The “Re:Imagine India” Project: Ambitions and Limits of British Cultural Diplomacy in India

Abstract

This article analyses one of the United Kingdom’s most recent cultural diplomacy programmes, the 2015 “Re:Imagine India” project. It firstly explains the context, then shows the programme’s strengths and argues that this project is a prime example of the way that Britain is trying to develop its soft power in order to grow its influence in India. Thirdly, it delves into the project’s “informally imperialist” rhetoric, which seems to persist behind the narrative of soft power. It concludes by studying the claim put forward by scholars like Oliver Turner, according to whom the concept of “Global Britain” and the interest in soft power, especially in the Commonwealth, are evidence of Britain’s identity crisis in the early 21st century.

Keywords

• United Kingdom
• soft power
• national identity
• cultural diplomacy
• informal imperialism
• India