India and Climate Change: What India Wants, Needs, and Needs to Do

This article outlines the elements of India's foreign policy on climate change, including aspects of India's negotiating strategy in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) and Kyoto Protocol processes. It examines, in particular, India's interventions in the ongoing negotiations for future action on climate change. It also explores, in an initial and contingent fashion, the domestic roots of India's position. It highlights the beneficial impacts of India's equity-based stance, yet argues that taken as a whole India's position is neither sagacious nor imaginative, and, certainly not in keeping with India's preferred self-image as a dynamic nation ready to take its due place in the international community. It concludes by recommending a proactive and forward-looking role for India in its interventions in the multilateral climate negotiations.