Foreign Policy: Future Imperfect

The government gets high marks for its foreign and security policy handling. There is uncertainty, but people seem optimistic about the challenges ahead.

- Sandeep Unnithan

A WEEK, AS BRITISH prime minister Harold Wilson once observed, is a long time in politics. Six months—since the last Mood of the Nation survey in August 2016—seem like an eternity now. Consider how the global political climate has changed since then. Brexit, Britain’s exit from the European Union, is now a reality; Russia has established itself in Syria and Donald Trump is the 45th president of the United States.

Closer home, Pakistani terrorists killed 19 soldiers at an army base in Uri, Kashmir, on September 18, triggering retaliatory cross-border surgical strikes by India. This also led to the country ratcheting up pressure on Pakistan, a result of which was an India-led boycott of the SAARC summit which was to be held in Islamabad last November. But while India Pakistan relations are fairly predictable in their unpredictability, a similar situation seems to be unfolding globally.