Australia must adjust to a shifting centre of gravity - AUSTRALIAs current leaders are too focused on an old Atlantic... world order to notice that its days are over.... former Prime Minister Paul Keating warned that the world has changed, and there will be a centre of gravity in the Pacific and EAST ASIA, as there has been for the last 250 years in the Atlantic... others have said similar things. Few, however, seem willing to face the immediate implications of this profound power shift... The Abbott government believes the centre of world power is still located in Washington, or should be. The Anglosphere is Tony Abbotts blind spot. US Secretary of State John Kerry... marshalled the arguments of fear and containment: Chinas rise must be inhibited, its potential to rule investment and infrastructure projects in the region restrained. The AFR reported that China is frustrated by the old rules of the World Bank and the IMF, and seeks a new mechanism by which China can recirculate its $4 trillion in foreign reserves into the real economy and out of US Treasury bonds. Bonds, that is, issued to finance US debt. China is Americas largest creditor. The Obama administration faces the exquisite dilemmas of the debtor, including the golden chains of a resentful dependency. Yet at the same time former Bush administration national security adviser and current Lowy Institute fellow Stephen Hadley says that Australia must engage China on multiple levels of regional co-operation, to keep the Middle Kingdom on a peaceful course of development... Whats more co-operative and peaceful than investing in the future growth of the region, stimulating productivity and lifting communities out of poverty?
Posted on: Sun, 02 Nov 2014 19:40:10 +0000