Japan Symposium 2018
This public symposium on Thursday 1 March 2018 seeks to provide a strategic forum for policymakers, scholars, and business leaders in the region to grapple with the emergence of the “Indo-Pacific” as a regional construct. The economic rise of ASEAN, China and India will change the existing global political and economic order. This symposium constitutes an effort to examine policy options for addressing the regional security and diplomatic problems which will emerge from these significant changes in the international system.
Speakers
Ambassador Richard Court AC
Ambassador Richard Court is a former Western Australian politician who has held a number of senior positions and directorships in private and public companies, including Resource Investment Strategy Consultants, the Anglican Diocesan trustees and the Olympic Team Appeal for Western Australia. Mr Court was elected to the Western Australia Legislative Assembly in 1982. He served as Premier and Treasurer of Western Australia from 1993 to 2001.
Ambassador Sumio Kusaka
As Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Australia, Sumio Kusaka brings with him 37 years of distinguished service as a member of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA). Before arriving in Australia, Ambassador Kusaka was posted as Ambassador and Consul-General of Japan in New York (2013-15), after serving in Tokyo as Ambassador and Chief of Protocol (2012-13) and Ambassador and Director General for African Affairs (2010-12).
C. Raja Mohan
C. Raja Mohan is Director of Carnegie India. A leading analyst of India’s foreign policy, Mohan is also an expert on South Asian security, great-power relations in Asia, and arms control. He is the foreign affairs columnist for the Indian Express, and a visiting research professor at the Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore.
Peter Varghese AO
Mr Peter N Varghese AO began as Chancellor of The University of Queensland on 11 July 2016. Prior to this appointment, Mr Varghese’s extensive career in public service spanned 38 years and included senior positions in foreign affairs, trade policy and intelligence. Most recently, he served as Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (2012-2015).
Xenia Wickett
Xenia Wickett is the Head of the US and the Americas Programme at Chatham House and the Dean of the Queen Elizabeth II Academy for Leadership in International Affairs. As of 2016, she also serves as a Commissioner of the Marshall Aid Commemoration Commission.
Bruce Miller
Bruce Miller has spent most of his career dealing with Australia’s relations with East Asia, Australian responses to regional and global security issues and international legal issues. He was Australian Ambassador to Japan from August 2011 until January 2017. Most recently, from January until December 2017 he worked as Director-General of the Office of National Assessments (ONA).
Professor L. Gordon Flake
Professor L. Gordon Flake is the founding CEO of the Perth USAsia Centre, a position he assumed in January of 2014. He was previously Executive Director of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation, a Senior Fellow and Associate Director of the Program on Conflict Resolution at The Atlantic Council of the United States and prior to that Director for Research and Academic Affairs at the Korea Economic Institute of America.
Commodore Lee Goddard CSC Ran
Commodore Lee Goddard CSC RAN has been fortunate to have experienced many ‘careers within a career’ during his 30 years of service since joining the Navy through the Australian Defence Force Academy. He was recently seconded into the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet as a Branch Head (International Division) for two years.
Professor Stephen Smith
Professor Stephen Smith was Federal Member for Perth for the Australian Labor Party from March 1993 until September 2013. In a distinguished career spanning 20 years in the Australian Federal Parliament, Professor Smith served as the Minister for Defence, and prior to that, as Minister for Foreign Affairs.
Yuki Tatsumi
Yuki Tatsumi is Director of the Japan Program at the Stimson Center and concurrently serves as Senior Fellow at Canon Institute for Global Studies. Her most recent publications include Lost in Translation? Defense Innovation and Northeast Asia (Stimson, 2017) and Japan and Peacebuilding: Views from the Next Generation (Stimson, 2017).
Richard Heydarian
Richard Heydarian is an academic and author based in the Philippines. His recent book, The Rise of Duterte: A Populist Revolt Against Elite Democracy, analyzes the path to power of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and its implications not just for the country, but the broader region and the world.
Professor Benjamin Reilly
Professor Benjamin Reilly is Dean of the Sir Walter Murdoch School of Public Policy and International Affairs at Murdoch University. He is a political scientist specialising in democratization, comparative politics and political development.
Vice Admiral Yojo Koda (Ret.)
Retired Vice Adm. Yoji Koda is a Fellow at the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University focusing on the direction of the US-Japan alliance in the coming decades and Chinese naval and military expansion. Before retiring in 2008, Koda served in the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) for more than 36 years.
Professor Rikki Kersten
Professor Rikki Kersten specialises in Japanese history, politics, security policy and foreign policy. She has a special interest in Australia-Japan relations, and in the US-Japan alliance.
Ambassador Shyam Saran
Ambassador Shyam Saran is Senior Fellow for the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi. Ambassador Saran is a career diplomat, having joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1970. He has served in several capitals of the world including Beijing, Tokyo and Geneva. He has been India’s Ambassador to Myanmar, Indonesia and Nepal and High Commissioner to Mauritius.
The Hon. Kim Beazley AC
The Hon Kim Beazley was elected to Federal Parliament in 1980, in 1993 became Minister in the Hawke and Keating Labor Governments holding various portfolios. He was Deputy Prime Minister (1995-96) and Leader of the Australian Labor Party and LEader of the Opposition (1996-01 and 2005-06). Mr Beazley was Ambassador to the United States of America from February 2010 to January 2016. Upon returning to Australia he has been appointed as President of the Australian Institute for International Affairs (2016-17), Co-Chairman of the Australian American Leadership Dialogue and Distinguished Fellow at both the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and the Perth USAsia Centre.
Darshana M. Baruah
Darshana M. Baruah is a Research Analyst and Program Administrator with Carnegie India. Her primary research focuses on maritime security in Asia with a focus on the Indian Navy and its role in a new security architecture.
Dan Blumenthal
Dan Blumenthal is the director of Asian Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, where he focuses on East Asian security issues and Sino-American relations. Mr. Blumenthal has both served in and advised the U.S. government on China issues for over a decade. From 2001 to 2004, he served as senior director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia at the Department of Defense.
Natalie Sambhi
Natalie is a Research Fellow at the Perth USAsia Centre where she publishes on Indonesian foreign and defence policy as well as Southeast Asian security. She was most recently an Analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) from 2012 to 2016 and Managing Editor of ASPI’s blog, The Strategist. She worked previously at the Department of Defence and University of Canberra.
Ken Jimbo
Ken Jimbo is Associate Professor at Keio University and a Senior Research Fellow at the Canon Institute for Global Studies in Tokyo. Jimbo earned his doctorate from the Graduate School of Media and Governance, Keio University, in March 2005. He has also been a Visiting Research Fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, and at the Faculty of Political Science, Thammasat University.
Bill Townsend
Bill Townsend is General Manager, External Affairs and Joint Venture at INPEX. In this role, Bill leads the team responsible for managing the company’s government and community relations, corporate social responsibility, Aboriginal affairs, regulatory approvals, communications, media relations and joint venture management.
Sadanand Dhume
Sadanand Dhume is a Resident Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, DC. He writes about South Asian political economy, foreign policy, business, and society, with a focus on India and Pakistan. He is also a South Asia columnist for the Wall Street Journal.
Carmen Lawrence
After training as a research psychologist at the University of Western Australia and lecturing in a number of Australian universities, Dr Lawrence entered politics in 1986, serving at both State and Federal levels for 21 years. She retired from politics in 2007. She is now a Professorial Fellow at the University of Western Australia where she is working to establish a centre to research the forces driving significant social change in key areas of contemporary challenge as well as exploring our reactions to that change.
Eric Sayers
Eric Sayers is Vice President at Beacon Global Strategies, a national security consulting firm in Washington DC. He is also an Adjunct Fellow for Asian Security at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). Prior to joining BGS, Mr. Sayers was a consultant to the Commander’s Action Group at U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) where he served as Special Assistant to the Commander. In this capacity, he advised Admiral Harry Harris on long-range strategic engagements and special initiatives in the Indo-Pacific theater and Washington DC.
Chris Salisbury
Chris was appointed chief executive of Rio Tinto’s Iron Ore group in July 2016, with accountability for an extensive suite of assets, operations and supply chain logistics in the Pilbara, Western Australia. He became acting chief executive of the Copper & Coal group in March 2016, overseeing its operations and projects globally. Chris was previously chief operating officer, Coal with accountability for strategy, project development, operations and logistics for Rio Tinto’s coal mines in New South Wales, Queensland and South Africa.