Jane is a former Australian diplomat and foreign policy expert who brings decades of on-the-ground experience to explain how global events unfold and why they matter.
Jane’s work connects history, strategy and lived diplomatic experience to help audiences make sense of today’s rapidly shifting international landscape.
Today, Jane brings that perspective into broader conversations. She contributes to media, speaks at public forums and works with organisations and professionals who need to understand the forces shaping global events.
Her approach is grounded in practice, drawing on decades inside government and diplomacy to connect current events with the deeper context that explains them.
Over a career spanning more than thirty years, Jane served across Europe, the United States and the Indo-Pacific, including four ambassador-level postings. Her work placed her alongside political leaders and senior decision-makers, often in countries navigating conflict, authoritarian systems and complex security environments.
This experience gives Jane a perspective rarely seen publicly. She has been part of how diplomacy operates behind closed doors, where outcomes are shaped through negotiation, judgement and compromise, often under pressure and without clear answers.
MAKING SENSE OF THE WORLD
A core part of Jane’s work is making international affairs understandable without oversimplifying them.
Diplomacy can often feel opaque or overly technical, yet the issues at stake such as security, conflict, alliances and cooperation all shape the world we live in. Jane focuses on explaining what sits behind diplomatic language, why leaders frame issues the way they do, and how many of today’s geopolitical challenges are rooted in long-standing dynamics rather than sudden change.
Today, Jane is a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and a member of the United States Studies Centre’s Women in the Alliance Advisory Group. She contributes to these and other advisory boards and professional networks focused on security, diplomacy and international cooperation.
Based between Canberra, Sydney and Seoul, she remains closely connected to international networks across the Indo-Pacific, Europe and the United States.
Alongside her government career, Jane has worked across the non-government and university sectors, including with organisations such as Oxfam and on overseas aid and development programs in the Pacific and South Asia. These experiences have shaped her view of how policy operates in practice, particularly the gap that can exist between strategy on paper and outcomes on the ground.
