Writer: James Curran, College of Sydney
Though 2022 introduced a change of presidency in Australia and a brand new public tone to its diplomacy — significantly in direction of relations with China, Southeast Asia and the Pacific — it additionally revealed Australia’s deep-seated geopolitical anxieties.
The brand new Labor Get together authorities, led by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, stopped beating the ‘drums of warfare’ and seemed in direction of respectful, if cautious, cooperation with Beijing. Although it additionally underlined its robust dedication to the pillars of its predecessors’ coverage. This included its dedication to the US alliance, elevated defence spending and nearer cooperation with India and Japan.
In November final yr, on the eve of Albanese’s assembly with China’s President Xi Jinping on the G20 Summit in Bali — the primary such encounter between Australian and Chinese language leaders since 2015 — Australian Defence Minister Richard Marles restated Australia’s strategic outlook. He famous that ‘the world round us has change into extra unsure and extra precarious than at any time for the reason that finish of the Second World Struggle’.
Australian International Minister Penny Wong has additionally pressured that Australia confronted ‘essentially the most vexing set of circumstances within the post-war interval’. The Russian invasion of Ukraine and mounting tensions over Taiwan appeared to verify US President Joe Biden’s framing of a world contest between autocracies and democracies.
Albanese and his authorities’s senior ministers made a strong begin on prioritising diplomacy in Australian overseas and defence coverage. Labor demonstrated continuity on the Quad, AUKUS and deepening safety relations with Japan.
That included deepening ties with New Delhi, constructing on conferences between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former Australian prime minister Scott Morrison in March 2022 and the signing of a free commerce settlement with India simply earlier than the Might federal election. Ministerial exchanges continued between Australia and India after Labor took workplace.
Whereas the Labor authorities broke with the Morrison cupboard’s tendency to shout at China, it has not performed down the difficulties of relations with Beijing. China’s International Minister Wang Yi attributed the tensions over current years solely to Australia. And in his first weeks in workplace, Albanese confessed that there’s nonetheless a ‘lengthy technique to go’ in rebuilding the connection.
Labor has achieved a cautious resumption of ministerial contact with Beijing on the highest ranges, however this has not led to any reprieve from China’s financial coercion. Two Australian residents, Yang Hengjun and Cheng Lei, stay detained in Chinese language prisons on murky fees. The central query for 2023 can be what would possibly stream from the present ‘stabilisation’ of Australia’s relations with China, such because the potential leisure of Chinese language tariffs on Australian imports.
The Albanese authorities is trying to develop a working relationship of kinds with China. Wong, after assembly her counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing in December 2022, acknowledged the 2 nations’ ongoing variations however added that ‘the problem for this era is to navigate these variations correctly’.
With anxieties about what China’s bullying means for Australian safety, the Labor authorities emphasised that it’ll deepen Australia’s relationship with Washington. Marles has expressed Labor’s ongoing dedication to the US alliance. Following a gathering with US Protection Secretary Lloyd Austin in October 2022, he stated that ‘our alliance with the US is totally central to our nationwide safety and to our worldview’.
These developments occurred in opposition to the backdrop of accelerating tensions between the US and China. In August 2022, a go to to Taiwan by US Home of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi heightened the strain in a relationship already reeling from commerce wars, rhetorical insults and mutual suspicion and enmity.
Australia had little possibility however to play a straight bat. Earlier than the seriousness of China’s live-firing workouts have been identified, Wong emphasised that ‘all events’ ought to de-escalate tensions. However because the gravity of China’s navy workouts turned clearer, the overseas minister referred to as on Beijing to train restraint.
The Albanese authorities additionally renewed Australia’s method to its Southeast Asian neighbours. Wong, whereas stressing that Canberra’s deal with ASEAN centrality ‘doesn’t imply [an] ASEAN solely’ overseas coverage, locations the Quad and AUKUS in a broader narrative of regional safety engagement.
In in December final yr, Wong emphasised the Quad’s position as working ‘alongside ASEAN and different regional structure’ in a speech in Washington. Wong additionally reminded the US that it had work to do in decreasing the probability of battle with China and convincing the area that it has a critical financial plan for nations to have interaction with. Wong referred to as on Beijing, too, to work in direction of regional stability and guarantee extra transparency over its navy spending.
On the annual Australia–United States Ministerial Consultations in Washington final yr, ministers signed off on an extension of US power posture initiatives in Australia. Japan and Australia additionally set in movement a plan to deploy Japanese fighters to Australia. A Defence Strategic Overview set to be handed down in early 2023 will, amongst different issues, announce the best way forward on Australia’s acquisition of a nuclear submarine functionality underneath the auspices of the AUKUS settlement.
One of many main tales of 2023 and past will due to this fact be the robust fiscal selections awaiting Albanese’s cupboard in bringing this formidable imaginative and prescient for the nation’s defence to fruition.
James Curran is Professor of Fashionable Historical past on the College of Sydney.
This text is a part of an EAF particular function collection on 2022 in overview and the yr forward.
