In 1999 Paul Dibb used the concept ‘arc of instability‘ to describe the security challenges facing the Pacific. The concept had its roots in the geographic school of strategic thinking, which holds that Australia’s main strategic …
Richard Herr’s recent item on intra-regional relationships in the Pacific is a timely contribution to this discussion. The past, present and future of regionalism and sub-regionalism in this part of the world are topics of …
The Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI)—an extensive (and expensive) Australian-led state-building intervention under the auspices of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF)—has been operating in Solomon Islands since July 2003. It’s about to undergo …
US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s decision to attend the Pacific Islands Forum meeting in the Cook Islands this week signals the growing strategic importance of the South Pacific. Clinton’s attendance may also be a …
A continuous theme of successive White Papers has been that our strategic challenges in the South Pacific come not from powerful states, but from weak ones. The idea that weak South Pacific states pose a …