Session V: Ideas for common projects between IDSA and GIGA

Moderation:

Meena Singh Roy, Research Fellow, IDSA

Dr. Sandra Destradi, Research Fellow, GIGA.

Dr. Sandra initiated the proceedings by stating that the purpose of the current session was for free brainstorming of future projects that may be undertaken between IDSA and GIGA. A concrete plan could be put in place which could involve joint publication on topics like global governance, the exchange of researchers between the institutes for a period of two-three months. As a follow up of the present dialogue, a joint workshop will be conducted in Hamburg in 2014. However she was of the opinion that unlike the wide spectrum covered this time, the topic for the next workshop should be more focused.

Dr. Meena Singh added that as per the agreement signed in 2010 there were two options: the first involved scholars funding their own travel and the respective institute provides logistics or secondly, a similar workshop like the present one is funded like for example the last two days have been funded by the German Resource Foundation. In addition she felt that new ideas and themes should be taken up for the subsequent workshop. Topics like South Asia, non-traditional security and West Asia could be considered for collaborative research.

A delegate from GIGA highlighted the importance of having mid-term research goals and the need for external funding, which further required a number of joint publications and a list of experts being consulted. Some of the priority areas that could be focused on are global governance, migration, internal security. Also, energy security and climate change are areas of mutual interest and could be explored.

Dr. Sandra added that they felt that a theory driven agenda would be useful. Some of the issues that were raised during discussion yesterday like multilateralism and bilateralism would be interesting to tackle using the theoretical approach. Dr. Joachim added that they would like to leverage IDSA knowledge on India’s conflict management, peace keeping missions, etc and that at the most three issue areas should be selected and not more.

Dr. Arvind Gupta, DG IDSA expressed that global governance was an important topic and that IDSA was seeking to improve their expertise. Conceptual issues like what is global governance could also be explored. IDSA was fairly strong on geopolitics issues – climate change and the resulting geopolitics revolving around negotiations could be examined. Other issue areas that were important and seeking to improve expertise were maritime security, international terrorism and cyber security.

A participant at the discussion noted that it was important to keep in mind the relevance of issues to policy makers in the government before deciding. Another suggestion was made from the floor that one could also look at global governance of water resources.

A participant from GIGA stated that more specific focus within global governance could be looked at like the role of the United Nations in issues like peacekeeping, climate and energy security. An IDSA scholar suggested that it would help if the term ‘security’ was defined both, in the German and Indian context both in terms of traditional and non-traditional security and then examine the areas of overlapping interest.

A question was raised asking the rationale of the workshop, whether it was meant for solely academic interest or it was to influence government policy. Dr. Sandra clarified that though they (GIGA) were a think tank, they had more of a academic tilt. Though she was of the opinion that as the research progresses as a by product, would also inform policy. The workshop was important as it allows people to identify suitable partners who they would like to work with.

Former Ambassador Phunchok Stobdan was of the view that during his tenure in the government there wasn’t enough articulation through academia between different countries which is vital for track-1 diplomacy. Topics like regional security, climate change and water should be taken up initially, while at a later stage the mandate can be broadened.

Mr. Uttam Sinha stressed the importance of conceptual clarity before one could more towards establishing a policy framework. For this one could use IDSA journal to express new ideas and as it is peer reviewed which gives it academic credibility.

Dr. Robert Kappel suggested the need to postulate global solutions to problems like climate change and energy. In addition he felt that there shouldn’t be any worries regarding whether research is academic oriented or policy oriented as one could always synthesis and produce policy briefs. Furthermore, it is important to have a narrow topic for discussion at the workshop otherwise people feel the same topics are being repeated and end up feeling disenchanted as no concrete ideas or new perspective come forth. It would be a better idea if the workshop allowed for the expressing of the Indian and German view point on security issues in Burma, Central Asia, etc. He also stressed the fact that during their 60 or so workshops they conduct with the ministry of foreign affairs in Germany they repeatedly ask for new interpretation and narratives of developments unfolding across the globe to help inform their policy decisions.

It was clarified by Meena Singh Roy that there were two parts to the agreement signed between the two institutes of which bilateral dialogue were one aspects and the other is an annual workshop. The sessions conducted the past few days were part of a workshop conducted under the bilateral agreement. The bilateral allows participants from both the institutions to pick the topics they would like to discuss as both have a stake in it while the workshop deals with a more focused topic of discussion.

During summing up , Dr. Arvind Gupta invited the writing of articles and the exchange of scholars between the two institutes. Dr. Jochim added that he was extremely satisfied with the proceedings and outcomes over the past two days and looked forward to the next dialogue in Hamburg in 2014.

Report prepared by Rahul Chauhan