Abstracts Political Science

Representing conflict: A study of the Indian Government’s use of legitimisation and de-legitimisation in its internal security policy

by Priyanka Talwar

Amongst the various internal challenges facing states, armed conflict presents one of the most serious policy issues. The representation of such conflicts is closely intertwined with the policy measures taken to address them. The legitimization and delegitimization of certain kinds of actors or demands is not however fixed; these often change over time, creating space for alternative policy options. India, in the unique position of being one of the few countries with the existence of simultaneous but different internal conflicts, offers a ready canvas for studying the discursive representations of conflict and conflict resolution. In this thesis, state discourses on the conflicts in Punjab, Kashmir and Naxalism are analysed in order to draw a comparative framework of India’s internal security strategy which, in the absence of a cohesive declared policy, highlights certain common patterns. The analyses show how identities, policies and demands are represented in the framing of these internal conflicts and point to India’s ambiguous, and often ad hoc, internal security strategy. Moreover, this study shows that as the representation of these conflicts changes over time, policies exhibit certain continuities and changes, suggesting an inter-relatedness between discourse and policy. The public discourse of the Indian Government on the legitimacy of political actors involved in armed insurgency strongly reflects and in turn influences its overall discourse on internal armed conflicts and its policy response to them. Advisors/Committee Members: Doyle, John, McDonagh, Kenneth.