Can Australia Act as a Middle Power Between the U.S. and China? Not Likely, says Dr. Sun Wanning

Editor’s Note

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent visit to Australia, shortly after his speech about the “ruptured” world order in Davos, has stimulated debates over whether middle powers can exercise greater agency in an increasingly fragmented international system. Canada and Australia face a similar strategic dilemma: both rely on the U.S. for security while seeking to profit from their economic engagement with China. This raises a central question: can countries in comparable positions meaningfully act as middle powers – being able to balance their relationships with both Washington and Beijing on their own terms?

In our conversation, Dr. Sun Wanning offers a largely pessimistic answer. Australia’s capacity to exercise independent middle-power agency is constrained at multiple levels of policymaking. At the level of ideas and expertise, the China policy ecosystem has become increasingly dominated by a nexus of security agencies, media, and think tanks that tend to favour more hawkish positions, sidelining traditionally trained China scholars. At the domestic level, highly competitive electoral politics make it difficult to sustain a stable and moderate consensus on China. At the strategic level, Australia’s position as a junior ally, shaped by an obvious power imbalance with the United States, means that alliance considerations consistently outweigh economic calculations potentially in favour of China. 

This interview was conducted by Dr. Yanchuan Liu and facilitated by Dr. Ye Xue.

Interview Highlights

• Increasingly Politicized Landscape of China Studies: Over the past two decades, the ecosystem of Australia’s China studies has shifted from a largely academic field to a highly politicized space characterized by a symbiosis of media commentators, think tanks, and security agencies.
  
  
• Shrinking Space for Nuanced Views: In a security-driven policy environment, traditionally trained scholars with extensive experience studying China are either marginalized or viewed with suspicion, while efforts in introducing nuances or more balance views to the public discourse struggle to gain traction.
  
  
• China as an Electoral Issue: China has increasingly become a domestic political subject in Australia, with parties from both sides of the aisle adjusting their rhetoric based on electoral incentives and political convenience.
  
  
• Tensions within the Liberal-National Coalition: Australia’s conservative Coalition contains competing constituencies: The Liberal Party’s urban base and the National Party’s rural voters, whose livelihoods remain closely tied to trade with China. While the Coalition has repeatedly adopted more hawkish rhetoric toward China, this internal division preserves momentum among its members to stabilize bilateral relations with China.
  
  
• Alliance Strategy vs. Economic Reality: Australia’s position as a junior ally to the U.S. and the obvious power imbalance that defines this bilateral relationship means that alliance-based considerations occasionally take precedence over Australia’s economic ties with China.
  
  
• The Limits of Middle Power Agency: A deeply entrenched fear of strategic abandonment by the US constrains Australia’s strategic flexibility and reinforces an alliance-centered policy orientation in the region, effectively limiting its capacity to exercise Middle Power autonomy.

The China Institute (hereafter TCI): Dr. Sun, thank you very much for agreeing to share your insights with us. We’d like to open this conversation with a question that simultaneously touches on your intellectual journey and the evolving relationship between China, Australia, and the U.S. Your CV suggests that, after completing your PhD in Australia, you spent a year visiting the State University of New York in 2005, when the guiding principle of Washington’s China policy was still engagement rather than competition. What was it like to be a China scholar in the U.S. back then? How does it compare with the current environment?

Dr. Sun: I was trained as a media scholar, and I specialize in political communication. My earlier work was on rural-urban migration in China. That kind of work mostly took an anthropological approach. So I had been a conventional academic researcher combining teaching, publishing, and research until three or four years ago, when my university—the University of Technology Sydney (UTS)—asked me to join ACRI, a university-funded research institute. While in this role, I geared toward more contemporary issues such as Australia-China relations.

To answer your question about my observations of China studies 20 years ago, I think either in the U.S. or in Australia, the world 20 years ago looked very different. To start with, there was a lot of synergy and a lot of connection between China studies in Australia and China studies in the U.S., We saw a lot of academics who were trained in the U.S. and then found jobs in Australia.

Back then, I would say even up to ten years ago, the field of China studies was not politicized. People were just studying China as if they were studying any other area of the world: Get the training, learn the language, do the field work, write books, write journal articles, write monographs, and that's it. Beyond China experts in academia and a few foreign correspondents who called themselves China hands or China watchers, there was not much discussion about China in the public domain.

I think things only started to change about a decade ago, when politics and China studies became intertwined. Since then, China studies have been much more polarized and politicized, with some parts becoming quite sensitive, politically sensitive. In the public domain, you see something about China every day.

TCI: The landscape of Australia’s China discussions definitely feels more diverse today. Who
are the main participants in these discussions?

Dr. Sun: Everybody is talking about China, and everybody is a China expert now. To start with, media journalists are talking about China. Once upon a time, you had a few foreign correspondents in China. They went there, brushed up their language skills, and stayed for two or three years. Now, a lot of onshore journalists and editors who write about international affairs have developed a bit of a reputation for covering China. All of a sudden, they're referred to as China experts.

Closely related to the media are think tanks. Speaking of them, my institute is a strange creature because it is within a university. We're supposed to produce journal articles. So our capacity to engage with the public is still limited because we're funded by the university,which is always facing budget challenges.

Yet there are other think tanks that are not necessarily China-focused, but they nevertheless spend a lot of time talking about it. Because China as a topic has been securitized, a lot of security think tanks are keeping a very close eye on China. The Australia Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) is technically about strategic policy, but they do spend much time researching on China. The Lowy Institute is a foreign policy think tank, and China is also a big part of their work.

In addition to the media and the think tanks, we've got the security establishment: the people in the security agencies. Quite a few of them also make comments on China, regardless of their expertise. They're usually more cited because the media consider them to be the “go-to-people” for quotes about China. The relationship between the three actors—the security establishment, the media, and think tanks—is symbiotic. They are working very closely with each other.

Then come the academics who are usually within the universities. They are like what I said about China experts 20 years ago: people who just quietly do their own research. You would think that they would be doing well because of the huge demand for knowledge and information about China. But, ironically and tragically, it is not the case. There is a tendency to think that China specialists might have spent too much time on China to view it in an untainted manner, or that they don't know enough about Australian current affairs and geopolitics. I think there is sometimes an attempt to either dismiss or openly discredit China studies.

To give you an example, a security expert who is not a China expert once made this argument in Australia’s public domain: Australian universities need to build up the nation’s expertise on Chinese politics, but we need to train “homegrown” experts. There is distrust in China specialists who received training or have spent a lot of time in China, regardless of where they come from.

TCI: We noticed that in addition to producing academic research, you are a regular commentator on Australia-China relations through Crikey, a non-academic outlet. What prompted you to engage in the China debate, despite all the headwinds you have described?

Dr. Sun: That's a really good question. Not everybody, not every academic, wants to do that, nor do their universities support them. I talk with my colleagues all the time about why we're doing this. We're definitely not in the mainstream and definitely not in the majority. If you look at the impact we were making, we tried very hard to inject some nuance and complexity to reduce the heat between the two nations, but at the end of the day, I'm not really sure how much impact we have achieved in terms of informing public opinion.

It also comes at personal costs because unless you are a vocal critic of the Chinese government, you are likely to be portrayed in a number of nefarious ways. You could attract criticisms and personal attacks for saying “hang on, that's not all there is to it, things are more complicated; this is what I know, and this is what I think.” Sometimes I do feel quite despondent.
Why do I do this?

I think the answer still lies in the intellectual drive to say, “hang on, we need to think through this issue.” Coming from a background in media and culture studies, I was trained to critically analyze discourses. I have the intellectual tools to engage with potentially problematic arguments to at least put my perspectives on them.

This goes back to my earlier comment on why the media tend to favor non-academics for quotes about China. Often the media come to you and ask for a straight answer: yes or no, do you support a position or not? And academics say, “oh, well, it's more complicated.” Then you run the risk of turning the media off. We tend to be overly wishy-washy for them because we are inclined to look at the gray areas and are reluctant to give them a quick line that they can quote.

China in Australian Domestic Politics: Electoral Incentives and Party Division

TCI: Australian politics is dominated by two camps, the center-left Australian Labor Party and the center-right Liberal-National Coalition. In your recent reflection on Australia-China relations, you identified—in agreement with several other Australian observers—the Liberal-National Coalition’s hawkish campaign language about China as one of the contributors to its defeat in the 2025 election, because this strategy backfired in divisions that host large Chinese communities. We know that the Coalition had used similarly hawkish campaign messages in 2022 and lost to the Australian Labor Party. Why did the Coalition repeat a strategy that has proven counterproductive? Is this simply a political miscalculation?

Dr. Sun: I have a very, very quick answer for you: Yes.

In 2022, the Coalition thought it could appeal to conservative voters with its hawkish rhetoric about China. They operated on this premise and failed miserably in 2022.

They learned a lesson. Between 2022 and 2025, the Coalition was actually doing quite okay. Coalition candidates were very careful with their rhetoric. They made all kinds of friendly gestures toward Chinese communities by going to Chinatowns, shaking hands, and eating dumplings, until the electoral competition became extremely heated.

The Coalition needed to score whatever points it could reach. Not only did its message about China change, but everything else became more extreme. In that moment of desperation, a Coalition politician went on television and, while sparring with her opponent, called election volunteers of Chinese origin spies, setting back all the efforts the Coalition had made in softening its stance on China and the Chinese communities. That was very unwise.

Chinese Australians account for 5.5% of the population. It is not big, but big enough to form a critical mass. Furthermore, our compulsory voting system, which Canada does not have, encourages political engagement. When people walk up to the booths, they are prompted to think about which party feels closer to them.

TCI: There is a theoretical explanation of the Coalition’s behavior in political science known as “issue ownership.” It describes a tendency for political parties to campaign on issues where they have a reputation for being more capable than their opponents. The Coalition, as we know, has always portrayed itself as more competent in safeguarding Australian national security than the Australian Labour Party. When China is perceived as a threat, it is not surprising that the Coalition assumes a more hawkish position and makes national security a more salient topic in public debates. This strategy, if it works, may be effective in pressuring political rivals to take the same policy positions.

Dr. Sun: Yes, you've got a more dignified explanation of the Coalition’s choice. I think the short answer is the Coalition was unwise. The longer answer is it was trying to play up this message about national security that “we are qualified defenders” of Australia.

As the Coalition’s principal rival, Labor is indeed walking a very tight rope because it is scared of being seen as weak on national security. In reality, there is practically no daylight between the Coalition and Labor as far as China is concerned. The only difference exists at the rhetorical level.

TCI: We have a related question about the Coalition’s position on China. As Australia’s largest trading partner, China buys large amounts of food and raw materials produced by Australians who may be represented by the Coalition. Did these economic interests provide any check on the Coalition’s hawkish rhetoric? This seeming conflict—between conservative parties which tend to be China hawks and their supporters whose livelihoods benefit from exports to China—potentially generalizes to other middle powers.

Dr. Sun: That sounds like a paradox, but it's actually easy to explain. The Coalition consists of the National party and the Liberal Party, who have different constituencies. The support base for the National Party is rural, whereas the support base for the Liberal Party consists of conservative urban residents. Rural supporters of the National Party care more about whether Australian beef, red wine, and barley could go to China than urban supporters of the Liberals. So that is why, within the Coalition, the shadow minister for trade is from the National Party.

Even though the Coalition as a collective has been hawkish toward China, it has someone inside who says, “oh, we need to engage with China.” The Liberal agenda and the National agenda do not always align, which is why there have been two threats of divorce.

Middle Power Between Washington and Beijing: Australia’s Strategic Conundrum Between Strategic Alliance and Economic Ties

TCI: Let’s turn our attention to the choices Australia can make as a middle power. So far, our discussion about Australia’s policy toward China has been rooted in domestic politics, particularly the pressure to win elections. However, you have hinted at an international factor as well. In your keynote speech to the Chinese Studies Association of Australia’s Conference in December 2025, you made the following observation in the concluding remarks: “America’s China threat centres on the rivalry between two superpowers; Australia’s China threat, by contrast, reflects Australia’s struggle over its difficult position of being caught between China and the USA.” Could you please elaborate on how the U.S. shapes Australia’s interaction with China?

Dr. Sun: Australia's relationship with China is invariably shaped and complicated by our relationship with the U.S. On one hand, unlike Canada, Australia is much more reliant on China on trade such that we are more economically vulnerable. On the other hand, the U.S. has been Australia's security partner—not only a partner but a senior or dominant player. The so-called Western alliance lurks behind how Australia conducts its relationship with China. For Australia, China is no longer solely in the domain of international news. Rather, it is intricately implicated in Australia’s domestic politics, not only in political and security aspects but also in trade, education, and everything.

The point I was making in that speech is that, for the U.S., the China threat is more straightforward: The U.S. didn’t expect China to develop so quickly, and now it laments the engagement strategy that seems to have empowered China to become a rival. China is simply a competitor.

By contrast, Australia faces an entirely different picture. It's a long distance away from China. It’s such a small potato in the Chinese imagination of the world. I don't really think China is going to pay much attention to us. Yet we trade heavily with China. Some people just scratch their heads and ask, why do we adopt all this hawkish China rhetoric, which conflicts with our own economic interests?

Simultaneously, Australia is closely aligned with the U.S. on the political and security fronts. If we look at international relations from the psychological point of view, as some people have done, Australia’s behavior could be explained by the theory of fear of abandonment.

TCI: In international relations, fear of abandonment plays a prominent role in the study of alliance politics. Allies worry about each other’s commitment, particularly when the alliance is severely asymmetric. Simultaneously, allies experience fear of entrapment, that is, unwanted involvement in someone else’s trouble. The two types of fear involve a tradeoff: Junior allies may choose to double down on their relationship with a dominant power to reduce their fear of abandonment, but doing so inevitably ties them closer to the dominant power’s agenda, thereby heightening fear of entrapment.

Dr. Sun: Yes. As an Asia-Pacific island country of European origin, Australia has an urge for an external protector. Initially, Australia depended on the UK. When we couldn’t do so anymore, we turned to the U.S. We are so closely aligned with the U.S. that we are known as the U.S.'s deputy sheriff in the Asia-Pacific. This mentality is so entrenched that as the tensions between China and the U.S. persist, Australia acts against its own economic interests and still cannot see itself completely outside that geopolitical framework.

The other middle powers, such as France and Germany, also trade with China, but they may not feel as much pressure to align with the U.S. as we do.

TCI: Yes, and it naturally transitions to our last question. Prime Minister Carney is traveling to Australia in the wake of his call for a coalition of middle powers, but our dialogue has implied that Australia’s challenges in handling China and the U.S. differ in kind and intensity from Canada’s. How can the two states collaborate?

Dr. Sun: I'm actually writing an article for Crikey as we speak now, just on that. Australian journalists have written a lot about Carney’s Davos speech. I think he will say that both Australia and Canada are middle powers and that we should band together to be strong. Yet I don't really see a viable alternative for Australia. Canada is definitely trying to forge a coalition of middle powers, but how much agency you have as a middle power is not just about building a coalition; it’s also about your ability to absorb pushback from the great powers.

TCI: Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us. We hope you enjoyed it because we certainly did.

Dr. Sun: I did! Thank you.