Challenge of Multipolar World

‘There are both challenges and opportunities for my country Australia in the current global movement away from the old Western-dominated ‘Rules Based Order’, and  towards a genuine multipolar world order,  of strong civilisational states  and regions sharing the world’s resources and governance more equitably and peacefully.  

Australia by virtue of its geography and history as a European-settled British colony in the Asia-Pacific region is particularly torn between negative and positive cultural forces on our complex national identity and foreign policy.

First , the negatives .  Dominant is the inbred white Australian fear of Anglo-American abandonment. The early European settlers in Australia , mainly from England Scotland and Ireland , took the continent from its indigenous peoples with relative ease. They imported the British hierarchical imperial model of society and adopted it as their own.  

Australians unconsciously absorbed racist attitudes of cultural superiority to our indigenous First Australian peoples , and to our Asia-Pacific neighbours.  These attitudes have held our nation back. 

As Japan grew in military and economic strength , and began her own imperial adventurism in the Russian Far East,  Korea, Manchuria, China and further south, most Australians instinctively sought our security in the old Anglo-American rules- based order: protection first by our colonial motherland, Britain, and then increasingly by our adopted step-parent , the imperial United  States.

Australia’s evident weakness and vulnerability to Japanese invasion in WW2 indoctrinated Australians to a perceived need to be, and to be seen as, an indispensable and super-loyal forward military ally of United States and Britain in the Asia -Pacific region. 

The two parent countries continue, even now , to take advantage of these deeply ingrained Australian insecurities to consolidate their positions as key influencers of, and beneficiaries from, Australian strategic policy.  It has become a deeply unequal relationship. 

Against these powerful negative forces are important positive forces which I believe are strengthening and will prevail. 

First is geography. As a secure continental state rich in natural mineral and agricultural resources, Australia is a natural economic partner to the dynamic Asia-Pacific region  to our north. 

Second is the asset of our increasingly multicultural society. Especially in our major cities, our civilisation is now being profoundly influenced by immigrants from our Asia-Pacific region  and their cultural inheritance,  now going back many generations in Australia. 

It is becoming anachronistic to describe Australia as a predominantly European country in Asia . Our civilisation is increasingly multicultural in character, and this is beginning at last to influence our political culture.

Australia stands to benefit greatly from the coming multipolar world order , now being championed by Russia and China. It will be easy for Australians culturally to ‘plug into’ our Asia-Pacific region’s main socio-economic poles - China, India, Japan, ASEAN , even extending to West Asia, Eurasia and even Russia -  but only if we can mentally move forward from the backward-looking psychological insecurities that still tie us to the waning Anglo-American Rules Based Order: an order which most of the world increasingly sees through as an hollow shadow of its former hegemonic self.

It is difficult to predict how soon this might happen in Australia.

At the moment, Australia seems to be moving backwards : retreating into the military posturing and risk-taking of AUKUS, and the empty promise of a meaningless Quad grouping; and enlisting ourselves as a forward United States military base for its futile attempted encirclement and provocation of China. And,  in the worst case , risking national disaster as an expendable American pawn.

Our southeast Asian neighbours shake their heads sorrowfully at how Australia, after our progress towards real sovereignty in the 1970s  and 1980s,  is now apparently retreating into an anachronistic Anglo-American camp.  

They see the opportunities Australia is missing to re-direct its energies as a vibrant young multicultural nation in an increasingly multipolar Asia-Pacific region . 

All the economic and social assets are here to achieve this : the only thing stopping us is our political elites’  immature fears of Anglo-American abandonment.

Fortunately , influential Australian voices are calling for a change in policy direction : people like former Prime Ministers the late Malcolm Fraser and a still influential Paul Keating, former foreign ministers Gareth Evans and Bob  Carr , and many distinguished former academics and senior public servants such as John Menadue and Hugh White . 

The critical mass in Australian elites for real policy change is not there yet, but I am sure that Australia’s present competent leadership trio  - Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Defence Minister Richard Marles, and Foreign Minister Penny Wong - are beginning to think about how Australia over the next few years might jump into the multipolar world pool. They will find it a refreshing and welcoming place when they do. “ 

Tony Kevin