Australia in the World

The launch of the Defence White Paper was a hot mess of hashtags: Prime Minister Turnbull (#DWP2016), Defence Minister Payne (#2016DWP), the Department of Defence (#defencewhitepaper) and Chief of Defence Force (#WhitePaper) all used different ones. As a result, defence commentators also fractured

Hugh White's piece in The Age today makes many good points about the limitations of the latest Defence White Paper on strategic outlook and policy. As White says: The more likely outcomes are escalating US-China strategic confrontation and growing risk of war between them, or gradual US withdrawal

On 30 January, 95 days after its previous effort, the US Navy conducted another 'freedom of navigation operation' in the South China Sea (an operation known by the unlovely FONOP acronym). This time around, the US improved the public diplomacy of the exercise with clear and reasonably

The official announcement today that the government would refuse a US request for additional assets to be deployed in the Middle East against Islamic State came as little surprise. These types of requests rarely come out of the blue, and it is likely that Washington was aware of what Canberra’s

To mark International Migrants’ Day on December 18 the World Bank released its Migration and Remittances Factbook for 2016 (summary available here). It’s packed full of statistics, and includes one of my favourite graphs exhibiting the importance of remittances as a source of development

Happy first birthday to the Korean Free Trade Agreement (KAFTA), which came into effect on 12 December last year. At the time, Trade Minister Andrew Robb said: KAFTA will increase export opportunities across a wide range of industries: from beef, wheat, sugar, dairy, wine, horticulture and seafood

It's not often that Canberra's senior bureaucrats provide a sustained critique of the functioning of global economic diplomacy. But Martin Parkinson did just that a week ago in the 5th Warren Hogan Memorial Lecture,  using the extra freedom he had while 'between jobs', after he was dismissed in

MIT and Harvard economists have debunked the claim that aid funded welfare programs in developing countries make people lazy. Vox has a good summary. Devpolicy has posted the second in a two part series looking at Australian development NGO expenditure, which I have co-authored. In this post we

Last Thursday, The Australian newspaper ran an editorial, 'Strengthening links with China'. This followed its front-page coverage of the visit to Canberra by China's Chief of General Staff Fang Fenghui, for annual talks with Chief of Defence Force Mark Binskin and Department of Defence Secretary

The Commonwealth has announced its first female secretary-general, Baroness Patricia Scotland. The Baroness’ first task should be to beef up the effectiveness of their aid work as The Commonwealth has routinely ranked as one of the worst performing multilateral donors. In the first of a two part

As the world slowly absorbs the full implications of the terrorist attacks in Paris, thoughts inevitably turn to whether events will be repeated elsewhere. That ISIS or ISIS-affiliated groups and networks would seek to emulate the impact of the Paris attacks is almost certain. If an opportunity

'Should Donald Trump be elected US President, Australia should tear up the ANZUS alliance', leads this article by veteran analyst and political reporter, Daniel Flitton. He doesn’t hold back: Malcolm Turnbull or Bill Shorten could be prime minister by this time next year, but this is a simple

Malcolm Turnbull's visit to Jakarta this week did not signal any drastic changes for the direction of the Australia-Indonesia relationship, but it did leave relations considerably warmer than before. So warm, in fact, that both the prime minister and his Indonesian counterpart were forced to remove

Several posts on The Interpreter have argued recently that Australia should join the US in conducting freedom of navigation operations (FONOPs) in the South China Sea. This is not a good idea for several reasons, not least of all is how our involvement would be perceived in the region.  The

As the fastest growing economy in Asia, many countries are vying for India's attention. India's understaffed Ministry of External Affairs is constantly grappling with the demands of foreign governments for meetings with senior Indian leaders. There is no doubt Australian leaders have to work harder

So Tony Abbott's revival of knights and dames has proved a short lived thing, with newly installed PM Malcolm Turnbull moving quickly to axe the contentious honours. It's a move likely to be greeted with relief at home and bemusement abroad, given it is less than two years since knights and dames

After many months of intense debate inside the Obama Administration, the US conducted a freedom of navigation operation (FONOP) in the South China Sea on 26 October. The destroyer USS Lassen sailed for over an hour within 12 nautical miles of Subi Reef, a low tide elevation (LTE; a feature that was

The discussion of the pros and cons of warship building in Australia has, with some honourable exceptions, left a lot to be desired. Stephen Grenville's Interpreter post 'Opportunity Cost in Australia's Future Submarine Decision' exemplifies some of the most significant deficiencies. Straight

In his recent Boyer Lectures, the Lowy Institute's Michael Fullilove notes that the old world had gone, and that the rise of China calls for a serious re-examination of Australian foreign policy. This is true. Michael also called for a more ambitious Australian foreign policy and stressed the need

A few days ago a suggestion was made on Crikey that DFAT, Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, should be scrapped. I was tempted to ignore it, because as far as I can tell, the author, Jason Murphy, based his call largely on the fact that he just doesn't like free trade agreements

After marathon talks, the Trans Pacific Partnership has been sealed. The stage is now set for some fantastic battles to get this through national legislatures. I'll leave it to others to count the numbers. I've written previously about my concerns regarding the TPP, and agreements like it. I won't