Strategic & Defence Studies Centre

One of the world’s foremost experts on China and Northeast Asia’s strategic affairs and international relations, Professor Bates Gill, has joined Australia’s leading university-based think tank, the ANU Strategic and Defence Studies Centre (SDSC).  

Professor Gill has a 25-year career in international affairs as a scholar, policy advisor, institution-builder, and active global citizen. He will take up the newly established role of Professor of Asia-Pacific Studies at SDSC.

First travelling to China in 1986 and making more than 60 working trips since the early 1990s, Professor Gill was recently named by the Chinese Diplomatic Academy as among the top 10 American China watchers.

"I am honoured by this appointment and the opportunity to work with ANU colleagues--the greatest concentration of Asia-Pacific expertise in the English-speaking world,” said Professor Gill.

"This is a great chance to return to my long-time professional passion and expertise of interpreting strategic developments in the Asia-Pacific and especially regarding China.

"The Asia-Pacific is the world's most dynamic region with a strategic future of enormous importance to Australia and the world.  All the better to follow that dynamic in the region itself and to do so from the region's premier institution for Asia-Pacific studies."

Professor Gill has a long record of research and publication on international and regional security issues, including arms control, non-proliferation, peacekeeping and military-technical development. This work has resulted in more than 140 publications, including books, monographs, chapters, journal articles, essays, magazine columns and opinion pieces, and research-related travel to more than 50 countries.

SDSC Head Professor Brendan Taylor said that he was excited to have one of the world’s most important thinkers on these issues join the team.  

“This appointment is key to continuing the Centre’s long history on leading research, debate and engagement with the region and the world’s major strategic challenges and questions,” said Professor Taylor.

“Over the course of his distinguished career Bates' work has appeared in a number of prestigious outlets, including Foreign Affairs (four times), Asian Survey, The Washington Quarterly and Survival, to name just a few. Bates has also raised approximately US$15 million in research funding for the various institutes and programs that he has worked at over the past two decades.

“He wil make a significant contribution to the Centre and its future, particularly as it celebrates its 50th anniversary.”

Professor Michael Wesley, Director of the ANU Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs said, "We are delighted to appoint Bates to this role and welcome a China and strategic affairs specialist of his world-class calibre to ANU and the Bell School. This further solidifies the School's leading position in Asia-Pacific studies."  

Professor Gill received his PhD in Foreign Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson Department of Government and Foreign Affairs, University of Virginia, USA.  In recognition of his accomplishments, he was inducted in to the Johns Hopkins University Society of Scholars in 2007.  He is also recipient of the Royal Order of the Commander of the Polar Star, the highest award bestowed upon foreigners by the Swedish monarch, for his contributions to Swedish interests. 

Dr Gill is also a Director of China Matters, a Sydney-based strategic advisory and public policy initiative.  From 2012 to 2015 he was the Chief Executive Officer of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney.