Abstract:In 2022，two major events，the Covid-19 epidemic and the Ukrainian crisis，have overlapped and have had a profound impact on the evolution of the world’s political and economic landscape. This has not only led to more tremendous pressures on the world economic recovery，but also intensified geo-strategic competition among major powers in the Indo-Pacific region. At the same time，the return to “minilateralism” led by the U.S. is attempting to maintain the U.S.-led hegemonic order in a more flexible manner and to counterbalance China’s rising influence. As a strategic tool，minilateralism with highly flexible in the military-security arena as well as the advantage of overcoming the “collective action dilemma”，can not only play roles in shape hegemonic power but also exert strategic pressure on rising powers from the geopolitical dimension. However，the limitation of minilateralism is that it cannot solve the problem of both legitimacy and effectiveness of U.S.-led regional order under the changing power structure，and it is even more difficult to gain universal acceptance at the regional level by demonstrating its ability to build institutions and economic rules. In any case，due to the return of minilateralism，the economic function in the Indo-Pacific context has been weakened and gradually shifted to the economic dimension of involution and military security dimension of internal conflict，which to a certain extent also adds another variable to the security situation in the Indian Ocean and the interaction between the major characters in the region. As the most economically powerful country around the Indian Ocean，India strives to pursue unique influence and its security needs are rising under the influence of minilateralism. India not only seek strategic gains depend upon miniilateralism such as “Indo-Pacific Strategy” and the quad in order to hedge against China’s rising influence in South Asia and the Indian Ocean，but also attempt to build its minilateralism sucha as India-Australia-France and India-Australia-Indonesia in the Indian Ocean. The undercurrents of minilateralism in the Indian Ocean are profoundly influencing the evolution of the security situation in the Indian Ocean and will certainly continue to intensify the strategic competition among the major actors in the Indian Ocean region. India’s strategic choice in the Indian Ocean region is also an important variable affecting the game and future trend of strategic competition in the region.
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