Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy – Page 2

Southeast Asian diplomacy: consistency is not always a virtue (AIIA)

2 October 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

As a contiguous big country, China is always going to enjoy significant influence in Southeast Asia. But for precisely the same reasons, China is also always going to evoke anxieties. Countries on China’s periphery will therefore not allow themselves to be hemmed into an exclusive relationship no matter how dependent they are on China. Having lived in the midst of great power competition for centuries, the strategic instinct of Southeast Asia is not to align with any major power across all domains.

The Trump Administration’s China policy experiment (Brookings)

30 September 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

The Trump administration’s China policies are explored clearly and succinctly in this working paper by the Brookings Institution’s Ryan Hass. While Hass describes the approach to China over the past four years as a Trump Administration (failed) experiment, he leaves no doubt that the nature and trajectory of US-China relations has now been reset, irrespective of who is the next president.

Six persistent myths about China-Africa relations (Clingendael)

21 September 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

An inconvenient truth often ignored or denied is that Chinese economic activities on the African continent are not worse than (and often not even as bad as) US or European activities in Africa. Clingendael Research Associate Sanne van der Lugt presents six persistent myths about China-Africa relations based on her own research experiences.

China and the US: the 21st century’s ‘Great Game’ (Conn Hallinan)

20 September 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

The U.S. has dominated the Pacific Ocean — sometimes called an “American lake” — since the end of World War II. Suddenly Americans have a competitor, although it is a rivalry that routinely gets overblown. China’s major thrust is economic, through its massive Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), not military.

The UN at 75: a real declaration of intent, or multilateral virtue signalling?

14 September 2020 Mike Scrafton By Mike Scrafton, Climate crisis, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, International relations

An atmosphere of unreality is building in advance of the virtual meeting of world leaders on 21 September 2020 to mark the 75th anniversary of the United Nations (UN). Nothing demonstrates this more than the proposed draft declaration. Rather than reaffirming the UN’s centrality, the draft declaration’s faux earnestness jars amid the current international reality. Additionally, it ignores the biggest challenge to multilateralism.

Sino-US competition: the importance of disaggregating China’s revisionism

8 September 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

Revisionism as a strategy in international politics, and China’s revisionism in particular, however is not the “all-or-nothing” proposition portrayed by US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo. A more accurate understanding of the factors that have driven Beijing’s transition between different types of revisionist behaviour suggests that rhetoric such as Pompeo’s will merely reinforce China’s move toward more problematic revisionist behaviours.

Out of shape: Australia’s lack of strategic influence

1 September 2020 Mike Scrafton By Mike Scrafton, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, International relations, Strategy, defence and security

It seems clear from recent surveys that the Australian government is overestimating its influence in ‘the immediate region’ and underestimating the capacity of the ASEAN states, in particular, to recognise their own strategic interests. The strategic objectives set out in the 2020 Defence Strategic Update rest on the assumptions that Australia will be able to ‘shape’ strategic perceptions in the region, and that this can best be done while acting in close association with the US. Are the foundations of Australia’s strategic logic sound?

Why is ‘values’ the new buzzword in Australian foreign policy? (Benjamin Reilly)

23 August 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

In international affairs, words are bullets, according to an old diplomatic saying. If so, Australia in recent years has begun firing new ammunition. ‘Values’, a word seldom used in the past, has now assumed a central place in our foreign policy rhetoric. Speeches, press conferences and policy statements vibrate with the V-word. If values are now the coin of our foreign policy realm, we will have to start walking the talk.

Demystifying Australia’s South China Sea stance (Sam Bateman)

19 August 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

Despite Australia and the United States having no direct interest in continental shelf claims in the South China Sea, both have recently joined the debate. Both appear to have sought maximum publicity for their submissions – which have been reported as providing the basis for confronting and false media headlines, such as ‘Australia says China’s claims to disputed islands are ‘invalid’ and are not consistent with UN convention on law of the sea’. In fact there is nothing new in the Australian or US statements despite suggestions that they reflect new aggressive stances against China, and it is not clear why Australia and the United States made statements at this particular point in time other than to add another dimension to the intensifying rivalry with China.

Australia-China July monthly wrap up | On being ‘very different countries’ – AUSMIN and China’s rise (Australia-China Relations Institute)

4 August 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

ACRI’s Elena Collinson and James Laurenceson present a useful summary and analysis of major developments in July 2020. The authors’ observations about Australia-China and Australia-US trade issues are a welcome contribution to an area often long on rhetoric and short on analysis. Professor James Curran sees reason for optimism in an assessment of the state of the Australia-China relationship in light of the comments of Australian ministers Payne and Reynolds at the AUSMIN 2020 talks in Washington. But has Australia done enough to distance itself from the US’s confrontational stance with China? Or will Australia-China high-level channels of communication “continue to stagnate”?

Ocean of debt? Belt and Road and debt diplomacy in the Pacific (Lowy Institute)

27 July 2020 Online editor Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, Research and reports

The Lowy Institute authors’ objective analysis suggests China has not been engaged in such problematic debt practices in the Pacific as to justify accusations of debt trap diplomacy, at least not to date.

The weaponisation of the US financial system (Jacque Delors Centre)

24 July 2020 Online editor Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, Research and reports

Secondary sanctions are a potent form of economic coercion that allows the US to extend its jurisdiction well beyond its borders, enabling interference in other nations’ foreign policy independence and infringing other nations’ sovereignty. Knudsen argues that economic autonomy depends on displacing the US from the central role in international finance.

Europe’s ‘pushback’ on China: recommendations for EU-China relations (Institut Montaigne)

6 July 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

A detailed, informative and comprehensive policy paper covering the span of the current state of EU-China relations as the growing economic power of China, and Europe’s awkward situation in the US-China trade war, puts enormous pressure on the EU to find a way to manage relations with China.

Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne

Australia’s foreign policy: Resurgent realism or the survival of multilateralism?

5 July 2020 Mike Scrafton Australian focus, By Mike Scrafton, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, International relations

Conceptual confusion is evident in the speechmaking of leading Australian political figures as the post World War II era’s structured international arrangements of durable institutions and agreed norms – designed to facilitate peaceful dispute resolution and cooperation on security, economic and social matters between nations – are challenged by the United States and others.

Anticipating a new US foreign policy

15 May 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

Author Lauren Schwartz | Friedrich Ebert Stiftung | Published 21 April 2020 Lauren Schwartz considers what US foreign policy might look like under a Democrat president – after Trump, and after coronavirus. The paper canvasses “30 years of ambivalent foreign policy” – from 1989 through to 2020, and a Trump administration prepared to signal its willingness and ability to adopt a more competitive approach towards its rivals, militarily, economically and diplomatically. A new American foreign

US-China strategic rivalry: causes, trajectories, and implications

7 May 2020 Online editor Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, Research and reports, Strategy, defence and security

An insightful paper that seeks a strategy for Europe ‘to escape the bipolar logic that demands it choose between the American and Chinese economic/technological spheres’. The recommendations for Europe should resonate equally in Australia – a country already caught up in the global competition for influence, and likely to be subject to ‘increased pressure from Washington on its allies to take a clear position on the sharpening US-China conflict and clearly side with the United States’.

A tale of two Americas: Australia’s foreign policy choices post-pandemic

14 April 2020 Mike Scrafton Australian focus, By Mike Scrafton, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

Writing in ASPI’s The Strategist, Michael Shoebridge rightly points out that how the US rebounds from the COVID-19 crisis will be important. For better or worse Australia is tightly bound with the US economically and strategically. But Shoebridge’s arguments posit an excessively flattering picture of the US and an incomplete view of its history – at a time when it is crucial that Australian foreign and strategic policy-makers have a realistic and unvarnished understanding of how the US might approach the post-pandemic world.

Chatham House: Liu Xiaoming on China’s foreign policy and 2020 international agenda

10 March 2020 Online editor Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy, Video and podcasts

In this Chatham House (UK) video presentation, Liu Xiaoming, China’s ambassador to the United Kingdom discusses his country’s current foreign policy and provides an outlook for China’s international agenda for 2020.

Clingendael: The relevance of the Maritime Silk Road for the Netherlands

1 March 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

This report discusses two main questions: What is the relevance of Chinese involvement in European ports for China’s political influence in the European Union? What are the long-term implications for the Netherlands of the Maritime Silk Road, in particular in regard to Chinese involvement in European ports?

China’s Belt and Road Initiative: are EU and China’s interests compatible?

1 March 2020 Online editor Analysis and comment, Foreign policy, trade and diplomacy

China’s Belt and Road Initiative opens a clear set of crossroads for the EU. The report’s authors Cornell and Swanstrom ask, has the EU payed enough attention to the geopolitics? And should the EU focus more on European interests, and not only on norms and values?