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India, though a working democracy, has adopted an ambivalent stance toward the genesis and evolution of the doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect. This article traces India’s views toward the earlier principle of humanitarian intervention, outlines its reactions toward the advent of the norm, and discusses India’s positions on the attempts to apply it to recent international crises. It then argues that India’s cautious support for the principle stems in part from concerns about its potential abuse in the hands of the great powers, post-colonial concerns about the diminution of the norm of state sovereignty, and finally, its own domestic vulnerabilities in the protection of human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The enduring role of Pakistan's army in both foreign and domestic affairs has long drawn the attention of political scientists. Since its emergence from the partition of the British Indian Empire in 1947, Pakistan has suffered four military coups (in 1958, 1969, 1977 and 1999), long periods of political instability and a persistent inability to consolidate democratic institutions. At first glance, Pakistan's inability to sustain a transition to democracy is especially puzzling given that India, which also emerged from the collapse of British rule in South Asia, has experienced only a brief bout of authoritarian rule (1975–77) and has managed to consolidate democracy – even though the quality of its democratic institutions and their performance leaves much to be desired. Many scholars have proffered explanations for Pakistan's failure to make a successful transition to democracy. This essay will argue that all the extant accounts are partial and incomplete. It will contend that the roots of Pakistan's propensity towards authoritarianism must be sought in the ideology, organisation and mobilisation strategy of the movement for the creation of Pakistan. Whereas other recent writing on authoritarianism in Pakistan dwells upon the aggregation of power by the military, this essay focuses upon the failure of civilian democratic institutions to fully abandon authoritarianism even when the military is not in power. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses the potential for Pakistan to face economic and social strife as a result of infrastructural bottlenecks combined with escalating food and fuel prices. A period of enlightenment promised by former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has failed due to suicide bombings and Taliban actions. The author evaluates the history of Pakistan to determine why democracy is difficult to implement within the nation. Problems arising between India and Pakistan are attributed to the writings of Muslims such as Sir Sayyid Ahmed Khan. Figures such as Ayub Khan and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto are discussed.

The article explores six decades of independence and democracy in India. The country's rapid and successfully consolidated transition to democracy during the years following British withdrawal in 1947, raised doubts about the validity of arguments on economic development and democracy. The British evidently did little or nothing to promote the growth of democratic institutions in the country.

The article focuses on the political conditions in Nepal. By any measure, Nepal's experience with democratization has been a tragic failure. Despite a 1990 popular revolution and the king's subsequent embrace of what looked like a serious attempt to introduce multiparty competition to the world's only officially Hindu divine-right monarchy, recent Nepalese history has been fraught with instability and strife. While Nepal has long been among the world's poorest nations, is home to an array of distinct ethnolinguistic and religious groups, and is wracked by a violent insurgency, neither the country's poverty nor its diversity nor the armed Maoist campaign suffices to explain Nepal's failure to make serious progress toward liberal democracy.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles on topics related to India, including a comparison of India's democracy to democracies in other South Asian countries, the economic and political effects of globalization on the Indian state of Odisha, and India's internal security.