James Curran launches new podcast series 'An Australian World'

The biggest influence here was my PhD Supervisor, Neville Meaney, the doyen of Australian diplomatic historians. I did a PhD with Neville here at Sydney University from 1997-2001 which explored how prime ministers from Whitlam to Howard projected a story of Australian nationalism and an understanding of Australia’s place in the world. So, it was an intellectual history of those leaders, where their ideas came from and how they adjusted, or not, to Australia’s changing circumstances in an era when old orthodoxies such as the empire, White Australia, our relations with the indigenous peoples and with Asia, and protectionism, were crumbling. That opened up new interests in Australia’s relations with the world from the late 19th Century down to the present. 

The brilliance of Meaney – unlike so many he was a scholar as well as a historian – is that he was untroubled by the demise of the old diplomatic history, recognising that international relations needed anchoring in the broader political culture of the nation, and required more than a faithful account of meetings, cables and policy briefs from the archival coal face. And he was sufficiently old-fashioned to believe that the past held out defining themes of significance, that not everything was “contested” or “unstable”, and that the study of politics remains a valuable point of entry into the national psyche. 

More to the point, he saw politics and international affairs not as a cul de sac of elite mannerisms, but as an extension of wider social, intellectual and cultural trends, particularly in democratic societies where political leaders are obliged to seek a popular mandate.

I am currently working on a book about former Australian prime minister Paul Keating, specifically looking at his foreign policy as PM but also the nature of political power and his grasp of it. I am also thinking of writing a short history of Australian foreign policy.

As the international editor of the Australian Financial Review, I am writing about these issues regularly, including in my weekly column. 

At the moment, the focus is on a number of areas – the US election and its implications for Asia, whether China’s growth stall is cyclical or structural, how Southeast Asian countries are managing China’s rise, whether the gap between American resolve and capability will widen, and why a Labor government has gone “all the way” with the US on AUKUS and basing, but with no public or parliamentary debate. The long-term consequences of this policy have not been thought through, and they carry significant risks.

Listeners can expect a rollicking ride through over 100 years of Australia’s history of dealing with and thinking about the outside world. With a particular focus on leaders, the making of policy, relations with the great powers, finding a home in Asia, and the clash between Australia’s cultural loyalties and its distinctive interests in this part of the world.