Podcast
Australia in the World
Hosted by Darren Lim · EN
A discussion of the most important news and issues in international affairs through a uniquely Australian lens. Hosted by Darren Lim, in memory of Allan Gyngell.
16episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Ep. 178: The attack on Iran
Mar 200:35:34Tap to summarizeIn (yet another) emergency episode, Darren offers eight initial thoughts on the US and Israeli strikes on Iran and the killing of Ayatollah Khamenei. Inside Iran, the question is whether airpower and decapitation can deliver regime change when the historical record says they never have — though this case may be an outlier given how weakened the regime already was. Regionally, Iran's “drizzle” retaliation strategy is targeting Gulf states and depleting expensive US interceptors, while the munitions being consumed come directly at the expense of what the US would need in a Taiwan contingency. Globally, no country or institution has any agency to shape what happens next — and China may be the quiet winner simply by being predictable while Washington lurches between crises. On international order, Darren explores how US deterrence is simultaneously stronger on willingness but weaker on material capacity, and why the Venezuela-Greenland-Iran sequence is normalising a new and dangerous operating model for the hegemon. On Australia, he thinks the government made the right call. He finishes by asking what we're learning about Trump's emerging “anti-Powell Doctrine”, what the erosion of rules means for world politics, and what constraints — if any — exist on this new kind of American power. 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 Charles Clover, Neri Zilber and Abigail Hauslohner, “Military briefing: Iran’s new retaliation strategy”, Financial Times, 1 March: https://archive.md/R24HQ#selection-1700.1-1889.0 Michael Gordon and Shelby Holliday, “U.S. Races to Accomplish Iran Mission Before Munitions Run Out”, Wall Street Journal, 1 March: https://archive.md/IHG7H#selection-547.0-547.62 Eliot Cohen, “Trump rolls the iron dice”, The Atlantic, 28 Feb: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/02/trump-rolls-iron-dice-iran/686199/ Kyle Chan, “China is winning by waiting: How Beijing turns predictability into power”, Foreign Affairs, 27 Feb: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/china-winning-waiting Tanner Greer, "On bombing Iran", Scholar's Stage, 1 Mar: https://scholars-stage.org/on-bombing-iran/
Transcribe →Ep. 177: Tariffs, power, and the US Supreme Court
Feb 2700:25:39Tap to summarizeThe US Supreme Court has struck down the Trump administration’s use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose sweeping “Liberation Day” tariffs. This is a big deal! In this episode, Darren argues that the decision is not primarily a story about tariffs — important as they are — but about power. The Court has drawn a clear line around the President’s ability to declare an “emergency” and unilaterally impose across-the-board tariffs. While other tariff authorities remain in place, the removal of IEEPA as a rapid escalation tool represents a concrete institutional constraint on executive authority. What does that mean for Trump’s negotiating leverage? How does it change the international landscape — particularly ahead of a planned visit to Beijing? Why does this matter for Australia’s vision of regional order? Darren cannot avoid the bad news: heightened uncertainty, likely litigation, and the longer-term drift toward protectionism that this ruling will not reverse. But ultimately, this episode asks a bigger question: what actually constrains presidential power in the United States? And does this moment represent a small but meaningful crack in the aura of inevitability surrounding the current administration? 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.
Transcribe →Ep. 176: Davos, Greenland and Carney’s speech
Jan 2500:40:07Tap to summarizeA 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
Transcribe →Ep. 175: How should we model Greenland?
Jan 1800:35:42Tap to summarizeLess 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
Transcribe →Ep. 174: AI and policy, both foreign and domestic
Jan 1500:52:58Tap to summarizeIn 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
Transcribe →Ep. 130: Economic security, made in Australia
May 20, 2024Tap to summarizeRecent events in economic security (or, geoeconomics) have been dizzying, but exciting for Darren given this is his primary academic field. In Australia, the new budget delivered by the government plans over $20b of industry policy funding for a “Future Made in Australia”. Meanwhile in the US, the Biden Administration has sharply increased tariffs on Chinese goods focused on green energy. The US wants to cultivate domestic manufacturing, in part because it sees PRC dominance of green technology as a national security risk. This means there is a lot to discuss! In this episode Darren talks with Hayley Channer. who is the Director of the Economic Security Program with the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. Hayley has a diverse background having worked as an Australian Government official, Ministerial adviser, think tank analyst, and represented global non-profit organisations. Prior to her current role, Hayley was a Senior Policy Fellow with the Perth USAsia Centre and, amongst other accolades, was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship in 2022. This lengthy discussion covers the goals of economic security policy and the inherent trade-offs in this domain, particularly in the context of both Australia’s and the US’ emerging industrial policy efforts, as well as the problem of responding to economic coercion. Australia in the World is written, hosted, and produced by Darren Lim, with research and editing this episode by Walter Colnaghi and theme music composed by Rory Stenning. Relevant links Hayley Channer (bio): https://www.ussc.edu.au/hayley-channer Anthony Albanese, “A future made in Australia”, Speech, 11 April 2024: https://www.pm.gov.au/media/future-made-australia Jim Chalmers, “Economic security and the Australian opportunity in a world of churn and change”, Speech at Lowy Institute, 1 May 2024: https://ministers.treasury.gov.au/ministers/jim-chalmers-2022/speeches/address-lowy-institute-sydney Hayley Channer and Georgia Edmonstone, “What does ‘economic security’ mean to Australia in 2024?”, US Studies Centre Brief, 30 January 2024: https://www.ussc.edu.au/what-does-economic-security-mean-to-australia-in-2024 Lim, D. (2019). Economic statecraft and the revenge of the state. East Asia Forum Quarterly, 11(4), 31–32: https://eastasiaforum.org/2019/12/04/economic-statecraft-and-the-revenge-of-the-state/ Ferguson, Victor A., Darren J. Lim, and Benjamin Herscovitch. “Between Market and State: The Evolution of Australia’s Economic Statecraft.” The Pacific Review 36, no. 5 (September 3, 2023): 1148–80. https://doi.org/10.1080/09512748.2023.2200026 Victor A. Ferguson, Scott Waldron and Darren J. Lim (2022), “Market Adjustments to Import Sanctions: Lessons from Chinese Restrictions on Australian Trade, 2020-21”, Review of International Political Economy”, http://doi.org/10.1080/09692290.2022.2090019 Darren J. Lim, Benjamin Herscovitch, and Victor A. Ferguson, “Australia’s Reassessment of Economic Interdependence with China”, in Strategic Asia (2023): https://www.nbr.org/publication/australias-reassessment-of-economic-interdependence-with-china/ Leading (podcast), “Speaking Truth to Trump | Former Head of Trump’s Communications, Anthony Scaramucci”, 21 February 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juvfEZsZqUY&list=PL_6zDbB-zRef_M7eXuSLUlGnt7qk66hJq&index=9 Abhijit V. Banerjee, Esther Duflo, Good economics for hard times: Better answers to our biggest problems (2019): https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51014619-good-economics-for-hard-times (Goodreads page) Dani Rodrik, “Don’t Fret About Green Subsidies”, Project Syndicate, 10 May 2024: https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/green-subsidies-justified-on-economic-environmental-and-moral-grounds-by-dani-rodrik-2024-05
Transcribe →