As Australia and the United States commemorate the 70th anniversary of their alliance, the alliance agenda is burgeoning, matching the pace and breath of geostrategic change in the Indo-Pacific, accompanied by constant innovation in ways nation states project power and influence. China’s economic coercion of Australia is a telling case in point, figuring prominently in recent remarks from US senior officials. But where and how does geoeconomic competition fit in the Australia-US alliance agenda? What should a framework for a geoeconomic alliance cooperation encompass? What does an Australia-US alliance with a geoeconomic agenda look like, institutionally and operationally?
The USSC hosted a discussion with the authors of Trust and diversify: A geoeconomic strategy for the Australia-US alliance, a new United States Studies Centre (USSC) report launched on 2 September. The report’s co-authors – American Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Zack Cooper, Australian National University Senior Lecturer Darren Lim and former Center for a New American Security researcher Ashley Feng – engaged in a discussion moderated by Perth USAsia Centre Research Director Jeffrey Wilson.
Dr Zack Cooper
Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
Zack Cooper is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he studies US strategy and alliances in Asia. Zack is also co-director of the Alliance for Securing Democracy, an adjunct faculty member at Georgetown and Princeton Universities, and a partner at Armitage International.
Dr Darren Lim
Senior Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations, Australian National University
Darren J. Lim is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Politics and International Relations and a Fellow in the School of Regulation and Global Governance at the Australian National University. His primary academic research focuses on geoeconomics and economic statecraft under the auspices of the ANU’s Geoeconomics Working Group. Darren has also published on the rules-based international order, technology competition, and foreign policy responses to major-power rivalry, with a regional focus on the Indo-Pacific.
Ashley Feng
Ashley Feng is a former research associate for the Energy, Economics, and Security program at the Center for a New American Security. Her research includes US-China trade relations and the intersection of trade, investment restrictions, and export controls and national security. Prior to CNAS, she was research associate for China studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Dr Jeffrey Wilson
Research Fellow, Perth USAsia Centre
Dr Jeffrey D. Wilson is a Research Fellow with the Perth USAsia Centre at the University of Western Australia. He is a political scientist, who specialises in economic regionalism and resource/energy politics in the Asia-Pacific.
