WHITLAM INSTITUTE WITHIN WESTERN SYDNEY UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND TRADE WHITE PAPER SUBMISSION
Leanne Smith, Associate Director
28 February 2017
Never in most of our lifetimes has there been a more crucial time for Australia to have a strong, united
and strategic sense of our national identity and national interest, our place in the world and how we
want to engage with it. Yet, at this time of uncertainty and ever shifting geopolitics, Australia remains
precariously positioned on the edge of a region it is yet to fully embrace, and is not fully embraced by,
reliant on one global power for its security and on another for its trade and investment future – with the
potential to be torn between the two.
This White Paper provides a timely opportunity for Australia to strengthen its foreign policy
underpinnings and ensure a galvanized and strategic approach to both our near and long term future.
The Government is to be commended for initiating the White Paper process. We welcome the
opportunity to be involved and at this stage wish to briefly outline several broad areas which we would
suggest warrant the Department’s attention.
We need better coherence between Australia’s domestic and foreign policy, based on the core
principles of our democracy and our values and through wider engagement and consultation within
the Australian community.
Like every nation, Australia must define its interests in a realistic way, in line with its core values,
domestic priorities and financial resources. Australia is a multicultural society with a long democratic
tradition whose national identity is based on the principles and values of equality, rule of law and
respect for human rights. This is who we are. It is important to our credibility on the international stage
that our foreign policy aligns with those national values – adherence to them will make us a credible and
reliable partner and sustain our long-term relationships into the future. Additionally, at their best,
foreign and domestic policy can be mutually reinforcing and in other cases are simply inseparable, given
the interplay between the two and the consequential policy and practical impact in respective spheres.
Central to this coherence is the need for our domestic policies to also meet the international obligations
we have committed to. One clear example where this is not so can be seen in our current refugee and
asylum seeker policies failure to meet the standards required by the 1951 Refugee Convention. Without
doubt, such policy lapses affect Australia’s credibility in contexts such as our bid for a seat on the Human
Rights Council – one of Australia’s stated core foreign policy priorities for the year ahead.
The public policy space for discussing and debating our national interest and foreign policy priorities and
positions has become extremely insular and needs to be expanded – across federal portfolios, in the
parliament, with state and territory governments, engaging academia, think tanks, civil society
organisations and the community at large more consistently – in order to develop a more rigorous,
coherent and inclusive conception of our national interest and place in the world. DFAT must explore
new and creative ways to engage multiple perspectives and create more bureaucratic space for
consultation and for considered policy development into the future. The Whitlam Institute would be
glad to engage further to share ideas on how this might be achieved.
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To this end the White Paper process should explicitly support an Australian foreign policy that
articulates the national interest and is capable of pursuing those interests through a genuinely
independent and strategic policy framework. Inherent in this is a commitment to developing relations –
particularly in our own region – which are rich and diverse (rather than narrowly transactional): a
political relationship firstly; a relationship of ideas and cultural understanding and exchange; a
relationship that would grow with Australia’s growing sense of itself as being part of Asia.
The current international climate provides no certainty that past assumptions about the best way to
pursue our national interest can be relied upon. Now more than ever, Gough Whitlam’s vision of a
foreign policy secure in our own principles and interests, and not dragged from pillar to post by our
allies’ distinct objectives, is crucial.
‘A more independent Australian stance in international affairs…an Australia which
will enjoy a growing standing as a distinctive, tolerant, co-operative and wellregarded nation not only in the Asia-Pacific region but in the world at large’ 1
Multilateralism, and in particular our membership and active participation in the United Nations, is of
course one way Australia has historically asserted, and can continue to assert, its independence and
international identity 2. Australia’s current public policy space is too small to grapple with the enormity
of the geopolitical shifts underway. We need a policy outlook that can bring together different aspects
of our international engagements – diplomacy, development assistance, humanitarian aid, trade,
cultural and peace and security engagement- in a coherent way, and to our best advantage. This White
Paper is a clear opportunity to achieve that goal. Wherever possible, the government of the day should
seek a clear bipartisan vision of our role in the world, and at the very least seek agreement on the
purposes and architecture of our foreign policy, and DFAT should foster continued adherence to a
strategic agenda for achieving our long term national interest.
Australia should continue to focus on building strong and respectful relationships with countries in
the region as well as countries beyond with which we share likeminded values and interests.
Australia’s national interest lies first and foremost in the Asia-Pacific region, secondly in key
relationships with other bilateral allies, and thirdly in effective engagement in multilateral and regional
fora. These relationships need to be more strategic, mutually reinforcing and less transactional and
short term. These observations are not new but they warrant renewed attention.
In the Asia-Pacific context, Australia must work to deepen and broaden its engagements across the
region and beyond political and security elites, with an end to achieving a genuine mutual respect with
our neighbours that focuses on opportunities presented by points of commonality, while respecting our
differences. Strategic, respectful relationships in the region will allow for more tolerance of differences,
Prime Minister Whitlam’s swearing in speech December 1972
Kirby, M. ‘Whitlam as Internationalist: A Centenary Reflection’, Melbourne University Law Review, Vol 39:887
2016
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and more protection against short term shocks. Deeper engagement in track two diplomacy and
continued emphasis on regional collaboration for regional and global solutions will be key to this end.
However, our focus on our region must not be at the expense of the value to be gained by collaboration
and partnership with countries across the world with whom we share historical, cultural, political, trade
and value-based ties. Much has been gained and will continue to be beneficial to Australia from
sustaining healthy relations with this likeminded community. Australian foreign policy must remain
responsive and flexible enough, within agreed strategic priority parameters, to accommodate serious
engagement beyond our immediate region.
Australia should continue to support an international rules-based order, including with multilateral
and regional institutions as well as international law.
This is of course most true for a middle-sized country like Australia where constructive engagement in
the international system allows us to have influence beyond our perceived status to achieve our
objectives and build productive relationships internationally. However, our commitment to this
objective has been less clear in recent times. Due to a lack of clear articulation about any strategic vision
around it, Australia’s 2013-14 Security Council seat, while productive for us in terms of outcomes,
reputation and relationships, was not perceived as part of a longer-term investment in multilateral
engagement. There is much to be learnt from our Council experience, and relationships that require
continued nurturing to make the investment grow into the future. Particularly in this time of
uncertainty, generally positive and strong long term relationships across multilateral fora as well as a
commitment to the international rule of law will help Australia to buttress our own objectives.
”International law – and by that I include not only the rules of international law but
also the law-making and law-applying processes and the formal and informal
institutions – provides the only alternative to tensions, chaos and destruction.” 3
In a timely coincidence, Stephen Fitzgerald AO, Australia’s first Ambassador to China, will deliver the
Whitlam Institute’s Annual Whitlam Oration on 16 March on the topic “Managing Ourselves in a
Chinese World: Australian Foreign Policy in an Age of Disruption” – a public forum that will address
many of the topics considered by the White Paper process. Invitations to ministers and senior officials
have been issued and the Institute would be delighted to continue to engage on the dialogue generated
by the Oration, and in the context of the White Paper process, to offer to facilitate further discussions,
particularly with the communities of Western Sydney, should that be useful.
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Whitlam, ‘Abiding Interests’, University of Queensland Press 1997 at 171.
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The Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University is a dynamic public policy institute that
commemorates, and is inspired by the life and work of one of Australia's most respected Prime
Ministers, The Hon. Gough Whitlam AC QC. It pursues the causes he championed and is guided by the
principles upon which his parliamentary career and years of service to the people of Australia were
founded.
Established under an Agreement between Western Sydney University and Mr Whitlam in 2000 as an
incorporated entity, the Institute bridges the historical legacy of Mr Whitlam's years in public life and
the contemporary relevance of the Institute's work to public discourse and policy. The Institute exists for
all Australians who care about what matters in a fair Australia and aims to improve the quality of life for
all Australians.
The Institute is custodian of the Whitlam Prime Ministerial Collection housing selected books and papers
donated by Mr Whitlam and providing on-line access to papers held both at the Institute and in the
National Archives. The other key area of activity, the Whitlam Institute Program, includes a range of
policy development and research projects, public education activities and special events. Through this
work the Institute strives to be a leading national centre for public policy development and debate.
Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University
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