Episodes over the past decade—including China's trade measures against Australia and Japan, Russia's manipulation of European gas supplies, and the tightening of global controls over critical minerals—demonstrate how economic levers are being used to impose costs and reshape incentives without crossing traditional thresholds of conflict. This has included for the purposes of coercing nations into tolerating military aggression, cyber-attacks and foreign interference, or particularly in the case of China also creating monopolitistic dependencies. More recently, the US has employed overt economic instruments, such as tariffs, as tools of strategic leverage and industrial policy—underscoring not an equivalence of intent or method, but the extent to which the use of markets for geopolitical ends is becoming embedded across the international system.
Australia isn't starting from scratch in responding to these market realities, with substantial foundations already in place. Australia's challenge isn't necessarily creating new instruments, nor simply coordinating disparate capabilities across government departments, agencies or sectors of the economy. Rather, the task is to embed deeper integration and fusion of the tools and capabilities that already exist.
This report argues that doing so requires strengthening the connective tissue between policy, intelligence, economic and security functions so that information flows more freely, preparedness is built collectively, and joint capabilities can be brought to bear under pressure. In practice, this means a system better able to anticipate pressure, absorb shocks and align economic and security decision-making in more ways that reinforce Australia's long-term resilience—while operating at speed and across multiple fronts concurrently.
Ultimately, in a system as complex and contested as today's global economy, this report suggests that success depends on clear strategy, disciplined escalation thresholds and integrated decision-making. When nations fail to align intent, tools and execution, they do more than miss opportunities—they risk ceding ground by default. The recommendations set out in this report offer Australia a way to integrate the strengths it already has—its institutions, regulations, alliances and industrial strengths—into a genuinely national capability for economic statecraft, better allowing Australia to act in time, with purpose, and on its own terms.
