Australian Politics and Policy - Senior, 2019a

Thomas S. Wilkins and Nicholas Bromfield
Key terms/names
ANZUS, defence strategy, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Department of
the Prime Minister and Cabinet, foreign aid, liberal internationalism/liberalism,
middle power, National Security Committee, non-traditional security, realism,
regionalism, securitisation, three pillars
The foreign and defence policies of Australia have been marked by periods of
continuity and change since the country slowly decoupled from the UK and forged
a more independent international posture from the postwar period to the present.
This short introductory chapter cannot do justice to the full scope of Australian
foreign and defence policy, which is a process of immense complexity, but rather
seeks to highlight the key actors, events and enduring issues that face Australian
policy makers from the present and into the future. By necessity, an introductory
chapter cannot be comprehensive, and examples are therefore chosen representatively
and selectively. Before proceeding to the main text of the chapter, which
examines a range of selected contemporary aspects of Australian foreign and
defence policy, it is necessary to provide some relevant historical background since
current issues all have their historical antecedents.
Wilkins, Thomas S., and Nicholas Bromfield (2019). Foreign and defence policy. In Peter J. Chen,
Nicholas Barry, John R. Butcher, David Clune, Ian Cook, Adele Garnier, Yvonne Haigh, Sara C. Motta
and Marija Taflaga, eds. Australian politics and policy: senior edition. Sydney: Sydney University Press.
DOI: 10.30722/sup.9781743326671
580