Mindmine Summit 2026: Strategic Autonomy, Geoeconomics And India’s Sovereign Choices In An Uncertain World

The 16th edition of the Mindmine Summit brought together policymakers, diplomats, business leaders and public intellectuals to explore the choices shaping India’s future on Monday, June 15. 

Held under the theme Uncertain Times, Confident Choices: India Recalibrates Agenda, the summit served as a platform for conversations on how India and the world are responding to an increasingly complex global landscape.

Within this context, a discussion on The New Geopolitics: Reimagining the Sovereign Nation examined how shifting power centres, economic fragmentation and strategic competition are redefining ideas of sovereignty and national interest. 

As nations balance diplomacy with resilience and conversations with strategic autonomy, the discussion explored how “geoeconomics is the new geopolitics”, what these changes mean for governance, economic priorities and India’s evolving place in the world.

The discussion featured Dr. Shamika Ravi, Member, Economic Advisory Council of the Prime Minister, and Antonio Bartoli, Ambassador of Italy to India, in conversation moderated by Shekhar Gupta, Founder & Editor-in-Chief, ThePrint. 

In his opening remarks, Gupta reflected on the changing global order, arguing that nearly eight decades of efforts to build a rules-based international system are being fundamentally tested.

For 80 years, the world moved towards a rules-based order. We built institutions — the G7, G20, NATO, the WTO and other global organisations. Today, all of them seem to have been upended, accelerated under US President Donald Trump’s Presidency.

“Donald Trump has decided that the United States will increasingly deal with countries bilaterally,” Gupta said, He suggested that in such a world, much of Asia risks being sidelined as major powers recalibrate priorities.

Against that backdrop, he turned to Italy and posed a broader question about sovereignty and alliances.

“No country lets things drift — especially not Italy.”

Asking whether Europe increasingly feels isolated amid these changes, Gupta said: “Do you feel friendless? Where does the sovereign state rediscover itself?”

Ambassador Bartoli said that there is no doubt that we are living in uncertain times. “But I think one cannot build without being an optimist. The Western world is not a monolith — the recent moves by the US administration have demonstrated that.”

However, there is also a positive side, because this is a wake-up call for Europe. What we call strategic autonomy means having the capability, tools and resources to pursue your interests without depending entirely on anybody else. And it is also fair, because you cannot expect 330 million Americans to take care of an additional  150 million people, the Italian Ambassador added.

He argued that the conversation is not to dismantle NATO, but to cultivate greater strategic autonomy through concrete action.

“This requires ambitious steps from an institutional point of view. As Europeans, we have to become more efficient, more innovative, and simplify administrative processes.”

Bartoli added that Europe’s ambitions extend beyond security. “It is not just a question of defence but also of political role. We have to engage more with other countries and acquire a stronger political voice.”

He pointed to India as a key partner in that effort, citing progress on the India–EU Free Trade Agreement and ongoing discussions in areas including critical minerals and artificial intelligence.

Moderator Gupta then shifted the discussion to geoeconomics, arguing that economics increasingly shapes geopolitics, pointing to tariffs being used as leverage and energy becoming a strategic tool. He asked Ravi how India, as both a target and beneficiary of these shifts, is navigating the moment.

Responding, Ravi said India’s position stems from structural features of its economy.

“We have to realise that a lot of big structural changes are happening at the same time. But India’s growth, compared with China, Japan or South Korea, has been quite different. Unlike these export-oriented growth models, India’s growth has largely been driven by domestic demand. That is our strategic strength and the factor that gives India tremendous leverage.”

She argued that this domestic-demand-led model helped India absorb shocks ranging from Covid and trade wars to global conflicts more effectively than export-dependent economies.

Ravi also linked growth models to sovereignty. “Japan is today above $40,000 per capita income, but at its peak growth years it was much lower. “South Korea followed a similar path. If you look at long-term moving averages, growth eventually slows. She contrasted this with China.

“But unlike South Korea and Japan, China has an army and has articulated its ambitions in many ways.”

Against that backdrop, she said India cannot simply replicate East Asian growth models.

“For us, every deal, every trade agreement we enter into, we keep at heart that we are a domestic-demand-driven economy. Since we are an electoral democracy, some objectives take precedence. Number one is poverty. We had around a 30 per cent poverty rate 12 years ago. Today it is 3.9 per cent.”

The changing nature of domestic demand in India is important to understanding our response to global shocks, she said.

Later, when Gupta asked whether US President Donald Trump’s presidency would permanently reshape geopolitics or whether things could return to normal, Bartoli said Europe had already entered a different era.

“We enjoyed three main factors that are no longer there, cheap energy from Russia, an export outlet to China and a security umbrella from the US. But this was not a unidirectional relationship; it was a win-win scenario.”

Still, he dismissed the idea of a temporary “Trump clock”.

The change from the Biden administration has demonstrated that some factors are here to stay. “We cannot go back,  and that is not necessarily bad news. It is a stimulus towards greater autonomy and independence for Europe.”

Asked whether strategic partnerships actually translate into meaningful outcomes, especially as few countries have publicly backed India in recent years,  Bartoli defended Italy’s relationship with India.

“India and Italy truly have a strategic partnership. I am glad that toffee diplomacy - #Melodi - is popular, but it is good insofar as there is something behind the toffee.” Personal chemistry between Prime Ministers matters, but substance matters too, he said.

Turning to India’s economic strategy, Shekhar Gupta asked Shamika Ravi what the country is doing to attract capital and whether concerns around net foreign direct investment (FDI) are overstated.

Ravi argued that the debate around net FDI often misses important context.

“It is important to understand that the debate around net FDI has multiple components. The inflow into India is steadily rising — in fact, inflows today are at an all-time high. But so are outflows, which is why net numbers appear lower.”

She cautioned against interpreting outward investment as a sign of weakness.

“That does not mean outflows should be restricted. It has taken us 25 years of reforms to reach a stage where we can say: you make money, and if you want to repatriate it, that is okay.”

She added that Indian companies investing abroad should also be seen as a sign of economic maturity.

At the same time, if the Indian industry wants to acquire technology overseas, that is okay too, she said. “To think that Indian industry buying assets abroad — which shows up in outflow numbers — represents a loss of capital is a very myopic way to look at things. When an economy matures, this is exactly what happens.”

Asked whether the current crisis-ridden global environment presents opportunities for India, Ravi said the country’s biggest advantage remains its demographics.

“Big ones and the biggest one we have is our young population.”

She noted that ageing populations are emerging as a major challenge across OECD economies, while India is positioning itself differently.

“We see ageing as one of the defining issues that OECD nations are facing. We envisage India becoming the human resource capital of the world.” “We see ageing as one of the defining issues that OECD nations are facing. We envisage India becoming the human resource capital of the world.” 

“We see that ageing is one of the major problems  the OECD nations are facing,” said, noting that “we envisage India becoming the human resource capital of the world,” not just in terms of doctors and engineers but the entire value chain and the labour market.