Remarks made at the launch of Asanga Abeyagoonasekera’s ‘Winds of Change: Geopolitics at the Crossroads of South and Southeast Asia’ (World Scientific Publishing, 2026) at the Alliance Francaise Colombo on 10 March
Distinguished members of the audience, it has been almost two weeks since the war in Iran began. Since then, the situation has spiralled out of control, and as yet there is no end in sight.
Slowly but surely, the shock effects of this war are being felt across South Asia. In India, for instance, hotel and restaurant owners in certain states are urging the Government to address what they feel will be chronic shortages of gas. In Sri Lanka, yesterday, the price of petrol and diesel shot up by more than Rs. 15 a litre. In Bangladesh, universities have been asked to scale down operations to conserve fuel and electricity.
The future of world order
All this raises an important question, which Asanga Abeyagoonasekera addresses in this book. Though written before the outbreak of hostilities in West Asia, that question is relevant now. What is the future of world order going to be, and how are the world’s de facto powers, including India and China, going to adjust?
This is a very important question. For much of the last quarter-century, how India and China see each other has shaped the contours of geopolitics, both in this region and outside. That relationship has been mediated by several factors, not least of which is the US presence in the Indian Ocean and the Indo-Pacific.
Going by current trends, it is this relationship which will determine the course of world order and regional stability for the foreseeable future. The question that presents itself is, simply, whether both countries are willing to adjust to and accommodate one another as everything around them transforms.
When talking about these two countries Abeyagoonasekera invoked the idea of civilisational states. This is an important point. If you reconcile that idea with the notion that the future belongs to Asia, and that power is pivoting to Asia – and, of course, that other continents, including Europe, are looking towards Asia – then it becomes clear that the future of the world cannot be written without a future for the relationship between India and China. The question then is, what is the future of this relationship going to be?
India-China relationship
Abeyagoonasekera was very clear that this relationship is fraught with internal tensions and contradictions. He engaged in a lengthy analysis about each country, their strengths and weaknesses, and drew conclusions which may intrigue some and unnerve others.
He questioned the received wisdom about these countries, which may well go against the grain of conventional thinking. You may agree with them, or you may not. But his point, that no single country, not even a regional power, can sustain the weight of an entire region on its own, in isolation, is convincing. More than anything, it makes sense.
Of course, there are many differences which set India apart from China, and which define their relationship. These differences have to do with cultural and political structures, and social, economic, and historical conditions. At a certain level, they translate into a difference in diplomatic approach.
Appraising how India and China project power at home and abroad, Abeyagoonasekera argued that a strategy of building influence will prevail over one of seizing influence. For those who read between the lines, the implications of this argument and observation cannot be clear enough.
The elephant in the room
More importantly, Abeyagoonasekera questioned whether it makes sense to build up power abroad by aligning with global powers whose foreign relations have suffered a near-total rupture because of certain domestic convulsions.
Statements made by State officials, ambassadors, and diplomats at functions abroad indicate that these powers want to do things their own way. They want to remake the world in their image, and they want allies to fall in line with their approach, with or without tangible benefits.
This is at odds with how superpowers and regional powers framed the so-called rules-based order for over 80 years. Suddenly, almost overnight, we have been told that all what we had learnt in international relations courses and international law classes was a myth, that there is no rules-based order, only the mirage of one.
In this scheme, countries which have the luxury of changing the piper’s tune do everything they can to stay at the top, whereas other states have to fall in line with the new approach with pivotal, and often negative, consequences to their society and their economy. The recent fallout in West Asia is one example of perhaps many to come.
The elephant in the room is not so much whether we should fall in line with that approach, but whether there are alternatives to such approaches which we can tap into in our own backyard. Abeyagoonasekera observed that the only sustainable solution was to look at ways of achieving a synergy closer to home. When these solutions are clear and present in the neighbourhood, the problem becomes easier to resolve.
Sri Lanka and the road ahead
Meanwhile, the great geopolitical confrontations of our time have compelled countries like Sri Lanka to think of a road ahead.
The recent attack on and sinking of an Iranian vessel indicates that the best way forward for countries like ours is to adhere to the norms of international law, and international conventions, carrying out our legal and humanitarian obligations without dithering in the dark.
There is a perception that we cannot afford to take sides, and to a large extent this is true. But we should also have the courage of our convictions, as the Sri Lankan Government demonstrated, despite tangible risks, to abide by principles and norms which we are now told no longer matter.
Ultimately, that has a great deal to do with how we perceive ourselves and whether we let others define who we are. During an informal conversation with a former Indian Foreign Secretary in Hyderabad last year, I raised the question of what we should do to chart our way forward in terms of our relations with the rest of the world.
His response rang true. I quote: “The important thing is for the country concerned to have a body of scholars who can analyse the relationship from the domestic angle. This leads to making more effective policy, rather than the policy maker making policy after reading third-party writings.”
Foreign policy
All too often, in countries like Sri Lanka, foreign policy has largely been refracted through the prism of third-party writings. We have seen our place in the world through the lenses of other actors, institutions, and countries. We have been afraid to be the authors of our own foreign policy, because we feel we are not good enough.
What Asanga Abeyagoonasekera tries to do in his book is to make us think about an order in which solutions are based on domestic and regional priorities and not on the priorities of others. These priorities can be many things at the same time: democratic governance, economic prosperity, foreign trade, and domestic production. Some may argue that this is an insular policy. It does not have to be.
To quote Abeyagoonasekera: “The world order is shifting; the certainties of the past are crumbling.”
Against the backdrop of an uncertain future, the old order can no longer be relied upon. To invoke Mark Carney, today marks the end of a pleasant fiction.
This is the morning after.
(The writer is an independent researcher, author, columnist, and analyst whose work spans international relations, history, anthropology, and politics. He holds an LLB from the University of London and a Postgraduate Diploma in International Relations from the Bandaranaike Centre for International Studies [BCIS]. In 2024, he was a participant in the International Visitor Leadership Program [IVLP] conducted by the US State Department. From 2022 to 2025, he served as Chief International Relations Analyst at Factum, an Asia-Pacific-focused foreign policy think tank. In 2025, he did two lecture stints in India, one as a Resident Fellow at the Kautilya School of Public Policy in Hyderabad and another on art and culture at the India International Centre in New Delhi. Since 2023, he has authored books on Sri Lankan institutions and public figures while pursuing research projects spanning art, culture, history, and geopolitics. He can be reached at udakdev1@gmail.com)
(The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the official position of this publication)