If one positive comes from coronavirus-inspired panic buying, let’s hope it’s that Australians begin to reconsider the wisdom of our reliance on overseas supply chains and just-in-time inventory for critical resources and supplies. And if …
Black swan events produce big but unforeseen consequences. Was Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison right, even prescient, in his speech at the Lowy Institute on 3 October 2019? It’s hard to think of a better example …
In this pandemic, every nation’s leaders and institutions are rightly focused on ensuring the wellbeing of their own populations. Despite this introspection, Australia cannot achieve that result without cooperation with its regional and broader international …
The beat Australian police enforce coronavirus restrictions Human rights advocates are worried about new measures to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in Australia. The federal government announced new restrictions, but states have applied the physical …
Threats to national security invariably limit domestic political disputes. Now that governments have assumed a leading role in fighting the Covid-19 pandemic, the political opposition in countries under populist rule is quickly being marginalised. In …
In their prophetic 2018 book, The end of epidemics, authors Jonathan Quick and Bronwyn Fryer warned that ‘a severe worldwide pandemic could cost the global economy up to [US]$2.5 trillion.’ They also warned of the …
In a world filled with think tanks, shrewd minds and an internet, interesting assessments of the geopolitical ramifications of Covid-19 appear almost daily. From Michel Duclos’s observation that the pandemic is ‘a crisis revealing a …
When pandemics strike, world leaders and health responders must adapt quickly to the looming threat. Often the last factor they consider—if it makes their to-do lists at all—is gender. As advocates for the health and …
In this interview, The Strategist’s Brendan Nicholson talks with ASPI’s director of defence and strategy, Michael Shoebridge, about how the Covid-19 crisis will affect the global strategic balance and how the world will be changed …
The Covid-19 crisis has sparked a truly inspiring wave of citizen-led, open-source innovation, from 3D-printed medical devices and open-source designs for personal protective equipment, to virus tests which could allow for more rapid, large-scale testing. …
This special episode of Policy, Guns and Money marks the publication of ASPI’s 2020 counterterrorism yearbook. The threat of terrorism has plateaued at an unacceptably high level and this report shines a light on an …
With the containment of Covid-19 nowhere in sight, a war of words has broken out between the United States and China about the culpability of the latter for the worldwide spread of the deadly virus. …
Sea state Construction of a third Arafura-class offshore patrol vessel for the Royal Australian Navy is underway in Western Australia. Two are already being built in South Australia, but this is the first of 10 …
The February 2020 release of the latest parliamentary review of administration and expenditure in the Australian intelligence agencies (2017–18) does little to allay the concerns that I raised after the publication of the last one …
The rapid spread of Covid-19 throughout Indonesia is a serious challenge that could have strategic implications for Australia. But, unlike in previous disasters, there’s little Australia can do to assist Indonesia in the short term. …
Remember December 2019? That innocent age before our kids knew how to spell ‘Covid’, when all we were worried about was the terrible bushfires and the ongoing climate crisis? In only three months, the novel …
With the novel coronavirus devastating one economy after another, the economics profession—and thus the analytical underpinnings for sound policymaking and crisis management—is having to play catch-up. Of particular concern now are the economics of viral …
If the recent bushfire crisis and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic have taught us anything, it’s that Australia has an opportunity to evaluate its coordination on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR). The tumultuous start to …
ASPI’s Counterterrorism yearbook 2020, released today, was drafted at a time of upheaval in the global system. Like now, interstate tensions were on the rise and the global system was going through a drastic change. …
Rank the threats, risks and challenges the South Pacific faces. What’s most significant? What matters most in the lives of islanders? Putting things in order of importance appeals to the orderly minds of public servants …