Description
In the 1990s, the Lumbini Museum was created at the birthplace of the Buddha in Lumbini, Nepal, with the help of Indian donations. In July 2011, the Asia Pacific Exchange and Co-operation Foundation – based in Hong Kong but backed by China – invested USD 3 billion to extend Lumbini’s tourist network. The case of Lumbini illustrates that India and China materialise their competition in Nepal mostly in the cultural sector, departing from other small states in the region such as Sri Lanka, where Sino-Indian competition manifests over port infrastructural development projects.
By adopting a neo-Gramscian approach to conceptualise dyadic competition and small state agency in South Asia, this paper investigates how Nepal exercises its agency as a small state by shaping the domain of competition between India and China. Overcoming mainstream Constructivist literature on norm diffusion, this paper suggests that small state agency does not just rest on the direct responses of small states to great powers but also shapes the spaces of great power competition. The relevance of this study lies in accounting for change and variation in the interests and agency of states while problematising the Western notions of sovereignty and bilateral relations.
