About The Sydney Dialogue

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s Sydney Dialogue is the premier policy summit for critical, emerging and cyber technologies.

Technology is developing much faster than societies can regulate it or even fully absorb its implications.

The remarkable surge in the capabilities of generative artificial intelligence (AI), and the lack of any agreed roadmap on what the next breakthrough will be – much less how governments might respond – is just the latest and most profound demonstration of the growing gulf between the advances of innovators and the ability of policymakers and societies to understand and confidently adopt them.

The Sydney Dialogue (TSD) was created to help break down silos and bring together political leaders, senior officials, technology industry innovators and civil society leaders. It aims to promote diverse views that stimulate real conversations about the best ways to seize opportunities and minimise risks and bring more diverse voices into public debates.

While the positions of the United States, China and Europe tend to dominate the global conversation, the world hears too little about policy thinking taking place in India, Japan, Southeast Asia and Oceania. TSD is also a place where new partnerships are built between governments and with industry, and where existing partnerships are deepened.

TSD 2025 will explore trends in the most advanced and consequential technology fields including artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, quantum computing, biotechnology, space technology, hybrid warfare such as disinformation, climate and energy and critical infrastructure. We will look at the ways technology is disrupting workforces, upending economic and strategic power, splintering supply chains and transforming militaries.

In addition to public sessions, TSD 2025 will also include a series of closed-door discussions, smaller roundtables and media engagements.

Now in its fourth year, TSD 2025 builds on the momentum of previous dialogues, which included contributions from India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Japan’s former Prime Minister, the late Shinzo Abe, Samoa’s Prime Minister Fiamē Naomi Mata’afa, Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, Chair of the Special Competitive Studies Project and former Chief Executive Officer of Google Eric Schmidt and Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Rappler Maria Ressa.

Organisations and governments can find out more about partnership opportunities for TSD 2025 here.

Explore TSD 2021, TSD 2023 and TSD 2024 here to find out more about the speakers, sessions, side events and supporters that were involved in previous dialogues.

What is ASPI?

The annual Sydney Dialogue is convened by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) – an independent, non-partisan think tank that produces expert and timely advice for Australian and global leaders.

ASPI generates new ideas for policy makers, allowing them to make better-informed decisions and is one of the most authoritative and widely quoted contributors to public discussion of strategic policy issues in the Indo-Pacific region.

ASPI was established by the Australian Government in 2001 and is partially funded by the Department of Defence with other sources of revenue including from overseas government agencies, corporates and civil society groups.