The State of India’s Democracy

India's democracy is under strain — politically, economically, and socially. Its standing as the world's largest democracy sits alongside democratic backsliding and institutional erosion. Robust economic growth co-exists with poverty that remains massive, if declining, and with expansion that has come without commensurate job creation. And a demographic dividend that should be India's greatest asset is instead accompanying a rise in populism and nationalism. In this talk, Šumit Ganguly will examine what India's choices — past and present — mean for its future.

Šumit Ganguly is a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and director of its Huntington Program on Strengthening US-India Relations. He is also the Rabindranath Tagore Professor in Indian Cultures and Civilizations, Emeritus, at Indiana University in Bloomington, where he served as distinguished professor and professor of political science and directed programs on India studies and on American and global security. His research and writing focused on South Asia have been supported by grants from the Asia Foundation, the Smith Richardson Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the American Institute of Indian Studies, the W. Alton Jones Foundation, the US departments of State and Defense, and the United States Institute of Peace. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books on several topics including Indian foreign policy, India-Pakistan relations, India-China relations, nuclear weapons, and strategic rivalries. Most recently, he is the co-editor of The Troubling State of India’s Democracy that was published by University of Michigan Press in 2024.

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