[1][2] He is a member of the executive council of the Australian Institute of International Affairs,[3] Australia's oldest think tank, and a Fellow of the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS) at the University of Wollongong.
His parents were married in 1925 and his eldest brother, Stanley, was born in 1926 (died 2014), followed by Walter in 1929 and John (former Prime Minister of Australia) in 1939.
His father and his paternal grandfather, Walter Howard, were both veterans of the First AIF in World War I and in peacetime ran two Dulwich Hill petrol stations.
[7] Howard is the only member of his family to vote for the Australian Labor Party.
[1] Howard is currently an associate in the Department of Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney and a Visiting Professorial Fellow at the Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security at the University of Wollongong.