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By John Garrick and Margaret McCuaig-Johnston
CIPS Policy Report, January 2023

• No Indo-Pacific country is closer to Canada in character and nature than Australia. Few countries are better suited in the Indo-Pacific region to collaborate and complement one another’s strengths. A high degree of trust is already built-in after many years as ‘Five-Eyes’ intelligence partners. Perhaps these factors explain why Australia was the first destination of the Executive Director tasked, at Global Affairs Canada in November 2019, with developing the country’s first Indo-Pacific Strategy.
• That Strategy was released after three years in consultation and development on November 27, 2022 to strong positive acclaim. Its strategic objectives are interconnected, notably to promote peace, resilience and security; expand trade, investment and supply chain resilience; invest in and connect people; build a sustainable and green future; and be an active and engaged partner in the Indo-Pacific. The Strategy also describes ways in which Canada has been engaging, and will continue to engage, constructively with other countries in the region including Japan, South Korea, India and ASEAN nations.
• Here we recommend five interrelated prongs to Indo-Pacific strategy which, if well-developed and implemented, should help Canadian and Australian policy frameworks to optimal effectiveness:
  • Extend diplomatic ties
  • Broaden and diversify economic relations
  • Deepen defence and security partnerships
  • Strengthen international assistance
  • Protect democratic values and respect for human right
• The challenge in the coming months and years will be for both countries to implement comprehensive Indo-Pacific Strategies that connect ground-level initiatives to broader opportunities and help positively reset the most difficult relationships where possible – to more cooperative, diplomatic tones rather than aggressive militaristic stances.

John Garrick is Research Fellow in Law at Charles Darwin University. He is a Supreme Court lawyer in Australia and was previously in private legal practice with a major Sydney law firm specialising in commercial law, Chinese commercial law reform and international comparative law. Dr Garrick has worked extensively in both legal practice and academia in Hong Kong, the Middle-East, North America and Australia and he is author and co-editor of a wide range of scholarly publications. His degrees are LLB (Hon 1, UTS), M.Soc Stud (Policy) (Sydney), and Ph.D (UTS).

Margaret McCuaig-Johnston is a Senior Fellow at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and a Senior Fellow with the Institute for Science, Society and Policy, both at the University of Ottawa, as well as a Board Member of the Canadian International Council (NCR), the Canada-China Forum, Human Rights Watch Canada, the forthcoming China Risks Institute, and a Policy Advisor to the Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project. Her research includes China’s human rights violations and technologies used in surveillance, as well as China’s innovation system. She was a Canadian public servant for 37 years, including as an Assistant Deputy Minister and holds an MA in International Relations focused on China, and an Honours BA in Political Economy.