Global Issues
Can LNG continue to fuel Papua New Guinea's economic growth?
2015 has been heralded as the year when Papua New Guinea (PNG) will enjoy the highest GDP growth rate in the world, on the back of its first full year of liquefied natural gas…
Balancing act: Jordan's fight against ISIS
When the video of the murder of Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kasasbeh was released, the King of Jordan was in Washington. This brutal act led directly to discussions about the need to…
Does it matter if Australia is no longer among the top 20 largest economies?
A recent report by PwC, The World in 2050, suggests that Australia could slip from 19th largest economy in the world in 2014 to 28th in 2050.
The report comes from the UK and…
How Greece and Europe can both win
The press is making much of the academic qualifications of Greece's new finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis. His specialisation is economic game theory, which in this case might be…
SA's Royal Commission into nuclear energy: Let's talk about waste
South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill has announced the establishment of a Royal Commission to consider Australia's, and specifically South Australia's, possible future role in…
Should the West arm Ukraine?
Should the West arm Ukraine against Russian-backed rebels? That's a question guaranteed to generate earnest debate among armchair foreign policy pundits. But it also found its way…
China's leaders read an old French book
It is witty these days to observe that the Chinese Politburo's required reading list, apparently recommended by the daunting anti-graft chief Wang Qishan, includes The Old Regime…
How much is too much? The debt mystery
The 2008 financial crisis left no doubt that ill-considered debt can cause major damage not just to an individual country, but to the global economy.
You might think that by now,…
Tough choices for Beijing following execution of Chinese ISIS militants
Despite China's long-standing diplomatic principle of non-intervention in the internal affairs of other states, Beijing cannot completely control its citizens' involvement in…
Arab Spring lives on as protests give way to new forms of activism
The uprisings that swept across the Arab world from late 2010 are, to put it mildly, faltering.
Egypt has returned to authoritarianism. Syria is a bloodbath. It is getting harder…