Patrick Köllner

Explaining Sender–Receiver Gaps in Signalling: Australia’s ‘Pacific Step-up’ and Solomon Islands’ Multi-Alignment

British Journal of Politics and International Relations | 2024


  • Abstract

    Amidst growing strategic competition, regional powers have intensified their engagement with Pacific Island Countries (PICs). This article examines Australia’s ‘Pacific Step-up’, a signature foreign policy initiative of the Scott Morrison government (2018‒2022), from a signalling perspective. Through the Step-up, Australia sought to affirm its resolve to be partner of choice for PICs. This was not cheap talk but led Canberra to invest substantially in its ties with the region. Despite this and significant prior Australian engagement leading to a bilateral security pact, Solomon Islands’ government signed an additional security agreement with China in 2022. How can we explain this sender–receiver gap? I argue that close attention to the agency of domestic actors on the receiver side and the context in which such agency occurs – in this case an extended history of insecurity in the Pacific country – provides us with analytical leverage when examining concrete instances of signalling.

    Journal

    British Journal of Politics and International Relations

    Signalling and Perception in Australia’s “Pacific Step-up”

    Conference | 21/06/2023 - 23/06/2023

    Signalling and Perception in Australia’s “Pacific Step-up”

    British International Studies Association Annual Conference 2023, Hilton, Glasgow Organisers: British International Studies Association Prof. Dr. Patrick Köllner (Speaker)

    At the annual conference of the British International Studies Association (BISA), Patrick Köllner discusses Australia's Pacific policy under the Morrison government (2018-2022) from a foreign-policy signalling perspective.

    Signalling and Perception in Australia’s “Pacific Step-up”

    Department of Politics | 01/03/2023

    Signalling and Perception in Australia’s “Pacific Step-up”

    Organiser: Department of Politics, University of Otago Prof. Dr. Patrick Köllner (Speaker)

    Patrick Köllner addressess the issue of signalling in Australia's Pacific policy under the Morrison government at a departmental seminar of the University of Otago in New Zealand.

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