Strategies for Middle Powers: Lessons from the G20

There is a general consensus that the existing international architecture across a range of policy domains is out-dated. World leaders themselves have acknowledged that international organisations, such as the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and International Energy Agency, need to be reformed to reflect the rising power of the BRIC countries—Brazil, Russia, India and China. In a multipolar environment, power is more diffuse and the attributes traditionally associated with middle powers like Australia – such as convening, agenda setting, and coalition building – could, if mobilised, provide significant power to shape the international system. Australia’s presidency of the G20 in 2014 provides an excellent opportunity to re-consider the role of middle powers in a multipolar world and the strategies they employ.

Dr Christian Downie is a fellow and the higher degree research convenor in the School of Regulation and Global Governance at The Australian National University. He was previously a vice chancellor’s postdoctoral fellow at the University of New South Wales. Christian has worked as a foreign policy advisor to the Australian Government’s Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and a climate policy advisor to the Department of Climate Change. Christian holds a PhD in international relations and political science from the Australian National University, having graduated from the University of Sydney with first class honours in economics. He has spent time teaching or researching at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the London School of Economics and Political Science and the University of Chulalongkorn, among others, and he has worked in policy think tanks in Canberra and Washington D.C. His first book, The Politics of Climate Change Negotiations, was published in 2014. Christian is also the author of more than 20 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters and more than 40 policy, conference and opinion pieces.