E.U.-India Free Trade

Early in 2026, “(a)fter months of intense negotiations,” the E.U. concluded “a free-trade deal with India,” which, if ratified by the E.U.’s upper and lower chambers (the European Council and the European Parliament), would sharply reduce “tariffs on E.U. products from cars to wine as the world looks for alternative markets following President Donald Trump’s tariffs.”[1] Signaling that something more than trade was involved in the treaty, “(b)oth countries hailed a ‘new chapter in strategic relations’ as both sides” sought “alternatives to the US market.”[2] The E.U. had just engineered a free-trade treaty with four South American countries. Competition for better, cheaper, trade was reducing Trump’s bargaining power by means of tariffs. Using them to inflict geopolitical harm on other countries, including the E.U., would become less effective as free-trade deals excluding the U.S. materialized. The implications, and even the motive in the free-trade negotiations between the E.U. and India, extend beyond economics.

The full essay is at "E.U.-India Trade."

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1. Peggy Corlin and Maria Tadeo, “EU Inks ‘Mother of All Deals’ with India Trade Agreement Amid Global Turmoil,” Euronews.com, January 27, 2026.
2. Ibid., italics added.

RBI Overheating India’s Economy: On Materialist Greed Fueling Ceaseless Consumerism

A phenomenon as massive as the global coronavirus pandemic, which ran from 2020 to 2022, is bound to have major economic ripple, or wave, effects in its wake. India’s record high 9.2% growth of GNP in the 2023-2024 fiscal year illustrates the robust thrust of pent-up demand met with increased supply. To the extent that consumption over savings is the norm in any economy, a couple years off can subtly recalibrate economic mentalities to a more prudent economic mindset wherein saving money is not so dwarfed by spending it. Moreover, putting the brakes on a consumerist routine and societal norm can theoretically lead to putting the underlying materialism in a relative rather than an absolute position and thus in perspective. Yet such a “resetting” must overcome the knee-jerk instinct of any habit to restart as if there had been no change. Coming back to college, for example, after a summer away, students tend to pick up their respective routines right away as if the recent summer were a distant memory. India’s astonishing rate of economic growth just after the pandemic demonstrates that the penchant for consumerism and economic growth as a maximizing rather than satisficing variable returned as if the steeds in Socrates’ Symposium—only those horses represent garden-variety eros sublimated to love of eternal moral verities, to which Augustine substituted “God.”

The full essay is at "RBI Overheating India's Economy."

India on Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine: On the Flawed Hegemony of Political Realism

India took an equivocal position on Russia’s invasion. This is surprising at first glance because India has been so concerned to protect its sovereign territory from baleful encroachments from China. What explains India looking the other way as Russia unilaterally invaded a sovereign state? I contend that the explanation supports the assertion that the world could no longer afford its system based on national sovereignty if political realism is in the driver’s seat at the national level.

The full essay is at "India on Russia's Invasion of Ukraine."

A Night of Knowing Nothing

Diwali, or Deepavali, is one of the biggest festivals in India. More than a billion Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, and Buddhists in the world celebrate the festival of lights in which good triumphs over evil. “Despite its deep religious significance, Diwali today is also a cultural festival observed by people regardless of faith.”[1] In this regard, Diwali is like Christmas, which plenty of non-Christians celebrate as a day of giving complete with the secularized myth of Santa Claus, Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer, and Frosty the Snowman. To claim that Diwali is exclusively Hindu or Christmas is only a Christian holiday—and thus in resentment to ignore either holiday—violates the spirit that both share. The “Happy holidays” greeting is an oxymoron, given its underlying motive of resentment. Yet if this were the extent of human aggression, the world would be a much better place. The Indian documentary film, A Night of Knowing Nothing (2021), reveals much worse than the passive aggression of dismissing a national holiday as if it did not exist. The violence unjustifiably and wantonly inflicted by university police on students at several universities who are protesting caste discrimination and the politically partisan coup at the Film and Television Institute of India, goes beyond even the harm exacted by the discrimination by caste. A Diwali celebration is shown in the film, and this raises the question of whether we can of yet even assuming our species' “progress,” celebrate the victory of good over evil as long as human beings in power abuse their discretion with impunity.

The full essay is at "A Night of Knowing Nothing."

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1. Harmeet Kaur, “What to Know about Diwali, the Festival of Lights,” CNN.com, November 11, 2023.

Anna Hazare: A Modern Incarnation of Gandhi?

On August 21, 2011 in New Delhi, India, tens of thousands marched in support of Anna Hazare, then in the sixth day of his hunger strike in support of the Jan Lokpal anti-corruption bill. He told the crowd, “Even if the prime minister comes, I will not withdraw my hunger strike until the [bill] is passed in the Parliament. I can die but I will not bend.”[1] What a unique and intriguing statement! To be sure, the man's “professed unwillingness to compromise,” as well as his “occasionally belligerent tone, . . . attracted criticism.”[2] Even so, he inspired mainly hope, particularly from the young. His main constituency, however, was the middle class, who felt alienated and unfairly treated. Hazare self-consciously embraced the model of Gandhi. That model, including the principled unbending, is no stranger in India, yet I am surprised that it took until 2011 for a societal figure so Gandhi-like to emerge and galvanize a mass protest using Gandhi’s methods. Of course, the likeness between the two men could be overstated. How much like Gandhi was Hazare and his political action? For example, would Gandhi have stopped eating simply out of preference for one of two bills before the Parliament? Putting a stop to widespread violence is arguably much more significant than reducing corruption. Also, the demand that conduct be changed is more direct than that a law be enacted unless to abolish an unjust one. 

 

                              Associated Press

The full essay is at "Hazare and Gandhi."

1. Jim Yardley, “Thousands Back Antigraft Hunger Strike in New Delhi,” New York Times (August 22, 2011). 
2. Ibid.

Democracy and Over-Population in India: Foreign Direct Investment

How well can the democratic form of governance serve as a means by which a society is circumscribed, or restricted in some way? In other words, can self-government be used to enact self-discipline on the body politic itself? Adding another level to this question, can elected representatives be expected to go beyond fixes that are perceived societally as sufficient to redress the underlying causes of governmental, economic, or societal problems? Far from urging or implying the supremacy of non-democratic forms of government, such questions invite improvement in democracy itself. In this essay, I reflect on these questions using India’s industrial policy as a case study.

 

Singh and Gandhi at a rally. It is clear who's the boss.   AP

 

 The full essay is at "India's Industrial Policy."

 

 

Federalism & Business: States in India Deregulating for Economic Growth

The gross domestic product in India for the year ended March 31, 2011 was estimated to have grown at a robust 8.6%. Gordon Chang at Forbes argues that besides Delhi’s own fiscal and monetary stimuli, competition between the states of India for business has been a formidable factor. Federalism, it turns out, can be good for business—yet at what cost? Chang omits this element, writing only that “As the states try to outdo each other, India’s investment climate improves.”

The full essay is at "Deregulating States in India: Federalism and Business in Action."

Nature’s Caste System: Character-Based Clusters

Pushing good characters down for no good reason in a sort of “collective judgment” that applies to an entire group of people—as in the case of the untouchables in the caste system in India—and accepting the false entitlement of “professionals” to membership in the highest caste simply because they tend to be wealthy—as in the case of lawyers and physicians in America—violates the clusters that naturally cohere—like gases that form distinct planets having their own separated orbits—on the basis of character. Being “on one planet,” it is immediately obvious that someone else is on another. In this essay, I attempt to sketch some of the basic mechanisms by which nature’s caste system is sustained and articulate the nature of the differences that occasion there being appreciable distance between the clusters.

The full essay is at "Nature's Caste System."

Capitalism & Caste: Melting Untouchability in India

In what has become known as India, the caste system of Hinduism has for millennia served as the template for the socio-economic ordering of people into family-based groups. By the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, the economic liberalization policy put in place in 1991 to replace the stagnant “import-substitution” domestic-favoring model of economic development had enabled some people in the lower castes to vault into social acceptability by virtue of what The New York Times calls “the newest god in the Indian pantheon: money.” Given the advent of the prosperity gospel in Christianity and the associated eclipse of the “camel getting through the eye of a needle” much-earlier-hegemonic association of wealth with greed, a similar statement could be made with regard to the Trinity (see “Godliness and Greed” and "God's Gold," both available at Amazon).

The full essay is at "Capitalism and Caste." . 

Anti-Corruption and Federalism in India

At the end of 2011, India’s coalition government adjourned the upper chamber of the federal legislature without passing legislation that would have created an independent anti-corruption agency. India was a the time rife with governmental corruption. A college wants its foreign students protected from crime? A payment is made to local police employees, who pocket the money for themselves. Someone wants a government contract? Well, that goes without saying.

The full essay is at "Anti-Corruption and Federalism in India."

Source:

Jim Yardley, “Bill to Create Anticorruption Agency Stalls in India,” The New York Times, December 30, 2011. 

Is Democracy Inimical to Prudent Government Budgeting: The U.S. and India Contrasted

At a time when the U.S. Government sported an accumulated debt of roughly $20 trillion, with continued deficits expected to add about $10 trillion more over the next ten years, the most populous democracy in the world, India, laid out a prudent budget proposal—one that had been “extremely well thought-out,” according to Deepak Parekh of the Housing Development Finance Corporation in India.[1]

The full essay is at "Prudent Government Budgeting."

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1. Getta Anand, “Arun Jaitley, India’s Finance Chief, Aims to Spur Economy Hit by Cash Shortage,” The New York Times, February 1, 2017.

Squandering a Tradition of Ethical Leadership instead of Protecting the Accrued Reputational Capital: The Case of Ratan Tata in India

In India, Ratan Tata was a revered figure, dubbed Mr. Clean, until the end of 2016, by which time serious allegations of financial improprieties had cut into the stellar reputations of both the man and the famous company founded by J.N. Tata, who had intentionally applied his Parsee ethic to the founding of India’s first steel company with a zero tolerance for corruption. Generally speaking, strategic ethical-leadership and even the resulting reputational capital depend on the persona of whoever is in charge of a company, and not even family linage can be counted on to perpetuate a culture of ethical leadership and protect a company’s accrued reputational capital.

The full essay is in Cases of Unethical Business: A Malignant Mentality of Mendacity, available in print and as an ebook at Amazon.

Gandhi's Philosophy of Nonviolent Defiance: A Way to Freedom

Film is indeed an art form, but the medium can also function as a teacher in how it conveys values and wisdom. Both of these features of film are salient in Gandhi (1982), whose director, Richard Attenborough, says in his audio commentary that the film has done much keep Gandhi’s philosophy alive in the world. In using the film’s star protagonist to explain what is behind his approach, viewers become, in effect, students. The strength of film here lies in its use of both audio and visual means to engrave the lessons in memories. In Gandhi, the main concept to be explained and illustrated is nonviolent active non-cooperation or defiance of unjust laws or regimes.

The full essay is at “Gandhi”

India’s Business Environment: Beyond Corruption

In spite of expected growth of 6 or 7 percent for 2012, the economy of India was facing a pessimistic outlook at the time. The underlying cause seems to have been mismanagement by the federal government—in particular, by the ruling Congress Party. In actuality, the problem lies in the Indian business culture, and the society itself. As such, the problem is not so easily fixed as a change of government or policy.

The full essay is in Cases of Unethical Business: A Malignant Mentality of Mendacity, available in print and as an ebook at Amazon.

Using Corporate Position to Torture Whistle-Blowers

Jack B. Palmer made a quiet complaint through internal channels at Infosys, an outsourcing company based in India. He suspected some managers were committing visa fraud. His complaint leaked. As a result, investigators from the U.S. Government looked into “whether the company used workers from India for certain kinds of jobs here that were not allowed under their temporary visas, known as B-1.”[1]

The full essay is in Cases of Unethical Business: A Malignant Mentality of Mendacity, available in print and as an ebook at Amazon.

1. Julia Preston, “Whistle-BlowerClaiming Visa Fraud Keeps His Job, but Not His Work,” The New York Times, April 13, 2012. 

Food Prices Rising: Will the Global Population Growth Outstrip Food Supply?

I contend that it is in our interest as a species to see that our population size is managed toward a steady state rather than as a maximizing variable (i.e., schizogenic). In fact, we have a right and obligation as one body to see that our various limbs are coordinated such that none engages in hypertrophy. That is to say, the whole has the right to protect its viability by arresting excessive growth in one of the parts. That much of the world's population growth takes place in the developing world does not mean that this right, or obligation, of the world is somehow a plot by the developed countries to oppress the poorer countries. In fact, much of the pain of the higher food prices is in the developing world rather than in the industrialized countries, so it is in the interest of the developing countries to accede to the world’s demand that their population growth be stopped.

The full essay is at "Food Prices and Global Population Growth."