A ‘Bubbles Of Trust’ Approach

Context: China attained power through asymmetric globalisation, now using that power to undermine liberal democratic values around the world. New approaches are needed to tackle them.

Ambits of de-globalisation

• Asymmetric globalisation favouring China: The Chinese market was never open to foreign companies in the way foreign markets are to Chinese firms. Meanwhile, Chinese firms rode on the globalisation bandwagon to secure significant market shares in open economies.
• Limited response to aggressive China: The popular backlash against China is pushing Quad governments towards policies of self-reliance. Eg. Trump era policies in US, Aatmanirbhar Bharat in India etc.
• Towards self-defeating technological sovereignty: When it comes to critical and emerging technologies, no single country can replicate the combined genius of the world.
• Geo-political marginalisation: Worse, inward-looking policies often acquire a life of their own and contribute to geopolitical marginalisation.
• Differences in approaches in information age: There is no consensus even in liberal-democratic approaches to the information age.

Way forward: ‘Bubbles of trust’ approach

• The idea of ‘bubbles of trust’ focusing on few sectors for deep collaboration, offers a cautious middle path between extremes of technological sovereignty and laissez-faire globalisation.
  • Bubbles tend to expand organically, attracting new partners that share values, interests and economic complementarities.
• Quad as a starting point: Convergence of values and geopolitical interests means Quad countries are uniquely placed to envelop their economies inside bubbles of trust, starting with technology sector.
  • Complementarities in capabilities can power innovation and growth.
  • The Quad’s Critical and Emerging Technology Working Group can develop the necessary ‘bubbles of trust’ framework, which could be adopted at the next Quad summit.
• Leverage technological bubble: As U.S. is a global leader in intellectual property, Japan in high-value manufacturing, Australia in advanced niches such as quantum computing and cyber security, and India in human capital.