Globalization and the Politics of International Corporate Taxation: A View From India
by Rahul Mukherji

Globalization spurred by information and communication technology could erode the ability of states to tax its corporations. Digitization makes it easy to penetrate foreign markets without the need for physical presence in the buyer’s country. This phenomenon has generated debates on the salience of source versus residence-based taxation, and, the definition of permanent establishment. There is no multilateral organization governing international corporate taxation. The paper notes both the inadequacy of unilateral approaches and the need for a global approach to setting and monitoring standards. Consistent with the interests of producer developing countries like India, it commends the vitality of source-based principles and the traditional conception of permanent establishment. India’s interests are similar to those of many capital scarce producer countries exporting their services over the Internet. Moreover, they are not antithetical to the interests of capital abundant countries. The issue-area is in dire need of global governance.

Some Economic Consequences of India’s Institutions of Governance: A Conceptual Framework
by Nirvikar Singh

This paper examines the functioning of some of India’s institutions of governance, namely, the legislative and executive branches of government, the judiciary, and the bureaucracy, from an instrumental, economic perspective. Governance is analyzed along three dimensions: (1) the degree of commitment or durability of laws and rules, (2) the degree of enforcement of these laws, and (3) the degree of decentralization of jurisdictions with respect to local public goods. It is suggested that India's experience of governance reflects insufficiencies in all three dimensions: of durability, enforcement, and decentralization, with adverse consequences for economic efficiency. The paper concludes with a brief normative discussion of collective action in general, and alternative structures of institutions of governance.

Failed Threats and Flawed Fences: India’s Military Responses to Pakistan’s Proxy War
by Praveen Swami

In the wake of a terrorist attack on Parliament House in New Delhi in 2001, India mobilized its armies along its western frontiers, and threatened to go to war with Pakistan. In the event, India did not go to war, although none of its key demands – an end to cross-border terrorism, for example, or the return of twenty terrorists claimed to be harbored by Pakistan – were met. This paper examines the backdrop to the military of crisis of 2001-2002, in particular the long series of war threats made by India in response to Pakistani sub-conventional warfare in Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir. It argues that neither war threats nor physical fencing of India’s frontiers have deterred this sub-conventional warfare, and that alternate means have to be found to contain it.

Review Essay: India, China, the United States, Tibet, and the Origins of the 1962 War
by John W. Garver

This article reviews several recent books, including the recently declassified Indian official history of the 1962 war, and analyzes the possible role of India complicity with US covert operations in Tibet as a factor in the origin of the 1962 Sino-Indian war. The Indian official history of the 1962 war offers little useful information in this regard, while other scholarly studies are reckless in their assertions of Indian complicity. We still remain in the dark about what Nehru knew and when he knew it about CIA activities in Tibet. The best guess seems to be that Nehru had a broad, general knowledge of US covert activities, recognized as useful for pressing China to compromise with India over Tibet, but refused to associate India in any way with US activities.