Anna Hayes

Dr Anna Hayes serves as a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations within the College of Arts, Society and Education at James Cook University, Australia. She also holds a position as Senior Research Fellow at the East Asia Security Centre, a collaborative initiative involving Bond University, China Foreign Affairs University, and the University of New Haven. Her academic career spans teaching and supervising at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels in her field of expertise.

Anna Hayes specializes in non-traditional security threats with particular emphasis on China's role in the Indo-Pacific region. Her research portfolio includes significant work on the Uyghur situation in Xinjiang, where she has documented what she terms 'creeping genocide' and analyzed how Chinese government policies silence international criticism through Belt and Road Initiative funding. She has also made substantial contributions to understanding the geo-strategic dimensions of great power competition between the US and China, examining how the Belt and Road Initiative functions as a grand strategy for achieving the 'Chinese Dream' and its impact on regional states.

Analysis of Hayes' scholarly output reveals a consistent trajectory focused on Chinese foreign policy evolution under Xi Jinping, security dynamics in the Indo-Pacific, and human rights implications of Chinese expansionism. Her work demonstrates methodological diversity across journal articles, book chapters, edited volumes, and policy submissions, with increasing emphasis on the intersection of economic statecraft and human rights violations. Recent publications show a sharpening critique of Chinese policies in Xinjiang and their global diplomatic repercussions.

As a Primary Research Advisor at James Cook University, Hayes chairs and supervises independent academic research projects. Her advocacy extends beyond academia, notably through her 2021 submission to the Australian Parliament regarding the Customs Amendment (Banning Goods Produced by Uyghur Forced Labour) Bill, where she argued for stronger action against what she describes as 'the largest detention of an ethnic group since the Holocaust.'