New Director for Centre for Strategic Studies

New Director for Centre for Strategic Studies

Victoria University’s independent think tank in strategic studies will gain one of Australasia’s top scholars in the field next year.

Dr Robert Ayson, BSocSci(Hons) (Waikato), MA (ANU), PhD (London), has been appointed Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies, commencing on 11 January 2010.

The new Professorial position was created on the recommendation of a recent review by an expert panel chaired by Victoria’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), and also including the Secretaries of Foreign Affairs and Defence.

Victoria University Vice-Chancellor Pat Walsh has welcomed the appointment, noting that “Dr Ayson is a scholar of distinction whose research interests mesh well with the Centre for Strategic Studies and the Strategic Studies teaching programme.”

Dr Ayson is currently Senior Fellow and Director of Studies, Graduate Studies in Strategy and Defence at the Australian National University, where he teaches Strategic Concepts. His research interests centre on the relationship between strategic ideas and strategic policy. He is an authority on the Nobel Prize winning work of the American strategic theorist Thomas Schelling, and is currently undertaking a study of Hedley Bull's strategic thinking. He is also a Chief Investigator for an Australian Research Council Linkage Project on Australia's Nuclear Choices. Dr Ayson has also written on security issues involving Asia's great powers, Australian strategic policy towards Asia, and the future of the nuclear non-proliferation regime.

About the Centre for Strategic Studies
Victoria University’s Centre for Strategic Studies is an independent national think tank, founded in 1993 with the task of sustaining levels of awareness and understanding within New Zealand about the external environment in which the nation must operate in the 21st Century.

The Centre's focus is the Asia-Pacific region. It addresses matters of national security and defence, conflict resolution, arms control and disarmament. It also examines the strategic implications of political, economic, social and industrial issues, as well as global issues such as human rights, the environment and sustainable development.
http://www.victoria.ac.nz/css/index.aspx

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