Diagnose to defend: Net assessments key to Australia’s security

Australia should expand its use of net assessments — an analytical practice that helps decision-makers diagnose strategic problems and compete effectively — to guide the country in this new age of global disorder and conflict, argues strategy expert Dr Andrew Carr in a new Lowy Institute Policy Brief.

In Net Assessments for Australia, Dr Carr recommends establishing dedicated net assessment directorates within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Home Affairs, Treasury, and the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. He also calls for an expanded analytical remit of the existing Directorate of Net Assessments within the Department of Defence, created by the Albanese government in 2023.

Dr Carr says net assessments will help ministers confront Australia’s most pressing security challenges with greater clarity and pragmatism.

“If we are entering a new age of rivalries and conflict, we need to ensure our Ministers are aware of how Australia can compete and defend itself from those threats,” Dr Carr said.

“Rather than look for large national security documents that try to cover everything important, we need to focus on understanding the balance of power — military, economic and political — in our region, and how to keep our people safe and our region sovereign and free.”

“Net assessments are an analytical practice ideally suited for Australia. It helps reveal the choices facing the nation’s leaders so that they can use the daily flow of decisions — on capabilities, personnel, funding, organisational structure, and much else — to strengthen Australia’s competitive position, pre-empt emerging security problems, and impede the efforts of those who would do Australia harm.”

KEY FINDINGS

• Established in 2023 in the Australian Department of Defence, net assessments will play an increasingly important role in shaping the future of the Australian Defence Force, disciplining long-term capability decisions to a series of key scenarios of concern.
  
• With Australia’s security requirements ranging across many more domains — and dependent on careful analysis of trends and networks beyond its shores — four additional Directorates of Net Assessment should be established, in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Department of Home Affairs, Treasury, and the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.
  
• Net assessments will help Ministers better understand key strategic problems as well as potential conflict scenarios and outcomes, assisting them to make effective decisions to improve Australia’s competitive position and prepare the nation for any conflict in its region.

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