{"id":75866,"date":"2022-10-18T06:00:29","date_gmt":"2022-10-17T19:00:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=75866"},"modified":"2022-10-17T21:43:48","modified_gmt":"2022-10-17T10:43:48","slug":"strategic-advantage-sovereignty-and-australias-geopolitical-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/strategic-advantage-sovereignty-and-australias-geopolitical-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"Strategic advantage, sovereignty and Australia\u2019s geopolitical identity"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

What does it mean to win? Instinctively, this seems like a straightforward question that should have a correspondingly straightforward answer. But when it comes to developing a national edge or strategic advantage, concepts such as winning and losing may not be so easy to define. In Australia, which has experienced few national existential crises, there appears to be little understanding of, or consideration given to, all the nuanced contours of winning\u2014how to achieve advantage, how to identify gains and, more profoundly, how these things inform an associated theory of victory.<\/p>\n

As the strategic landscape changes, and as adversaries\u2019 use of the grey zone threatens to compromise citizens, infrastructure and the cognitive domain, this complacency may be the nation\u2019s undoing. How can Australia turn the strategic environment to its advantage\u00a0if it doesn\u2019t have the intellectual frameworks to understand what winning looks like?<\/p>\n

Part of the problem is Australia\u2019s insistence on situating itself in the\u00a0middle-power paradigm<\/a>. Certainly, Australia doesn\u2019t possess all the tools necessary to secure the breadth of its stated strategic objectives. It might punch above its weight in a limited operational scenario, but developing the capacity to go it alone for an extended period and realise \u2018victory\u2019 is a different challenge altogether. This reflects the kind of Goldilocks predicament middle powers often find themselves in; they\u2019re not large enough to be able to dominate others with the sheer force their own instruments of military and economic power, but not so small that they can be easily dominated by a major power. Australia has arguably let its middle-power status come to mean that it must think about how not to lose<\/a>\u00a0rather than what it means to win.<\/p>\n

Australia may need to develop the knowledge and confidence to hold its own, in intellectual and strategic terms. Established theories of asymmetry and deterrence, which are based on great-power dynamics, do not map neatly onto Australia\u2019s context. And Australia\u2019s middle-power mode is different from that of other middle powers with interests in the region, such as South Korea, the UK and Vietnam. Australia\u2019s specific characteristics, as they are expressed both internally and externally, are what\u00a0determines its competitive standing<\/a>\u00a0and the dynamic space in which strategy is devised. But identifying the opportunities this affords requires rigorous agitation of what Brendan Sargeant has termed Australia\u2019s \u2018strategic imagination<\/a>\u2019.<\/p>\n

It is not Australia\u2019s middle-power status that\u2019s important in how it conceptualises the strategic levers that are available. Rather, it is understanding the dynamic and relational nature of advantage and identifying how Australia can capitalise on its particular national circumstances to enhance its strategic presence.<\/p>\n

And now could be the moment. With increasing strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific, Australia has, at least, recognised that it must re-evaluate its regional role and its strategic identity.\u00a0The 2020 defence strategic update<\/a>\u00a0underscored the need for Australia to adapt to a challenging strategic environment, emphasising regional partners and the US alliance as key enablers. The recognised need to understand Australia\u2019s position relative to others in the region, whether they be ally, potential adversary or invested third power, could be critical to creating a strategically advantageous security environment. But the strategic update fell short of articulating how to develop these relationships so that Australia can attain a winning position or strategic advantage. Certainly, it has become limiting to think of strategic advantage in strictly military terms.\u00a0The proliferation of grey-zone threats may require a broader conceptualisation of the levers for strategic advantage than those mitigated by Australia\u2019s current defence strategy.<\/p>\n

Perhaps it\u2019s time for Australia to reject the conventional conceptualisation of the middle-power paradigm and commit to the difficult task of self-creation and a tailormade theory of victory. Australia may need to reframe its strategic identity in terms of competition and cooperation and start to conceptualise its security policy much more broadly in terms of where strategic advantages can be achieved relative to others in the region.\u00a0Australia may need to focus more on its\u00a0national and societal propensity for strategic advantage (that is, its ability to translate underlying potential into beneficial outputs) than its overall potential, (that is, its raw capacity in terms of resources, population, territory and so on). But because strategic advantage is relational and dynamic, the real challenge could be to determine how the Australian conceptualisation of competition in the Indo-Pacific differs from, or aligns with, that of key allies and partners, and what unique levers Australia possesses.<\/p>\n

Australia may need to critically assess its strategic traditions to develop a broader conceptualisation of how to secure the safety and wellbeing of the nation and position itself advantageously. As Sargeant argued, it may be time to \u2018imagine ourselves into what we might be, but also what the world might be\u2019 and to develop a distinctive, gainful and effective presence in the region.<\/p>\n

In this moment of strategic disruption, Australia needs to do the intellectual hard yards or risk forgoing the ability to shape its national destiny. The field could be left open to those who are more determined and who have a greater dedication to self-determination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What does it mean to win? Instinctively, this seems like a straightforward question that should have a correspondingly straightforward answer. But when it comes to developing a national edge or strategic advantage, concepts such as …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":865,"featured_media":75874,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[40,17,2338,603,21],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nStrategic advantage, sovereignty and Australia\u2019s geopolitical identity | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/strategic-advantage-sovereignty-and-australias-geopolitical-identity\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Strategic advantage, sovereignty and Australia\u2019s geopolitical identity | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"What does it mean to win? 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