Australia and Africa

This book offers analysis of Australias engagement with Africa, as well as the countrys rather unique status as a new actor and emerging country in Africa. With its empirical originality and comparative contribution, the book fills a gap in both the study of Africas global engagement with emerging countries, and in connection with Australias largely unknown engagement with African states. Australia has presented itself as Africas friend from the south, without any colonial baggage, and is interested in a long-term partnership for trade and development. In this context, Australia is only one of many new players seeking more intensive engagement with Africa since the end of the Cold War. At its core, the book argues that because of its largely unacknowledged flawed historical engagement with Africa, as well as the political partisanship driving its fickle and volatile contemporary engagement with the continent, Australia suffers from an inability to assess its strategic and long-term interests i.e., it doesnt know what it wants in or from Africa. This makes Australia a rather unique emerging player in Africa: while other 'new' actors' engagement with Africa is generally strategic, and driven to a large extent by a desire to secure resources and counter the influence of geopolitical rivals, Australias efforts with regard to Africa are more episodic and not about acquiring resources or countering its rivals. Hence, while immigration, globalization, trade, terrorism, and climate change continue to bring Africa and Australia closer together, Australias failure to understand its own interests continues to hamper its engagement with Africa.