The Intel

It’s remarkable that fragility has dropped lower on Australia’s foreign policy radar, given how it’s driven our strategic concerns since the 1990s. From 1999 to the mid-2010s, the so-called 'Arc of Instability’– from Indonesia through to Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Fiji – was the dominant framing for many commentators thinking about Australia’s near neighbours. Strategists worried that ‘balkanised’ and ‘broken-backed’ versions of these states would present security threats to Australia.

This was never unproblematic. Leaders in the Pacific found the framing alienating as, among other things, it incorrectly constructed their countries as more-or-less homogenous, while privileging Australian-centred threats. But there was truth in it. Issues of state effectiveness, weak economies and ungoverned spaces were and remain profoundly interlinked with the possibilities for geopolitical gamesmanship in the Pacific and Southeast Asia.

One of the landmarks of this era was the 2003–2017 Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands intervention. Looking back, RAMSI appears more vexed than ever. Just a few years after such an expensive, long-running intervention, the Solomon Islands’ political settlement looks shaky. Violence has flared in Honiara, and elite capture in the context of China-US-Australia geopolitical tensions looms. This outcome isn’t good for Australia and it’s tough to see how it’s good for Solomon Islanders. Beyond a clutch of specialist scholars there has been remarkably little reflection on how this has come to be. 

Australia shouldn’t excavate the Arc of Instability formulation. But if we want to support a near region that is safer and more prosperous for both our neighbours and Australia, perhaps we could usefully rediscover some concern for issues of fragility and peacebuilding.

As tensions rise across the Asia-Pacific, the old debate over whether foreign aid should promote development or be used as an often-ineffective tool of foreign relations has returned to centre-stage. Australia’s interests will be served well by taking a long-term approach, integrating efforts to mitigate conflict and tackle the causes of fragility into foreign policy and aid. 

Support for conflict resolution and associated reforms to tackle the causes of wars increased hugely after the end of the Cold War, contributing to a global decline in violent conflict. But more recently, security-led international engagement along with a narrow development focus on infrastructure have reduced interest in preventing conflicts even though the risks of further violence are rising as tensions ramp up globally.

Overwhelmingly domestic rather than international, conflict tensions in the Asia-Pacific sometimes engulf entire countries such as Myanmar although violence more often endures for decades in remote provinces where the central state is not trusted. If priority is given to building security ties with militaries and short-term alliances with leaders, less attention will be focused on addressing conflict and reducing fragility. Worse still, external support for militaries and security-first approaches may intensify violence and increase repression.

High-level reports quantify the immense economic and development returns to investment from conflict prevention. Aid can support growing capacities in governments and across civil society to resolve tensions through dialogue and conflict mitigation. This is not an externally motivated agenda: the endurance of democratic systems in much of the Asia-Pacific region through turbulent recent times, as well as strong support for peacebuilding both from the grassroots and among regional leaders, demonstrates the demand to end violent conflicts and promote responsive civil leadership.

 The capabilities and mechanisms to deliver assistance along these lines is the West’s unique selling point, not seeking to rival support for powerful elites and joining an infrastructure investment bidding war.

In a word, yes. If donors and partners aren’t thinking enough about factors of fragility, then they’re not serious about peace, stability or preventing conflict.

Societies that have experienced violent conflict, or are experiencing violence - such as Bougainville and the highlands of PNG, Solomon Islands, and Myanmar - develop deep-rooted and complex conflict challenges, including lingering social tensions, highly contested and unstable governance, and the proliferation of modern weaponry. Such conflict-affected regions tend to be more vulnerable to external actors who can further drive instability, including states and commercial interests.

This conflict complexity affects all aspects of development, such as political instability and local insecurity hindering aid delivery and economic development, and conflict-induced versions of masculinity and trauma driving higher levels of GBV and community violence. In turn, without a depth of conflict analysis and conflict sensitivity, well-intentioned development and security initiatives can further fuel conflict.

The world is seeing an increase in threats to peace and stability, with violence increasingly more fragmented and complex. The regions of primary focus for Australia (within the Indo-Pacific) are far from immune from such threats, be they from state responses to self-determination desires, and the overarching conflict effects of climate change.

In response, all major Indo-Pacific donors comparable to Australia (such as the USA, UK, and the EU) along with smaller contributors to the region (such as Canada, Ireland and Germany) have expert units focused on conflict, stability and political mediation. Units building the internal knowledge, external partnerships and iterative analysis to support their development, security and peacebuilding work.

If Australia is serious about its stated objective to advance an Indo-Pacific that is peaceful, stable, and prosperous, the formation of a peace and stability unit is an essential first step. This unit, beyond the necessary support and oversight to development programmes in conflict-affected regions, could ultimately enable Australia to retake Indo-Pacific leadership in addressing conflict and fragility.