2016 marks the 50th anniversary of SDSC’s founding and the 25th anniversary of the Cold War’s ending. To mark its 50th anniversary, and drawing inspiration from the 1980 event (‘New Directions in Strategic Thinking’), SDSC hosted this conference at ANU entitled ‘New Directions in Strategic Thinking 2.0’.

As in 1980, the conference in 2016 considers major trends which have taken place in strategic thinking since the ending of the Cold War, and where these developments might lead over the coming decade.

Chair

Professor Michael Wesley

Director, Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, and Professor of International Affairs,The Australian National University

Professor Wesley’s career has spanned academia, with previous appointments at the University of New South Wales, Griffith University, the University of Hong Kong, Sun Yat-sen University and the University of Sydney; government, where he worked as Assistant Director General for Transnational Issues at the Office of National Assessments; and think tanks, in which he was Executive Director of the Lowy Institute for International Policy and a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Professor Wesley has also served as the Editor in Chief of the Australian Journal of International Affairs. He is a non-executive Member of the Senior Leadership Group of the Australian Federal Police, and a Member of the NSW/ACT Advisory Board for the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA). His book There Goes the Neighbourhood: Australia and the Rise of Asia won the 2011 John Button Prize for the best writing on Australian public policy. Professor Wesley’s most recent book is Restless Continent: Wealth, Power and Asia’s New Geopolitics (Black Inc, 2015).

Speakers

Dr C. Raja Mohan

Director, Carnegie India

Dr Mohan is Director of Carnegie India, the sixth international centre of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, launched in April 2016. Dr Mohan is also the contributing editor for The Indian Express and a visiting research professor at the Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore. His most recent book is Modi’s World: Expanding India’s Sphere of Influence (2015).

Dr Amy King

Lecturer, Strategic & Defence Studies Centre, The Australian National University

Dr King specialises in Chinese foreign and security policy, China-Japan relations, and the international relations and security of the Asia-Pacific region. Dr King is the author of China-Japan Relations After World War II: Empire, Industry and War, 1949–1971, which was published by Cambridge University Press in 2016. It examines the post-WWII rebuilding of economic ties between the People’s Republic of China and Japan. It also explains how and why Japan became China’s most important economic partner in the aftermath of major war, and at a time when the two countries were still Cold War opponents. The book is based on hundreds of declassified documents from the Chinese Foreign Ministry Archive, gathered during extensive fieldwork in China between 2008 and 2012. Dr King received a D.Phil in International Relations from the University of Oxford, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar. Her doctoral thesis was awarded Oxford’s 2013 Dasturzada Dr Jal Pavry Memorial Prize. Dr King completed her M.Phil in Modern Chinese Studies at the University of Oxford, B.A. Hons (First Class) in International Studies, and B.Bus in International Business at the University of South Australia.

Major General John J. Frewen

Head, Military Strategic Commitments, Australian Defence Headquarters

Major General Frewen AM is a career infantry officer who has commanded from platoon to brigade level, specialising in rapid response forces. In 2003, as Chief Officer of the Second Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (2 RAR), he led a multinational military intervention force supporting police to re-establish law and order in the Solomon Islands. This combined-joint task force comprised almost 1,800 troops from five nations with an array of air and maritime assets. Major General Frewen’s other service includes deployments with the United Nations in Rwanda in 1994 and NATO in Afghanistan in 2007.

Professor Evelyn Goh

Shedden Professor of Strategic Policy Studies, Strategic & Defence Studies Centre,

The Australian National University Professor Goh has published widely on US-China relations and diplomatic history, regional order in East Asia, Southeast Asian strategies towards great powers, and environmental security. Her latest book is The Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia (Oxford University Press, 2013, 2015). Professor Goh edited the volume Rising China’s Influence in Developing Asia (Oxford University Press, 2016), and is co-editor of the Cambridge Studies in International Relations book series with Christian Reus-Smit and Nicholas Wheeler. Professor Goh commenced at ANU in 2013, and has held positions at the Royal Holloway University of London (2008-13); the University of Oxford (2006-8); and the Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore (2002-5). She has held visiting fellowships at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars and the East-West Centre, both in Washington, DC. Professor Goh’s major project grants include a UK Economic and Social Research Council Mid-Career Fellowship, an East Asia Institute Fellowship, and research grants from the British Academy, MacArthur Foundation, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, and Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation. Professor Goh holds masters and doctoral degrees in International Relations and an undergraduate degree in Geography, all from the University of Oxford. She also holds a Masters in Environment and Development from the University of Cambridge.