Dr Bates Gill is Professor of Asia-Pacific Security Studies at Macquarie University and ​a Senior Associate Fellow with the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in London. He is also the inaugural Scholar-in-Residence for 2020–21 with the Asia Society Australia.

Dr Gill is an internationally respected scholar and policy expert, with a 30-year career as a researcher, author, advisor and board member, focusing on Chinese and Asian politics, foreign policy and security.

He began work in Australia in 2012 as Chief Executive Officer of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and he later served as Professor of Asia-Pacific Strategic Studies at Australian National University.  He was previously Director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) (2007–12), an independent think tank recognised as one of the world’s top ten research institutes in international affairs. In August and September 2016 he held the Kippenberger Chair in Strategic Studies at Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand.

Before joining SIPRI, Dr Gill held the Freeman Chair in China Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC (2002–07) and previously served as a Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies and inaugural Director of the Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution (1998–02). He also held the Fei Yiming Professorship at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Chinese and American Studies, Nanjing, China. 

Among his more than 200 publications, he is author, co-author, or co-editor of seven books, including: Governing the Bomb: Civilian Control and Democratic Accountability of Nuclear Weapons (Oxford University Press, 2010); Asia’s New Multilateralism (Columbia University Press, 2009); Rising Star: China’s New Security Diplomacy (Brookings, 2007; revised edition 2010; republished in Japanese 2014); and China: The Balance Sheet (Public Affairs, 2006). His latest book is titled China Matters: Getting it Right for Australia, co-authored with Linda Jakobson and published in 2017.

Dr Gill serves on the Board of Governors of the Rajaratnam School of International Studies (Singapore) and is a member of the International Board of Advisors for the Shanghai Institutes of International Studies.  He is on the Editorial Board of China Quarterly, Journal of Contemporary China, and Security Challenges.

Dr Gill received his PhD in Foreign Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson Department of Government and Foreign Affairs, University of Virginia. In 2013, he received the Royal Order of the Commander of the Polar Star, the highest award bestowed on foreigners by the Swedish monarch.