Australia, APEC, and the Politics of Regional Economic Integration

For Australia, APEC represents an important step in its attempts to become politically and economically integrated with the Asia Pacific region. Indeed, Australian politicians and diplomats have attempted to set the agenda for APEC and they have achieved some notable successes. But developments to date have been in a large part due to a fortunate combination of circumstances, and it is by no means obvious that either the rhetoric or the objectives underpinning both APEC and Australian policy will be fulfilled.