| Summary/Abstract |
The United States and India have forged a remarkably close security relationship since 2000, given the previous hostility of India to American foreign policy in general. Indian state identity until the mid-1990s was shaped by nonalignment and antipathy to the US-led liberal economic order. If identity is the source of interests, then how do states adopt policies that conflict with core elements of their identity when geopolitical shifts push states to adapt to a new regional balance of power? We argue that India did this by activating parts of the state identity that were compatible with American state identity and de-emphasizing those elements that were incompatible. But in doing so, Indian state identity changed, which impacts future foreign policy choices. This case illustrates the reciprocal relationship between security interests and state identity. We use content analysis of ten years of Indian media to demonstrate that the depiction of the US–Indian relationship increasingly focused on the democratic shared values of both states, despite beginning with an emphasis on military cooperation.
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