Australia Archive

Editor’s note: This is the second of a two-part series. Part I looked at the domestic politics of Australia’s upcoming elections. Part II examines the foreign policy issues at stake. Bipartisanship is generally the hallmark of Australian foreign policy, and this election is no different. As a result, no matter who wins September’s polls, the focus of Australian policy will remain how best to capitalize on the trading benefits flowing from the economic rise of Asia, while navigating carefully through the security uncertainty that such growth brings to the stability of the region. A particular challenge will be how best […]

Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series on Australia’s upcoming elections. Part I looks at the domestic politics of the elections. Part II will examine the foreign policy issues at stake. When a desperate Australian Labor Party (ALP) ousted the incumbent prime minister, Kevin Rudd, in June 2010, replacing him with Australia’s first female prime minister, Julia Gillard, no one foresaw that the ALP would be relying on Rudd to bring the party back from political oblivion in 2013. But in June of this year, with polls predicting the ALP would be decimated in the September election, […]

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s recently announced asylum policy made headlines around the world. The approach is punitive, insisting that no asylum-seeker who arrives in Australia by boat without a visa will ever be settled there. Instead, asylum-seekers’ claims will be processed in Papua New Guinea; if successful, that is where they will be resettled. The policy also comes against the backdrop of a steady increase in boat arrivals, or irregular maritime arrivals (IMAs) in the language of Australian bureaucracy. In 2010-2011 there were 4,750 IMAs, while in 2011-2012 there were 8,092. Current estimates are for even more during 2012-2013. […]