Australia’s long-awaited defence strategic update and force structure plan have been released by the prime minister and defence minister. After minimal recital of the continued rightness of the 2016 defence white paper judgements, the government …
Articles by: "Michael Shoebridge"
The pandemic has many lessons for how Australia’s future economy must operate, with opportunities to build new wealth around the global supply chains that originate with us—in natural resources, energy, food, research and education, for …
Last Friday’s announcement by Prime Minister Scott Morrison that Australia was ‘being targeted by a sophisticated state-based cyber actor’ puzzled some: why not name China, why not be specific about the attacks? It’s the eternal …
There’s a wrestle underway between Australia’s universities and the government over funding, priorities and the future. Right now it looks like a Mexican standoff, not a negotiation. There are grounds for a deal, although getting …
Australia’s parliament is considering a bill that will, among other things, lower the age at which a minor can be questioned by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation during a terrorism investigation from 16 to 14. …
The looming strategic update to Australia’s 2016 defence white paper is an opportunity for creativity and practicality. It’s too easy to imagine the update describing what’s happened in the last four years and moving on …
The protests across America flowing from the killing of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis have exposed continuing deep rifts over race and equality of treatment by the police. The anger, frustration and grief are …
As the world remains focused on the Covid-19 pandemic, the Chinese Communist Party has set about boiling two frogs. Beijing has turned up the heat on Hong Kong. It’s also stepping up its attempts to …
National security agencies can be surprisingly risk-averse organisations and have been historically slow to adopt new technologies outside times of crisis. Within these agencies, chief information and technology officers may be less effective champions of …
The Victorian government’s Belt and Road Initiative program is a zombie project that has its own inertia and is proceeding despite the world changing around it. It needs to be halted and comprehensively reassessed. The …
Bad assumptions make for bad policies and poor investment decisions. One big one we need to test is the notion that China’s post-pandemic economy is going to rescue the world. That assumption is flavouring much …
Can Australia stop the Chinese government’s economic coercion against our government and businesses? Yes. All it would take is for Australian political leaders and parliaments to align our national policies, laws and directions with those …