World Affairs
-
MARK BEESON. Trump’s America: the irresponsible stakeholder?
Will China fill the void that will be created by Trump? How times change. A decade or so ago, former World Bank president and deputy secretary of state Robert Zoellick suggested to China that it needed to become a “responsible stakeholder”. Even at the time this advice looked slightly condescending and patronising. Now it looks Continue reading »
-
MUNGO MacCALLUM. Trump, Turnbull and ANZUS.
So with a single bound across the Pacific, Trumpery has come to Australia – or at least to our elected leaders, which is the troubling bit. Last week Malcolm Turnbull was inveighing against the elites – yes, Malcolm Bligh Turnbull, the multimillionaire lord of Wentworth, Mr Harbourside Mansion himself. His complaint that the “elitist” ABC Continue reading »
-
IAN McAULEY. Opportunity Knocks: The Economics Of A Trump Victory
There’s ever reason to believe Donald Trump policies will hurt Australia. But there’s some important differences and insulation. Trump’s election has energised Australia’s far right. Abbott, Abetz, Bernardi, Canavan, Christiansen and Hanson have all said, in one way or another, that Trump’s victory vindicates their own policies. On the day after the election the Telegraph portrayed Continue reading »
-
PETER JOHNSTONE. The Royal Commission and the Catholic Church’s Dysfunctional Governance
In May 2016, the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse released Issues Paper 11 – Catholic Church Final Hearing, inviting submissions for its final Catholic Church hearing scheduled for three weeks 6-24 February 2017. That hearing will review the horror of clerical child sexual abuse and the Church’s cover-up and Continue reading »
-
MACK WILLIAMS. Trump : Getting our priorities right
Is China going to fill the void? The media-hyped flurry to try to establish the likely policy guidelines of the Trump administration is timely and natural but should be approached very cautiously. Not only is it virtually impossible at this moment to reach many definitive conclusions it is no less easy to identify the Continue reading »
-
RICHARD BUTLER. Attack on Mosul : Australian Involvement?
There does not appear to be a plan for the political disposition of Mosul, if and when the Iraqi/US led coalition frees it from ISIS. The political, economic, and confessional interests at stake have attracted all regional powers. Australia’s reasons for taking part, as the 4th largest contributor to the coalition, need clarification. Almost Continue reading »
-
ANDREW FARRAN. Under Trump – A moment of truth may be approaching
Indications are that a Trump Administration will expect America’s allies to pay their way to a greater extent than former President Nixon’s expectations were pursuant to the Guam Doctrine of 1969 mid-point in the Vietnam War. By and large it could be argued that Australia has paid its way – through Vietnam, Afghanistan and Continue reading »
-
ALLAN PATIENCE. The Tragedy of Trump
If nothing else Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election is compelling evidence that the neo-liberal project has been a catastrophic public policy failure. Blindly believing that he is their saviour, the victims of neo-liberalism’s caustic consequences have seized the moment by voting for Donald Trump. They view him as some kind of Continue reading »
-
GEOFF MILLER. Trump, Australia and the South China Sea.
The Trump victory has led to justified concern in Australia, as elsewhere, and few would carp at what seems to have been a successful and cordial talk between him and our Prime Minister. It’s a good thing that Trump thought enough of the relationship to include Australia among the countries to receive an early Continue reading »
-
MUNGO MacCALLUM. Shorten and Trump.
Malcolm Turnbull and his supporters regularly deride Bill Shorten as standing for nothing – first as a populist weather vane, and more recently as a constant nay-sayer in the style of Tony Abbott. And there has been some grounds for the accusations: Shorten has not always appeared a firm and consistent advocate of policies. Continue reading »
-
Why Trump should work with China on a massive infrastructure partnership
This is an extract from an interview on CNN on the 10th November 2016 with Kishore Muhbubani, Dean of the Lee Kwan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. Trump will have to make some painful choices, especially in regard to policy in Asia. His instinct will be to take a Continue reading »
-
ANDREW JAKUBOWICZ. A Bigots’ Frenzy: how race, class and gender still matter in the Australian politics of Section 18C.
Australia is a democratic pluralist society and there lies the rub. Democracies privilege freedom, while pluralism requires civility. In the increasing hyperbole surrounding the question of the impact of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act many are arguing that freedom of speech should trump freedom from hate, and others that the current “balance” Continue reading »
-
RICHARD BUTLER. President Trump: Foreign Policy and the Alliance
Donald Trump’s victory has shocked America and the world. America is deeply divided. Where he might take US foreign policy is unclear. We need to redefine the Alliance relationship. The competition between Trump and Clinton was widely described as savage, to an unprecedented degree. It was also a competition between two candidates who polling showed Continue reading »
-
STEPHEN FITZGERALD. Donald Trump. Seizing the opportunity to strengthen relations with countries in Asia.
Kim Beazley, as shocked as anyone by the election result, has said: “We do have one advantage going for us with a Trump presidency, and that’s this. We are a member of the only American alliance that the Trump people unreservedly approve of. So at least we’ve got a basis of a discussion with them.” Continue reading »
-
ROBERT MANNE. It’s Time
The Turnbull government has recently introduced new asylum seeker legislation into parliament. It has two parts. The first part aims to prevent any asylum seeker who tried to reach Australia after July 19 2013, including those who have been found to be genuine refugees, from ever being allowed to settle in Australia. The second Continue reading »
-
JOHN MENADUE. Donald Trump- the billionaire outsider!
But is there a possible silver lining? I am surprised and horrified by the election of Donald Trump as the Leader of the ‘Free World’. He is sexist, racist, xenophobic and a Muslim-basher. He doesn’t dog-whistle like our prime ministers, but speaks out bluntly on issues in ways I find offensive. Yet clearly large Continue reading »
-
TONY KEVIN. Trumpageddon? Not quite …. not yet.
Trump’s victory speech said all the right things. No talk now of putting Hillary in jail. On the contrary: gracious tribute for her hard-fought campaign. And promises to heal wounds, to be a president for all Americans. And new jobs. And infrastructure. And looking after all citizens, including significantly the veterans (of America’s endless Continue reading »
-
CAVAN HOGUE. US election.
It looks like a Trump victory with a Republican Congress, albeit one which contains Republicans who don’t like Trump. But it is far too early to speculate sensibly on what President Trump will actually do. There are more questions than answers. The problem is that we really don’t know what Trump will do and Continue reading »
-
FRANK BRENNAN SJ. Dog-whistling again on asylum seekers.
Labor has decided not to support the Turnbull government’s latest asylum bill which was announced in a most hamfisted way on the Sunday morning before last, and which contains very unacceptable overreach measures. So now it will be a matter for the Senate cross benchers. The Turnbull-Dutton bill is a disgraceful mishmash of dog Continue reading »
-
ROSS GARNAUT. Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. Part 2.
The Challenge of Globalisation. This is the second of a two-part series of extracts from an address which Professor Ross Garnaut gave to the Sydney Democracy Network, University of Sydney, 7 September 2016. The full text of his address can be found on his website. PART 2. RESPONDING TO THE CHALLENGES OF GLOBALISATION. Democratic capitalism’s return Continue reading »
-
ROSS GARNAUT. Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. Part 1.
The Challenge of Globalisation. I will be posting in two parts, extracts from an address which Professor Ross Garnaut gave to the Sydney Democracy Network, University of Sydney, 7 September 2016. the full text of his address can be found on his website: https://blogs.unimelb.edu.au/rossgarnaut/files/2015/12/Garnaut_CapitalismSocialismDemocracy_070916_3-2ei70mk.pdf PART 1. THE PROBLEMS WE FACE WITH GLOBALISATION In the twenty Continue reading »
-
MACK WILLIAMS. General Macarthur, the Philippines and Australian troops in WWII.
The very good Boston Globe article reminded me of two other events in Philippines history of WW11 about which so little is known in Australia. They have some relevance to the contemporary scene. For a long time prior to the famous Macarthur landing in Leyte, the Australian Government lobbied Washington right up to the Continue reading »
-
TONY KEVIN. Is Hillary the Russia-hater a safer American choice?
The final days of the US presidential campaign – a disgraceful saga at best – have been marked by a frantic race to the bottom by both sides. On the Trump side: an anonymous but skilfully made video is doing the social media rounds, alleging improper links between Hillary Clinton’s long-standing personal assistant and Continue reading »
-
Blowback for American sins in the Philippines – The Boston Globe.
In this article in the Boston Globe on October 15, 2016, Stephen Kinzer points out that President Duterte’s grievance ‘is rooted in history’. President Duterte asserted that the US had unjustly seized the Philippines in 1899 and waged a horrific military campaign to suppress native resistance. Stephen Kinzer is a senior fellow at the Watson Continue reading »
-
RAMESH THAKUR. The nuclear refuseniks: Australia follows the US again.
In voting against the UN resolution calling for negotiation of a treaty to ban nuclear weapons, Australia, Japan and South Korea are swimming against the global tide of opinion and that of their Asia and Pacific neighbours, argues Ramesh Thakur. Continue reading »
-
JOHN TULLOH. U.S. finally starts to ease its Cold War punishment of Cuba
It is astonishing that an impoverished speck on the rump of the most powerful country in the world has managed to intimidate it for more than half a century. Cuba, only 144 kms off the coast of Florida, has had to suffer Uncle Sam’s unforgiving wrath because it became a Communist regime, locked up Continue reading »
-
JEFFREY SACHS. The fatal expense of American imperialism.
In this article, Jeffrey D. Sachs says “the United States … is squandering vast sums and undermining national security. … today the United States has similarly over invested in the military and could follow a path to decline if it continues the wars in the Middle East and invites an arms race with China.” See Continue reading »
-
MACK WILLIAMS. The real shipping choke point for Australia – Sibutu Channel
Neither the Australian government nor the Australian media have informed us about the critical nature of the Sibutu Channel. As mentioned in this blog some time ago. the active political and media discussion in Australia about the South China Sea has continued to ignore the fact that the most critical choke point for Australia’s huge Continue reading »
-
JOHN MENADUE. White Man’s Media – A weekly column. This week: The US elections.
In this blog I propose to run a regular Wednesday column White Man’s Media focusing on the derivative nature of our media and its failure to reflect our own region .. I have in mind pieces of 100 -400 words. The longer pieces might focus on some of our complacent foreign affairs ‘ experts’ Continue reading »
-
PHIL GLENDENNING. We Need To End Australia’s Refugee Shame. Now
‘Human beings are never a means to an end. They are an end in themselves’. Emmanuel Kant’s words in the seventeenth century echo down the centuries in stark contrast to Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers and refugees on Nauru and Manus Island. The recent Four Corners program, The Forgotten Children gave Australians an all Continue reading »