Australian Perspective
Asian financial markets: Confected panic from professional doomsayers
Over the last few weeks, global financial markets have once again demonstrated their predilection for over-reacting to ephemeral news. For their part, the media are always happy…
Economic crisis in China? We're not there yet
I started my job at the Federal Reserve three weeks before Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy.
I wish I had kept a diary of my initial months at the Fed, so I could recall…
The TPP is still alive and Australia will likely sign
A month ago, international trade was in the headlines. President Obama had just obtained Trade Promotion Authority for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and in Australia, the…
Speeches
Address by Peter Varghese AO - An Australian world view: A practitioner's perspective
On 20 August 2015, the Lowy Institute hosted an address from Peter Varghese AO, Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Mr Varghese presented his…
Commentary
China's world view, in 6 parts
China's worldview, in 6 partsMerriden VarrallThe Straits Times12 June 2015Click here for the online text. Merriden Varrall
This week in Jakarta: Supersemar, cabinet reshuffle and hip hop economics
A Suharto family foundation was ordered to repay millions in embezzled state funds, Jokowi's cabinet ministers underwent a long-awaited reshuffle and the central bank chief put a…
Iran nuclear deal opens door for Syria diplomacy
The US and Russia are reportedly promoting a concert-of-powers approach to new negotiations over Syria.
Although any movement toward a political solution will be limited by the…
Indonesia: We don't have to be condemned to crisis
Ken Ward is to be congratulated for a straight forward and sober analysis of the Australia-Indonesia relationship. In his own matter of fact style, Ken takes us through a complex…
Indonesia: Too many 'unforced errors'
Maybe it's just the title – Condemned to Crisis? – that gives Ken Ward's book such a downbeat despairing tone, as if the accident of geography has locked us in an unhappy marriage…
Australia's PNG solution: The seeds of sectarianism?
As part of the 'Sectarianism and Religiously Motivated Violence' Masters course run by the Lowy Institute's Rodger Shanahan at ANU's National Security College, students are asked…