The Great Power Show

There’s a paradox at the heart of the India–Russia relationship.On one level, there are no direct conflicts of interest. In fact, at a moment like the present, when even trusted partners like the United States appear willing to coerce New Delhi, Moscow seems like a reliable friend. It remains a key defense supplier, and now also an important energy partner, offering deep discounts to keep its own economy afloat. The relationship with Moscow also gives Delhi a degree of maneuverability in the wider Eurasian space.And yet, there are growing limitations, and increasing costs, that this friendship brings. Beyond the 25% tariff penalty that the Trump administration has imposed on India for buying Russian oil, there are deeper strategic concerns. Russia’s increasing dependence on China raises anxieties in Delhi; its tentative outreach to Pakistan creates unease; and of course, the ongoing war in Ukraine continues to complicate India’s ties with Europe.All of these issues are likely to return to the headlines come December, when Russian President Vladimir Putin visits Delhi. But to understand the stakes of that visit, and indeed, the future of this partnership, we need to step back and look at Russia itself: the political system, the worldview of its leaders, and the strategic logic that drives its behaviour.How stable is the Russian state today? What kind of world order does Moscow want to build? And how does it really see India and the Indo-Pacific amid a world of shifting alignments?To unpack these questions, in this episode of The Great Power Show, I speak to Aleksei Zakharov, a Research Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation’s Strategic Studies Programme in New Delhi. Our conversation begins with a look at how Moscow views the world; what kind of an order does it crave? How has the leadership managed economic and political stability while engaging in what seems to be a protracted conflict in Ukraine.We also discuss how Russia conceives of great power competition between the United States and China? How deep are Moscow’s equities with Beijing? And how does it position itself in the Indo-Pacific, a region where its influence remains limited but its ambitions endure.As always, I hope you enjoy the discussion. Please like, share, subscribe and rate the episode; and if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, don’t hesitate to reach out to me.

Look around the world today; there are few certainties. The global order is in a state of flux. And that means that every country is rethinking old assumptions, and even old partnerships. There’s a lot of jockeying for wriggle room; a lot of signalling to partners and rivals. And often in the media environment that we live in today, signals get taken to mean substantive or even structural shifts. Alas, sometimes a signal is simply that; a signal.So what should we pay attention to if we want to understand the trajectory of countries and the international system? Interests, of course. But what else? What are the structural factors that students and watchers of International Relations should study?To understand these dynamics better, in this episode of The Great Power Show, I speak to Stephen Nagy, Professor of Politics and International Studies International Christian University in Tokyo. Stephen is a critic of the snapshot analysis that permeates the media environment. He contends that instead of photo-ops and rhetoric, one should focus on structural factors like budgetary allocations and force posture. In other words, it’s not the stated but the revealed preference that matters in geopolitics.Our conversation also focussed on the nature of US-China competition. More importantly, what is the Trump administration’s America First agenda, and how does it tie in with this great power competition? And of course, how are Japan and other countries in East Asia contending with these turbulent times?As always, I hope you enjoy the discussion. Please like, share, subscribe and rate the episode; and if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, don’t hesitate to reach out to me.Read Prof. Nagy’s piece in Japan Times: International relations analysis needs to grow upAbout: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

The past eight months have been among the strangest in recent times. The Trump administration has given substance to its rhetoric on tariffs, redrawing the landscape of the world economy. There have been some deals, but the details are scant. Ambiguity, it seems, is not just a negotiating position, but also evident in outcomes. On the surface, allies and partners are seemingly being punished, while challengers and rivals are being courted. There’s a deep sense of coherence in policy.So what is it that the Trump administration and the MAGA coalition that he rode to power truly want from the world? What is the economic order that they desire? Is there even a shared vision of the economic order America is trying to build? And behind the scenes, who is actually pulling the levers—on trade, on industrial policy, and on economic security?To unpack all this I reached out to Peter Harrell, a leading expert on US economic statecraft. Peter is a Non-Resident Fellow at Carnegie and hosts the fantastic Security Economics podcast. Our conversation delves into the thinking driving the Trump administration’s policies on trade and economic security, the nature of the deals that the US has inked with some of its partners and allies, how Washington is recalibrating its China strategy, and what all of this means for India and the global economic order.As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, subscribe and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out to me on my email.About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

At the beginning of 2025, if you asked someone in New Delhi, you probably would have heard a response of cautious optimism. India seemed well-positioned to deal with the return of Donald Trump to the White House. Trade talks were likely to be difficult, but there was a sense of possibility. The strategic logic of the relationship, one assumed, was robust enough to ensure close engagement.But today, the relationship feels deeply strained. We’ve arrived at an odd inflection point, one where deep strategic convergence coexists with growing political friction. There’s a bitterness in the air that hasn’t been seen for a long, long time.To make sense of this moment, and to step back and look at the bigger picture of India’s place in the world, I reached out to someone who knows the craft of diplomacy inside out. Nirupama Menon Rao has had a remarkable career: she has served as India’s ambassador to both the United States and China, and high commissioner to Sri Lanka. She was also only the second woman ever to hold the post of India’s Foreign Secretary.This is a wide-ranging conversation, from the personal to the geopolitical, from Washington and Beijing to New Delhi. We dig into the challenges and opportunities in India–US relations today, the balancing act with China and Russia. We also zoom out further, to ask: Are we truly in a new era of great power competition between the US and China? Or is this turbulence the messy reality of multipolarity?Ambassador Rao offers an insightful and poetic take on the world today, comparing it to a revolt in the Orchestra. The conductor has lost some authority. The concertmaster is challenging him for leadership. And the percussion section is drumming its own beat. So, how does one navigate this environment?As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, subscribe and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out to me on my email.About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

Over the past few months, I’ve often found myself overwhelmed by the pace and nature of global events. Each day seems to bring something that overturns long-held assumptions—norms I had internalised growing up in the 1980s and 1990s. It’s been disorienting. At times, it feels as if we’ve entered a new nihilistic and transactional world.It was in this frame of mind that I stumbled upon Prof. Steven Smith’s Open Yale Course on Political Philosophy. The series offered not just a masterful survey of Western political thought, from Socrates to Tocqueville and his contemporaries, but also a welcome opportunity to step back from the churn of headlines and reflect on the enduring debates they echo.How are economic globalisation and the resurgence of populism and nationalism reshaping the relationship between the individual, the community, and the state? How did earlier thinkers grapple with these tensions, and how are today’s societies addressing them? What does justice mean in our time? Does it inevitably imply a march towards progressivism? How should liberalism engage with patriotism? And to what extent is contemporary nationalism a reaction to the perceived failures of liberal cosmopolitanism?With these questions in mind, I reached out to Prof. Smith, who graciously agreed to discuss them, along with his views on the current trajectory of American politics.As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out to me on manoj@takshashila.org.in.If you are interested in Prof. Smith’s recent works, do check out his books:Modernity and Its Discontents – Making and Unmaking the Bourgeois from Machiavelli to BellowReclaiming Patriotism in an Age of ExtremesAbout: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

India’s global profile is rising. By the end of this decade, India will be the world’s third-largest economy. Diplomatically, it is also far more active as a member of key multilateral groupings. Arguably, India’s foreign policy today plays a bigger role in domestic politics than at any time since the Nehru years. All of this is changing how Indians think about world affairs, leading to an increasing number of young people studying International Relations. In fact, over the past 25 years, there’s been a visible expansion of Indian universities offering IR courses. The discipline itself evolved from the margins of political science to the heart of it.For decades, IR theory has remained anchored in Western experiences and epistemologies. But does that lens still suffice? Or is there a need to think through new, perhaps more rooted, ways of conceptualising power, order, and change?In this episode, I speak with Atul Mishra, Associate Professor of International Relations at Shiv Nadar University, in India. Atul is a refreshingly original voice in the world of International Relations. His perspective is incisive, anchored in rigorous theory, yet deeply informed by empirical realities.Our conversation begins by tracing his personal and intellectual journey before turning to bigger questions: What is theory for? Who is it serving? And does IR theory need to become fragmented accounting for culture and civilisation experiences? In other words, is there a need for an Indic IR or an IR with Chinese characteristics? From there, we take stock of the global order and the state of the idea of liberal democracy. Are the ideas of liberalism passé amid the rising tide of authoritarianism and under the weight of present-day realpolitik?As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out to me.- Atul’s Substack IR Wire- Atul’s Lecture on What is a liberal democracy?About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

Katja Drinhausen, a keen analyst of the Communist Party of China, dives into the complexities of Chinese political language. She discusses the significance of slogans, silences, and ideological shifts, questioning how they shape both domestic and global narratives. The conversation also touches on Xi Jinping's aggressive 'wolf warrior diplomacy' and its implications for international relations. Additionally, she explores how China crafts its image among European leaders, and emphasizes the need for diversity in political messaging to resonate with people.

What happens when a global order loses its story? In today’s world, it’s not just borders and alliances that are shifting. What’s also shifting are the shared narratives that held them together. The American-led order, once animated by the promise of liberal universalism, is now fraying at the edges. But this isn’t just a moment of geopolitical transition. It’s something deeper. There’s a crisis of meaning and purpose of power.Nowhere is this more apparent than in the United States itself. From isolationist reflexes to post-truth politics, the idea of America is being rewritten. And as the US redefines itself, the world must confront the fallout. But then, it’s not just the US alone. Even China, Europe, Russia and countries like India are in the process of shaping new identities.To make sense of all this, On this episode of The Great Power Show, I speak with Bruno Maçães, former Portuguese Secretary of State for European Affairs and one of the most original geopolitical thinkers of our time. We explore what he calls the “moments of disorder” that mark the end of old world orders, and the birth of new ones. We talk about America’s evolving sense of self, Europe’s disillusionment, and the nature of power in a multipolar world. All of this of course is also happening at a moment when technology is changing the very essence of geopolitical competition. Maçães believes that the old geopolitics of land and sovereignty is being replaced today by a new struggle over digital architectures and artificial worlds. This provocative thesis contends that geo-political contestation today implies building virtual systems and forcing others to live inside them. From cinematic politics to civilisational divergences and technological revolutions, this is a conversation about the deep structure of change.As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out. Books by Maçães:The Dawn of Eurasia: On the Trail of the New World Order (2018)Belt and Road: A Chinese World Order (2019)History Has Begun: The Birth of a New America (2020)Geopolitics for the End Time: From the Pandemic to the Climate Crisis (2021)World Builders: Technology and the New Geopolitics (2025)About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

Technology has always been a force multiplier in geopolitics. But today, it’s much more than that. It’s a source of power, a trigger for conflict, and a key arena in the contest for global leadership. Nowhere is this clearer than in the intensifying rivalry between the US and China.From tariffs to export controls, from AI regulations to investment screening, the two powers are locked in a battle, not just over who leads in technology, but over what technological leadership should look like. This contest is reshaping globalisation, redrawing alliances, and rewriting the rules of innovation.But what exactly are the goals behind Washington’s strategy? How does Beijing see it? And what do these shifts mean for countries that find themselves caught in between?On this episode of The Great Power Show, I speak with Ryan Fedasiuk, former Advisor for Bilateral Affairs at the U.S. Department of State’s China House and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. Ryan brings a unique and thoughtful perspective to these questions, having worked at the intersection of technology and diplomacy.We explore the evolving thinking in the US around technology competition…from Liberation Day to Geneva and London. We also look back at the policies adopted by the Biden administration, and unpack the logic behind industrial policy in both China and the US.Ryan’s Substack: Emerging Cracks in the China Tech ConsensusCSET Report: Harnessed Lightning How the Chinese Military is Adopting Artificial IntelligenceAs always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like, share, and rate the episode. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out.About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.

In politics today, communication is power. It shapes public opinion, manages crises, drives diplomacy, and fuels ideological battles. The ability to craft, control, and circulate messages is central to how power works, and how it’s challenged.The news media is right at the heart of this. Nowhere is that more evident than in India. The country’s media ecosystem is huge, and often chaotic. But beneath the noise, deeper shifts are underway. Journalism in India is being reshaped by changing political dynamics, new technologies, and a battle for trust.On this episode of The Great Power Show, I speak with veteran journalist Sachin Kalbag about how Indian media is responding to these changes. Sachin has held top editorial positions across some of India’s biggest newsrooms. He’s also reported from Washington, D.C. as a foreign correspondent. So he brings a rare and wide-ranging perspective to this conversation.We unpack the good, the bad, and the ugly trends in Indian journalism. We talk about the evolving relationships between journalists, politicians, and civil servants. We also look outward, at the global media landscape. Why is journalism no longer seen as neutral, anywhere in the world? And does a country like India need its own credible, globally visible media platforms?As always, I hope you enjoy the conversation. Please like and share the episode, and take a moment to rate the podcast. And if you’d like to support the show or the work I do, feel free to reach out to me.About: The Great Power Show is a bi-weekly podcast featuring candid conversations and thought-provoking interviews with leading scholars, thinkers and practitioners on the geopolitical and geo-economic changes shaping our world.