Australia in the World

A week after his emergency episode on President Trump’s threats to acquire Greenland, Darren returns with a rapid debrief of the Davos meetings—and what it means for the world (and for Australia). The immediate crisis appears paused: Trump has shifted from “ownership” to a negotiating “framework” focused on Arctic security, basing access, and keeping China and Russia out. Still, Darren thinks the sovereignty question is not resolved, and these events are a marker of deeper institutional decay.

Darren then unpacks Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s much-discussed Davos speech: a blunt warning that the world is experiencing a rupture of the international order, not a smooth transition. He shares Carney’s sense of urgency, but challenges parts of the diagnosis—and explains why those analytical distinctions matter for policy choices.

He assesses Trump’s proposed “Board of Peace” as a signal of how personalist, status-driven institutions can emerge when rules weaken. Darren also reflects on power—arguing that Trump’s performative displays of raw strength risk the Athenian problem of overreach and backlash, while for middle powers real leverage often lies in domestic resilience: the capacity to mobilise politically and absorb pain long enough to hold the line. The episode finishes once again with an Australia angle, given Canberra has benefited from luck as much as strategy. What are Australia’s red lines—and when would it speak up for partners before silence becomes precedent?

Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing by Hannah Nelson and theme music composed by Rory Stenning.

Relevant links

Thomas Wright, “Europe’s red lines worked”, The Atlantic, 22 January: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/2026/01/greenland-crisis-trump-diplomacy-nato/685715/

Paul Krugman, “Trump 1, Europe 1”, Paul Krugman (Substack), 23 January: https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/trump-0-europe-1

Davos 2026: Special address by Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada, 20 January: https://www.weforum.org/stories/2026/01/davos-2026-special-address-by-mark-carney-prime-minister-of-canada/

Richard Green and Daniel Forti, “The board of discord”, Foreign Policy, 22 January: https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/01/22/trump-board-of-peace-united-nations-gaza-ukraine-international-cooperation/

Anton Troianovski, “Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ Would Have Global Scope but One Man in Charge” New York Times, 21 January: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/21/us/politics/trump-board-peace-united-nations.html

Sara Jabakhanji, Graeme Bruce, “Here are the countries joining Trump's 'Board of Peace' so far”, CBC News, 22 January: https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/board-of-peace-gaza-trump-list-of-countries-9.7055866

Seva Gunitsky, “The Strong Will Suffer What They Must:Vaclav's Grocer and American Hubris”, Hegemon (Substack), 21 January: https://hegemon.substack.com/p/the-strong-will-suffer-what-they

Krzysztof Pelc, “The look of empire: Donald Trump’s dangerous fixation with imperial aesthetics”, Foreign Policy, 22 January: https://foreignpolicy.com/2026/01/22/trump-venezuela-empire-greenland-nato-europe/

Kyla Scanlon, “The Great Entertainment: Can you govern the world like a reality TV show?”, Kyla’s Newsletter (Substack), 22 January: https://kyla.substack.com/p/the-great-entertainment

Kate McKenzie and Tim Sahay, “Canada's new non-alignment: What sovereignty means now” Polycrisis Dispatch, 23 January: https://buttondown.com/polycrisisdispatch/archive/canadas-new-non-alignment/

Alan Beattie, “Carney’s new global order needs a huge shift in political will”, Financial Times, 22 January:  https://www.ft.com/content/5dcbc846-5f32-4076-909b-94b5ef87895c

Sarah Marsh and Elizabeth Pineau, “Europe's far right and populists distance themselves from Trump over Greenland”, Reuters, 22 January: https://www.reuters.com/world/europes-far-right-populists-distance-themselves-trump-over-greenland-2026-01-21/

The Rest is Politics (podcast), The real reason Trump wants Greenland, 21 January 2025: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJ0P-xkIQHY

Less than a year into Trump’s second term, his renewed push to acquire Greenland has escalated into a full-blown alliance crisis—complete with tariff threats against Denmark and other European backers, and a scramble for NATO unity. In (already) his second “emergency” episode of 2026 recorded solo on 18 January, Darren starts off by observing this episode doesn’t neatly fit neat orthodox models of international relations—it looks less like balancing or normal alliance bargaining and more like coercion and hierarchy politics, forcing Europe to weigh retaliation, endurance, and face-saving off-ramps. Given that, what kind of model(s) are useful?

Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Hannah Nelson and theme music composed by Rory Stenning.

Relevant links

Stacie Goddard and Abraham Newman. 2025. “Further Back to the Future: Neo-Royalism, the Trump Administration, and the Emerging International System.” International Organization 79(S1): S12–25. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0020818325101057

Joshua Keating, “Confused by the Trump administration? Think of it as a royal family.”, Vox, 6 Dec 2025: https://www.vox.com/politics/471070/trump-neoroyalism-monarchy

In an episode recorded just before Christmas, Darren interviews Janet Egan, Senior Fellow and Deputy Director of the Technology and National Security Program at CNAS, about AI policy and its implications for Australia. Janet (who started her career in the Australian government) frames the current AI landscape as a two-horse race between the US and China, given vastly asymmetric investment levels. She introduces “compute policy” as a tractable governance lever, explaining that the physical infrastructure required for AI—specialised chips, data centres, and energy—offers regulatable chokepoints unlike easily transferable data or algorithms. The US strategy focuses on scale and removing barriers to advancement, while China, constrained by export controls on advanced semiconductors, pursues a diffusion-oriented approach emphasising open-source models and practical applications.

Turning to Australia's recently released National AI Plan, Janet offers a mixed assessment. She praises the establishment of an AI Safety Institute and the acknowledgment that data centres matter, while noting the plan avoided overly restrictive regulation that could stifle investment. However, she argues the plan misses a significant opportunity: positioning Australia as a compute hub for frontier AI training. Australia’s renewable energy potential, available land, and skilled trades workforce make it attractive for data centre buildout, but copyright restrictions on training data remain a key barrier.

Janet argues that unlike critical minerals, AI does not lend itself to hedging between Washington and Beijing given its inherently dual-use nature and emerging evidence of bias in Chinese models. She highlights the UAE and UK as instructive cases—the former for ambitious state-led mobilisation, the latter for sophisticated thinking about AI sovereignty structured around supply resilience, value capture, and strategic influence. For Australia, she argues, meaningful participation in the AI supply chain would provide strategic leverage and a seat at the table where consequential decisions are being made.

Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Hannah Nelson and theme music composed by Rory Stenning.

Relevant links

Janet Egan (bio): https://www.cnas.org/people/janet-egan

Janet Egan, Spencer Michaels and Caleb Withers, “Prepared, Not Paralyzed:

Managing AI Risks to Drive American Leadership”, Center for New American Security, 20 Nov 2025: https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/prepared-not-paralyzed

Janet Egan, “Global Compute and National Security: Strengthening American AI Leadership Through Proactive Partnerships”, Center for New American Security, 29 July 2025: https://www.cnas.org/publications/reports/global-compute-and-national-security

Lennart Heim, Markus Anderljung and Haydn Belfield, “To Govern AI, We Must Govern Compute”, Center for New American Security, 28 March 2024: https://www.cnas.org/publications/commentary/to-govern-ai-we-must-govern-compute

Emanuele Rossi, “Undersecretary Helberg explains Pax Silica and the Indo-Pacific AI play” Decode 39, 17 December 2025: https://decode39.com/12841/undersecretary-helberg-explains-pax-silica-and-the-indo-pacific-ai-play/

Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI, “Artificial Intelligence Index Report 2025”, https://hai.stanford.edu/ai-index/2025-ai-index-report

Department of Industry, Science and Resources (Australia), National AI Plan, December 2025: https://www.industry.gov.au/publications/national-ai-plan

Helen Toner, “Rising Tide” (substack): https://helentoner.substack.com/

Lady Gaga, How Bad Do U Want Me (Official Audio): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nd_M9A5xFlY

To begin 2026, the Trump administration has once again served up a news story of immense implications, with a military intervention and seizure of Venezuela's President Maduro. In this episode, Darren talks through his initial reactions to this developing story. 

Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Hannah Nelson and theme music composed by Rory Stenning.

Darren is joined by returning guest Richard Maude to unpack what Australian foreign policy looks like in late 2025. The conversation centres on Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s recent AIIA speech, which Darren argues—mostly with Richard’s agreement—marks a clear evolution in Australia’s foreign policy doctrine. The traditional three pillars — alliance, region, and rules — have been replaced by a new framework, the "Four Rs": Region, Relationships, Rules, and Resilience. The discussion explores what this shift reveals about how Canberra sees the world today, and what it tells us about Australia’s strategic priorities as the international environment becomes more volatile.

Together, they assess how well the government is executing each of the “Four Rs” in practice — from strengthening ties across Southeast Asia and the Pacific, to managing the alliance with an unpredictable Washington, stabilising relations with Beijing, and linking foreign policy more overtly with domestic resilience. They ask whether Australia is being suitably ambitious in shaping the regional security environment, or whether it risks becoming over-focused on Southeast Asia at the expense of alliance leadership and broader coordination with partners like Japan, Korea and Europe.

Darren and Richard also grapple with Australia–China relations. Is Canberra being too cautious in public language — or sensibly risk-averse? Darren frames the question as whether the greater risk currently lies in under-reacting to the threat posed by China, or in over-reacting. And how should Australia manage economic dependence on China given the limits of diversification and the “iron laws” of trade? 

The fourth R is resilience, and they discuss whether tying domestic policy to foreign policy is a strength or a political trap. They consider how resilience language enables governments to justify hard economic choices, while also warning against overselling national security policy as economic strategy.

Finally, Darren and Richard look ahead to 2026. Richard nominates three global questions to watch closely: the trajectory of US–China relations, the fate of Ukraine, and whether anything remains of the liberal international project. Darren adds his own focal points: Australia’s critical minerals strategy, Europe’s struggle with Chinese economic leverage, and the political durability of Trump’s dominance ahead of the US midterms.

A wide-ranging episode on doctrine, diplomacy and domestic politics — and what it all means for Australia navigating a world that feels, as Richard once put it, "completely stuffed".

Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Hannah Nelson and theme music composed by Rory Stenning.

Relevant links

Richard Maude (bio): https://asiasociety.org/policy-institute/richard-maude

Penny Wong, “AIIA Gala Dinner Keynote Address”, 17 November 2025: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/speech/aiia-gala-dinner-keynote-address

Darren Lim and Hannah Nelson, “From Three Strands to Four Rs: The Evolution of Australian Foreign Policy”, Australian Outlook, 21 November 2025: https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/from-three-strands-to-four-rs-the-evolution-of-australian-foreign-policy/

Penny Wong, “Speech to the ANU National Security College “Securing our Future”, 9 April 2024: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/speech/speech-anu-national-security-college-securing-our-future

Allan Gyngell, Fear of Abandonment: Australia in the World since 1942: https://www.blackincbooks.com.au/books/fear-abandonment

Heather Smith, “Australia and Economic Cold War – Drifting into the New Paradigm”, AIIA 2025 National Conference Address, 17 November 2025: https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/australia-and-economic-cold-war-drifting-into-the-new-paradigm/

Penny Wong, TV interview, ABC Insiders (with David Speers), 16 November 2025: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/transcript/tv-interview-abc-insiders-0

Eli Hayes and Darren Lim, “Not every critical mineral is equal – and Australia’s policy should reflect this”, Lowy Interpreter, 10 November 2025: https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/not-every-critical-mineral-equal-australia-s-policy-should-reflect

Darren Lim and Nathan Attrill, “Australian debate of the China question: The COVID-19 case”, Australian Journal of International Affairs (2021): https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10357718.2021.1940094 (gated) or https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3856586 (ungated)

Jedediah Britton-Purdy and David Pozen, “What are we living through?”, Boston Review, 15 October 2025: https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/what-are-we-living-through/

Lachlan Strahan, The Curious Diplomat: A memoir from the frontlines of diplomacy (Monash University Publishing, 2025): https://publishing.monash.edu/product/the-curious-diplomat/

Nick Potkalitsky, “Where Should Student AI Literacy Live?”, Educating AI (Substack), 25 September 2025: https://nickpotkalitsky.substack.com/p/where-should-student-ai-literacy

Ethan Mollick, “The Best Available Human Standard”, One Useful Thing (Substack), 22 October 2023: https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/the-best-available-human-standard

Ethan Mollick, “15 Times to use AI, and 5 Not to”, One Useful Thing (Substack), 9 December 2024: https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/15-times-to-use-ai-and-5-not-to