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INDIA’s ECONOMIC DIPLOMACY AND THE PRINT MEDIA: WTO’s ABORTED CANCUN CONFERENCE (2003)

Parthe Pratim Basu

The 1990s have ushered in a tectonic shift in the relative balance between world economic and military power—or geopolitics and geoeconomics—propelled by the unravelling of the bipolar security regime on the one hand, and the unfolding process of marketdriven globalization, on the other. As a result, spectacular economic success has become as important a determinant of the international stature of states as their size, population or military prowess. International economic relations have become a much more critical plank of the foreign policies of states than they used to be, and the major, or potentially major powers are seriously aiming to synchronize their global economic capabilities with political influence and military might.

Although it is economically strong, India, which is the fourth largest in the world when measured on the indicator of purchasing power parity (PPP), has yet to become as important in terms of trade and investment flows as the other major global players. Part of the explanation for this lies in its myopic policy-making and the inadequacy of its economic diplomacy, i.e., failure to clearly and coherently determine international economic objectives and interests or to fashion well-honed bargaining strategies and alliances to deal with economic giants like the United States, the European Union or China.¹ However, India’s role in the World Trade Organization (WTO) remains by and large an exception to these observations as is evident from the overall continuity of the policy postures adopted by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and United Progressive Alliance (UPA) governments, and the endurance—to date—of the alliances it has successfully struck with countries like Brazil and China.

What was so interesting about the Cancun ministerial meeting of 2003? At the risk of simplification, one can argue that farm trade has been the main sticking point in most trade negotiations among the 147 member states of the WTO. The wealthy West provides subsidies to their farmers, as do most of the developing nations. However, the rich countries insist that the developing nations open up markets and cut back subsidies faster than they do. Against this backdrop, the Cancun ministerial was distinctive in two ways: first, during this meeting, the delegations of the developing countries led by India, China and Brazil persisted in their collective contention that trade reform had to be evenhanded and also perceived to be so in order to be politically viable, and thwarted the adoption of a resolution jointly piloted by the United States and the European Union. Second, the concessions the industrialized countries offered to their poorer brethren byway of promising to reduce farm subsidies as well as putting a cap on them at the Geneva meeting of the WTO in July 2004 (which came to be known as the ‘July package’) could very well be related to the developments at Cancun a year earlier. In other words, the Cancun conference represented a landmark in the epic struggle between then North and the South at the WTO; moreover, the issues that precipitated the confrontation there continue to remain part of the ongoing concerns of and debates within this premier world body.

The rationale for studying the role of the media in relation to diplomacy can be traced to the Wilsonian premise of ‘open diplomacy’,² i.e., diplomacy shall always proceed frankly and in public view. Whether exposing diplomacy to the glare of media attention and scrutiny has been beneficial or not is a debatable point but that cannot overrule the fact that the media has, over time, become an integral and irreversible feature of the business of diplomacy. Again, the spirit of President Wilson’s allusion to ‘open diplomacy’ primarily related to media public interface—with the media illuminating public regarding the distant world of foreign policy and diplomatic exchanges. The spectacular advances in communication and information technologies, resulting in high-velocity message flows, have turned the media not only into a vital information resource for policy-makers but also a catalyst for action.³ Moreover, through news analyses and editorial observations, it can occasionally furnish critical policy inputs and suggestions. Favourable coverage of the international moves made by the government helps bolster its position in terms of enhanced domestic support, which in tum prompts policy-makers to sell their perceptions to the media and influence the latter’s views.

A final word about our selection of the print media for the purpose of our analysis. While television, especially since the advent of cable TV, has undoubtedly emerged as the number one purveyor of on the spot news from all comers of the globe, it presents raw news and fleeting images with little scope for indepth analysis.⁴ Keeping in view the wider implications of media coverage vis-à-vis foreign policy—the media’s ‘participatory’ role in terms of attempting policy critiques and providing policy inputs—we have chosen to explore the role of the print media. Three national English language dailies have been selected in consideration of their long and rich traditions, wide circulation and ideological inclinations: Times of India, The Statesman and The Hindu.⁵

Cancun Conference: The Background

During the marathon eight-year Uruguay Round of trade negotiations, the developing countries agreed to make significant commitments in areas that were new to the GATI/WTO system, for example, intellectual property and services. In return, the industrialized countries undertook to open up their markets to exports from developing countries in areas such as agriculture and textiles. But by the Seattle ministerial conference of the WTO (1999), the developing countries found to their dismay that while the considerable market access concessions that they had agreed to make would be in place by 1 January 2000, the most important concessions they had received in return were either yet to be delivered or negotiated. In agriculture especially, many industrialized countries had simply replaced their existing quotas with tariff rates which amounted only to a marginal decrease in the degree of protection. In other words, nontariff barriers may have been dismantled, but the questions of reduction of tariff barriers, domestic support measures and export subsidies were still to be negotiated. Moreover, the substantial assistance promised by the developed countries to meet the huge costs, financial and otherwise, that the countries of the South had to incur while carrying out the new obligations were also not forthcoming. Under the circumstances, the developing countries found little justification for a new round of trade talks and the inclusion of new areas such as competition and investment policies in the agenda—as desired by the rich countries—until the agreements reached in the past were fully implemented.⁶

They further insisted that the next WTO round must focus on the major concerns of the developing world, which in turn brought into the open several areas of divergence of interests between the North and the South. Apart from the issue of reforms in agriculture, the developing countries pointed out that post Uruguay Round services negotiations had focussed on sectors of interest to industrialized countries (e.g., financial services and telecommunications) and wanted talks to shift to sectors where they had a comparative advantage, such as tourism, construction and shipping. Second, while the rich countries exhorted the developing countries to lower tariffs on manufactured items, especially in sectors which were of greater export interest to them such as footwear, leather goods, food products or textiles, the latter sought more flexibility to impose import restrictions when these served development goals. Again, they remained fiercely opposed to the linking of labour and environmental regulations to trade rules or to initiate discussions on other nontrade issues such as competition policy and investment.⁷

Finally, the developing countries called for instilling greater openness and transparency in WTO procedures. They complained that even though they constituted the majority of WTO’s membership, they had been practically excluded from leadership positions. They felt particularly resentful of the socalled ‘greenroom’ meetings, which arrived at a quick consensus through backroom consultations among the key countries, but thereby excluded the smaller states from the decision making arena.⁸

During the Doha ministerial meet in 2001—which inaugurated the ‘Doha Development Round’—members committed themselves to comprehensive negotiations aimed at increasing market access, and reducing (and eventually phasing out) exports subsidies and other tradedistorting domestic support policies. While the Doha Declaration acknowledged the rights of the members to take environmental protection measures, labour standards were taken off the agenda and the discussions on new issues were deferred to the next meeting—that too on the condition of securing ‘explicit consensus’ of the members.⁹ India, in spite of being branded as ‘obstructionist’ and ‘alienated’ by the representatives of the developed world, managed to hold its ground as a vocal champion of the underdogs’ cause at Doha.

Meanwhile, the developed countries showed only tepid interest in giving effect to the Doha agenda and even before the formal opening of the Cancun meeting in September 2003 the battle lines had been sharply drawn: on one side, the coalition of the rich led by the United States and the European Union (EU) aimed at expanding market access and opening a dialogue on the socalled ‘Singapore issues’ (i.e., to develop a multilateral framework for crossborder investment, focus on a competition policy which, by implication, had a builtin bias against smaller countries, evolve a system of uniform custom clearance for trade facilitation, and institute transparency in government procurement) without conceding the agricultural reforms demanded by the developing bloc; on the other were two coalitions headed by India, Brazil, China, Malaysia, South Africa that were determined not to allow any talks on the Singapore issues until the contentious issue of agricultural subsidies was resolved to their satisfaction.

The USA and the EU spared no pains to break the solidarity of the developing countries, but without much success. The draft declaration was rejected by the latter as the handiwork of the rich and powerful that failed to reflect the concerns of others and was brazenly evasive even on the issues that had been agreed on at Doha. It was then submitted to the ‘greenroom process’, and some progress, reportedly, was made through negotiations with the representatives of the developing world such as India and Brazil. However, the talks collapsed when the African and Caribbean countries refused to discuss the Singapore issues, and the curtains came down rather abruptly on the Cancun conference.

Press Coverage

The Indian press’ coverage of the Cancun meeting has been traced here at three levels: observations on the eve of the meeting, perceptions when the conference was in progress and evaluation of its outcome. During the runup to the event, the press quite plainly brought out the great divide between the positions adopted by the industrialized and the developing countries. It was noted that while the members of the WTO agreed during the Doha talks initiated in 2001 to liberalize farm trade, cut tariffs on industrial goods, protect intellectual property rights, and extend the trade body’s remit on trade facilitation, foreign investment, competition policy and government procurement and both the United States and the European Union said they would wrap up the Doha Round by 2005, a lot of ground remained to be covered which made their commitment sound hollow.¹⁰ It was against this backdrop that two opposing coalitions emerged under the leadership of India and the United States.

India’s position, quite expectedly, received detailed attention. The Times of India highlighted the core conflict: while India wanted the developed world to scrap farm subsidies in order to protect the livelihood of 650 million Indians dependent on agriculture, the USA and the EU were in favour of continuation of the bulk of the subsidies while allowing little market access to farm produce from the developing countries.¹¹ The paper said this was the reason why the leader of the Indian delegation, Arun Jaitley, launched an offensive against the USA and the EU, holding them responsible for depressed farm prices that were hurting the livelihood of the poor farmers of the South. Jaitly asserted that the ‘West must play fair on farm products’ and that reforms in agriculture must start in the USA and the EU.¹²

Elaborating on New Delhi’s stand on agriculture The Statesman reported that India was keen to push for a Uruguay Roundformula for tariff reduction, exemption from tariff cuts in the case of certain sensitive products, and the inclusion of livelihood concerns in the discussions. With respect to nonagricultural market access, India sought a formula that would provide adequate protection to domestic products through tariff binding at appropriate levels. Further, with regard to the ‘Singapore issues’, The Statesman said that, of the four, India was strongly opposed to any agreement on trade and investment, but its position on trade facilitation and transparency in government procurement was more flexible. Negotiators were also directed to consider an agreement on competition policy provided it was restricted to hardcore cartels and based on a per review mechanism. However, they were not to accept any binding agreement on competition policy, and more importantly, negotiation on these issues should commence only on the basis of explicit consensus on the modalities among all members of the WTO, and each issue had to be considered separately.¹³

The Hindu approvingly quoted a World Bank report¹⁴ that called for reducing protection in agriculture to maximize the gains from globalization and correcting the discrepancy in the tariff imposed by the developed countries on manufactured products (their average tariff on manufactures were lower but they charged more from the developing countries, compared with their industrialized counterparts) by way of reinforcing the Indian position.

The papers also highlighted India’s strategy of not only entering into a coalition with the leading countries of the developing world such as Brazil and China to counter the ‘prorich’ stance of the USA and the EU but also making common cause with the least developed countries (LDCs) on the Singapore issuesparticularly regarding the desirability of having investment and competition rules in the WTO. ¹⁵ It was reported that Jaitley hosted a dinner that was attended by countries as diverse in economic might as China, Brazil, Venezuela, Jamaica, Botswana and Bangladesh.

It is interesting to note that while the press captured the USEU coalition’s objections to the collective stance of the developing world especially as represented by India, the differences within the former camp—initially at least—also was not lost sight of. A report in The Times of India,¹⁶ ‘India Digs in as Mexican Marathon Begins’, pointed out that the industrialized countries felt that the poor countries may be right to demand cuts in the tariffs imposed by the rich countries and lifting of their quotas but they should reciprocate as well; in fact, they doubted if seeking exemptions from ‘WTO discipline’ was going to benefit the developing countries, for ‘few countries could emulate Korea’s self disciplined use of discriminatory tariff and export subsidies’. India was taken to task for doublestandards: ’Jaitley accused the developed countries of negotiating with a sword and a shield, but the description fits India too … India has brought more antidumping actions than any other country in the past seven years. Shouldn’t India drop its shield?’. Given its present economic stature, India was also lambasted for demanding special treatment at the WTO at par with other developing countries and seeking more leeway than the rich members to subsidize its home industries.

Simultaneously, however, the divergence of interests between the EU and the USA was also duly highlighted. Thus, the same report mentioned that the United States offered to embrace free trade in all manufactured and consumer goods by 2015 and cut agricultural tariff by 76 per cent over five years, but also threatened that if other countries (presumably from the EU) don’t join in cutting tariffs, it would go ahead and raise them. The EU’s common agricultural policy, on the other hand, was dubbed ‘a standing insult to economic intelligence’ which propped up prices for its own farmers keeping even the most expensive ones in business: ‘prices are so high that its farmers want to produce more than its consumers want to buy … [and the] surplus production is offloaded in the world market with the help of 2.5 billion in annual export subsidy’. Thus, the EU trade commissioner had the uphill task of defending ‘one of the most illiberal and illogical farm policies’.

In this connection, President Bush’s attempts ‘to assuage India on the WTO front’ were also taken into account. This was part of a strategy to dissuade it from acting as a stumbling block at Cancun (which many trade analysts in the West felt it did at Doha). Apart from the ‘new ascendancy’ in Indo US relations, India, it showed, was considered a key player in the current WTO negotiations, wielding high influence (somewhat disproportionate to its own trading power) as the spearhead and voice of the poor nations. Partial convergence of US and Indian interests was also taken note of: While the USA was opposed to ‘two sets of protection level for the developed and the developing countries as India has been arguing’, it was expected to try and convince the EU regarding ‘trade distorting subsidies’ according to The Times of India.¹⁷ Similarly, as to the Singapore issues, India was especially opposed to those of investment and competition, and the USA was likely to go with India on these counts because opening discussion on them was ‘the brain child of the EU’ which, according to The Hindu, meant that India would be ‘in direct confrontation with the EU(emphasis added)’.¹⁸ The Statesman, however, appeared to be more sceptical as it observed that while the initial assessment was that trade talks would focus on agriculture on which the US and the EU had opposing views, the joint paper on agriculture submitted by the trade giants sought to deflect attention from the subsidy issue and focus on tariff cuts making submission of a separate paper by India and other developing countries inevitable.¹⁹

Once the meeting commenced, the press chose to highlight India’s leadership role as was evident from headlines in The Times of India such as ‘Jaitley Bats for the South’²⁰ and observations that ‘spearheading the developing nations’ charge Jaitley made a forceful plea for correcting distortions in the agricultural/development dimension to take the centre stage’.²¹ The arguments he forwarded to safeguard the interests of the South were also pinpointed: ‘On the Singapore issues, many developing countries, Jaitley said, do not have the capacity to implement obligations arising out of commitments that such multilateral rules would entail’ and doubts were expressed regarding the benefits of a multilateral framework on such issues. On the other hand, he repeatedly pointed out that the 21-country coalition was home to nearly 50 per cent of the world’s population; 63 per cent of the world’s farmers resided in these countries which accounted for more than 23 percent of agricultural production, and thus sought to use the large population of the developing countries to their advantage by underlining the fact that any deal pushed by the developed countries would affect a sizeable chunk of mankind.²² That the 15 nation ‘rich bloc’, despite reservations, agreed to take up the draft proposals brought by the G-21 (coalition of the Southern states) was also hailed by The Times of India as a ‘major victory’ on their part²³ Another evidence of the solidarity of the developing world was produced—The Statesman noted while quoting Jaitley—when a new coalition of 22 developing countries under the banner of the Strategic Product and Special Safeguard Mechanism submitted proposals similar to those proposed by G-21. ²⁴

It was further noted that India and China had decided to coordinate their positions on issues of concern to the developing countries: ‘They are a part of the developing countries’ coalition … [and] also together in the Group of 15 formed to oppose the Singapore issues’ and The Times of India quoted Jaitley approvingly that this coalition building ushered in a new era of cooperation between the two: ‘together both could shape WTO negotiations and leave an impact on the functioning of the multilateral agenda’.²⁵

Moreover, official reports that South African President Mbeki had written to them Indian Prime Minister, Vajpayee, and China’s Vice President Hujintao seeking their support, The Statesman noted, attested to the fact that even away from Cancun several states were making an effort to ensure that the coalition stayed intact.²⁶

Quite predictably, a report in The Hindu titled ‘Gloves off at Cancun’ observed, the developed countries went all out to breach the unity of the poor by condemning the latter’s ‘double standards’ and insisting that farm subsidies would not be withdrawn by them with reciprocal gestures from the developing world.²⁷ Yet the last word in this connection seemed to come from The Statesman: ‘US pressure fails to divide G22 at WTO’.²⁸

After the conference collapsed following the standoff between the rich and the poor blocs, The Statesman reported that ‘India blocked the Cancun agenda’²⁹ and The Times of India reported that the ‘disastrous draft ignored [the] developing world’s interests’.³⁰ Arun Jaitley, it was reported, who ‘hogged international limelight as the powerful spokesperson of the developing world’, threatened to walk out unless three issues were addressed: ‘remove the proposal to reduce tariff on a few farm products, keep investment rules and competition policy out of negotiations and remove the provision of expansion of tariff rate quota’. The responsibility for the failure was laid squarely on the advanced economies, on their insistence that the WTO should start negotiations in ‘new areas’ which hammered the proverbiallast nail in the coffin. The pretence of the ‘development dimension’ of the Doha agenda, it was argued, had been discarded altogether, which corroborated the apprehension that this was mere rhetoric; the WTO system’s builtin lack of transparency—which allowed ‘the USA and the EU to incorporate in the text whatever they wanted’—was confirmed too.³¹

Jaitley, according to the press, had the full support of India’s political establishment as well as the business and industrial classes. New Delhi, The Times of India commented, instructed its negotiating team to ‘stand firm on agriculture’ because, with elections to the Lok Sabha and many state assemblies slated for the following year, the Vajpayee government could not risk anything that would be seen as a compromise of the interests of the 650 million Indians dependent on agriculture. At the minimum, it said, the government looked for some sort of a ‘victory’ in agriculture so that it could be in a position to politically defend any concessions it might have to make in some other areas, and the elements of such a victory were that: i) India did not yield to pressure for lowering tariff and other barriers protecting its farmers; and ii) the developed countries were made to slash farm subsidies detrimental to its farm sector.³²

Both The Times of India and The Statesman captured in detail the reaction of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industries (FICCI), both of which ‘expressed complete disappointment with the draft’; while the en held the proposals regarding agriculture ‘unacceptable, insensitive and unbelievable’, for FICCI, the draft was just another ‘attempt at sidelining the interests of the developing areas’.³³

Interestingly enough, Cancun’s failure was portrayed as a ‘victory’ for India: ‘India emerged a winner from the ruins of the collapsed WTO talks’, observed The Times of lndia.³⁴The ‘success story’ was recounted by the paper using largely the words of Jaitley who remained the ‘vanguard of India’s campaign at the WTO’, and several points emerged in bold relief. New Delhi’s most remarkable achievement was ‘that we brought the concerns of developing countries centre stage’ and ‘didn’t yield on any issue’ in the teeth of ‘relentless pressure, behind the scene armtwisting and brinksmanship’. Again, this was possible because the strong alliances forged by the Southern states not only stuck together but in fact ‘swelled over time’ and consequently what was a rearguard action led by a few (at Doha) evolved into a great show of Third World unity at Cancun. It was emphasized, however, that while we ‘dominated the twopronged agenda’ (agriculture and the Singapore issues), ‘our stand was not negative … we proactively engaged in negotiations’. On the other hand, since India opposed the launch of a new round of WTO talks in Doha, ‘there was little to grieve over the failure of the Cancun talks to kickstart the stalled round’. But India did not return empty handed either: ‘there could have been three outcomes: fair, bad and no declaration. We would have liked a fair deal. But no deal’s better than a bad deal’, for any sign of weakness would only have ‘further skewed the lopsided terms of global trade’. Jaitley, nonetheless, was cautious to point out that he did not believe that the trade talks had come to an end though the calendar of the Doha round was unlikely to be maintained.³⁵

The Statesman, on the other hand, took up the cudgels for Jaitley, who was ‘identified as [a] villain by many Western negotiators’ and asserted that he ‘should take this as a compliment’ for the manner in which he had put together an alliance of major developing countries, held it together and ‘called the USEU bluff’, and served them a powerful notice that from now on the onus rested on them toremove the biggest blot on world trade (i.e., farm subsidies). It also forcefully refuted the charge of ‘double standards’ clamped on India by the Western combine. While it was true, the paper maintained, that India did not suffer as much from farm subsidies as sub-Saharan Africa, it highlighted the issue on a tactical—rather than moral—ground. It was not wrong, it felt, ‘to use a smokescreen in any negotiation as long as there is genuine fire’. And after all, the ‘cruel absurdity of French and American farmers being paid to make food mountains denying African farmers any market is one of the few black and white moral issues in world trade’. ³⁶

Commenting on the longterm, overall significance of the outcome of the Cancun meeting, the press argued that at one level the meeting exposed the WTO’s crisis of legitimacy and a loss of confidence in its agenda since, instead of furthering the cause of ‘development’, the body came to be perceived as the protector and guardian of the ‘mercantilist interests of the advanced countries’.³⁷However, the Cancun fiasco also promised a thorough transformation of trade politics since issuebased coalitions of developing countries ‘led by economic powerhouses’ like India, Brazil and China had lent it a new dynamic. ‘Cancun Cements the Process of Democratic Assertion Initiated at Seattle’, observed The Times of India, quoting trade analysts (16 September 2003).³⁸ Similarly, under the headline ‘A New Voice Makes Itself Heard at Cancun’ The Statesman observed that the ‘meetings may have failed to make meaningful headway on farming reform for now, but they may have sown the seeds of real change’. For it, the WTO’s ‘biggest flaw to date’ was the inability of the developing countries to coordinate their demands. However, the emergence of a distinct and substantive counterweight to the USA and the EU at Cancun could eventually prove to be the making of the WTO’.³⁹The Hindu also took note of this change in the consciousness and outlook of the developing countries: ‘A decade ago such proposals would have been accepted at GATT But the developing countries, now aware of the new obligation they have been asked to take on over the past decade will no longer agree at the WTO to demands that provide little benefit to them’.⁴⁰

Yet, the papers also cautioned Indian policy-makers in particular, and the developing world in general, against celebrating this moment of ‘triumph’. Thus, The Hindu reminded New Delhi that India went to Cancun to obtain ‘a decent agreement in agriculture’ and keep the Singapore issues ‘confined to the ongoing study process’. At the end of the conference, the Singapore issues were ‘dead in the Doha round’ while an agreement on agriculture was ‘yet to be negotiated’. Its only gain, therefore, was the formation of a coalition⁴¹ that needed to be nurtured and strengthened with care and diplomatic finesse. The Statesman drew attention to the possible impediments to this process: the ‘success’ at Cancun rested on the Indo-Brazil alliance, but it wondered whether this partnership between a ‘food exporter’ like Brazil and India, a protectionist regime with an ‘impoverished farming community’ could really stand the test of time.⁴² Finally, The Times of India was more forthright in arguing that while the Doha agenda had been dealt a total blow at Cancun—it ‘may not be dead but surely in coma’—the poor countries’ ‘political victory’ could very well ‘turn out to be their economic debacle’. After all, it continued, global trade, for all its inequities, remained ‘the only real longterm hope for the world’s poor’. While many in the West would be happy with the abolition of the WTO, ‘a vulnerable Third World [had] a far greater stake in an internationally agreed mechanism for regulating global trade’. Moreover, it apprehended that the ‘unity displayed by the developing world [would] come under increasing strain with the USA and the EU picking up individual countries for bilateral deals, not to mention regional trading blocs. It would be difficult to repeat the Cancun show in a one to one negotiation’. Hence the developing countries needed urgently to work out a joint longterm strategy and revive the failed Cancun process.⁴³

Conclusion

While analysing the press coverage of the Cancun ministerial meeting, one is struck by the volume of front page attention it received because, conventionally, reports on economic issues—whatever their import—are usually relegated to the inside pages. This is mainly done as these reports have less appeal for the general reader. Two explanations could be contemplated: first, the focus on the conflict dimension of North-South relations—especially the way the media played it up using the ‘David vs Goliath’ and ‘greed vs equity’ imagery with India reportedly providing the leadership—imparted to it a somewhat ‘populist’ flavour and was expected to generate sufficient interest and excitement at the popular level as well. It may also have borne the stamp of the Vajpayee government’s media management strategy: The regime not only attached especial importance to the issue from the point of view of domestic electoral calculus but also grabbed the opportunity to refurbish India’s image as a global player of some consequence. And the contribution of Arun Jaitley, the suave and articulate commerce minister and the leader of the Indian delegation, at Cancun, could hardly be overlooked as a contributor to the success of this strategy.

As to the tenor of reports, the Indian policy, including its coalition building strategy, was presented with barely concealed approval, with silver linings located in the collapse of the Cancun talks, again much in keeping with the sentiments officially expressed by New Delhi. Simultaneously, the criticism directed at the developing world in general and India, in particular, by the representatives of the industrialized countries failed to carry much conviction with the Indian press. Initially, a crack was located within the developed bloc—between the positions of the USA and the EU—and its consequences for the conference were sought to be anticipated, but this issue was not pursued afterwards. However, there was no satisfactory explanation of the abrupt end to the meeting following the rigid posture adopted by the LDCs even as the search for a way out of the impasse was very much underway through the ‘greenroom’ process in the presence of India and Brazil, and some progress had been made as had been stated by Jaitley himself. Some critics held that India’s failure, as the ‘champion’ of the cause of the South, to adequately fathom the exasperation and angst of the African and Caribbean nations and formulate a more inclusive strategy came in the way of a more satisfying end to the talks; some sensed an American hand behind the flop show at Cancun, but this question, somewhat curiously, was never seriously raised by the papers surveyed.

Did the papers suggest any policy inputs? The Times of India came closest to this when it argued editorially that India’s longterm economic interests—which lay in strengthening rather than destroying a multilateral trading system—should not be overshadowed by the sense of political triumph generated by Cancun. The other two papers confined their comments to the need for reinforcing the coalition of the developing bloc, along with some forebodings regarding its endurance in future. The editorial positions of the papers could roughly be traced to their respective ideological leanings: when the WTO was inaugurated in the mid-1990s, both The Statesman and The Times of India welcomed this multilateral trading arrangement, but the former, more ‘libertarian’ in orientation, predictably appeared more enthusiastic. Hence for The Statesman, the attempt on the part of the developed world, the long time self styled champion of‘free trade’, to subvert the same within the WTO framework seemed all too reprehensible: in addition to undermining India’s national interests, it went against the grains of its philosophical moorings which probably explains why the sharpest reactionand defence of Arun Jaitley’s role at Cancuncame from this paper. The Times of India, with its more eclectic and centrist stance, even after hailing India’s ‘great moral victory’ came back with the sober reminder that New Delhi should start working for resuscitating the WTO in right earnest. Lastly, The Hindu ended by stressing the need for bracing up the coalition of the developing countries which was the only guarantee of more democratic and equitable functioning of the WTO in future.

Postscript

The disjunctions—deriving, as argued above, from divergent ideological nuances—in the three papers’ perceptions of the outcome of the Cancun ministerial conference became more pronounced after the Hong Kong ministerial meet held in December 2005. On the eve of the event, The Statesman reports highlighted the Indian commerce minister Kamal Nath’s resolve not to compromise on the question of agricultural subsidies and also to uphold the hardearned solidarity among the developing countries. However, after the conference ended, its headlines stressed that the draft declaration evoked discontent among all the stakeholders, developed as well as developing. While from India’s point of view, all its concerns seemed to have been addressed, the paper felt that there was barely any progress in real terms; in support of this stance it quoted the minister of commerce as saying that the text needed further improvements in order to adequately address the core concerns of the developing countries. It also quoted a Zambian minister (‘We are not going to be party to disguise failure as success’) to underscore the depth of the LDCs’ frustration.⁴⁴

In one of its editorials The Times of India, in keeping with its pragmatist stance manifested earlier, urged all the WTO members (before the meeting began) to get beyond the impasse over the farm subsidies issue—which was, so to say, the primary concern of the Cairns group of farm and dairy product exporters—and steer the WTO talks to other areas. For the Indian policy-makers, its advice was twofold: first, to seriously ponder if the country wanted to count itself among the big players in the world grain trade rather than remaining incessantly stuck with the question of endangering farmers’ livelihoods through reduction of farm subsidies; second, to agree to preserve the status quo in agriculture (thereby reducing the possibilities of further shocks) and thereupon engage in talks on industrial tariffs and services. No wonder that its reading of the outcome of the ministerial meet too was different as it chose to quote Kamal Nath as saying ‘From going round and round about we now seem to be setting course to a development agenda’ and the Brazilian foreign minister depicting the declaration as a ‘fair compromise’. Indeed, a postedit article showered praise on the ‘constructive’ role played by the G20-which was formed at Cancun ‘to counter the USEU alliance—in advancing the negotiations while using its leverage to promote the interests of its membership. To elaborate, the group led by the Indian commerce minister and Brazilian foreign minister joined hands with 90 smaller developing countries (G-90) and successfully negotiated the dutyfree, quotafree access for the products of 50 LDCs in developing countries’ markets (which was hailed as a key achievement of this meet). Later, ‘in an important act of leadership’ Kamal Nath ‘broke ranks with Brazil’ and went on to support the ‘reasonable EU demand’ that the date for ending agricultural subsidies be set at 2013 instead of 2010 and thereby provided the ‘necessary balance’ to clinch the deal on export subsidies.⁴⁵

The Hirulu, on the other hand, sounded decisively more hawkish. While the byandlarge positive The Times of India report captured the disappointment of the NGOs campaigning on behalf of the developing countries only in a footnote, The Hindu piece with the screaming headline ‘Statement Betrays Poorer Countries; A Profoundly Disappointing Text; Akin to Rubbing Salt into a Wound’ focussed entirely on the views of these antiglobalization agencies, but more than neutralized the effect of its major report on the final Hong Kong declaration on the following day with the commerce minister’s statement (‘Concerns Fully Addressed, says Kamal Nath; “Grand Coalition” Helped Clinch Deal at WTO’). Finally, a hardhitting commentary took the Indian delegation severely to task roughly on the same grounds for which earned it accolades in The Times of India’s posteditarticle. It pointed out that the Indian negotiators not only implicitly acknowledged that the country’s interests in agriculture were defensive (i.e., protecting domestic producers) and not aggressive (i.e., focussed on expanding exports) they along with other developing countries also committed to providing greater market access for agricultural commodities in return for ‘minor concessions’ from US and EU. The commentator also described the commitments made by the developing countries in the Hong Kong draft regarding liberalization of services as another ‘setback’ and castigated New Delhi for its reported role in ‘mobilizing developing countries’ support’ behind this ill-advised move driven by a ‘misreading of its interests’.⁴⁶

To sum up, The Times of India, from the vantage point of realpolitik, applauded the flexibility and maneuvering capacity exhibited by the Indian delegation—instead of putting all its eggs in one basket—in switching sides as and when necessary. The Statesman, however, betrayed a more cautious optimism though it stopped short of openly questioning New Delhi’s moves. But The Hindu explicitly denounced the deal accepted by the Indians as running counter to their long-term economic interests and also indirectly brought against them the charge of misleading the combine of developing countries. Thus, the incipient faultlines within the press regarding its evaluation of the Indian delegation’s performance at the WTO’s ministerial platform revealed in connection with the Cancun conference were further exposed at the end of the exercise at Hong Kong two years later.