Australia in the World

It's a blue moon occasion for Australia's foreign aid program to be the lead story across the morning news media. But bad policy decided in secret and then leaked to the media can ensure front page headlines, even for aid. And that's what has happened this week with the Government's decision to

I like the independence of Canadian policy in the Middle East on some big issues. Exhibit A has to be the decision to refuse to join the US-led invasion of Iraq. Canadian independence of action is once again on display over the question of Syria. When President Obama gave the Syrian opposition

Sinclaire Prowse, a postgraduate student at the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, writes: Julia Gillard’s opinion piece in the Australian yesterday, 'We'll follow Whitlam’s way on China', is a further example of the late arrival of the current Australian government

Dr Khalid Koser is Head of the New Issues in Security Program at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, and a non-resident Fellow at the Lowy Institute. Bloggers, government officials, academics, and radio interviewers have kindly (and in one or two cases, not so kindly) responded to my paper

Below, a comment on our aid debate from Anna Kent. But first, Thomas O'Connor, Senior Programs Manager at the Centre for Australian Progress, writes: An important distinction to make in the aid debate is between relief aid, which is about providing a stop-gap social safety net in developing

In cabinet, foreign policy choices normally and naturally reside with the prime minister and foreign minister. The rule was pithily expressed by Alexander Downer when I asked him once how a decision had been treated by cabinet: 'The Prime Minister voted for it and I voted for it, so it went through

Sam Byfield from the Nossal Institute for Global Health at the University of Melbourne writes: The Lowy Institute's commitment to stimulating debate about aid is laudable, and hopefully successful in elevating (and adding complexity to) the aid debate. On the issue of the AusAID's '

Jeni Whalan's post on the issues that should get more attention in Australia's aid debate is full of good ideas. But can I suggest we add another issue to her list of things that need to be debated: what is Australian aid trying to achieve? The need for us to think about this question more

Mike Prince, Director of Charting Services at the Australian Hydrographic Service, responds to Olivia Wilson's piece on Sandy Island, which appeared on numerous maps but which the Australian research vessel Southern Surveyor recently (re)discovered did not actually exist: Congratulations on an

2012 will be remembered as a year of sluggish international policy debate. Ken Henry recently said he couldn't remember a time in the last 25 years when the quality of public policy debate had been as bad as it is right now. In my opinion, Australia's aid debate is no exception. Australia's

One bit of the Asian Century that has already arrived in Canberra is the way the Prime Minister keeps flying off to meet Asian leaders. Over a three month period, Julia Gillard has done Asia Pacific duty at APEC in Vladivostok, attended the Asia-Europe summit in Vientiane, and co-chaired the

At the end of October this year, I traveled to Papua New Guinea as part of the Lowy Institute's Leadership Mapping Project to interview Papua New Guinean leaders about their careers, motivations and aspirations for their country. I timed my visit to to coincide with the first real sitting of the

I'm attracted to Nick Bryant's idea of using football as a metaphor for Australian diplomacy, but he's altogether too nice about it. The sports metaphor also reveals some of our limitations*. In football and in diplomacy, Australians tend to be sticklers for the rules. We can't abide

Ed. note: the Lowy Institute is hosting a conference this Friday on Football Diplomacy: Australia's Engagement with Asia Through Football. For me, Australian diplomacy has never been about the punch, however much DFAT is portrayed as the departmental equivalent of the boxing kangaroo. It is

Derek Woolner is a Visiting Fellow at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, ANU. He was Director of the Foreign Affairs and Defence Group in the Commonwealth Parliament’s research service till 2002. The debate in The Interpreter over the consequences of the reduced Australian defence budget

John Blaxland and Albert Palazzo are quite right: there was a clear risk in 1999 that escalation in East Timor could have led to serious combat. I'd disagree that this was something understood only by those in the field, and not by those of us in Canberra. On the contrary, some of us in Canberra

Let the footnotes of history record that, in the week the Gillard Government published its Asian Century White Paper, Australian readers of The Economist saw on its cover a picture not of Barack Obama or Mitt Romney but of China's new leader, Xi Jinping. The campaign story, 'America on a knife-

This was unknown to me until yesterday, but yes, Australia does have something called the Australian Reinsurance Pool Corporation. The best plain English description of ARPC's role that I could find was not on its own website but comes from the National Insurance Brokers Association: The

Dr Peter Dean is a Fellow at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, ANU. Hugh White, writing in response to Al Palazzo and Jeffrey Grey, has questioned the use of East Timor as an example of the limitations of the ADF to undertake operations at this time. In response I offer a quote from Dr Bob

The recent Lowy Institute PNG New Voices Conference was a much-needed shock to the complacency I have become attuned to as a member of Australia's international policy community. It was the best Lowy Institute conference I have ever attended. In fact it was the best conference I have ever attended

What role does Australian multiculturalism have to play as the Asian Century progresses? At a time when the country is reaching out to its neighbours, it seems axiomatic that Australia should celebrate its ethnic diversity and particularly the contribution of its Asian-born citizens. Unsurprisingly

Here's a short video I recorded this morning with Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove, focusing mainly on the Australian angle to Obama's victory. The Lowy Institute paper I refer to in one of my questions is here: The Audacity of Reasonableness: Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, US

These views are the author's own and do not reflect those of the Department of Defence or the Australian Government. Jeff Grey's recent Interpreter post on Defence cuts is the latest in a number of compelling pieces expressing concern over the Government's direction for the nation's future security

James Goldrick's thoughtful response to my last post raises lots of important issues. Let me touch on two of them. First, James says that my argument for sea denial over sea control focuses too much on high-intensity conflicts and especially power projection in such conflicts.  James says we