The Indo-Pacific enters 2026 amid accelerating strategic uncertainty. Intensifying US–China competition, questions surrounding the durability of American regional engagement, and the growing strategic agency of middle powers in Southeast Asia and Indian Ocean region are reshaping the region’s security and economic landscape.
What to Expect When You’re Expecting Uncertainty: The Indo-Pacific in 2026 brought together the next generation of policy and data researchers from the region to unpack key geostrategic challenges that will define the region in the year ahead in January 2026. The webinar examines how shifts in great power behaviour, minilateral arrangements such as the Quad and AUKUS, as well as ASEAN’s concept of its ‘centrality’ are altering regional deterrence dynamics in the Indo-Pacific. Tune in to find out how the region will navigate 2026 by bolstering economic resilience and find new ways of cooperating at a time of weakening trust in the ‘rules-based order’.
MEET THE PANEL:
- Moderated by Dr Teesta Prakash, Australia India Institute Research Fellow. Prakash is an expert on the strategic affairs of the Indo-Pacific, specialising in geoeconomics of India, Southeast Asia and the Quad. She was previously an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute leading the Australia-India Cyber and Critical Technology Program between 2022 and 2023.
- Dr Bich Tran is a Research Fellow with the Military Transformations Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS). Her research expertise spans grand strategy, maritime security, cybersecurity, outer space security, and other issues at the intersection of geopolitics and technology.
- Jack Sato is a Data Analyst for the Asia Power Index at the Lowy Institute. Since joining the Institute in 2022, he has also contributed research and analysis to the Global Diplomacy Index and played a key role in the development of the Southeast Asia Influence Index.
- Rushali Saha is a recipient of a 2025 Maitri Fellowship based at the United States Studies Centre. She is an independent researcher and analyst with Horizon Intelligence, a Belgium-based threat intelligence firm. She is a foreign affairs columnist and her key areas of interest are Indian foreign policy and Indo-Pacific geopolitics.
- Tom Corben is a Research Fellow in the Foreign Policy and Defence Program at the United States Studies Centre, where he works on US Indo-Pacific Strategy, regional strategic dynamics, defence industry and technology issues, and alliance modernisation trends. He was previously a resident Lloyd and Lilian Vasey Fellow with Pacific Forum in Hawaii, where he focused on Japanese and Korean politics and foreign policy, and Australia’s engagement with Northeast Asia.