The World Economic Forum’s annual meeting wraps up off the piste in the Swiss ski resort this weekend. Two themes are growth and stability; and innovation and industry. Attendees must feel like Bill Murray…
In April, Treasurer Joe Hockey set the tone for his economics policies in a speech in New York on what he referred to as ending the “entitlement culture”. Hockey, who had given a defining speech in 2012…
Harald Sander, Cologne University of Applied Sciences (CUAS)
Shortly after the G20 summit in Brisbane, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced initiatives to increase trade and investment relations between Germany and…
Throughout his prime-ministership, which ran from 1996 to 2007, John Howard’s perspective on climate change was informed by geopolitics more than science. The Kyoto Protocol, the key international climate…
Despite the adoption of a third two-year G20 Anti-Corruption Action Plan, corruption received only a few lines in the latest G20 leaders’ communique. The credibility of the G20 as a whole now rests on…
G20 leaders have put growth and employment at the centre of the global agenda. To spur collective growth by more than 2% over five years, member countries have agreed to implement a package of structural…
There’s nothing quite like being the centre of attention, even if it costs A$400 million to do so. Now that the curtain has come down on Australia’s moment in the diplomatic spotlight, taxpayers might…
The G20 summit in Brisbane has put the pressure on Australia to boost its action on climate change not just at home but also internationally through a new UN-backed fund. The summit yielded major pledges…
Despite Australia’s best efforts, climate change muscled its way onto the G20 agenda. The summit’s final communique included one paragraph restating the importance of international negotiations in Paris…
Never before has Australia been more at the heart of global affairs. Here in Brisbane we have finished our year as G20 President, with the G20 leaders presenting their communiqué. A series of significant…
The G20 Communique is good news on the international tax reform front. As part of the G20 commitment to boost economic resilience the Communique commits G20 nations to taking action to ensure fairness…
The G20 leaders have reaffirmed a commitment to raise global growth, saying if more than 800 agreed measures are “fully implemented”, GDP will grow by an additional 2.1% by 2018, adding more than US$2…
Focusing on growth, the Brisbane G20 leaders’ summit has not grappled with three key issues. How much more growth can the planet survive? How can poorer nations raise their living standards to parity with…
US President Barack Obama took to the stage at the University of Queensland in Brisbane on a day which had the soles of your shoes melting. We had been through a complicated but reasonable security process…
The recent US-China climate announcement is a significant development in humanity’s equivocal response to the climate crisis. Despite over four decades of political engagement with climate change, tangible…
While much of Australia’s media has been covering Abbott’s macho stance on Russian President Vladimir Putin, the G20 meetings will be focusing on how best to improve global trade, which severely declined…
The spotlight may be on the leaders at this weekend’s G20 Leaders’ Summit in Australia, but who will be behind the leaders at the big table in Brisbane? The G20 sherpas are very senior officials who have…
University of Canberra Vice-Chancellor Stephen Parker and Michelle Grattan discuss the week in politics including the G20, Russian warships in international waters near Australia, and the tension between…
British Prime Minister David Cameron has said that “a new and pressing challenge” in the fight against terrorism is getting extremist material taken down from the internet. Addressing a special sitting…
Tony Abbott finds himself the party host caught somewhat off-balance as his guests set off crackers all over the place. The government is – and has been all year – shouting that it wants this weekend’s…