Australia’s anti-climactic ASEAN Summit

The ASEAN Summit in Sydney offered many words but little action. If Australia wants to make Southeast Asia the ‘strategic fulcrum’ of its Indo-Pacific strategy, it needs to look well beyond ASEAN as its means.

More competition could risk human service delivery

The Australian Council of Social Service argues that introducing further competition into human services provision carries significant risk, in response to the Productivity Commission’s report.

What is Australia’s strategic plan B?

Australian strategic policy has not accounted for a failure of the post-war international order, even as the threats to it grow. Now, as elements of that order crumble, Australia has no coherent alternative to simply hoping against hope that the past will persist into the future.

Finding the right balance between China and the USA

Former Prime Minster Paul Keating argues that the much maligned Donald Trump may have found the right approach to managing relations with China.

New paths or missteps at the ASEAN summit?

Anthony Milner charts the success and failures of the ASEAN summit in Sydney and argues that Australia must play the long game if we aren’t to face regional isolation as American dominance begins to fade.

How Oz politics works

A twenty year veteran of the Canberra Parliament reporting scene, Graeme Dobell takes a wry look at the cut throat world of Australian politics, a place where you’re always on your own and, in the end, you’ll let everyone down.

ASEAN and Australia peer from the summit

Southeast Asia is where Australia’s geography collides with our economic and perhaps political future. Australia has always thought ASEAN a good thing – the harder question for us is what to do with it.

Decoding the ASEAN declaration

As the ASEAN summit wraps up, the Sydney Declaration has subtly taken Australia’s relationship with its closest Asian neighbours into new territory after a diverse week of engagement from soccer to social entrepreneurs.

The mundane reality of ‘Think Tanks’

Think tanks are a source of both fascination and fear for the media. The reality of efforts to influence policy-making is far more prosaic and think tanks continue to evolve to survive in a changing political landscape.

The ‘Game of Thrones’ in our own backyard

Allan Gyngell, the National President of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, discussed the challenges posed by China’s growth at a recent NZIIA conference and warned that ‘winter is coming’.

Xi’s Chinese power grab weakens global democracy

Xi Jinping has rewritten the Chinese constitution to install himself as President for life and his ruthless power grab has wider implications for democracy in Asia and the rest of the world.

The future of ASEAN

Over five decades, ASEAN has helped to strengthen Southeast Asian political and economic relations, but important changes are required to ensure it remains relevant, including the addition of at least one more member state.