Contemporary India and South Africa: Legacies, Identities, Dilemmas

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The first Indian indentured laborers arrived on South African soil in 1860. A century and a half later, Indian and South African scholars come together in this volume to deliberate on the interwoven histories of these two nations, their respective experiences of democratic transition, and the future possibilities relating to their participation in the global arena as regional powers. Both South Africa and India have had a long history of group-based identity movements organized against the colonial and post-colonial states, with consequences for identity formation and the modalities of democratic citizenship. The essays in the first part deal with the legacies of the Indian experiences of migration and diaspora in South Africa. They highlight the social imaginaries of migrants (now citizens) as they negotiate between a reconstructed notion of India and their real present and future in the country of citizenship. The second part of the book dwells on the difficulties attending democratic transition in the two nation-states following Indian independence in 1947, and the end of the regime of Apartheid in South Africa. The final section problematizes the role of the two states in the global South (IBSA), as well as in the global arena as regional powers (BRICS). It raises important questions regarding the future roles of these two nations at the international level, especially in the fields of education and the environment.