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The article discusses the foreign relations policy adopted by Australian Prime Minister within the framework of the Coalition government that tool power in 2013. Topics addressed include economic changes that occurred in Asia since the end World War II, the role of Australia in the peaceful re-emergence of China as aregional and global power, and Austrlian cooperation with the U.S. and Japan. The goal of economic diplomacy is assessed.

In 2014 the Coalition government announced a 320 million dollar package for drought-hit farmers. In describing this initiative as a 'hand-up' not a 'hand out' Prime Minister Tony Abbott encapsulated more than 150 years of tension over whether government drought response should be unconditional limited relief or conditional longer-term assistance. This paper considers the long history of drought assistance in Australia as seen through government legislation, year books, newspapers and personal papers. It argues that despite changing political and social circumstances, contradictions in the approach to government drought response, as well as in public and personal reactions to those policies, have remained remarkably consistent. We further suggest that lack of consensus over the inherent nature of drought is not sufficient to explain the dilemma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article, building on previous research into earlier Australian pork-barrel schemes, uses data from Australia's Regional Partnerships Program (RPP), and its apportioning of $104 million in constituency-level grants in 2003-4, to explore the distinctive logic of parliamentary pork-barrel politics. Results show that the Liberal-Nationals Coalition's distribution of these funds was consistent with three electoral priorities - to reward its own MPs and show voters that the government 'can deliver'; to provide vote-winning assets in the Coalition's most marginal seats, where even small vote gain can make the difference between victory and defeat; and to try to re-establish its credibility at the local level in regional seats that had proven vulnerable to inroads made by Independent candidates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]