Ordering Oceania's Crowded Oceanscape For Maritime Security Cooperation

YCAPS is excited to announce our next event in Tokyo. This event will feature Dr. Genevieve Quirk who will lead us in a talk on Oceania's Crowded Oceanscape.

Competition for strategic influence in Oceania among external and metropolitan powers is intensifying. This presentation outlines how these powers contribute to the ‘crowded and complex’ maritime security oceanscape of Oceania. External powers enhance regional capabilities to surveil, defend, and protect the integrity of the Pacific Islands’ vast Exclusive Economic Zones. However, the increased external presence now challenges traditional alliances, marked by the imminent deployment of Quad-at-Sea Ship Observer Missions, AUKUS partners’ nuclear-powered submarines, and the addition of Chinese Coastal Guard vessels and US Navy vessels to regional fishery surveillance. In this modern maritime theatre, this presentation outlines Oceania's emerging role in great power competition under their 'Indo-Pacific' strategic framing. It introduces the Pacific States’ strategic counter-framing as a ‘Blue Pacific Ocean Continent’ and foreign policy commitment to ‘act as one’ diplomatic bloc. The presentation concludes by examining a new Partnership Mechanism designed to strengthen the centrality of the Pacific Islands Forum and improve oversight, thereby reducing overlaps, duplication, and conflictive activities to better order maritime security cooperation.

YCAPS is glad to partner with Temple University Japan to deliver this opportunity. Robert Dujarric of Temple University Japan will co-moderate this event.

Please Bring a photo ID upon reception.

Please use this link to RSVP for in-person attendence.

Location:

Temple University Japan Campus, Room 405

1-14-29 Taishido, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo

Map

Speaker:

Genevieve Quirk BSc (UQ), DULF (UParisIII-Sorbonne), MEnvLaw(ANU), PhD (UOW) is a Research Fellow on Pacific Maritime Security Cooperation at the University of Adelaide. Her PhD at the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security explored the evolution of regional ocean governance and diplomacy by Pacific States over 75 years. Dr Quirk’s publications examine the governance architecture implementing the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea focusing on the ecological security of the Indo-Pacific. Genevieve is on the editorial board of the journal Marine Policy, an East West Centre Visiting Fellow, EarthSystem Governance Research Fellow and a member of the IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law. Dr Quirk joined the Australian delegation to the UN in relation to SDG14 and the High Seas Biodiversity Treaty and Track 1.5 talks on maritime security. In Brussels, Dr Quirk worked as a Policy Advisor on ocean governance reform in the European Union. Previously, she held the position of Lecturer at the University of Paris II (Pantheon-Assas) for three years whilst also consulting to UNESCO.

Cost: Free of charge

Moderators: Jeff Mazziotta, YCAPS Activities Coordinator and Robert Dujarric, Temple University Japan

Format: This event will be off-the-record. Questions are encouraged.

Registration: Required via this link