I first became interested in Asian political and strategic affairs during my Bachelors studies in Politics at the University of Waikato in the early 1980s during which I took courses on the politics and foreign policies of a number of regional countries including China and Japan. I remember very fondly an Honours course which looked at various attempts to apply Lenin’s theory of colonial revolution to Asia. I also recall preparing an essay on China’s historical view of international relations and becoming fascinated with the tributary system centred on the Middle Kingdom.

My exposure to Asian security affairs received a tremendous boost when I travelled to the Australian National University in 1988 under a New Zealand Ministry of Defence Freyberg scholarship to undertake a Masters degree with the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre (SDSC). This programme included a core course on Asia-Pacific security featuring a host of experts on Asian security affairs and my fellow students came from all parts of the region.

Many of the issues covered in that degree have remained with me as continuing areas of interest. My current job as Director of Studies in the SDSC has seen me teach a core course on Asia-Pacific security challenges, supervise a number of research students on Asian security issues, and introduce an elective course which investigates strategic concepts in terms of their applicability to Asian security challenges. I am thrilled to count among my colleagues at the ANU a great number of scholars for whom Asia is a core research focus and to have worked alongside a number of them for a recent book on Strategy and Security in the Asia-Pacific which Desmond Ball and I recently published with Allen and Unwin.

Robert Ayson

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