Australia in the World

What purpose do think tanks serve in Australian foreign and strategic policy? How do they actually influence government decisions? And how should their role, funding and ways of working change in the age of AI? To explore these questions, Darren welcomes two returning guests: Bridi Rice, founder and CEO of the Development Intelligence Lab, and Dr John Kunkel, Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Unit...

In a somewhat different episode of the podcast, Darren speaks with Tim Watts MP, a member of the parliament’s new Joint Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence, about how Australia should think about AI at a moment when both the technology and the politics surrounding it are moving extraordinarily quickly. The conversation (recorded on 11 Sep) begins with the remarkable run of AI news over the...

In this episode, Darren speaks with Graham Fletcher, who recently retired after almost four decades in the Australian public service, much of it spent working on China. Fletcher served four postings in Beijing, culminating in his term as Australian Ambassador to China from 2019 to 2023 — covering COVID-19, the deepest downturn in bilateral relations for decades, China’s campaign of economic coerci...

This episode Darren goes full academic, using Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s recent Allan Gyngell Lecture as the starting point for a broader discussion of Australian grand strategy. Wong takes up Allan’s conception of foreign policy as a means of expanding Australia’s international space, increasing its options and maximising its choices, and sets out her “Four Rs” framework of region, relationshi...

Stephen Dziedzic of the ABC returns to catch up on a remarkable month in Australian foreign policy. The conversation begins with China’s submarine-launched ballistic missile test into the South Pacific. Stephen and Darren ask who Beijing was really signalling, what the test says about China’s nuclear deterrent, and why Pacific governments responded much more strongly than they did to China’s 2024...

Darren is back at the mic after a month away and, again, back on the Iran/Hormuz story. The deal he spent an hour analysing in June is dead inside three weeks, the two sides are fighting again, American soldiers are dying, important infrastructure has been destroyed across the region, and a fresh ceasefire proposal is circulating even as Washington weighs a much larger campaign alongside Israel. T...

Darren is back to do (yet another) solo episode on Iran. This week, the United States and Iran did a deal, Trump put pen to a physical copy at Versailles, and the war looked like it might be — in a narrow sense— over. At least, this is what Darren sought to analyse when he first recorded on Saturday 20 June. But before he could publish the following day, Iran had announced the Strait of Hormuz was...

Stephen Dziedzic of the ABC joins Darren to catch up on something besides Iran and the (still-closed) Strait of Hormuz. The conversation begins with the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, where Stephen was on the ground. They discuss the mood in the room, the relative absence of Iran from the public discussion despite its obvious relevance to maritime security, and the broader regional anxiety abou...

Eleven weeks into the U.S.-Iran war, the news cycle is relentless, but the strategic position has barely moved. Darren looks to step back from the weekly churn to lay out the five durable lessons of this conflict — the things that were becoming visible in March, that have held through April, that are still true in May, and that may well remain true for some time yet. The episode begins with a fact...

Eight weeks into the US-Israeli war against Iran, the ceasefire is about to expire and the second round of negotiations is supposed to be happening this week in Islamabad. Darren uses the framework of “war-as-bargaining” to make sense of an extraordinary three weeks—the threats, the ceasefire, the collapse of the first talks, the blockade, Iran's brief reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and its nea...

In the second episode of the week recorded just 48 hours after the last one (around 12pm on Wed 1 April), Darren is joined once again by Stephen Dziedzic of the ABC to talk through what, again, has been a wild few days. In two Truth Social posts barely twelve hours apart, President Trump threatened to destroy Iranian desalination plants — a move legal experts describe as a war crime — and then tol...

Now in its fifth week, the Iran war may be about to enter its most dangerous phase. In a shorter update this episode, Darren assesses what he sees as four important dynamics as President Trump’s new extended 6 April deadline approaches: (1) the collapse of negotiations and the simultaneous buildup of U.S. ground forces in the region; (2) why seizing Kharg Island or Iran’s enriched uranium may be t...

Three weeks into the US-Israeli war on Iran, Darren looks to international relations theory — particularly the bargaining and war termination frameworks associated with James Fearon — to explain why this conflict is so resistant to ending. He organises his thinking around two conditions for war termination: the existence of a mutually acceptable deal, and a credible mechanism for enforcing it. Nei...

Two weeks into the US-Israeli war on Iran, Darren uses Robert Pape's cost-benefit framework to assess where things stand. The tactical achievements are real — two-thirds of Iran's missile launchers destroyed, its navy sunk, its leadership decapitated — but the probability of converting those gains into durable strategic outcomes is low, and the costs are mounting fast. On the military side, interc...

In (yet another) emergency episode, Darren offers eight initial thoughts on the US and Israeli strikes on Iran and the killing of Ayatollah Khamenei. Inside Iran, the question is whether airpower and decapitation can deliver regime change when the historical record says they never have — though this case may be an outlier given how weakened the regime already was. Regionally, Iran's “drizzle” reta...

The US Supreme Court has struck down the Trump administration’s use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs. This is a big deal!  In this episode, Darren argues that the decision is not primarily a story about tariffs — important as they are — but about power. The Court has drawn a clear line around the President’s ability to declare a...

A week after his emergency episode on President Trump’s threats to acquire Greenland, Darren returns with a rapid debrief of the Davos meetings—and what it means for the world (and for Australia). The immediate crisis appears paused: Trump has shifted from “ownership” to a negotiating “framework” focused on Arctic security, basing access, and keeping China and Russia out. Still, Darren thinks the...

Less than a year into Trump’s second term, his renewed push to acquire Greenland has escalated into a full-blown alliance crisis—complete with tariff threats against Denmark and other European backers, and a scramble for NATO unity. In (already) his second “emergency” episode of 2026 recorded solo on 18 January, Darren starts off by observing this episode doesn’t neatly fit neat orthodox models of...

In an episode recorded just before Christmas, Darren interviews Janet Egan, Senior Fellow and Deputy Director of the Technology and National Security Program at CNAS, about AI policy and its implications for Australia. Janet (who started her career in the Australian government) frames the current AI landscape as a two-horse race between the US and China, given vastly asymmetric investment levels....

To begin 2026, the Trump administration has once again served up a news story of immense implications, with a military intervention and seizure of Venezuela's President Maduro. In this episode, Darren talks through his initial reactions to this developing story.  Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Hannah Nelson and theme...

Darren is joined by returning guest Richard Maude to unpack what Australian foreign policy looks like in late 2025. The conversation centres on Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s recent AIIA speech, which Darren argues—mostly with Richard’s agreement—marks a clear evolution in Australia’s foreign policy doctrine. The traditional three pillars — alliance, region, and rules — have been replaced by a new...

Zack Cooper of the American Enterprise Institute returns to the podcast to discuss the recent Trump-Xi meeting in Seoul. Who got the better deal, and is the year-long “truce” a stable one?  As both sides look to use this window to de-risk, who will have more leverage over the medium term? More broadly, Trump’s Asia trip was a very important data point in helping us all understand what US foreign p...

The much-anticipated face-to-face meeting between Prime Minister Albanese and President Trump has happened, not in the Oval Office but the Cabinet Room of the White House. The PM will be very pleased with how it went, with only one major casualty – embarrassment for Australia’s US Ambassador Kevin Rudd, after past tweets critical of the president were brought up, creating some awkwardness. To disc...

Darren welcomes back Tim Watts MP to the podcast. Tim is now the government’s Special Envoy for Indian Ocean Affairs having also served as assistant minister for foreign affairs in the Albanese government’s first term. The discussion begins with Tim’s new role and the importance of the Indian Ocean Region to Australia’s national interests. From there, Darren asks Tim to reflect on his time as Assi...

Former Victorian Premier Dan Andrews made headlines when he was snapped in a picture with Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, amongst others, at China’s recent military parade. While Andrews’ activities were puzzling, they also raise bigger questions around both the opportunities and the limits of Australia’s bilateral relationship with China. Will Glasgow, The Australian newspaper’s North Asia Corres...