Volume : VI, Issue : III, March - 2017

Emerging Trends in the IndoPacific Region

Sunil Dutt Sharma

Abstract :

 In 2007, before the Indian Parliament, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe put forth the idea of a united Indo–Pacific inging about prosperity and freedom. He also spoke of a ’Broader Asia’ that oke away geographical boundaries. In context of the primary importance of the Indo–Pacific region, the last few years has formed the yolk of all foreign policy, economic, maritime, and political discussion in the region. Over the last about a decade, there have been two important developments that have altered the world’s economic and strategic balance. First, the “Indo–Pacific” has replaced the Atlantic– Pacific combine, as the new financial and strategic centre of gravity. Second, the rise of local maritime powers has resulted in the presence of alternate ‘power –hubs’ within the oader Asia–Pacific region. The Indo–Pacific region has evolved as a viable strategic construct with its progression from an idea that had limited acceptance to one that is now seen as a feasible strategic notion. The pendulum of global maritime significance has swung to the east, and that various markers of societal progress viz. interdependent economic activity, vital trade exchanges, energy flows, strategic resources development seem to all endorse the idea of a strategically integrated region. The shift in the strategic balance of power to the East makes it necessary to explore the emerging security imperatives in the oader Indo–Pacific region, amidst a rising constellation of economic and political stars such as China, Indonesia, Japan, Australia and India, on the geo–strategic horizon. The wider Indo–Pacific region is home to nearly 3 billion people and has a combined Gross Domestic Product of nearly $20 trillion. It has three of the four largest economies in the world i.e. China, India and Japan. It is in this context that the strategic import which the Indo–Pacific region holds cannot be missed. The Indo–Pacific is important because it represents the centre of gravity of the world’s economic and strategic interests. As the world’s most economically dynamic region, it is home to resources that can help power many developed and developing economies. The world’s leading and rising economic powers such as China, India, Korea, Australia and Japan, etc., are principal constituents integrated space. Consequently, maritime trade flowing through the busy sea lanes of Indo–Pacific region is vital for the economic prosperity of the entire region and beyond.  As global economic power shifts from the West to the East, the vast geo–strategic and geo–economic realm spanning the western Pacific Ocean right up to the western Indian Ocean along the eastern coast of Africa is rapidly eclipsing the once dominant Asia–Pacific as the centre of trade, investment, rivalry, competition and cooperation. Today, it makes more sense to think of this maritime region of interest as an organic and integrated strategic entity rather than as two separate distinctive geographic and strategic theatres i.e. the Indo– Pacific Region. 

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Article: Download PDF   DOI : 10.36106/ijsr  

Cite This Article:

Sunil Dutt Sharma, Emerging Trends in the IndoPacific Region, INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH : VOLUME-6 | ISSUE-3 | MARCH‾2017

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