Sam Roggeveen

Director, International Security Program
Areas of expertise

Australian foreign and defence policy, China’s military forces, US defence and foreign policy, drones and other military technology. Also, trends in global democracy.

Sam Roggeveen
Biography
Publications

Sam Roggeveen is Director of the Lowy Institute’s International Security Program. He is the author of The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace, published by La Trobe University Press in 2023.

Before joining the Lowy Institute, Sam was a senior strategic analyst in Australia’s peak intelligence agency, the Office of National Assessments, where his work dealt mainly with North Asian strategic affairs, including nuclear strategy and Asian military forces. Sam also worked on arms control policy in Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs, and as an analyst in the Defence Intelligence Organisation.

Sam has a long-standing interest in politics and political philosophy, and in 2019 he wrote Our Very Own Brexit: Australia's Hollow Politics and Where it Could Lead Us, about the hollowing out of Western democracy and its implications for Australia. 

Sam writes for newspapers and magazines in Australia and around the world, and is a regular commentator on the Lowy Institute’s digital magazine, The Interpreter, of which he was the founding editor from 2007 to 2014.

Sam also serves as lead editor at the Lowy Institute, and editor of the Lowy Institute Papers.

The Trump call forces Australia to confront a big question
The Trump call forces Australia to confront a big question
In an environment of such unpredictability, it is more important than ever that our leaders hold fast to a sense of what ultimately matters to Australia.
Western democracy and the crumbling party system
Western democracy and the crumbling party system
After the election of Donald Trump I argued that populism may not be the right lens through which to view recent political trends in Western democracies.
South China Sea: Tillerson throws a rhetorical bomb
South China Sea: Tillerson throws a rhetorical bomb
The normally restrained Reuters said Tillerson had 'set a course for a potentially serious confrontation with Beijing'. Reuters is not exaggerating
The Interpreter's best of 2016: US election
The Interpreter's best of 2016: US election
The US election was a dominant theme on The Interpreter in 2016.
How to pick your predictors
Commentary
How to pick your predictors
Sam Roggeveen writes in the Australian Financial Review on how to choose your pundits. Photo: Flickr/Will FisherSam Roggeveen
Why did the media get Trump so wrong?
Why did the media get Trump so wrong?
In the Fairfax papers yesterday, Tom Switzer poked some well-deserved fun at the Australian political commentariat's collective failure to get the Trump phenomenon right.
Is there a global wave of populism?
Is there a global wave of populism?
Local circumstances, individual talent and a dash of pure chance might have brought about the political results we have seen across the world, not populism.
Trump victory signals US decay, not a popular revolt
Trump victory signals US decay, not a popular revolt
The idea that America must always play a dominant role in upholding the 'global rules-based international order' is under serious threat.
PLA Air Force unveils its pride and joy
PLA Air Force unveils its pride and joy
Yesterday at the Zhuhai Air Show, China's air force officially unveiled its worst-kept secret, the J-20 stealth fighter.
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