Rimli Basu

"Cultural Diplomacy in South-east-asia: India's Look East Policy": Buddhism As an Instrument of Foreign Policy Rimli Basu

The idea of this book has been with me since the height of the Look East Policy [LEP in short] conceived by India. Although India conceived the ideology of Look East Policy way back in 1991, not much has been achieved through it. It is argued through this book that in foreign policy procedure and execution of most of the South East Asian, Buddhism has acted more as a ?culture? than as a religion. The dynamics of South east Asia metamorphosed through tremendous economic and financial growth, resulting in global political attention. From that retrospect, it was my idea that religion per say, does affect the foreign relations, whatever be the basic tenets and that hypothesis required to be tested on the ground. Cultural diplomacy, or the deployment of a state?s culture in support of its foreign policy goals or diplomacy, has not attracted the level of scholarly attention it warrants, given its long history, the substantial investment by some practitioners, and its relevance to a number of related subjects in International Relations.