Centre for International Security Studies
Analysing security issues facing Australia, the Asia Pacific and the world
In a rapidly changing security environment we expect the unexpected and apply our expertise to regional conflicts, global events and shocks to the international order.
The Centre for International Security Studies was established in 2006, along with the Michael Hintze Chair of International Security, to produce innovative research and education programs on the enduring and emerging security challenges facing Australia, the Asia-Pacific and the world.
The centre takes a multidisciplinary approach to the study of international security and draws on a wide range of skills and expertise from academics, researchers and practitioners across the University and from around the world.
Our research informs debates and promotes engagement with the policy community, NGOs and the public. We work with organisations spanning policy and operations, uniquely positioning us to analyse and interpret the strategic implications of world events for governments, businesses and individuals.
Research and teaching at the Centre for International Security Studies covers six main areas: biosecurity, ecosecurity, gender security, geosecurity, infosecurity and regional security.
Disease-related events, biological weapons, unregulated population movements and changing demographic patterns pose constantly evolving challenges to security. Key amongst these is how national, regional and multilateral organisations and frameworks rapidly respond and adapt to biosecurity events.
We examine the following questions:
Our biosecurity research examines these challenges and produces policy-relevant outputs for Australia, the Asia-Pacific region and the global community.
Research Area Lead: Emeritus Professor Roy MacLeod (Interim)
Key academics: Honorary Professor Peter Curson
Ecosecurity focuses on the interrelationship between biosphere integrity and international security. Our research program is unique in that it cuts across and combines human, national and global levels of analysis to address the most pressing issues at the interface of ecology and security.
We examine the following questions:
Research Area Lead: Professor Susan Park
Key Academics: Associate Professor Jonathan Bogais, Associate Professor Charlotte Epstein, Honorary Associate Dr Peter Hayes, Dr Robert MacNeil, Professor David Schlosberg
It is impossible to understand war and peace without paying attention to gender, as both a site and a category of analysis, and how gender intersects with other relations of power. Drawing on the knowledge of our unique group of experts, the Centre initiates research into critical issues of gender, peace and security.
Research questions under investigation include:
Gender and security research asks critical questions, challenges easy assumptions, and seeks alternative solutions to global violence.
Research Area Lead: Professor Laura Shepherd
Key academics: Dr Caitlin Biddolph, Dr Christopher Neff
While war is not the only threat to international security, armed conflict is a critical and enduring challenge. Our geosecurity research examines the driving factors of political violence, such as natural resource competition, environmental disasters, political and civil conflict, developmental inequalities and technology races. We question the impact of these factors as triggers for armed conflict and challenges to peace-building.
Questions we seek to address include:
Our geosecurity research explores local, regional and global responses to issues emerging from the competition for natural resources, wealth and power.
Research Area Lead: Professor Sarah Phillips
Key academics: Dr Minglu Chen, Professor James Der Derian, Professor Justin Hastings, Honorary Associate Dr Peter Hayes, Emeritus Professor Roy MacLeod, Dr Robert Macneil, Professor Brendan O'Connor, Professor Susan Park, Dr Stuart Rollo, Professor Glenda Sluga, Dr Jayson Waters, Dr Thomas Wilkins
Digitised information, proliferating digital platforms, networked convergence and the timeless need to connect have changed our world. Technology-savvy global actors have harnessed this revolution to their advantage, while social media and a relentless news cycle transform local incidents into global events. Our hyperconnected world is precarious, made vulnerable by cyber attacks, negative synergies and quantum effects.
Our infosecurity research tackles the big questions presented by an information revolution:
The Centre works in collaboration with the School of Computer Science, the Sydney Cybersecurity Network and the Sydney Nano Institute to analyse and interpret technical and social issues presented by the latest stages of the information revolution.
Research Area Lead: Associate Professor Aim Sinpeng
Key academics: Associate Professor Jonathan Bogais, Dr Olga Boichak, Professor Charlotte Epstein, Professor John Keane, Honorary Associate Professor Simon Reay-Atkinson, Dr Jayson Waters
Regional security addresses a multitude of security issues at the local level. Trends and threats such as weapons of mass destruction, digital surveillance, the transborder flow of money, people and diseases, and complex media, criminal and terrorist networks, pose new challenges at the regional level. While these challenges exceed the capacities of individual states and international institutions, new regional institutions are emerging to provide security.
We examine the following questions:
Research Area Lead: Professor Justin Hastings
Key academics: Associate Professor Jonathan Bogais, Dr James Loxton, Dr Robert Macneil, Professor Adam Morton, Dr Christopher Neff, Professor Brendan O'Connor, Professor Sarah Phillips, Associate Professor James Reilly, Dr Stuart Rollo, Associate Professor Aim Sinpeng, Associate Professor David Smith, Emeritus Professor Colin Wight, Dr Thomas Wilkins
We host a large public events program. Whether it's a lecture on the geopolitics of the Indo-Pacific, a panel discussion on the security implications of quantum technologies, or a film screening about the global arms trade, CISS events are always exciting and informative.
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US Election 2024: What will it mean for Global Security?
Friday, 1 November 2024
Moderated by Stan Grant, featuring CISS experts in a discussion on the implications of the US election for international, regional, environmental and human security.
Watch the event on YouTube.
Project Q: War, Peace and Quantum Mechanics
Saturday, 20 July 2024
A screening of Project Q: War Peace and Quantum Mechanics in the Melbourne Documentary Film Festival. The culmination of a decade-long investigation, Project Q dives into the strange world of quantum theory, science, and technology, revealing its power to transform geopolitics. As university labs, big tech, and major powers race for quantum supremacy, Project Q asks who will win, what are the risks, and what will it mean for war and peace.
Location: Cinema Nova, 380 Lygon St, Carlton VIC 3053
Ruin Warfare: Weaponising Heritage from UNESCO to NATO
Thursday, 14 March 2024
International organisations including UNESCO, NATO, and the ICC now recognize that heritage violence is a persistent feature of modern conflict, posing a threat to human communities and global security. The protection, destruction, and manipulation of heritage (and by extension history) by state and non-state actors has become so commonplace in contemporary conflicts, that it is now framed as cultural heritage exploitation (CHX).
This lunchtime lecture by Professor Lynn Meskell (University of Pennsylvania) will outline how CHX is unfolding in India, for example, with the erasure of Muslim heritage, not dissimilar from actions taken by China toward its own Muslim minority, the Uighurs.
Understandably, reflections on the ethics of technology have tended to focus first and foremost on technology’s downstream consequences: the discrepant risks and harms that follow from innovation. Increasingly, however, analysts have come to see that distributive implications are built into technological design, well before it enters the market and people’s lives. In this talk, I will revisit the notion of “anticipatory governance” from a political standpoint. What might an ethics of anticipation look like with regard to some of today’s most celebrated technological breakthroughs?
Email: ciss@sydney.edu.au