In episode 15 of Australia in the World, Allan moderates a live panel discussion on the topic: “Towards reinvigorating Australian foreign policy studies.”

The 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper highlighted how forces of change are challenging the rules-based international order upon which Australia’s security and prosperity has depended since World War II. At this moment of uncertainty in Australian foreign policy, how well-equipped are Australian academics to contribute to navigating a way forward? Asking this question invites reflection on the state of foreign policy studies in Australia as well as the extent to which the study and practice of foreign policy are (or could, or even should be) connected.

The Panel was comprised of three very distinguished guests:

• Professor Valerie M Hudson, the ANU Vice Chancellor’s “Australia in the World” visiting fellow and professor and George HW Bush chair in the Department of International Affairs of the Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University;
• Mark Kenny, senior fellow at the ANU Australian Studies Institute and former chief political correspondent and national affairs editor of The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, and The Canberra Times; and
• Professor Jacqui True, professor of politics & International Relations and an Australian Research Council future fellow at Monash University.

The event was held on Thursday 14 March 2019 on campus at the Australian National University, in partnership with the ANU Australian Studies Institute and the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific. It was the concluding event of a day-long conference on the topic of Australian Foreign Policy Studies chaired by Professor Hudson and Professor Michael Wesley, dean of the College of Asia and the Pacific (from whom you will also hear from on the podcast).

Our thanks go to Martyn Pearce of the Crawford School for his production and editing support.

Allan Gyngell AO FAIIA is national president of the Australian Institute of International Affairs and an honorary professor at the ANU’s College of Asia and the Pacific.

Dr Darren Lim is a lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations at the Australian National University.