The Moving Spirit of Settler Colonialism: Temsula Ao, Counter-Sovereignty, and the Politics of Intervention in the Borderlands of India

Abstract This paper investigates the incursions, or more accurately, the interventions of the Indian state into what are often called its “Northeast borderlands.” It grapples with the specific space occupied by those who belong to this minoritized region in India. Theoretically, it works through conceptions of “sovereignty” and “intervention” to underscore what is at stake for those who lie within the remit of recognized state sovereignty but are nonetheless subject to brutal and invasive “intervention.” The article engages Naga author Temsula Ao’s writing on questions of “tribal” identity, globalization, and borders to situate India as a postcolonial “settler” state. Finally, it puts her work in conversation with Manu Karuka’s notion of “counter-sovereignty” to highlight the ways in which even critical International Relations (IR) theory risks falling into the trap of reifying “sovereignty” and unwittingly giving credence to Westphalian and Euro-centric understandings of sovereignty at the expense of alternative and prior imaginaries.