John Garnaut in Washington: China is “manipulating” Australia

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The very calm and China knowledgeable John Garnaut has delivered Washington an unsettling message, via The Australian:

The powerful US House Armed Services Committee in Washington has been told by Malcolm Turnbull’s former adviser how China has sought to brazenly manipulate Australian society to ‘tilt the political and strategic landscape to its advantage’.

John Garnaut, who until recently was principal adviser on international affairs for Prime Minister and Cabinet, was invited by the committee to Washington to testify. The move was a sign of the growing awareness in Washington about Chinese interference in education, business, politics and media in both Australia and the US.

“The Chinese Communist Party manipulates incentives inside our countries in order to shape the conversation, manage perceptions and tilt the political and strategic landscape to its advantage,” Mr Garnaut told the committee.

“The modus operandi is to offer privileged access, build personal rapport and reward those who deliver. We know this is happening in universities, in business communities, in ethnic Chinese communities, in media and entertainment, and in politics and government.

“But wherever covert, coercive, or corrupting elements are involved — when legitimate and transparent forms of influence cross the line into harmful ‘interference’ — then we need to respond.”

He said shutting down this interference was “primarily a counterintelligence and law enforcement challenge — an enormous one.”

It is indeed and it requires a more comprehensive response than we’ve seen to date, though it is underway. If the CCP is going to use total soft power tactics to distort Australian democracy then it should be countered equally widely:

  • cut immigration;
  • police foreign buying of property properly;
  • enforce new codes of conduct for university freedoms;
  • anti-bribery legislation in all parliaments;
  • engage the US more heavily in broader regional institutions.
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About the author
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.