Anthony Milner (historian)

Anthony Crothers Milner[1] AM is an Australian historian of Southeast Asia – concerned primarily with the history of ideas – and a commentator on Australia-Asia relationships. His writings on Malay history and society – and the history of Islam in Southeast Asia – include Kerajaan: Malay Political Culture on the Eve of Colonial Rule (1982), an interdisciplinary (history/anthropology) study, published in a new edition in 2016. He is also co-editor of the series of volumes, Australia in Asia (see below), which examine the role of culture and values in Australia-Asia relationships; and of the Asialink report on Australia-ASEAN relations, Our Place in the Asian Century: Southeast Asia as the Third Way (2012). Milner is professorial fellow and international director at Asialink, The University of Melbourne, and visiting professor at the Asia-Europe Institute, University of Malaya. He was dean of Asian studies at the Australian National University (1996–2005), and Basham Professor of Asian History (1924-2013). He is now emeritus professor of the Australian National University.

Anthony Milner

Milner has been concerned with the historical and cultural processes that shape the Asian region, and which also influence Australia's opportunities and security. In the last few years he has been focused on defining Southeast Asian – especially Malaysian – approaches to international relations and regionalism. He is described, sometimes critically, as adopting a post-modern approach.[2][3] Milner has been a strong advocate of Track II diplomacy – arguing that the globalising and democratising of international relations demands an enhanced role for non-government interaction.[4][5]

Milner is co-chair of the Australian Committee of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific. He has also played a leading role in the development of the 'Asialink Conversations', and in the establishment of an Australia-New Zealand dialogue with the influential network ASEAN-ISIS. He has been research chair of the Australian Institute of International Affairs and editor of the Asian Studies Review of Asian Studies Association of Australia. While acknowledging the Howard Government's (1996–2008) practical achievements in Asia policy, Milner lamented its neglect of Asia education and the general 'narrowing of cultural horizons on the part of the Australian community'.[6][7] He expressed strong disappointment regarding the Asian diplomacy of the later Rudd Governments (2007–2010, 2013).

Milner has also been member at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and has held visiting professorships at the National University of Singapore (Raffles Visiting Professor of History), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Kyoto University, the National University of Malaysia and the University of Malaya. In 2014–2015 he was Tun Hussein Onn Chair of International Studies at the Malaysian Institute of Strategic and International Studies. In the 1990s, he was director of the Australia-Asia Perceptions Project of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia. He has been a member of the Australian Government's Foreign Affairs Council (1998–2008), a panel member on the Australian Research Council, and a member of the Founding Committees of the Government's Australia-Malaysia Institute and Australia-Thailand Institute.

Milner received his B.A from Monash University and PhD from Cornell University under John Legge and Oliver Wolters. He also worked with the leading international cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz.

Awards

Awarded Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2007 for "service to education in the field of Asian studies as an academic and author, and to international relations through the development of cross-cultural education and outreach activities".[8] He was elected a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia in 1995 and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in 2017, and was made a National Life Member of the Australian Institute of International Affairs in 2007. In 2017 he received the prestigious Merdeka Award for "outstanding contribution to the People of Malaysia". He was presented with an Honorary Degree as Doctor of Humanities by the University of Malaya in the same year.

Key Publications
  • Kerajaan: Malay Political Culture on the Eve of Colonial Rule (American Association of Asian Studies Monograph, 1982; Thai translation, 2008) – selected as one of the 25 "works of major importance to historical studies" in Southeast Asian history by the Association for Asian Studies in the USA on behalf of the American Council of Learned Societies. ISBN 0-8165-0772-4. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • (With Hooker, V.), Perceptions of the Haj, (Singapore, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1984). ISBN 9971-902-83-4. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • Ed, with Marr, D. 'Southeast Asia in the 9th to 14th Centuries', (Singapore, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1986). ISBN 9971-988-40-2. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • Ed, with Herbert, P., South-East Asia: Languages and Literature, A select guide,[9] (Whiting Bay, Kiscadale, 1988; Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press, 1989). ISBN 1-870838-10-6. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • (Editor, with Gerstle, D.), Recovering the Orient: Artists, Scholars, Appropriations, (London, Harwood Press, 1994). ISBN 3-7186-5687-6. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • The Invention of Politics: Expanding the Public Sphere in Colonial Malaya, (Cambridge, New York and Melbourne, Cambridge University Press, 1995, 2002). ISBN 0-521-46565-6. National Library of Australia catalogue and N2000971
  • (Ed, with Quilty, M.), Australia in Asia (3 Vols), (Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 1996–2000). ISBN 0-19-553672-X. National Library of Australia catalogue, 1764159 and 1194330
  • Region, Security and the Return of History, (Singapore, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2003, p1-59). ISBN 981-230-221-2. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • The Malays, (Oxford, Blackwell, 2008, 2012). ISBN 978-0-631-17222-2. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • (Ed, with Abdul Rahman Embong and Tham Siew Yean), Transforming Malaysia: Dominant and Competing Paradigms (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2014)
  • Asia-Australia (history), in Galligan, B. & Roberts, W. (eds), The Oxford Companion to Australian Politics, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 2007, p43-45. ISBN 978-0-19-555543-1. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • (with Tomoko Akami) 'Australia in the Asia Pacific' in Alison Bashford and Stuart Macintyre (eds) Cambridge History of Australia. Vol 2: The Commonwealth of Australia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 537–560
  • (co-author, with Sheryn Lee), ‘Practical vs. Identity Regionalism: Australia’s APC initiative, a case study’, Contemporary Politics, 20:2, 2014: 209–228
  • (with Sally Percival Wood), Our Place in the Asian Century: Southeast Asia as The Third Way (Melbourne: Asialink Commission, 2012), 1–44
  • (Ed), Positioning Australia in the Region and on the Global Map, Report of the First Annual Future Summit, 6–8 May 2004, Melbourne, Australian Davos Connection, 2004, p86-96.
  • Balancing 'Asia' Against Australian Values, in Cotton, J & Ravenhill, J. (eds), The National Interest in A Global Era: Australia in World Affairs 1996–2000, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 2001, p31-50. ISBN 0-19-551525-0. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • What Happened to 'Asian Values'?, in Segal, G. & Goodman, D. (eds), Towards Recovery in Pacific Asia, London, Routledge, 2000, p55-68. ISBN 0-415-22353-9. National Library of Australia catalogue
  • 'Asian regionalism', in Juliet Love (ed), The Far East and Australasia 2014 (New York and London: Routledge, 2017)
  • 'Culture and the international relations in Asia', The Pacific Review, Vol. 30 No. 6, p857-869

References
  1. Asian values
  2. "Autonomous history and ‘The Invention of Politics,' Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, (Vol 29), 1998. (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  3. "Illusions of Relevance? An Australian Encounter with Malay History and Southeast Asian Security,' East Asia, (Vol 25, p187-210), 2008. (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  4. "Australia's relationship with ASEAN, 12 September 2008, Canberra,' Archived 8 May 2010 at the Wayback Machine (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  5. "RMIT University, Submission to Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Inquiry into the nature and conduct of Australia’s public diplomacy, Submission No. 9, p1" Archived 5 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  6. "House of Representatives Official Hansard", 8 December 1999, p31-33' Archived 2 March 2009 at the Wayback Machine. (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  7. Howard’s decade: an Australian foreign policy reappraisal,' Archived 22 July 2008 at the Wayback Machine Lowy Institute Paper 15, p30, 2006. (Accessed 9 February 2008)
  8. Australian honours website: Anthony Milner (accessed:01-06-2019)
  9. Lope K. Santos
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