#316 Being Unreasonable

Violence in the US, India's Cards, and Protests in Nepal.

Sep 14, 2025

Global Policy Watch #1: Cycle of Violence

Global issues relevant to India

—RSJ

We don’t talk often about political violence in democracies on these pages. The default principle I hold is that democratic institutions, the rule of law and electoral contests provide the safety valve for channelling individual political and social grievances away from violent means of solution.

The state has a monopoly on violence, and the enforcement of law (with its threat of force) ensures that intergroup conflicts are kept in check and directed towards social consensus. The democratic institutions, like the parliament and the judiciary, and social platforms, like the media and the civil society, help in litigating the differences among social groups and enable bargaining among them towards optimised choices.

Citizens have faith in the structure that offers them political opportunity to change things. That faith restricts violence to isolated individual acts rather than an organised pattern. That’s the theory, at least.

So, every time I read of another act of political violence in a democracy, I assume it is a one-off case of an individual disenchantment for whom the target (wrongly) represents the sum total of everything that’s repressing them. I ask if such an act is any different from other high-profile acts of violence that have happened in the past, and does it, in any way, signal a deeper shift in the way social groups view their ability to bargain for optimised choices.

The usual conclusion I reach is - No; that political violence in democracies isn’t unusual, that it tends to have spikes but settles down on its own after the democratic process subsumes that grievance into the electoral bargain.

The classic example of this is the black America movement in the 60s where the violence was first used by extreme elements as the solution to a lack of social and political access. The violence was ‘attractive’ and it raised political consciousness among young black Americans but eventually the moderates used it to make the movement mainstream. Eventually, its objectives entered political and electoral discourse and that led to a more optimised social bargain that ended the cycle of political violence.

So, how should one view the assassination of Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and a staunch Trump ally, during an event at Utah Valley University this week? There has been a spike in political violence in America over the last year, including killings of political leaders, corporate executives and public officials, that has been carried out by ideologically motivated lone actors. Is this going to trigger a cycle of political violence with a crackdown on the radical left as promised by the Trump administration and the inevitable response to it that will follow? Is there a danger of this sliding into more organised violence between groups?

Political violence in a democracy isn’t an unnatural behaviour, as we in the Indian subcontinent, with our history of political violence, understand well.

“Beneath all the forms of polite society lies a stratum of potential violence which constitutes the ultimate test of the viability of social groups and institutions.” (Nieburg, 1969)

The repressive power of the state and its agents remains credible up to an extent, till an individual perceives that it is no longer interested in or there is no way to find a common ground on any outcome that is of value to them. This feeling of being helpless, of being socially and politically alienated, is often the basis for an act of retaliation.

The continued polarisation of American society, where hate speech is now a norm on both sides, and the inevitable way the demographics and electoral college are stacked in most states will produce more lone actors of violence. There will be a tit-for-tat response because the political rhetoric rewards extreme positions to mobilise the base. That’s exactly what Trump and most Republicans have done since the assassination.

The other point to note here is that lone actor violence doesn’t lead to coercion of the target opponent group to change their behaviour. Instead, it serves to persuade the supporters to sympathise with the cause and normalise violence with the excuse of how evil the other side is to induce such violent behaviour. This is exactly how the reactions from the Democrats have been.

The other effect of such solo high-profile acts of violence is the chilling effect it has on anyone wanting to be in the public sphere and speak their minds on political issues. Despite misgivings about Charlie Kirk’s political views, even his political opponents agreed that his style of mass connect and open debate was a net positive for the discourse. A lack of public engagement makes polarisation worse.

The other thing queering the pitch in the U.S. is the increase in visible violence of the state. The great trick in managing the state is to use the monopoly of violence in a manner that’s almost invisible to its citizens. And when it is visible, it should be seen as a measure of last resort, and therefore, welcome.

The Trump administration has doubled down on visible state violence in the past few months - the spectacle of ICE raids complete with armoured vehicles, drones and weapons on ordinary people, many of whom are legal citizens; the deployment of federal forces in multiple cities against the wishes of the local administration; the deportation of thousands of people after being rounded up and jailed and the witch-hunt and raids on public servants with different political leaning.

These acts don’t have bipartisan support. They are viewed as welcome by one section but with fear and anger by another at whom they seem to be aimed. The oppressive nature of the state, once visible to people, can’t be unseen, and from then on, every act of it seems like violence. This is exactly how the seeds of insurgent movements are sown, as we have seen over and over in India. Nothing organises people more and robs them of their empathy than being against a demonstrably cruel system that revels in violence.

The deepening of identity politics, the widening of economic disparity with terrible solutions like tariffs and closed borders, and the control of social media algorithms that feed disinformation and conspiracies are all enablers that strengthen the feeling of hurt and outrage among impressionable young minds. The glorification of violence in mass media and the easy availability of firearms make it easier to transform this outrage into action. There will always be individuals to whom the system appears rigged and all peaceful avenues to make their voice heard unavailable.

The real worry for the society is when a critical mass of such people is reached who can then band together and organise violence. Most commentary about political violence in the U.S. hold out hope that these are solitary acts of violence and there is almost no possibility of a mass movement of political violence on the horizon. This is drawing selective lessons from the past and a rather optimistic view of the current situation. There are enough warning signs here that indicate this could be worse.

Matsyanyaaya: Taking Charge

Big fish eating small fish = Foreign Policy in action

—Pranay Kotasthane

Events of the past few months have made it clear that India is not a swing power but a swung power. The argument that India must swing between the US and China was made by Nitin Pai in 2010 here. To paraphrase him, a swing power possesses enough strength to decisively shift the balance in favour of the great power it throws its weight behind.

Such a status is achieved by having the capability to inflict costs and bestow benefits to both the sides in a dyadic contest. Now India has enough capabilities to bestow benefits to both China and the US. Its market is a huge sink for China’s overcapacity and its large services talent pool and substantial defence import needs are quite useful for the US.

But the problem lies in India’s inability to inflict substantial costs on both the US and China. Opportunistically bandwagoning with one side against the other has limited value unless we can independently sharpen our tools of retaliation. The reasonable view is that we are too weak to retaliate, especially in the economic sphere. And that the self-harm caused by any retaliation will be far worse than its intended effect on the misbehaving power. I largely agree with this view. It is practical and eminently sensible. As the Hindi idiom goes, jiitni chaadar utne hi pair failaao.

And yet, we must think of an insurance policy. No nation-state can rely on the rationality of the US or China, especially not in the current times. Imagine if India and the US were to sign a trade deal, only to find that the Trump administration wants to put fresh new tariffs on Indian services exports or deport some Indian migrants in the most humiliating way. Or what if China were to escalate border tensions after the normalisation has gathered some pace?

Thus, as self-defeating as it may seem, we must consider our retaliatory options. The conventional thinking is that we don’t have that many today; we can retaliate only when we have acquired substantial economic strength. But that would be a misunderstanding of India’s current position.

India’s big domestic market is already a source of leverage. Retaliatory tariffs are the obvious option, but there are several other fast-yielding strategies to consider. Swaminathan Aiyar proposes two such options in his provocative Times of India article, titled Sorry Economists, the Foreign Policy Experts are Right on Trump:

“But now India must change tack. It must tell Trump, gently but firmly, that India cannot buy arms from a country that imposes a 50% import tariff. That is retaliation through foreign policy rather than trade. It will be a big, credible threat. The economists are plain wrong in saying India has no cards.”
“India does indeed have a big card in pharma but a different one… US drug giants fear India will make it difficult to get fresh patents. Even more they fear India may liberally issue compulsory licenses, allowing Indian companies to cheaply produce drugs still under patent. India can gently turn the screws on both issues without any open announcement. It can then agree to retreat as part of a deal”

These are two reasonably unreasonable options. The challenge is that each of them will set in motion effects that will extend beyond the India-US relationship.

I have another one to propose: India needs a SAMR-type regulator for leverage against Trump's US or Xi's China.

China's State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) has masterfully turned what should be bureaucratic processes—mergers and acquisitions—into powerful geopolitical levers. The key to its geopolitical power lies in this mega-regulator’s antitrust function. SAMR's authority is triggered to review any M&A deal if the companies involved meet certain revenue thresholds in China, even if the companies are not Chinese. It allows Beijing to claim jurisdiction over a deal between, say, two American tech giants if they both sell a significant amount of products or services in China. Punishment for non-compliance can range from hefty fines to a complete ban on operating in the Chinese market.

SAMR has repeatedly used its merger review process to extract concessions, protect domestic industries, and signal political displeasure. Two recent cases come to mind. First is Intel's failed acquisition of Tower Semiconductor, an Israeli firm. The deal was approved by virtually every other regulator worldwide. The last holdout was China's SAMR. As the deadline passed without a decision from Beijing, the deal collapsed. This was direct retaliation for US semiconductor sanctions. Second, Broadcom's acquisition of VMware in 2023 needed SAMR's blessing. However, the approval came only after a positive Biden-Xi meeting and with "restrictive conditions" to ensure VMware’s software remained compatible and fair for Chinese customers.

The lesson for India is simple: when you are a big buyer, you have power. The question is whether you are willing to use it.

India is the only other big market which can use a strategy of this nature. The current Competition Commission of India focuses narrowly on market competition. We need a regulator that considers national strategic interests, data sovereignty, and geopolitical implications.

India’s power isn’t theoretical or based solely on its future consumer market. It has a unique, existing leverage point that makes this strategy particularly potent: the 1,800+ GCCs of the world's largest corporations. Many of them are no longer back-office call centres. They are the high-value, deeply integrated R&D, engineering, and digital transformation hubs that form the operational backbone of these global giants. They are what we call sticky investments. A company can't just pack up a 10,000-person engineering campus in Bengaluru or a fintech innovation lab in Hyderabad and move it elsewhere. The talent, processes, and infrastructure are deeply embedded in their global operations.

This changes the entire risk calculation for a foreign company. If an Indian strategic regulator were to review a merger, the threat is no longer just about losing access to future Indian sales. A much more immediate and painful threat is the potential disruption of a critical nerve centre of their current global business. This operational entanglement gives India a powerful bargaining chip that few other countries possess.

I must reiterate that I do not like any of these options because I can anticipate the many unintended consequences. I also believe it's in India's national interest to first resolve the trade-related issues with the US. However, these retaliatory policies are meant to protect Indian interests against irresponsible great power behaviour in the future. We must sharpen the tools for inflicting pain on misbehaving powers lest we get swung once again.

Global Policy Watch #2: It’s RNS Once Again

Global issues relevant to India

—Pranay Kotasthane

The violent events in Nepal seem to be a canonical case of radically networked societies (RNS) in action. Nitin Pai and I define Radically Networked Societies as:

a web of connected individuals, possessing an identity (imagined or real) and motivated by a common immediate cause.

The conceptual framework is illustrated below:

RNS existed in the past, but social media has thoroughly changed the scalability, speed and depth (the technological aspect), making it easier to bring latent identities and causes to the fore in some cases, or to create entirely new causes and identities. What we see today is a clash between contemporary hierarchically ordered states and their radically networked societies. The information flows much faster in a network than in a hierarchical structure. Hence, states are struggling with counter-mobilisation against RNS.

All three factors are at play in Nepal.

The political cause was the Nepal government's decision in early September 2025 to ban major social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. This act was perceived by many as a direct assault on freedom of expression and a blatant attempt to stifle dissent. However, the social media ban was merely the spark that ignited a tinderbox of long-standing frustrations.
The Gen Z identity provided the sociological aspect. The protests are seen as a response to government corruption, nepotism, and a lack of economic opportunities for the youth. A viral social media trend, using hashtags like #NepoKid, had been gaining momentum, exposing the lavish lifestyles of the children of political elites, starkly contrasting with the struggles of ordinary Nepalis.
Social media platforms provided the scale. There was no single charismatic leader or formal organisational structure directing the demonstrations. Instead, calls to protest and information spread organically across the very networks the government was attempting to shut down. People utilised Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to circumvent the ban and flocked to the platforms that remained accessible, such as TikTok and Discord, to coordinate and disseminate their message. This decentralised nature made the protests incredibly resilient for the police to suppress. News reports suggest that a poll on a Discord server comprising largely anonymous accounts was used to select the interim PM candidate.

In the neighbourhood, we have now seen RNS in action in large-scale protests in Sri Lanka (2022), Pakistan (2023), Bangladesh (2025), and now in Nepal. Sociologist Zeynep Tufecki’s work shows that such “adhocracies” can often disrupt the status quo and create new narratives, but are seldom able to affect electoral or institutional changes. Thus, the tricky part for the protests has now begun. Violence might continue unless they can coalesce around a political formation (as it happened in Sri Lanka).

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