The Lowy Institute

Do leaders matter? Are the trajectories of nations directed by unstoppable social and economic forces regardless of who’s in charge, or are the histories of states those of a handful of highly influential leaders? At the Wednesday Lowy Lunch on 20 October, Fergus Hanson and Alex Oliver reported on an intensive empirical pilot study tracing the pathways taken by leaders in Timor-Leste and Samoa.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On 17 November, Scott Featherstone discussed the development of Africa’s political economies with a particular emphasis on the continent’s recent spurt of sustained economic growth. He explored how sustainable this is, what might prevent it from continuing, and what the implications of this are for Australia’s policy-makers and companies.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On 2 November 2010 the US mid-term elections took place for the House of Representatives, the Senate and many important governorships. These elections are enormously important in their own right but they may also have significant implications for the presidency of Barack Obama. At the Wednesday Lunch on 10 November, two leading commentators on US politics, Dr Michael Fullilove and Brendon O'Connor, provided analysis of the mid-term results.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Scientific research has become one of the most important economic drivers, especially in countries which are poor in natural resources. Yet, the role of science in modern society goes beyond the production of knowledge. At the Wednesday Lunch on 3 November, Professor Dieter Imboden explored the delicate relationship between research, politics, economy and society.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For more than half a century the view that radiation represents an extreme hazard has been accepted. At the Wednesday Lowy Lunch on 20 October, Professor Wade Allison challenged that view by facing the question "How dangerous is ionising radiation?"See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As a follow-up to the Lowy Institute MDG conference held in Sydney in June and the recent UN MDG summit in New York, the Lowy Institute, through The Myer Foundation Melanesia Program, convened a special panel of diverse commentators and experts from government and non-government sectors to tackle some of the key issues that are of particular importance for Australia as a large and growing provider of overseas aid.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Obama administration inherited a complex and interrelated set of problems in the Middle East - a prolonged war in Iraq, Iran's quest for a nuclear weapon capability and a moribund Middle East peace process. On 13 October in our Wednesday Lowy Lunch series, Ambassador Daniel Kurtzer examined the U.S. administration's efforts to deal with these issues and the prospects for success.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

At the Wednesday Lunch at Lowy on 6 October, Professor John McAneney, the Director of Risk Frontiers and a Professorial Fellow in the Division of Environment and Geography at Macquarie University, addressed the contribution of global climate change to the rising cost of natural disasters.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The realm of international affairs has become a 'state of nature' with asymmetrical powers of a kind that Thomas Hobbes would recognise as entirely familiar. What, then, should be the prescription to cure this ill? At the Wednesday Lunch on 29 September, Dr Simon Longstaff, Executive Director of the St James Ethics Centre, explored how the discipline of ethics helps to address this question.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this panel discussion on China Radio International's Beyond Beijing program, Research Associate and Asia Security Project Coordinator Raoul Heinrichs explores the future prospects for the Six Party Talks, and for security on the Korean Peninsula.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aviation is one of the world’s more challenging industries. On 22 September, as part of the Lowy Institute's Distinguished Speaker Series, Alan Joyce discussed the Qantas approach to managing short- and long-term risks and seizing commercial opportunities within a complex and rapidly changing operating environment. Alan Joyce was appointed Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Qantas on 28 November 2008.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

At the Wednesday Lunch at Lowy on 15 September, Professor Hugh White spoke about Australia's choices as China grows. Hugh White is a Visiting Fellow at the Lowy Institute for International Policy and Professor of Strategic Studies at the Australian National University.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What sort of world will a new Australian government be dealing with, and how is it likely to approach it? Deputy Director Martine Letts, Director of Studies Andrew Shearer, International Security Program Director Rory Medcalf and Myer Foundation Melanesia Program Director Jenny Hayward-Jones briefed guests on the big strategic issues shaping Australia's future in the world as well as the foreign policy challenges closer to home for this special post-election Food for Thought session.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Cyber attacks in Estonia and Georgia are one recent prominent example of cyber space being challenged by growth in crime, espionage and disruptive activity. Disruptive activity targeting governments, cyber infrastructure providers and commercial enterprise is growing significantly around the world. For Australia, where over 90 per cent of the networks that now underpin our economy are in private-sector control and increasingly interconnected to global sources of vulnerability, this an important national issue. Paul Twomey discussed this growing global phenomenon and suggested some policy responses for managing this growing threat.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The 2010 Dr John Gee Memorial Lecture, 'Can we eliminate nuclear weapons?', was presented by Joseph Cirincione, who has devoted a long career to the study of nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament. He is currently the President of Ploughshares Fund.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As China emerges fully on the global stage, its impact is being felt in various dimensions -diplomatic, commercial, cultural, energy and environment, military-strategic, global governance, and other domains. Yet the international community remains very uncertain of China’s intentions, goals, strategies, and tactics. One way to begin to understand how China may behave on the global stage is to delve into domestic debates about China’s international identity and roles in the world. Professor Shambaugh’s lecture at the Wednesday Lunch on 1 September illuminated China’s domestic discourse about its international position.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On Friday, 27 August 2010, the Executive Director of UNAIDS, Mr Michel Sidibé, addressed the Lowy Institute for International Policy as part of our Distinguished Speaker Series. In 1996, UNAIDS was established as a specialised agency of the United Nations to give policy guidance and advice on all aspects of the global struggle against the HIV/AIDS pandemic.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Success in the development and adoption of 'infotronic' technologies is going to be critical to the future of Australia's economic competitiveness and our standard of living. In this Wednesday Lowy Lunch presentation, Hugh Bradlow, Chief Technology Officer for Telstra, looked at the changes in ICT technologies over the next 10 years and the impact that they are likely to have on human behaviour and economic outcomes. He then addressed the perspective of Australia's competitive position in this new world.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The debate about overseas aid’s effectiveness has until recently been largely confined to policy-makers but, over the past few weeks, the issue has featured prominently in the Australian media. In the Wednesday Lowy Lunch on 4 August, Joel Negin examined the increasingly complex arena of international development assistance, putting the challenges of development assistance into a global context and aiming to widen the scope of the aid debate to a broader audience.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The 41st Pacific Island Forum leaders meeting will be held in Port Vila from 4 August 2010. Australia is the outgoing chair of the Forum. In the lead up to the meeting the Lowy Institute convened a panel of diverse Pacific commentators and experts from government and non-government sectors to discuss key issues of importance for the Pacific at the Wednesday Lunch at Lowy on 28 July.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.