantitative approaches while analysing Nepal’s efforts in strengthening the SAARC process.

Nepal’s Post Pandemic Diplomacy

The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the importance of priortising health and other social and environmental issues and treating them as national security concerns. Taking a small state policy capacity approach-a small state’s ability to make informed policy decisions, this article looks at the nascent efforts being made to pursue regional cooperation in dealing with non-conventional threats in South Asia; and both implications and opportunities for Nepal to diversify its diplomatic engagement with a view to bridging its own domestic capacity gap-heightened by the pandemic. This analytical article argues that this is the right time for Nepal to reframe the issue of health and other emergencies, recalibrate the roles of its domestic institutions and diversify its diplomacy with the regional players and pivotal middle powers for building domestic capacity.

Nepal Worldview: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy

Review of 'Nepal Worldview: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy' Author: Madhu Raman Acharya. No abstract available.

Diplomacy in the Perspective of Boundaries

Diplomacy is an instrument for negotiation to find mutually acceptable solutions to a common challenge in a non-confrontational and polite manner. In this perspective, border diplomacy refers to the diplomatic approaches to demarcate, manage and resolve the border disputes in a peaceful manner. For Nepal, border diplomacy for demarcation and management should be based on the dynamic equilibrium of both the neighbours, China and India. This paper revisits the crux of diplomacy and border diplomacy for the peaceful settlement of disputes in a peaceful way. The research emphasizes on border demarcation diplomacy, focussing on Nepal-India and Nepal-China borders. The study explains about the border dispute between Nepal and India in the region of Lipulek, Limpiyadhura and Kalapani. Further, the paper suggests border management diplomacy for Nepal-China and Nepal-India, focusing on the Kalapani issue, and alerts about the possible circumstances during the negotiations and recommends Nepal’s potential strategies for border management in the future.

Editorial Vol.1(1)

No Abstract Available

Charting a New Direction and Strategy in Nepal's Foreign Policy

Despite assorted contributions to the understanding of how Nepal’s foreign policies are formulated, and how different actors and factors shape and implement them, foreign policy research remains largely centered in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. But it doesn’t mean that the increasing importance of other actors can be ignored. Thus, this paper aims to discuss a dire need to revamp our institutional structures regarding foreign policy decision-making and implementation to suit the new challenges and opportunities that have come on the way because of changes and transformation in the global and national politics. This research identifies the growing number of actors in foreign policy decision-making and implementation along with the changing geopolitical and geo-economic scenario of Nepal, and concurrently reiterates that Nepal must comprehensively overview the efficacy of other ministries and departments that influence foreign policy making and implementation to bring into synergy. Hypothesising that Nepal’s foreign engagement can be robust with policy coordination and structural change, the paper gives a way forward to improve and adapt to the changes, and chart a new direction for Nepal’s foreign relations.

Labour Diplomacy and Migration Governance in Nepal

This paper examines the linkage between labour diplomacy and migration governance, which is one of the most interconnected subjects in international relations. Especially in the case of Nepal, almost a quarter of the total working age population is working abroad and the remittance contributes to more than a quarter of its national GDP and greatly influences the socio-economic dynamics of Nepali society. Myriads of socio-economic tangibles, besides macroeconomic variables are intertwined with the country’s labour migration phenomena. The paper focusses on analysing different facets of this linkage by distinctly dissecting various issues concerning labour migration, including the gender perspective, on the diplomatic as well as governance front to explore the gap between the economic aspirations of the country and the actual pace of economic development. The paper uses qualitative methods to allow analytical assessment of various government as well as secondary sources of literature, including reports prepared by international bodies. This leads to the conclusion that without proper interlinkage and cooperation between labour diplomacy and migration governance, it is not possible to achieve sustainable economic growth and development of Nepal.