Sunday, November 25, 2012

The empire strikes back | if India exits, commonwealth would collapse instantly, like cricket. I wrote an essay suggesting we exit

Bagehot

Some British Eurosceptics see the Commonwealth as an alternative to Europe. It isn’t

KAMALESH SHARMA, the Commonwealth’s secretary-general, reckons he has the “most spectacular office in London.” Through one window he views St James’s Palace, stolidly Tudor; through another the royal ...

http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21567071-some-british-eurosceptics-see-commonwealth-alternative-europe-it-isnt-empire

Sent via Flipboard

on galaxy note, pardon brevity

3 comments:

Pagan said...

Similarly, if India moves away from English (Spanish as alternative?), the dominance of English will end soon.

san said...

Why would we want to exchange English hegemony for Spanish hegemony? Just imagine - if Spaniards had conquered India instead of the English, then we'd all have been slaughtered and fully converted by now, like the South Americans were. But I do agree that improving ties with South Americans is important for India's future, because they are a large reservoir of people with whom we haven't traditionally interacted with before, and therefore represent new potential. They also have some commonality of perspective with us as people previously colonized by Europeans. I would definitely like to see Prime Minister Modi making strong diplomatic overtures to South America.

Pagan said...

San, all I am saying is that Spanish is not far behind English as a global language and India has the ability to tilt the balance in its favor.
However, I don't see that happening as we are perhaps the most devoted of the English colonies even today.
Since the Spaniards never conquered us, I feel using their language is less harmful. My opinion, anyway.