MCRG Logistical Spaces (7)

The paper looks at the connection between networks of finance capital and infrastructure-led development in the context of India’s Look East Policy (renamed as the Act East Policy in 2014) whose main thrust has been to forge sustainable political and economic relationships with its neighbouring countries in Southeast Asia so that it can compete with China as a regional power, especially in the context of Asia’s emergence as the leader of globalization following the economic meltdown in the West. It strives to explore this connection in the background of the idea of a ‘seamless Asia’ (often mentioned in documents of regional conglomerates like ASEAN and financial institutions like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank as an ideal state of an interconnected continent through transport facilities and specially designated trade routes, border policies and economic liberalisation) and the many infrastructural requirements for its realisation in connection with the emerging networks of finance capital in the region.