Lowy Institute

In 2021, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) said that right-wing extremism makes up 50 per cent of its priority caseload. Since that announcement, intelligence and law enforcement agencies have disrupted a number of plots related to right-wing extremists in Australia. But this is not only an issue in Australia. There has been a 250 per cent increase in right-wing terrorism globally. So, what exactly is right-wing extremism and how is its potential for violence growing? Why is it a global problem? How does it threaten democracy and what should we do about it? Rise of the Extreme Right answers these questions.Award-winning investigative journalist Nick McKenzie, whose recent work includes a major investigation on Australian neo-Nazi groups, will launch the book. Lydia Khalil will also speak about her book and her experiences as a counter-terrorism specialist in the United States and Australia. Lydia and Nick will then take questions from our audience.  Lydia Khalil is a Research Fellow at the Lowy Institute and an Associate Research Fellow at Deakin University. She began her counter-terrorism and national security career after the September 11 attacks. She is a recognised expert on terrorism and extremism, having worked for the White House Office of Homeland Security, US Department of Defense, the New York Police Department, Boston Police Department and the Council on Foreign Relations. She is a frequent media commentator and has been widely published. Nick McKenzie is an award-winning investigative journalist for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. He has presented major investigations for the ABC's Four Corners and 7:30, 60 Minutes and The Australian Financial Review. With almost 20 years' experience, his investigations span foreign affairs, defence and national security, corporate wrongdoing, politics, organised crime and corruption, the criminal justice system and social affairs. His work has sparked Royal Commissions and parliamentary inquiries, and prompted investigations in Australia, the United States and Britain into corruption and bribery.Sam Roggeveen, Director of the Lowy Institute's International Security Program, will chair this event.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of the Aus-PNG Network Leadership Series, Mihai Sora speaks to Andrew Kuliniasi, award-winning playwright and Drama Director at the Moresby Arts Theatre, about how the dramatic arts engage with important social issues in Papua New Guinea.  Andrew tells Mihai about his own work, “Looking at the past informs the future…Meisoga as a play was about a sixteen-year-old girl that had to become the head of her clan, that had to become the matriarch. And I looked at that and I went, wow, this is a story that can inspire other women. And I remember having the lead actress at the time, who is mousy and shy, just become a lion on stage.”  “PNG is such a beautiful country,” says Andrew. “And it’s rich with so many stories and…social issues that happen, and the stories that come from that…may be hard and gritty and tough to swallow, or maybe even beautiful and amazing and triumphant. And I want to be able to show truth and build the industry here. If I’m not going to do it, who is? I can only be the change that I want.”  Andrew Kuliniasi is a playwright and Drama Director at the Moresby Arts Theatre, and Creative Director to PNG Fashion Week. Andrew’s works include Meisoga, He is Victor and his latest production, For My Father, premiering on September 1st.   Mihai Sora is the Project Director of the Australia-Papua New Guinea Network at the Lowy Institute. Mihai’s research focuses on Australian foreign policy in the Pacific, Australia-PNG relations, and geopolitics in the region. Mihai has more than a decade’s experience as an Australian diplomat with postings to Solomon Islands and Indonesia, and was a Pacific Analyst at the Office of National Assessments. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With Australia's security focus now firmly on the Pacific, it is easy to dismiss Australia's twenty-year military involvement in the Middle East as an aberration, or simply as a legacy function of our alliance with the United States. Yet Australia's direct connections and interests in the Middle East are much greater now than they were before the country committed military forces to the region. Canberra has a greater diplomatic presence, a military base, deeper economic interests and more significant people-to-people links in the Middle East than ever before. The evacuations by Australian troops from Lebanon in 2006 and Afghanistan in 2021, as well as the direct security threat to Australia posed by the rise of Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, show how we cannot insulate ourselves from the dynamics and instability of the region. In a new Analysis paper, Lowy Institute Nonresident Fellow Rodger Shanahan argues that Australia's contemporary focus on the Pacific should not blind it to the fact that it has continuing interests in the Middle East. Rather, Canberra should seek to leverage its regional ties and ongoing influence in the Middle East to better effect — to create greater balance in Australian foreign policy.  The event commenced with opening remarks by His Excellency Abdulla al-Sabousi, Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to Australia. Followed by an overview of the paper by Dr Shanahan and a Q&A with Dr Shanahan and Professor Karima Laachir, Director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Australian National University, moderated by Hervé Lemahieu, Director of Research at the Lowy Institute.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Ben Scott talks to Maria Rost Rublee, an Associate Professor of Politics & International Relations at Monash University, and Alan Kuperman, an Associate Professor in the LBJ School of Public Affairs, University of Texas at Austin, about Australia's plan to acquire nuclear powered submarines, and what that means for nuclear non-proliferation.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of Lowy Institute Conversations, Research Fellow Jennifer Hsu talks with Zhiqun Zhu to explore and assess some of China’s major foreign policy initiatives and priorities over the last five years. They discuss the driving forces behind these initiatives, including President Xi Jinping himself, and the major institutions that shape China’s foreign policy, namely the Chinese state, the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese people. Zhiqun Zhu is Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Bucknell University, USA. He is currently a US Fulbright Scholar at Griffith University, Australia. He is the author and editor of more than a dozen books, including A Critical Decade: China’s Foreign Policy 2008­­­­–2018 (World Scientific, 2019). He is a member of the National Committee on United States–China Relations and is frequently quoted by international media on Chinese and East Asian affairs.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of Conversations, Susannah Patton talks to Greg Poling, Director of the Southeast Asia Program and Director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) about his new book, On Dangerous Ground: America’s Century in the South China Sea. The United States has strong interests in the South China Sea, including maintaining the freedom of the seas and supporting its regional allies and partners, especially the Philippines. How can the United States protect these interests and prevent China from making further gains in the South China Sea? And how would the situation in the South China Sea be affected by a further escalation in US-China tensions over Taiwan?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Xi Jinping is one of the world’s most powerful leaders and will remain so for many more years if, as expected, he secures a third term as Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at the forthcoming 20th National Congress of the CCP. Despite being in power for close to a decade, he is also a man that remains a mystery to much of the world. Dr Joseph Torigian, one of the premier scholars of the Chinese leader and elite politics, discusses Xi’s early years and rise to power and what that reveals about the Chinese leader’s worldview and agenda. The event was moderated by Richard McGregor, the Lowy Institute's Senior Fellow for East Asia.Recorded on 26 July 2022See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Half of all Australians were born overseas or have a parent who was born overseas, and Australia is home to more than 250 ancestries and 350 languages. The new Labor government has invoked Australia’s multiculturalism as a part of our national identity in its recent engagement with the region. But what is the role of Australia’s multiculturalism in foreign policy? Are diversity and diasporas a source of soft power and engagement? Our panel examined how Australia’s multiculturalism can inform foreign policymaking chaired by Dr Jennifer Hsu, Research Fellow in the Lowy Institute’s Public Opinion and Foreign Policy Program.Panel guests include:Dr Melissa Phillips is a Lecturer in Humanitarian and Development Studies in the School of Social Sciences at Western Sydney University. She has previously worked for the United Nations and international NGOs in South Sudan, North Africa, and the Middle East, and recently co-edited Understanding Diaspora Development: Lessons from Australia and the Pacific. Jason Chai is the Director of Market Access and Government Affairs for Cochlear Asia-Pacific. He is a former Australian diplomat and has worked for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, as well as at senior government levels, including as a Chief of Staff to a Victorian Minister of Trade and Investment. Alfred Deakin Professor Fethi Mansouri holds a research chair in Migration and Intercultural Studies and the UNESCO Chair for comparative research on cultural diversity and social justice. He is the founding Director of the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation at Deakin University. He is the editor of the Journal of Intercultural Studies and since 2010 has served as an expert adviser to the United Nations on cultural diversity and intercultural relations.Recorded on 10 Aug 2022See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Lowy Institute researchers unpacked the findings of the 2022 Lowy Institute Poll in Canberra. How has Russia’s invasion of Ukraine changed Australian attitudes? What do the public think about China and the new Australian government? How are Australians responding to the contested nature of our region?The annual Lowy Institute Poll has tracked Australian attitudes to the world for 18 years and uncovered fascinating shifts in public opinion on Australia’s place in the world. Australians have diverse attitudes to a range of key foreign policy issues, including Australia’s alliance with the United States, immigration in the time of a pandemic, and the rise of authoritarianism.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There has been increasing concern that Russia and China are using state-owned media companies, social media campaigns and proxy actors to manipulate public discourse in the global south. In this episode, Sasha Fegan discusses the influence of disinformation in the media landscape in Africa. Her guests will talk about how Russia and China calibrate their messaging to different nation states, and how Chinese state-owned media in Africa is replicating and reinforcing Russian narratives around Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Idayat Hassan, is a lawyer, development expert and director of the Center for Democracy and Development in Abuja, Nigeria. Dani Madrid-Morales, is a lecturer in the Department of Journalism Studies at The University of Sheffield. He is an expert on Africa-China mediated relations, particularly in Kenya and South Africa. His latest book is Disinformation in the Global South.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.