While the centre’s focus is primarily on Australia and the Pacific, we conduct research on a number of other global aid and development issues, including state fragility and aid from emerging donors.

We also provide a platform for the discussion of broader global development issues through the Devpolicy Blog, our Mitchell Oration series, and at the annual Australasian Aid Conference.

Australasian AID Conference

The Australasian AID Conference, held in February each year in partnership with The Asia Foundation, has become an integral part of the Australian and regional aid calendar. The aim of the conference is to bring together researchers from across Australia, the Pacific, Asia, and beyond who are working on aid and international development policy (the AID in the conference title) to share insights, promote collaboration, and help develop the research community.

The 2022 AAC Speaker Series brought back some of our favourite speakers from the Australasian AID Conference. The speakers were Professor Eun Mee Kim, President of Ewha Womans University; Masood Ahmed, President of the Center for Global Development; Dr Donald Kaberuka, Chair of the Board of The Global Fund; Dr Nancy Birdsall, President Emeritus of the Center for Global Development; and Dr Lant Pritchett, Research Director of the RISE Programme and fellow at the London School of Economics.

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The Mitchell Oration

In 2012, the Mitchell Oration lecture series was created with support from the Harold Mitchell Foundation to provide a new forum at which the most pressing development issues can be addressed by the best minds and most influential practitioners of our time. With topics ranging from the challenges of aid dependency and economic reform in Africa to the Pacific and Indonesia’s new wave of economic change, this lecture series has established itself as one of the flagship events in the development arena.

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Devpolicy Blog

Through our partnership with The Asia Foundation, our blog features pathbreaking content on contemporary issues in Asian development.