Lowy Institute

Intensifying strategic competition between the US and China is having ramifications around the globe. The risk of military conflict is growing in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. Global economic growth is slowing, and supply chains are shifting. China and Russia are forging closer ties in response to commonly perceived threats. Will US-China competition abate or increase? How can Australia best navigate these dangerous shoals?Lowy Institute Nonresident Fellow Bonnie Glaser gave a speech, followed by a Q&A with Michael Fullilove, the Institute’s Executive Director.Bonnie Glaser is a Nonresident Fellow at the Lowy Institute and senior adviser for Asia at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), where she directs the CSIS China Power Project. Ms Glaser is an expert on Chinese foreign and security policy, and has served as a consultant for several US government agencies including the Departments of Defense and State. Ms Glaser has published widely in academic journals such as Washington Quarterly and International Security as well as leading newspapers including the New York Times and International Herald Tribune.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The last wave of globalisation delivered enormous economic benefits. But the massive social disruption and displacement fell disproportionately on less-skilled workers, helping to spawn the current populist revolt. The next wave of globalisation, however, might prove different, as emerging technologies combine with global economic forces to create a whole new set of opportunities and challenges.Richard Baldwin, one of the world's leading globalisation experts, argues that the inhuman speed of this transformation threatens to overwhelm our capacity to adapt. Digital technology is allowing talented foreigners to telecommute into our workplaces and compete for service and professional jobs. Instant machine translation is melting language barriers, so the ranks of these "tele-migrants" will soon include almost every educated person in the world. The combination of globalisation and rising automation means the next wave of disruption could risk a globotics upheaval that threatens the very foundations of the liberal welfare state. Professor Baldwin gave a talk on his new book, 'The Globotics Upheaval: Globalization, Robotics, and the Future of Work.'You can purchase copies of 'The Globotics Upheaval' from Booktopia, Amazon AU and Hachette Australia.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo was decisively re-elected in April but his second, and final, term in office looks set to be anything but plain sailing. The election revealed deep divides in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, with politics polarised along religious lines. The economy remains sluggish despite promises of structural reforms to unlock rapid growth. And Indonesia’s democratic system, long seen as a beacon of progress, is facing intensifying challenges, from crackdowns on free speech to a deterioration in the protection of minority rights.The Indonesia Update has been an annual event held by the Australian National University in Canberra since 1983; this panel discussion was part of the 14th abbreviated Sydney edition held by the Lowy Institute.Dr Eve Warburton is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Asia Research Institute. Dr Warburton received her PhD in 2018 from the Australian National University’s Coral Bell School of Asia and Pacific Affairs, where she researched the political economy of economic nationalism in Indonesia’s natural resource industries. Burhanuddin Muhtadi is a Senior Lecturer at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, State Islamic University, Jakarta. He is also an executive director of Indonesian Political Indicator and Director of Public Affairs at Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI). Dr Martin Daniel Siyaranamual is an applied microeconomist with broad empirical interests. He earned a doctoral degree in economics from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy and a bachelor’s degree in economics from Padjadjaran University, where he is also a lecturer at the department of economics.The discussion was chaired by Ben Bland, the Director of the Lowy Institute's Southeast Asia Project.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What does Russia want in the world? The dissident Russian journalist and academic Yevgenia Albats talks to Rules Based Audio host Kelsey Munro about how President Vladimir Putin has successfully dominated Russian politics for two decades; and then former Moscow-based diplomat and veteran analyst Bobo Lo discusses Russian foreign policy and worldview, and whether Russia is forming an authoritarian alliance with China.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo was decisively re-elected in April but his second, and final, term in office looks set to be anything but plain sailing. The election revealed deep divides in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, with politics polarised along religious lines. The economy remains sluggish despite promises of structural reforms to unlock rapid growth. And Indonesia’s democratic system, long seen as a beacon of progress, is facing intensifying challenges, from crackdowns on free speech to a deterioration in the protection of minority rights. The Indonesia Update has been an annual event held by the Australian National University in Canberra since 1983; this panel discussion was part of the 14th abbreviated Sydney edition held by the Lowy Institute.Edward Aspinall is a professor in the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, Australian National University. He is a specialist in the politics of Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia.Nava Nuraniyah has been an analyst the Jakarta-based Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC) since 2015, and her research interests include political Islam as well as the evolution of extremism in South East Asia, including the role of women.The discussion was chaired by Ben Bland, the Director of the Lowy Institute's Southeast Asia Project.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) is charged with protecting Australia and its citizens from terrorism, foreign interference, espionage, sabotage, and politically motivated violence.ASIO Director-General Duncan Lewis gave a public address at the Lowy Institute, followed by a Q&A with the Institute’s Executive Director, Dr Michael Fullilove.Duncan Lewis has served as the Director-General of Security since 2014. Mr Lewis served in the Australian Defence Force for 33 years, including as commander of the Special Air Service Regiment and Major General, Special Operations Commander Australia.Since 2005, Mr Lewis has served in a number of Australian Public Service roles, including assistant secretary of the National Security Division within the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Australia’s inaugural National Security Adviser, and Australia’s Ambassador to Belgium, Luxembourg, the European Union, and NATO. Mr Lewis was appointed Officer of the Order of Australia in 2005.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Modern technologies offer enormous opportunities for police and for criminals. Most crimes have a digital element. Rapid technological advances have led to new tools such as facial recognition, camera-equipped drones, and fingerprint scanners. These advances provide enormous amounts of data to be assessed and interpreted, generating a role for artificial intelligence in modern policing. They also create new tensions between protection of citizens’ safety and protecting personal data, as well as presenting a multitude of challenges for police leaders, policy makers, and those who hold the police to account. Cressida Dick was appointed UK Commissioner of Police in 2017, the first female commissioner in the history of the Metropolitan Police. She leads the United Kingdom’s largest police service, having served as a police officer for most of her 35-year career.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Anna Fifield, a long-time foreign correspondent, is one of the most knowledgeable journalists writing about North Korea, a nation that has largely walled itself off to outsiders. In her new book, 'The Great Successor: The Secret Rise and Rule of Kim Jong Un,' she draws on her dozen-plus trips to the country to penetrate the layers of myth and propaganda surrounding the young leader and his nuclear arsenal. Fifield has gained rare access to Kim’s inner circle (including the aunt and uncle who posed as his parents while he was growing up in Switzerland, members of the entourage that accompanied basketballer Dennis Rodman on his visits, and the Japanese sushi chef who pointed to Kim as the most likely successor to his father) to give a detailed and insightful portrait of one of the world’s most secretive dictators. Fifield, the Beijing bureau chief for The Washington Post and former Seoul correspondent for The Financial Times, had a conversation with Richard McGregor, a Lowy Institute Senior Fellow.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this wide-ranging conversation, Bobo Lo and Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove discussed key themes in Russian domestic and foreign policy, including the stability of the Putin regime, the issue of political succession, and Moscow’s growing activism in the Asia-Pacific region.Dr Bobo Lo is a Nonresident Fellow at the Lowy Institute. He is an independent analyst and an Associate Research Fellow with the Russia/NIS Center at the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI). He was previously Head of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House and Deputy Head of Mission at the Australian Embassy in Moscow. Dr Lo’s most recent book, A Wary Embrace: What the China-Russia Relationship Means for the World, was published as a Lowy Institute Paper by Penguin in 2017. His book Russia and the New World Disorder (2015) was described by The Economist as ‘the best attempt yet to explain Russia’s unhappy relationship with the rest of the world’.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Was the Philippines Patient Zero of the disinformation era? Democracy expert Dr Nicole Curato unpacks the role networked disinformation has played in the dramatic and fractious political moment we are living in; and discusses how disruptive populists like Duterte and Trump may be the new normal for democracies.Nicole Curato is an Associate Professor at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance at the University of Canberra. She is the author of two books published this year: Democracy in a Time of Misery: From Spectacular Tragedies to Deliberative Action and Power in Deliberative Democracy: Norms, Forums, Systems (with Marit Hammond and John Min). She has been published in academic journals in the fields of politics, policy and sociology, and featured in international media including the New York Times, Financial Times, the New Yorker, and CNN. She has just released a study about disinformation in the 2019 mid-term elections in the Philippines.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.