Rudd hitches Australia's future to rising China

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wants his fellow Australians to embrace China and the Asian region like never before. But this will be an exercise fraught with political danger given Australia's uneasy collective psyche about its Asian neighbours.

While sports-mad Australians are focused on the Beijing Olympics, and the media is busy complaining bitterly about the degree of security the Chinese are exercising, Mr Rudd is mapping a strategy to make Australia realise that its future lies predominantly in developing deep relationships with China and Asia.

This week, on his way home after waving the flag for the Australian Olympic team, Mr Rudd stopped off in Singapore to deliver a speech that would normally be front-page news in Australia if not for the Olympics.

Along with plugging his idea of a European Union-style Asian club - a concept that has so far fallen on deaf ears in the region - Mr Rudd outlined why Australia needs to move its relationship with China and the region beyond the economic and strategic.

'Will China democratise? How will China respond to climate change? How will China deal with crises in the global economic and financial systems? How will China respond domestically to the global information revolution? And how will Chinese culture adjust to the array of global influences now washing across its shores? ... How China responds to these forces will radically shape the future course of our country,' Mr Rudd said.

While Mr Rudd's conservative predecessor John Howard recognised China as a driving force in Australia's economic and strategic future, what Mr Rudd is doing is fixing Australia's fortunes as a nation to rise with the newest superpower.

And it's not only China that Australia needs to embrace, but the Asia-Pacific region generally. Australia needs to become a fully integrated nation in the region in which it happens to be located - being a European outpost that flirts with Asia is no longer enough, according to Mr Rudd.