The Japan – Australia Partnership in the Era of the East Asian Community – Can they Advance Together?

This paper aims to examine the implications of the rise of East Asian regionalism for the Australia-Japan partnership. In particular, it investigates whether both nations can sustain their partnership, which evolved around Asia Pacific regionalism over the last few decades, by exploring the upsurge of Japans interest in East Asian regionalism and examining characteristics of Australias foreign policy under the Howard government, which lacked a regionalist approach in its first three terms but has shown a keener interest in furthering relations with East Asian countries and promoting East Asian regionalism since late 2004.