Striving for an Equitable International Order: India’s Vision for Global Justice and Fairness

For most of human history, the rules of global politics and economics were written by a handful of powerful nations. The wealthy and militarily strong set the terms, while newly independent and developing countries were expected to follow. India has long rejected this arrangement. Having emerged from colonial rule itself, India built one of the central pillars of its foreign policy around a simple but ambitious idea: the international system should be fair, representative, and just for all nations, not just the powerful few. This vision is captured in the principle of an equitable and egalitarian international order.

What does an equitable and egalitarian international order mean? 🔗

The phrase sounds abstract, but it rests on two distinct components that work together. Understanding the difference between them is the key to understanding India’s foreign policy goals.

The first component is equitability. This refers to reforming the political institutions of global governance, especially structures within the United Nations such as the Security Council, so that countries of Asia and Africa get fair representation. In essence, it is a demand for the democratization of the UN and the way it functions. Decisions that affect billions of people should not be controlled by a small club of nations whose dominance reflects the world of 1945 rather than the world of today.

The second component is egalitarianism. This specifically refers to the creation of a new international economic order. The concern here is not political voice but economic fairness: addressing unequal terms of trade, ensuring fair access to development finance, and giving developing nations a genuine stake in global prosperity.

Together, these two strands express a single conviction. The fulfilment of this quest for an equitable and egalitarian order remains a cherished dream and guiding principle of India’s foreign policy, even though it has not yet been fully realised.

The political pillar: democratizing global institutions 🔗

The most visible expression of this principle is India’s decades-long campaign to reform the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The Council is the most powerful body in the UN, with the authority to authorise military action, impose sanctions, and make binding decisions on international peace and security. Yet its five permanent members, with veto power, are the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China, the victorious powers of the Second World War.

Why the Security Council needs reform 🔗

India’s argument is straightforward: the world has changed dramatically since 1945, but the Council has not. An entire continent, Africa, home to well over a billion people, has no permanent voice. Even the UN’s own leadership accepts this is untenable. Secretary-General António Guterres has acknowledged that the Council’s composition has failed to keep pace with the changing world.

India makes its case through the G4 grouping, an alliance with Brazil, Germany, and Japan. These four nations jointly demand reform and support each other’s bids for permanent seats. In 2024, India introduced a concrete reform model proposing to expand the Council from 15 members to 25 or 26. Under this plan, two of the new permanent seats would go to Africa, two to the Asia-Pacific, and one each to Latin America and Western Europe. India has also been firm that representation should be based on regional balance rather than religion.

The obstacles to reform 🔗

Progress has been painfully slow. The reform process, handled through Inter-Governmental Negotiations at the UN, has stalled for decades. In August 2025, the UN General Assembly postponed Security Council reform talks for the seventeenth time, prompting sharp criticism from the G4 that the delay damages global trust in the UN. A rival bloc called Uniting for Consensus, which includes Italy and Pakistan, opposes expanding permanent membership and instead proposes adding only non-permanent seats, a position India considers inadequate. India’s representative has bluntly described the UN’s credibility as being undermined by its inability to deal with raging conflicts, warning that delay only causes more human suffering.

India frames its overall approach as reformed multilateralism. At a UN Security Council debate, India advocated for what it called a “New Orientation for a Reformed Multilateral System,” aimed at making global governance more inclusive, legitimate, representative, fair, and equitable. Importantly, India is described as a reformist rather than a revisionist power. It seeks changes to the international system but not through disruptive means, positioning itself as a bridge between the West and the developing world.

The economic pillar: a new international economic order 🔗

The egalitarian dimension of India’s vision focuses on the economy. Its intellectual roots lie in a movement from the 1970s.

The legacy of the 1970s 🔗

The demand for a new international economic order has been part of global debates since the 1970s, when several countries of Asia and Africa called for fairer terms of trade and softer conditions on economic assistance from international lending agencies. This crystallised in a landmark moment: on 1 May 1974, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order (NIEO).

The Declaration argued that the prevailing economic order was unjust and inequitable. It pointed out a stark imbalance: the existing system allocated only about 30% of the world’s income to the 70% of the global population living in developing countries. The NIEO, spearheaded by the Group of 77 coalition of developing nations, called for sweeping changes, including permanent sovereignty over natural resources, stabilisation of export earnings, preferential market access, debt relief, and technology transfer on fair terms.

While the full NIEO vision was never realised, its underlying concerns never disappeared. A UN review found that many ideas from the 1974 Declaration remain relevant and useful for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The questions it raised about fairness in trade, finance, and development simply re-emerged in new forms.

India’s economic agenda today 🔗

India continues to press these themes through modern platforms. It consistently demands reform of the Bretton Woods institutions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, arguing their voting structures still reflect Western dominance rather than the rise of emerging economies. India also opposes Western agricultural subsidies that distort global trade and seeks reform of the World Trade Organization to give developing countries equitable, rules-based access to world markets.

At a recent BRICS Foreign Ministers’ meeting, India’s External Affairs Minister stressed the urgent need to reform the international financial architecture, calling for Multilateral Development Banks to become more robust, more responsive, and better equipped to mobilise resources at scale. The argument is that development and climate finance must become more accessible and aligned with the priorities of developing nations.

India as the voice of the Global South 🔗

In recent years, India has increasingly positioned itself as a spokesperson for developing countries collectively known as the Global South. A flagship initiative here is the Voice of the Global South Summit, first hosted in January 2023. The third edition in August 2024 was attended by over 120 countries, with many of them pitching for reforms in multilateral institutions.

This effort gained real momentum during India’s G20 presidency in 2023. India championed the admission of the African Union into the G20, a concrete step toward giving an entire continent a seat at one of the world’s premier economic forums. India framed its agenda around the goals of responding to the priorities of the Global South, recognising shared challenges, respecting sovereignty, and reforming international institutions to make them more relevant.

From principle to practical leadership 🔗

India’s claim to lead the Global South is reinforced by tangible contributions. Since 1948, India has participated in more than 50 UN peacekeeping operations, contributing significantly to international peace efforts. It has also exported affordable models of Digital Public Infrastructure, such as its digital payment systems, which have inspired adoption in other developing nations and advanced what advocates call digital equity. Through its G20 leadership, India pushed several Global South priorities, including reform of global financial institutions, restructuring of sovereign debt, and additional climate financing.

Challenges and criticisms 🔗

India’s vision faces real limits. The most obvious is that the powerful nations who benefit from the current order have little incentive to surrender their advantages. The veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council can effectively block any reform they dislike, and China in particular has opposed India’s bid. Economic reforms face similar resistance from wealthy nations reluctant to dilute their voting power in the IMF and World Bank.

There is also a question of consistency. As India grows into a major economic and strategic power in its own right, some observers ask whether it will continue to champion the interests of poorer nations or gradually prioritise its own great-power ambitions. India’s challenge is to balance its national interests with its stated commitment to global justice, and to show that its leadership of the Global South is genuine rather than a vehicle for its own rise. So far, India has tried to manage this tension by acting as a bridge, engaging the West while advocating for the developing world, but the balancing act is delicate.

What do you think? Can a country like India genuinely champion the interests of poorer nations while simultaneously pursuing its own ambition for a permanent seat at the global high table? And given how slowly institutions like the UN Security Council have moved, do you believe a truly equitable and egalitarian international order is achievable, or will it always remain an aspiration?

References

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