PRC Overseas Political Activities: Risk, Reaction and the Case of Australia by Andrew Chubb

Author:Andrew Chubb [Chubb, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: International Relations, European, Political Science, World, General
ISBN: 9781000520736
Google: 91dBEAAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 59140502
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2021-09-06T00:00:00+00:00

III. RISKS OF REACTION: AUSTRALIA'S EXPERIENCE WITH AGGREGATION

Chapter II illustrated the varied risks that overseas political activities of the CCP and its supporters have presented to liberal democracies, particularly those with multicultural societies. These can be understood as the risks of inaction. But the risks of responding to these challenges also demand careful consideration. Australia offers an example of public policy responses based on the aggregation approach that addresses this array of issues primarily as a matter of national security. This may have helped to mobilise rapid legislative action and rally other liberal democracies to action. However, as this chapter argues, Australia’s experience also illustrates major drawbacks to the aggregation-based approach.

Canberra’s efforts to counter PRC political activities have been hailed – and promoted – internationally as a pioneering model to follow.1 In February 2018, then US Assistant Secretary of Defense Randy Schriver said Australia had ‘done us a great service by publicising much of this activity and then taking action’.2 National Endowment for Democracy Vice President Christopher Walker testified to a US Congressional hearing that European states should ‘learn from countries, such as Australia, that are farther along on the learning curve in dealing with China’s sharp power’.3 The UK and Singapore’s foreign ministries have flagged intent to study Australia’s legislative response as they formulate their own policies to counter PRC interference.4 Yet besides the PRC propaganda organs’ shrill denunciations of Australia’s responses as ‘racist’ and ‘paranoid’, they have so far not been subjected to focused critical scrutiny outside the country.

On close inspection, Australia’s response has left some of the most impactful PRC activities unaddressed, and it remains unclear if the legislated expansions in the power of national security agencies have warranted the associated diminishments in civil liberties. This chapter focuses on three interrelated problems in Australia’s aggregative response. First, drawing together diverse issues into a wide-ranging national security threat produced a highly charged public discourse that has at times veered into alarmism and ethnic profiling. This has helped the CCP appeal to the loyalties of ethnic Chinese in Australia and fanned xenophobia in the community, harming social cohesion and ultimately national security. Second, legislation rushed through parliament during this period of agitated public discourse has been less effective in countering PRC political interference than expected, while carrying significant costs to civil liberties. Third, national security agencies have become increasingly involved in the provision of public policy information and the protection of diaspora communities’ civil liberties, tasks for which such agencies are not typically well suited.

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