## Colophon tags:: url:: https://www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe %% title:: How India became an unexpected role model for Europe type:: [[clipped-note]] author:: [[@economist.com]] %% ## Notes > Europeans have long come to poorer countries with lectures on how backward locals should aspire to be more like them, with a focus on human rights, green rules and so on. That moralising tone might usefully be left behind in this case. For all India’s flaws, an attentive European visitor will see much there that should make them envious—and that they might learn from. Once under the thumb of various European colonisers, India is an unexpected role model for today’s EU. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/YThbKvHpEe-m7EeS_qLi_w/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) ⬆️ hmmm > How India became an unexpected role model for Europe — [view in context](https://hyp.is/Zvn7LPHpEe-_rCd_O7TJKw/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) ⬆️ date:: [[2025-02-23]] > The median Indian, aged just 29, is in fine cricket-playing mettle. His European counterpart, in his mid-forties, needs a rest after softly kicking a football — [view in context](https://hyp.is/qX8dGvHpEe-Rmi-_Kas_Hw/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) ⬆️ lol > India frets its “demographic dividend” may fizzle, and that it might get old before it gets rich. Europe, for its part, worries it will get poorer as it gets older, and its social-security system runs out of workers to pay for the swelling ranks of retirees. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/vftnxvHpEe-hMzuAEF1aGA/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) > But whereas India suffers from bouts of crass majoritarianism, it can be hard for Europe’s disparate coalition governments to come up with any sort of majority at all. India’s polity is sometimes over-centralised; the EU’s conversely can feel unworkable under the weight of vetoes wielded by national governments. Something for the Europeans to ponder over a biryani. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/6dBjGvHpEe-hZMsbbk8OTQ/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) ⬆️ "bouts of crass majoritarianism" - 🤯 > What of policies that Europe could emulate? India has pioneered digital public infrastructure that works. An “India Stack” of technology now links citizens’ identity with their phones and bank accounts, making dealing with the still-hulking bureaucracy less daunting than it once was. Even more than Mr Modi, the Eurocrats should ask to meet Nandan Nilekani, an Indian tech grandee who pioneered the digital ID scheme, known as Aadhaar, and the whizzy services that go alongside it. A detour to Bangalore and its startup scene would prove enlightening for the EU brigade. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/BG9qSvHqEe-3SdO38fmrKA/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) > Both also worry about America’s Trumpian turn, though it is more obviously problematic for the EU. Without the kind of outside security guarantor that has underpinned European security for decades, India has developed some measure of the “strategic autonomy” Europeans now crave. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/Vjx_FvHqEe-maGulgH_77g/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe) > That is the type of diplomatic contortion even a yogi would struggle to pull off. Europeans may not like it, but they should at least try to understand it. — [view in context](https://hyp.is/WJhe7PHqEe-MZfewz7nwqw/www.economist.com/europe/2025/02/13/how-india-became-an-unexpected-role-model-for-europe)