India and Her Trade Agreements: What Lies Beneath?

Abstract

This paper analyses India's transition from a reluctant participant in preferentialism to a proactive negotiator in the last decade. While the deadlock of the Doha Round may have also played a part in this transition, our analysis suggests that the two main drivers of India's recent wave of preferentialism are minimizing trade diversion and promoting deeper integration with her trading partners. We do not, however, find evidence for India’s trade strategy in this regard to be motivated by mercantilist interests. Finally, we find that neutralizing China's competitive advantages may be getting overemphasized as an objective behind India's recent involvement in trade agreements. In fact, the dragon and the tiger may rather be following each other in negotiating trade accords with their common set of major trading partners.