At any given time, the Australian Federal Government divides its responsibilities among fifteen to twenty-five bureaucratic departments. While different governments may combine their various functional responsibilities in different ways, the same set of responsibilities tends to recur from government to government, conservative or Labor. A glance at the structure of the federal bureaucracy is a good way to gain a quick overview of how the government defines its responsibilities and work. Each department's policy “brief” – the discrete portion of the government's responsibilities assigned to it – is fairly apparent from its name: Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry; Education, Science and Training; Finance and Administration; Industry, Tourism and Resources; and so on. Most Federal Government departments relate to clearly defined interests, activities and aspirations in society, and the boundaries of their responsibilities are established by the societal interests and activities to which they relate, as well as by the government's policies regarding those interests and activities.

This may initially appear to be the case for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade also. In its 2005–06 Annual Report, the department announces it is “responsible for advancing the interests of Australia and Australians internationally”. However, it soon becomes apparent that this is a department that is not able to identify clearly a set of societal interests and aspirations that remain its brief. Foreign Affairs is a portfolio defined by the location of its policy responsibilities rather than by a given set of activities, interests or aspirations within society.