East of India, South of China: Sino-Indian Encounters in Southeast Asia.

• Jurisdiction: Singapore
• Author: Mishra, Rahul
• Date: 01 April 2018

East of India, South of China: Sino-Indian Encounters in Southeast Asia. By Amitav Acharya. Oxford and New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2017. Hardcover: 260pp.

Southeast Asia is a "confluence zone" where personas of Indian and Chinese civilizations have met over several millennia through recurring and often coalescing waves. The India-China interface in Southeast Asia has long been a matter of scholarly debates, and particularly since India launched its "Look East" policy in 1992 (rechristened as the "Act East" policy in 2014). China's "Good Neighbourly Policy" and its recently launched Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) have brought China-Southeast Asia relations into sharper focus.

Although several recently published books have probed the interplay between India and China in Southeast Asia, almost all of them have focused on either New Delhi or Beijing's perspective, or both. In this context, Amitav Acharya's book is a remarkably fresh piece of scholarly work because it looks at the issue from Southeast Asia's "own" perspective, thus aptly justifying the title East of India, South of China.

Moreover, instead of analysing the region as a mere theatre of rivalry, and Southeast Asia as a passive actor, Acharya considers Southeast Asia to be an active player which has vigorously shaped ties with both India and China, thus determining its own regional destiny. Instead of looking at India-China ties in binaries, Acharya explores India-Southeast Asia-China interplay to examine how their interactions have defined, and have the potential to redefine, Asia's future...