Search

As a close US ally, Australia is often seen as a recipient of US extended deterrence. This article argues that in recent decades, Australian strategic policy engaged with US extended deterrence at three different levels: locally, Australia eschews US combat support and deterrence under the policy of self-reliance; regionally, it supports US extended deterrence in Asia; globally, it relies on the US alliance against nuclear threats to Australia. The article argues that in none of these policy areas does the Australian posture conform to a situation of extended deterrence proper. Moreover, when the 2009 White Paper combines all three policies in relation to major power threats against Australia, serious inconsistencies result in Australia's strategic posture—a situation the government should seek to avoid in the White Paper being drafted at the time of writing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article delves into India and Australia's deepening involvement in the Indo-Pacific, emphasizing their expanding relationship in the context of regional security and the importance of collaboration for a free and peaceful regional environment. It explores the maritime strategies of India and Australia, their changing regional outlooks, and their commitment to international collaboration, both in bilateral and multilateral contexts.

As carbon emissions continue to rise, the need to adapt to climate impacts has become increasingly urgent. Planning and implementing climate adaptation is often left to local authorities and is fraught with the challenge of negotiating with multiple stakeholders holding differing interpretations of climate change. In such a space, local media has a critical role in communicating these differing perspectives within communities. In this article we explore the central role of a local newspaper in shaping public debate over the implementation of a climate adaptation plan in a coastal region of Australia. Rather than providing an arena for public discussion and constructive debate, we find that the newspaper adopted a clear position rejecting the need for changes in planning for anticipated climate impacts. We use the case study to explore how media discourse contributes to (i) the construction of an antagonistic debate undermining climate science, and (ii) strengthening the hegemony of economic value and property rights. In response, we suggest shoring up political alliances for climate change, including in the local media, as a basis for social change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of company and executive characteristics in strategic alliance formation in the tourism sector of travel. A survey of Australian travel sector businesses was carried out and the results indicate a high level of interaction through alliances between various sectors of the Australian tourism industry. Top managers' characteristics (experience, ownership and risk-taking attitude) were found to be influential in taking strategic decisions of whether to form alliances or not. These characteristics do not play an important role in determining the number of alliances an organisation has and their geographical location, as much as company characteristics do. The findings of this paper imply that company characteristics are important in determining alliance formation. Managers should thoroughly consider these characteristics when deciding not only to form alliances, but also the types of alliances that could help their organisations to be more competitive, given limited resources. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Businesses have used alliances to share knowledge and resources amongst themselves to achieve corporate goals, yet little is written in the literature on how non-profit organizations manage alliances and what makes these alliances effective. This paper examines how Australian environmental nongovernmental agencies (NGOs) perceive their alliances with other NGOs, profit- based organizations and governmental partners. To a large extent this paper replicates the work of Milne, lyer and (boding-Williams (1996) and includes measures of alliance effectiveness developed by Bucklin and Sengupta (1993). The findings suggest that Australian environmental NGOs use varying mechanisms to manage these alliance relationships, which is generally supported in the existing literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a rapidly changing geopolitical and strategic environment in which the current US administration is willing to demonstrate to the world that the pursuit of its national interest will not be encumbered by multilateral forums, what role will US bilateral alliance partners such as Japan and Australia play in redefining the international order, especially in their area of primary interest – East Asia? This paper examines an Australian proposal for establishing an informal security dialogue at the ministerial level comprising the United States and two of its bilateral allies in the Asia-Pacific. While the dialogue process has begun, the success of any such structure, however, will be largely coloured by accommodating the very different histories and strategic cultures that have developed within these countries, and the very different expectations other regional states have of them. Through the examples of the war on terror and the war against Iraq, this paper argues that there is little evidence of structured co-operation at the ministerial level in place. Further, any exclusive high-level security dialogue which forms around this troika will incur the suspicion of many East Asian nations, as it may be seen as a platform for unrestrained US unilateralism and exceptionalism, which may in turn have negative implications for Japan and Australia's continuing role in Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper explores the content of the Australian foreign and defence policy agenda over the past 50 years, finding evidence of both continuity and change. Australian political leaders have generally committed to cooperation with international institutions, wealth creation through engagement with Asian economies in particular, and security through the American alliance. In this period, changes in foreign policy approach either concerned marginal issues or were driven significantly by exogenous factors: by changes in the international environment or by global events that propelled a reconsideration of Australian foreign and defence policy interests. However, periods of policy change and significant public attention in - particular around the Vietnam and Iraq wars - illustrate the continued relevance of political choices and agency. Both conflicts and debates around them ushered in changing foreign and defence policy considerations, and both raised fundamental questions about Australian security and independence in the context of the American alliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'new' terrorism has not escaped Southeast Asia. Within this region, the Malay Archipelago has the world's largest Muslim population and Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim country. In the context of the struggle between radical Islam, and the West and its allies, the region assumes great, long-term strategic significance, particularly to the USA. The threat of terrorism to Australia, as demonstrated by the terrorist attacks at Bali in 2002 aimed at its citizens, has also ensured Australia's active interest and engagement with the littoral states of the Malay Archipelago. In addition, arguably the world's most strategic waterway and chokepoint, the narrow Straits of Malacca, is located within this cauldron. More than half the world's trade and oil passes through this strategic straits. By comparison, oil flows through the straits are three times more than through the Suez, and fifteen times greater than the Panama Canal. Not surprisingly, key Western states and their allies that have a deep interest in the security of the Straits of Malacca and in the global war on terrorism have paid special attention to the Malay Archipelago. Indeed, the idea of a Trilateral Security Dialogue centred on the USA, Japan and Australia was first mooted in 2001, and has since involved discussions on Asian security between senior officials of all three countries. In 2005, it was elevated to the level of the foreign ministers of Japan and Australia, and the US Secretary of State. This dialogue process is the third leg in the triangle between the two bilateral US alliances with Japan and Australia. It is obvious that all three are key strategic partners in Asia, with a strong common interest in maritime security and terrorism issues, particularly in Southeast Asia. It is the contention of this paper that this evolving trilateral extra-regional security nexus has benefited greatly from cooperation with Singapore, which has been doing everything it can to encourage and facilitate the regional involvement of these extra-regional powers. In fact, Singapore has become a critical regional ally of all three. On Singapore's part, this represents a striking success in foreign policy as security, political and economic allies enhance its own ability to better manage the new terrorist threats that have emerged since 9-11. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reality, it seems, is not what it used to be in international relations. In recent times many of the givens of the postwar world have undergone remarkable and often dramatic change. In the Gorbachev era, for example, ideologies have been reordered, boundaries redrawn. alliances reconstituted, new symbols of identification constructed and old identities resurrected. Recently, also, patterns of thought and behaviour, deemed to correspond with an enduring, essential reality in international life have come under increasing scrutiny within the international relations community. Accordingly, in the United States in particular. a new critical literature has emerged concerned to confront intellectual and policy sectors with the limitations, omissions, silences and givens of conventional approaches to international relations at a historical moment resonant with old dangers and unique opportunities. This paper represents a brief introduction to an Australian audience of some of the issues associated with this new literature. It seeks also to emphasise its relevance via an unconventional discussion on some major thinkers and important foreign policy themes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia's profile as one of Washington's leading allies in the Asia Pacific has grown due to the Obama Administration's rebalancing strategy. While New Zealand is both unable and unwilling to match the intensity of its neighbour's relationship with the world's leading power, its own strategic ties with Washington have strengthened considerably in recent times. While Australia's alliance with the United States may raise future challenges vis-à-vis its increasingly important relationship with a rising China, New Zealand also has a balancing act to maintain, not least because of its close economic ties with the People's Republic. In different ways both Australia and New Zealand may currently be reducing their room for maneouver if and when the contest between the United States and China becomes more severe. The risks may be higher for Australia because the same strategic geography that gives it renewed prominence may also increase its exposure to competition and conflict in Asia, and because its own military rebalancing towards the north and west of the continent is occurring just as its defence budget has been significantly cut. For New Zealand, while those direct risks may be smaller, staying on Canberra's radar screen will become harder. Indeed as they each look towards their own relationships with the major powers, Australia and New Zealand may need to work even harder to sustain their own bilateral alliance relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes and analyzes the little-known, but extensive, defense cooperative relationship that exists among the armed forces of the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. While perhaps arguably a relatively esoteric subject prior to 1989, given the recent changes that have taken place in the Soviet Union, U.S. alliance strategy is now on the threshold of a new era--an era in which the Soviet threat is seen by many allies as diminishing. As U.S. officials ponder the implications of a decreased Soviet threat on its many alliances, of which almost all have been threat-based, it will be important to recall the one series of collective security arrangements with allies that has been founded on similarities, vice solely threats. This intimate Anglo-Saxon connection appears to have the needed bases for enduring well into the post-cold-war era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the efforts of Japan and Australia to enhance the naval capability of third countries-specifically the Philippines-threatened by the rise of China. Considered as middle powers, both countries are members of two associations of maritime democracies, namely: the Democratic Security Diamond (DSD), and the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD). Since the formation of their special strategic partnership, Japan and Australia have jointly assisted in building up the capabilities of the Philippine Navy (PN), Philippine Coast Guard (PCG), and the Philippine Air Force (PAF). The recent dramatic shift in Philippine foreign policy direction fosters this triangular security relationship. On the one hand, President Rodrigo Duterte, in distancing the Philippines from the United States (the country's traditional ally) favors closer security ties with Japan and Australia. On the other hand, Japan and Australia want to prevent the Philippines from gravitating closer to China's orbit of influence and power. Gradually, however, this development can either modify or erode the American hub-and-spoke system of alliance in East Asia and increase the spoke-to-spoke links leading to the creation of minilateral and plurilateral security arrangements in the Indo-Pacific region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article critically evaluates the agenda and strategy of the Australian American Leadership Dialogue (AALD) for protecting and strengthening the Australia–US alliance. Nominally an exercise in informal diplomacy dedicated to fostering mutual understanding, the AALD functions more like a pro-American lobby group as it seeks to preserve orthodox thinking and eschew dissenting perspectives. The AALD performs this function in three main ways: by carefully framing discussion and debate, by socialising Australian elites into the alliance orthodoxy and by serving as a 'gatekeeper' of the status quo. 本文对保卫、加强澳美联盟的澳美领袖对话提出批评。该对话虽然名义上只是加强共同理解的非正式外交实践， 但其作用更像是亲美游说集团，因为它要保持正统的思路，回避不同的观点。该对话用三种方式实现这一功能：小心地设置讨论和辩论；向澳大利亚精英灌输联盟的正统观；充当现状的守门人。 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented which discusses Australian foreign relations from January 2014 through June 2014, with a particular focus on its foreign policy toward East Asia. An overview of Australia's foreign economic relations, including its trade relationship with China, is provided. The U.S.'s alliance with Australia, including in regard to its dependence on the U.S., is discussed.

In 2011, Australia communicated a clear choice about its strategic future. It would continue to cleave tightly to the US alliance, expand its military links and work to advance the USA's conception of regional order. Given its economic interests, why has Australia bound itself to the US alliance? What lies behind this strong commitment and what would it take for Australia to change its relationship with the USA? This article presents an analysis of the current state of the US–Australia alliance and argues that Canberra's pursuit of close relations with the USA reflects the interaction of a rational calculation of the costs and benefits of the alliance with a set of resolutely political factors that have produced the current policy setting. The article first assesses the security cost and benefit behind the alliance. It then argues that the move also derives from the strong domestic support for the US alliance, a sharpened sense that China's rise was generating regional instability that only the US primacy could manage and the realisation that the economic fallout of such a move would be minimal. It concludes with a brief reflection on what it might take to change the current policy settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1990s, Australia has become increasingly concerned about a perceived incongruence between its booming economic relationship with China and its security alliance with the US. There have been dire warnings that the future will be marked by an inevitable increase in tensions between China and the US as the former threatens to overtake and surpass the latter in aggregate GDP and in military force projection capability. This combination of bilateral tensions and concomitant pressures from each side for Australia’s support could force Canberra into a difficult choice: renounce its economic relationship with China to side with an economically moribund West, or betray old alliance commitments in pursuit of a lucrative relationship with a rising but ideologically alien new hegemon. What should Australia do? That is not a question that can be answered scientifically, but the framework provided here can perhaps elucidate the stakes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper discusses the complex political engagements undertaken by Muslims in Australia in the years since 9/11. In particular, it discusses the political alliances and tensions that have arisen during encounters with progressive social movements, as well as with other 'out groups' such as Indigenous and Gay, Lesbian, Transvestite, Transsexual and Bisexual organisations and individuals. We argue that both Muslim and non-Muslim participants in such encounters must engage in a process of critical self-reflexivity, in order to avoid the hazard of reproducing the processes of marginalisation and appropriation that are so apparent in 'mainstream' society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to make a long overdue re-examination of Indo-Australian relations in the early Cold War years. By drawing on available secondary sources, it reassesses the existing literature on Australian engagement with Asia. In so doing, it seeks to understand the reasons why the Menzies government found it so difficult to forge a close partnership with India. Canberra's rather frosty relations with New Delhi during the Menzies-Nehru years had little to do with Menzies' alleged condescension towards the Asians or his personal antipathy towards Nehru. Rather, it had to do with the two leaders' different readings of Cold War politics as well as their responses to the structural changes taking place at the international level following the end of the Second World War. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a study of the Australian government's exchanges with the Chamberlain government over the ultimately unsuccessful attempt to negotiate a Grand Alliance between the United Kingdom, France and the Soviet Union during 1939. Robert Menzies and Stanley Bruce carefully weighed the arguments for and against before deciding to support the proposal for an Alliance. Yet there was considerable ambivalence about their support as evidenced by Bruce's panicky response to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In its own very small and distant way the Menzies government contributed to the inertia that marked the British Empire's failure to secure a Grand Alliance in 1939. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Union renewal and coalition unionism are widely considered necessary; however, the reasons why a union might participate in a coalition is undertheorized. This article considers six factors that help explain when a union is likely to form a coalition with a community organization, which are explored in a case study comparison of two coalitions in Australia and Canada. Preexisting union identities, common interest, and decentralized union structures make coalition formation more likely and shape the degree of union member participation in coalitions. Unions are likely to engage in coalitions when there is a coincidence of crisis and perceived opportunity for coalition practice, while noting that the depth of union engagement is greatly affected by the type of union actors that initiate coalition participation (whether leaders, organizers, or stewards). Different passages for coalition unionism are possible, and they can originate inside unions or be provoked externally by community organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article assesses the global profile of Australian International Relations (IR) scholarship by measuring the presence of Australian-based scholars in leading journals and presses, relative to other non-US scholars. It presents three alternative conclusions, depending on the benchmark adopted. The first perspective, low impact, suggests that on the basis of publications in top journals, Australian IR scholars are doing a bad job, that is, Australian scholars have a much smaller presence in leading journals than could reasonably be expected. The second view, a bookish lot, is based on publication in leading book presses, and presents a much more positive picture. The third alternative, a very British affair, concludes that according to both journal and book data Australian scholars are notable for their disproportionate representation in British rather than American publication outlets. These claims are supported with publication data from top outlets over the past decade as determined by Australian and international rankings. [image omitted] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers recent developments in Australia–Japan security and defence ties and their trilateral dimension with the United States. I argue that the security links bilaterally and through their main ally the US have scope for development while the three nations share perceptions of security and strategic matters. However, there are elements of inherent unpredictability that may come into play to hinder the move towards a further strengthening of the current trilateral security arrangement. Possible impediments come from both external and internal sources making it difficult for the three nations to transform their trilateral security relations into an institution, alliance or treaty that formally links the three partners strategically.1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia has had a long connection with, and significant national interests in, the Southern Ocean and Antarctica. The Australian Antarctic Territory comprises 42 per cent of Antarctica's landmass. Australia is not only a claimant state and original signatory to the Antarctic Treaty but has played a significant role in the development of what is termed the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS). This article aims to provide an overview of Australia's key policy interests and government policy goals towards Antarctica, including its commitment to the ATS. In examining key policy objectives we note that despite continuity and development of these objectives, significant changes and challenges have arisen in the period 1984–2006. It is these challenges that will help frame Australia's Antarctic agenda over the next 20 years and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historiography on the Australian political and diplomatic role in the Allied Occupation of Japan (1945–1952) gives disproportionate attention to the meetings between the Australian Minister for External Affairs, H.V. Evatt, and the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers in Japan (SCAP), General Douglas MacArthur, in Tokyo during 1947. These meetings are then linked to the subsequent resignation from the Allied Council for Japan (ACJ) of William Macmahon Ball, an Australian academic representing the British Commonwealth, and used to justify the claim that Australian policy towards Occupied Japan was unpredictable and ad hoc. This attention to Ball's resignation has distorted analysis of Australia's role in, and policies towards, Japan during the Occupation. This article argues that there is a need to develop a new historical discourse for the Australian role in the Occupation, one that moves beyond the intrigues of personalities and investigates diplomatic policy practice and its underlying ideals. This, in turn, may encourage other scholars to rethink the wider conduct and practice of foreign policy under the Labor governments of the 1940s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) and the federal ALP have often been depicted as political allies due to the relative symmetry of their ideological positions. However, this article argues that their relationship is far more complex than an alliance would suggest, and has always involved a mixture of both cooperation and conflict. On the one hand, the ALP seems to expect political loyalty from ACOSS, but has never been willing to cede ACOSS the same influence granted to core interest-group allies such as the ACTU. Equally, ACOSS appears to have greater expectations of, and makes greater demands on, the ALP than Liberal—National Coalition governments, but is not willing to trade away its party­political independence in return. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deals with security alliance between Australia and the United States. Critical objective of Australian strategic and defense policies; Abandonment of principle of 'dependence' in favor of 'self-reliance'; Maintenance of British and American military facilities in Australia; Australia's involvement in United States ballistic missile defense efforts.

Analyzes the role of environmental policy in the alliance between Australia and the United States. Examination of whether the alliance relationship has had an impact on the two countries' international environmental policies; Australian government's maintenance of a 'non-linkage' policy on environmental issues; Degree of policy convergence on international environmental issues.

This article discusses the implications of the division of Australia's regional security arrangements between the older 'threat-oriented' alliances such as ANZUS and the FPDA and the newer 'order-oriented' arrangements Australia has signed with Indonesia, China, Japan and others. As Australia does not face a direct military attack in the near to medium term, the adoption of co-operative security is the most appropriate strategy for Australia. While many in the region are supportive of Australia's role and look towards Australia for support, some concern continues to exist as to Australia's own perception of the threats it faces in the region and its preference to secure itself from these latent military threats through its alliance with the United States. In the final section, the debate among the Australian security policy- makers between the effectiveness of bilateral versus multilateral approaches to regional security will be examined. While there is at least nominal bipartisan support for multilateral approaches, this support is usually tempered with caveats about the utility of Australia's bilateral arrangements, especially the alliance with the United States, as insurance should the multilateral approach fail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the approaches of Australia and the U.S. to the United Nations (UN). There have however been differences in approach to the United Nations, and to multilateralism generally, by Australia and the United States since even the earliest days in San Francisco, differences which have their roots in the very real differences in relative power of the two countries. Thus although the two countries share many foreign policy goals these differences have been particularly important in determining the relative weight each accords to the United Nations and multilateralism as instruments in foreign policy formulation and the conduct of international relations.