Watch: Girt by Sea: Finding security in Australia’s maritime domains

Girt by Sea: Reimagining Australia's Maritime Security

Australia is a maritime nation — yet for too long its strategic thinking has underestimated what that truly means. From the Torres Strait to the Southern Ocean, the seas that surround Australia are not just geography; they are the front lines of its national security.

In this Lowy Institute conversation, the authors of Girt by Sea: Reimagining Australia's Security joined Director of Research Hervé Lemahieu to make the case for a fundamentally different way of understanding Australia's strategic challenges. Professors Rebecca Strating and Joanne Wallis examined six maritime domains central to Australia's national interests — the Timor, Arafura and Coral Seas and the Torres Strait, the Western Pacific, the South China Sea, the South Pacific, the Indian Ocean, and the Southern Ocean — and offered a compelling alternative vision for how Australia should think about security in each.

Wide-ranging, rigorously argued, and deeply relevant to Australia's strategic moment, this is essential viewing for anyone engaged with the future of Australian foreign and defence policy.

About the speakers

Professor Rebecca Strating is Director of La Trobe Asia and Professor of International Relations at La Trobe University, Melbourne. Her research focuses on Asian regional security, maritime disputes, and Australian foreign and defence policy.

Professor Joanne Wallis is Professor of International Security in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Adelaide, Director of the Security in the Pacific Islands research program, and a Nonresident Senior Fellow of the Brookings Institution.

Hervé Lemahieu is Director of Research at the Lowy Institute and the original architect of the Asia Power Index.