Experience ANU: Recent Episodes
Experience ANU
The ANU campus is always alive with plenty to see, hear and do.
Listen here to one of the many fascinating talks delivered by the world’s finest thinkers.
If you’re interested in finding out more about events at ANU then visit us at events.anu.edu.
Ross Garnaut is in conversation on his new book, Reset: Restoring Australia after the Pandemic Recession, in which Garnaut shows how the COVID-19 crisis offers Australia the opportunity to reset its economy and build a successful future - and why the old approaches will not work. Garnaut develops the idea of a renewable superpower, calls for a basic income and explores what the 'decoupling' of China and America will mean for Australia.
In the wake of COVID-19, the world has entered its deepest recession since the 1930s. Shocks of this magnitude throw history from its established course - either for good or evil. In 1942 - in the depths of war - the Australian government established a Department of Post-War Reconstruction to plan a future that not only restored existing strengths but also rebuilt the country for a new and better future. As we strive to overcome the coronavirus challenge, we need new, practical ideas to restore Australia. This book has them.
Ross Garnaut AC is Professorial Research Fellow in Economics at the University of Melbourne. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences and a Distinguished Fellow of the Economic Society of Australia. He was principal economic adviser to Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Australian Ambassador to China (1985-88). In 2008, he produced the Garnaut Climate Change Review for the Australian government and a follow-up review in 2011. He is the author of many books, including the bestselling Dog Days and Superpower.
Dr Steven Kennedy, Secretary to the Australian Treasury since 2 September 2019, has held numerous senior positions in the public service in a 30 year career. He was the Head of Secretariat of the Garnaut Climate Change Review - Update 2011 and was awarded a Public Service Medal in 2016 for outstanding public service in the area of climate change policy. Dr Kennedy holds a PhD and a Masters in Economics from the Australian National University, and a Bachelor of Economics (First Class Honours) from the University of Sydney.
Welcome and introduction delivered by Professor Brian P. Schmidt, ANU Vice-Chancellor.
Vote of thanks given by Professor Helen Sullivan, Director of the Crawford School of Public Policy ANU.
Andrew Leigh is in conversation with Brian Schmidt on Andrew's new book with Joshua Gans, Innovation + Equality: How to Create a Future That Is More Star Trek Than Terminator.
Is economic inequality the price we pay for innovation? The amazing technological advances of the last two decades-in such areas as artificial intelligence, genetics, and materials-have benefited society collectively and rewarded innovators handsomely: we get cool smartphones and technology moguls become billionaires. This contributes to a growing wealth gap; in the United States; the wealth controlled by the top 0.1 percent of households equals that of the bottom ninety percent. Is this the inevitable cost of an innovation-driven economy?
Joshua Gans and Andrew Leigh make the case that pursuing innovation does not mean giving up on equality-precisely the opposite. In this book, they outline ways that society can become both more entrepreneurial and more egalitarian.
All innovation entails uncertainty; there's no way to predict which new technologies will catch on. Therefore, Joshua Gans and Andrew Leigh argue, rather than betting on the future of particular professions, we should consider policies that embrace uncertainty and protect people from unfavourable outcomes. To this end, they suggest policies that promote both innovation and equality.
The ANU Energy Update is the ECI's annual flagship event - a one-day summit that brings together energy researchers, policymakers, industry and the public to provide an overview of the latest world energy trends.
This day features national and international presenters from government, research and the private sector discussing a range of energy issues including global and regional outlooks, new technologies, energy security, energy access and energy productivity.
The ANU Energy Update is the ECI's annual flagship event - a one-day summit that brings together energy researchers, policymakers, industry and the public to provide an overview of the latest world energy trends.
This day features national and international presenters from government, research and the private sector discussing a range of energy issues including global and regional outlooks, new technologies, energy security, energy access and energy productivity.
The ANU Energy Update is the ECI's annual flagship event - a one-day summit that brings together energy researchers, policymakers, industry and the public to provide an overview of the latest world energy trends.
This day features national and international presenters from government, research and the private sector discussing a range of energy issues including global and regional outlooks, new technologies, energy security, energy access and energy productivity.
The ANU Energy Update is the ECI's annual flagship event - a one-day summit that brings together energy researchers, policymakers, industry and the public to provide an overview of the latest world energy trends.
This day features national and international presenters from government, research and the private sector discussing a range of energy issues including global and regional outlooks, new technologies, energy security, energy access and energy productivity.
The ANU Energy Update is the ECI's annual flagship event - a one-day summit that brings together energy researchers, policymakers, industry and the public to provide an overview of the latest world energy trends.
This day features national and international presenters from government, research and the private sector discussing a range of energy issues including global and regional outlooks, new technologies, energy security, energy access and energy productivity.
The Hon. Robert French AC speaks on the future legal issues of formalising a treaty agreement with Australia's First Nations people.
Mr French served as a Judge of the Federal Court of Australia from November 1986 until his appointment as Chief Justice of the High Court on 1 September 2008. From 1994 to 1998 he was the President of the National Native Title Tribunal.
He is an Adjunct Professor at the University of Western Australia and Monash University, a Distinguished Honorary Professor at the Australian National University and an Honorary Professorial Fellow at Melbourne University Law School.
Mr French was elected as Chancellor of the University of Western Australia in December 2017.
William Dalrymple is in conversation with Meera Ashar on William's new book, The Anarchy. The Relentless Rise of the East India Company. In his most ambitious and riveting book to date, The Anarchy, William Dalrymple tells the timely and cautionary tale of the rise of the East India Company, the first global corporate power. In August 1765 the East India Company defeated the young Mughal emperor and forced him to establish in his richest provinces a new administration run by English merchants who collected taxes through means of a ruthless private army - what we would now call an act of involuntary privatisation.
The East India Company became something much more unusual: an aggressive colonial power in the guise of a multinational business. In less than four decades it had trained up a security force of around 200,000 men - twice the size of the British army - and had subdued an entire subcontinent, conquering first Bengal and finally, in 1803, the Mughal capital of Delhi itself. The Company's reach stretched until almost all of India south of the Himalayas was effectively ruled from a boardroom in London.
'Dalrymple is a superb historian with a visceral understanding of India ... A book of beauty' - Gerard DeGroot, The Times
"[A] rampaging, brilliant, passionate history ... Dalrymple gives us every sword-slash, every scam, every groan and battle cry. He has no rival as a narrative historian of the British in India ... A gripping tale of bloodshed and deceit, of unimaginable opulence and intolerable starvation ... shot through with an unappeasable moral passion" - Wall Street Journal
Recorded at Australia House, London on 22 October 2019 with introduction by the Hon George Brandis QC, High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.
The remarkable contribution to Australian political life made by Andrew Fisher, Australia’s fifth Prime Minister, has only just begun to receive a measure of the recognition it deserves. Employed as a pit boy in the Scottish coal mines as a nine-year old, Fisher eventually migrated to Queensland aged 22, in 1885, and shortly after joined the fledgling Queensland Labor Party.
While never a charismatic politician, he was liked on both sides of the political divide for his honesty, integrity and unswerving dedication to the attainment of a more just Australia. Prime Minister no less than three times (between 1908 and 1915), and the first Prime Minister to enjoy a majority in both houses of Parliament, his governments legislated on the basis of fairness. His word was his bond.
Fisher is probably best known for his statement at the outset of the Great War that Australia would support Great Britain to its ‘last man’ and ‘last shilling’, yet the devastating loss of life in that unprecedented global conflict aged him terribly. Gallipoli horrified him. By the end of the war his hair was snow white, his inherent optimism in tatters, his memory in trouble. Fisher’s pacifist instincts had been violated. He never really recovered.
David Headon is a cultural consultant and historian. Formerly Director of the Centre for Australian Cultural Studies, Cultural Adviser to the National Capital Authority and History and Heritage Adviser for the Centenary of Canberra, he is now a Foundation Fellow at the Australian Studies Institute (ANU), a Parliamentary Library Associate and the Canberra Raiders club historian.
This lecture is part of the First Eight Project, a collaborative project between the Australian Studies Institute (ANU), Australian Parliamentary Library, National Archives of Australia, National Museum of Australia, and Victorian Parliamentary Library to enliven interest in this formative period of the nation’s history. The Australian Studies Institute thanks The Britain-Australia Society for hosting this event.
Lock up your tubas and your fairy wrens! In partnership with ANU Meet The Authors series, Chat 10 Looks 3 comes to Canberra for a live recording of the beloved podcast's bumper Christmas episode.
Leigh Sales and Annabel Crabb discuss their favourite books, TV shows, movies and recipes from 2017. Make a list of what to read in your Christmas holidays! Note ideas for the perfect gifts! Crabb's rider includes a fully stocked bar and the removal of all pianos from the premises while Sales just wants to know if ANU is providing a driver.
Associate Professor Ben Penny discusses the significance of the Classical Chinese text 'Daodejing' ('Tao Te Ching'). Books that Changed Humanity is a book club with a difference. Each month, the ANU Humanities Research Centre hosts an expert from one of a variety of disciplines, who will introduce and lead the discussion of a major historical text. All of these texts, which are drawn from a variety of cultural traditions, has had a formative influence on society and humanity. The series aims to highlight and revisit those books which have informed the way we understand ourselves, both individually and collectively, as human beings. hrc.anu.edu.au/books-that-changed-humanity
In this podcast, Professor Ian McAllister, Dr Jill Sheppard and Sarah Cameron reveal the results of the latest Australian Election Study live from Parliament House.
Spoiler: The 2016 survey shows significant changes of opinion that should act as a wake-up call to the major parties.
This talk gives an insiders account of Australia's national intelligence organisation as it grappled with continuing espionage from foreign agents and the rise of terrorist attacks on Australian soil during the years of the Fraser and Hawke governments.
John Blaxland uncovers behind the scenes stories of the Hilton bombing in Sydney, assassinations of diplomats, the Combe-Ivanov affair, and the new threat from China. It reveals that KGB officers were able to recruit and run agents in Australia for many years, and it follows ASIO's own investigations into persistent allegations of penetration by Soviet moles.
Natural resources are the biggest source of unaccountable power in the world. For decades resource-fuelled authoritarians and extremists have forced endless crises on the West—and the ultimate source of their resource money is consumers, paying at the gas station and the mall. Leif Wenar explores how the ‘resource curse’ threatens the West—and searches for the hidden global rule that puts shoppers into business with today’s most dangerous men. He discovers the same rule that once licensed the slave trade and genocide and apartheid—a rule whose abolition has marked humanity’s greatest victories, yet that still breeds tyranny and war and extremism through today’s global resource trade. Australia could now abolish this archaic law for resources—and lead the world to lift its oil curse.
Leif Wenar holds the Chair of Philosophy and Law at King’s College London. He has been a Visiting Professor at ANU, Stanford and Princeton, and a Fellow of the Carnegie Council Program in Justice and the World Economy.
Evolution was the theme of the fifth in the Conversations Across the Creek series. Our speakers tackled this subject from their differing research viewpoints: the philosophy of biology; phylogenetics and why some things evolve faster than others; the migration of people in the Pacific; and communication in healthcare.
This session’s speakers were: Dr Rachael Brown (School of Philosophy; College of Arts and Social Sciences), Dr Rob Lanfear (Research School of Biology; College of Medicine, Biology and Environment), Dr Hilary Howes (School of Archaeology and Anthropology; College of Arts and Social Sciences), Professor Diana Slade (School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics; College of Arts and Social Sciences).
The Conversations Across the Creek series is an initiative of the Humanities Research Centre and the Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. ‘Conversations’ seeks to highlight the commonalities and interesting intersections that exist across the university through TED-style talks delivered by academics from both sides of Sullivan’s Creek.
The inaugural 2006 Last Lecture was given by Professor Chris Reus-Smit. Professor Reus-Smit delivered a fascinating lecture on the topic of 'Sources of Insecurity and Instability in the Contemporary World'.
With a long teaching experience and exceptional rapport with students, it is no wonder so many students wanted to hear Professor Reus-Smit speak at the Last Lecture! He self-evidently loves teaching, and gives to his classes the same enthusiasm he has given to his many publications, including American Power and World Order (Polity Press) and the Oxford Handbook on International Relations.
Despite his less than formal high school education, Chris’s intellect has been recognised. At ANU in 2006 he was a Professor, the Head of the Department of International Relations in the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, and Deputy Director of RSPAS.
Books that Changed Humanity is a book club with a difference. Each month, the ANU Humanities Research Centre hosts an expert from one of a variety of disciplines, who will introduce and lead the discussion of a major historical text.
All of these texts, which are drawn from a variety of cultural traditions, has had a formative influence on society and humanity. The series aims to highlight and revisit those books which have informed the way we understand ourselves, both individually and collectively, as human beings.
Professor Iain McCalman gave the third lecture about On the Origin of Species. Prof. McCalman is professor of history and the humanities at the University of Sydney. http://hrc.anu.edu.au/events/books-changed-humanity-3-origin-species
ABC elections analyst, Antony Green, spoke at the ANU School of Politics and International Relations on 12 October 2016.
In a lively and entertaining with students and staff, he discusses the findings of his analysis of the 2016 Senate Federal election and the implications of the Senate's new voting system.
Placing these changes in their historical context, he finds that the new system has worked well and that some of the more surprising results were likely the result of the double dissolution rather than the reforms. Antony also discusses some possible future implications for the change
For the Northern Territory, 2016 is the year of two big anniversaries: the 50th anniversary of the Wave Hill walk-off and the 40th anniversary of the Commonwealth Parliament's passing the Northern Territory Aboriginal Land Rights Act. Next year will also mark the 10th anniversary of the Commonwealth's Northern Territory Emergency Response - the Intervention.
What benefits have government policies delivered to Indigenous peoples over those decades? How would Nugget Coombs rate the quality of advice and programs that have emanated from government bureaucracies, NGOs and powerful individuals, as they have applied to Indigenous affairs?
The passage of the Aboriginal Land Rights Act remains its acme. Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory have been so distracted gaining, then defending, their rights that they simply have not secured their future. Developing the North is a hollow mantra without real inclusion of Indigenous peoples: the need for them to be consulted is ignored and self-management continues to elude them.
Closing the Gap targets remain unmet. In the Northern Territory, social determinants of health for Aboriginal people are stagnant while the rates of imprisonment are ever increasing. The scandalous treatment of Aboriginal juveniles by the Northern Territory's justice system has led to a Royal Commission; at least its appointment will, to the relief of the Aboriginal population, help dispel for a long time the possibility of Statehood.
The failure of public policies in the Northern Territory leads only to the conclusion that Aboriginal people themselves must seize the agenda for change, in order to achieve social and economic development on their own terms for themselves and for the nation.
About the presenter Joe Morrison is the Chief Executive Officer of the Northern Land Council. He was born and raised in Katherine and has Dagoman and Torres Strait Islander heritage.
He holds a tertiary qualification from the University of Sydney and has over 25 years' experience working with Indigenous people across northern Australia and internationally on the management and development of traditional lands and waters. His experience includes extensive community development, research and policy creation focused on land and water rights, climate change, Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous ranger employment and Indigenous governance.
Joe was the founding Chief Executive of the North Australian Indigenous Land and Sea Management Alliance, a small not for profit company that brings western science-focused research into local community based settings across tropical northern Australia. During this period NAILSMA provided high-level policy, research and advice to Governments and Indigenous organisations on Indigenous Rangers, climate change and carbon economies, water policy and community development.
He has been intrinsically involved in the 'Northern Development' agenda advocating the importance of Indigenous control over our lands and waters through the creation of Indigenous development prospectus that sustains people, culture and future generations.
Joe has authored and co-authored many articles relating to Indigenous rights, management of country, economic development and of northern development.
Presented by The Australian National University and Charles Darwin University
Don Watson joins Professor Bates Gill in conversation to discuss his new Quarterly Essay, 'Enemy Within. American Politics in the Time of Trump' which takes the reader on a journey into the heart of the United States in the year 2016. Watson, with characteristic wit and acuity, places Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders in a larger frame. He considers the irresistible pull - for Americans - of American exceptionalism, and asks whether this creed is reaching its limit. He explores alternative paths the United States could have taken, and asks where its present course might lead Australia as a dutiful ally.
"The best book by an outsider about America since - forever," David Sedaris, on Don Watson's American Journeys.
Don Watson is a historian, author and public speaker. After writing political satire for Max Gillies and speeches for the Victorian premier John Cain, he became Paul Keating's speechwriter in 1992 and wrote the award winning biography Recollections of a Bleeding Heart: Paul Keating Prime Minister (2002). His Quarterly Essay, Rabbit Syndrome - Australia and America, won the inaugural Alfred Deakin essay prize in the Victorian Premier's literary awards. His other books include Death Sentence: The Decay of Public Language, American Journeys and Bendable Learnings: The Wisdom of Modern Management.
Dr Bates Gill is Professor of Asia-Pacific Strategic Studies, Coral Bell School of Asia and Pacific Affairs, ANU. From 2012 to 2015 he was CEO of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and from 2007 to 2012 served as the Director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Dr Gill has also led major research programs at US public policy think tanks, Brookings Institution and Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC and the Monterey Institute of International Studies.
'Albanese: Telling it Straight' is Karen Middleton's new biography of Anthony Albanese. Through interviews with more than 70 friends, relatives, colleagues, associates and adversaries, and more than 40 interviews with Albanese himself, respected political journalist Karen Middleton has gained unprecedented insight into the man behind the politician; a beloved son brought-up with a strong sense of social justice, a political activist with a firebrand reputation; a charismatic young leader; an independent thinker who antagonized both the soft-left and the right of his own party; a strategist with a remarkable memory and an uncanny knack for numbers.
Middleton charts the trajectory of Albanese's political career detailing the student shenanigans and factional power-plays of his rise through Young Labor; the influence of his mentor, Tom Uren; the manoeuvring ahead of his preselection - and eventual election - as Member for Grayndler in Sydney's inner west; his years in Opposition, and finally, the role he played in the Rudd/Gillard/Rudd leadership spills. But above all, it is the deeply moving story of one man's search for answers to the universal questions of identity and belonging.
Middleton reveals family secrets as Albanese, until his teenage years, believed his mother had been widowed before his birth. This is the story - revealed for the first time - of the random events and extraordinary coincidences that finally led to an emotional family reunion. Middleton will also reflect on the complexities of writing a biography when the subject is still active in public life.
Karen Middleton is Chief Political Correspondent for The Saturday Paper. Karen has worked in the Federal Parliamentary Press Gallery since 1989 and previously, she was Chief Political Correspondent for SBS Television. Karen appears on ABC TV's political talk show Insidersand is a contributor to ABC radio, Monocle24 Radio UK and Radio New Zealand.
Alex Sloan is the host of the Afternoons program on 666 ABC Canberra.
Books that Changed Humanity is a book club with a difference. Each month, the ANU Humanities Research Centre hosts an expert from one of a variety of disciplines, who will introduce and lead the discussion of a major historical text.
All of these texts, which are drawn from a variety of cultural traditions, has had a formative influence on society and humanity.
The series aims to highlight and revisit those books which have informed the way we understand ourselves, both individually and collectively, as human beings.
Dr Rick Kuhn gave the second lecture on ‘The Communist Manifesto.’ Dr Kuhn is an Honorary Associate Professor, Marxian economist and ANU Adjunct Reader in Sociology. http://hrc.anu.edu.au/events/books-changed-humanity-2-communist-manifesto
Acclaimed Indonesian writer and man of letters, Goenawan Mohamad joins ANU Emeritus Professor James Fox in conversation on Goenawan's new book, In Other Words, a volume of essays edited and translated by Jennifer Lindsay, who also participated in the conversation.
In this podcast Jennifer discusses some challenges of selecting and translating Goenawan's essays, written between 1968 to 2014, which demonstrate the breadth of his perceptive and elegant commentary on literature, faith, mythology, politics, history and Indonesian life.
Goenawan Mohamad has been at the forefront of Indonesian intellectual and cultural life since his early twenties, and a crusader for press freedom since his university days. He was founder of the Indonesian language weekly journal Tempo in 1971 and its chief editor from 1971-94, and again in 1998.
In the last seventeen years, Goenawan has been particularly involved with establishing alternative spaces for cultural and intellectual activity in Jakarta, writing, and as theatre director and producer. He is frequently invited nationally and internationally as guest speaker and commentator, and has received numerous prestigious awards. ANU will be the only public appearance by Goenawan following his appearance at the Melbourne Writers' Festival
Introduction by Boyd Hunter (PhB Convenor, CASS)
Launching the 2016 PhB Symposium—Professor Brian Schmidt (Vice Chancellor, ANU)
Ten PhB Student Presentations (in order) 1. Possibilities for innovative Native Title mapping—Mia Sandgren (PhB CASS) 2. How can playing ‘molecular Lego’ help us to understand the malaria parasite?—Lachlan Arthur (PhB Science) 3. Diagnosing Bottled Stars—Adrian Hindes (PhB Science) 4. Chemical Keyrings—Todd Harris (PhB Science) 5. Digital disruption in the academy—Oliver Friedmann (PhB CAP) 6. Writing Wrongs: Women and the Glass Ceiling of Literature—Rosalind Moran (PhB CASS) 7. Poking at Vibrations in Crystals—Kay Song (PhB Science) 8. Chemical weavings and coloured nets—Benjamin Thompson (PhB Science) 9. Gifted Underachievement: Causes and Interventions—Jessy Wu (PhB CASS) 10. Walt Whitman’s Civil War Poetry: Transcendentalism … or Jingoism?—Harry Dalton (PhB CASS)
In this discussion forum, four internationally recognised researchers will present their own research on different aspects of Australian biodiversity.
They will look back at historical evidence to show how Australian plants and animals evolved and what factors have influenced them.
By analysing the variety of animals and plants in Australia today, the researchers will propose ways they can be managed, protected and used effectively.
The presenters then come together in a panel moderated by Dr Rod Lamberts (Deputy Director of the Australian National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science) to discuss the future of Australia's biodiversity and what factors, including climate change, are likely to influence it.
Researchers Dr Marcel Cardillo, ANU Research School of Biology Professor Craig Moritz, Centre for Biodiversity Analysis, ANU Research School of Biology Dr Carsten Kulheim, ANU Research School of Biology Professor Adrienne Nicotra, ANU Research School of Biology
Bestselling American author Justin Cronin - in his only Canberra appearance between the Melbourne and Brisbane Writers Festival - discusses his life and books with Colin Steele, particularly his recently completed post-apocalyptic Passage trilogy.
The Weekend Australian has commented that the trilogy,The Passage (2010), The Twelve(2012) and The City of Mirrors (2016), is "part dystopian essay, FBI procedural, vampire saga and military novel. There are echoes of John Steinbeck, Cormac McCarthy, Bram Stoker, Tom Clancy and Stephen King". King himself has commented that the trilogy "is remarkable for the unremitting drive of its narrative, for the breathtaking sweep of its imagined future, and for the clear lucidity of its language". Film rights have been sold to Ridley Scott.
Harvard educated Cronin is also the author of Mary and O'Neil (which won the PEN/Hemingway Award and the Stephen Crane Prize), and The Summer Guest. He has been a Fellow of the US National Endowment for the Arts and is a Distinguished Faculty Fellow at Rice University.
Colin Steele is an ANU Emeritus Fellow and is Convenor of the Meet the Author series.
Peter is joined in conversation by Jack Waterford AM, former Editor-at-large at The Canberra Times to discuss his new book Hack in a Flak Jacket.
Hack in a Flak Jacket is a startlingly honest account of experiencing war and terrorism from the frontline by Peter Stefanovic, one of Australia's leading journalists and foreign correspondents. For almost ten years Peter Stefanovic was Channel 9's foreign correspondent in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. During that time he witnessed more than his fair share of death and destruction - all while putting his own personal safety very much in the firing line.
This is his memoir of those experiences - from wars and conflicts in the Middle East, to terrorist attacks in London and Norway through to royal weddings. His time spent covering these world events has opened his eyes to the human condition - and in many ways affected him personally.
Peter Stefanovic was the Europe, Africa, and Middle East correspondent for the Nine Network, from 2008 to 2015. He reported from the scene of major news events around the world for Nine News, the Today Show, and A Current Affair. In 2014 Peter Stefanovic was nominated for a Walkley Award for his coverage of the war in Gaza. He is currently the co-host of Weekend Today.
The fourth in the Conversations Across the Creek series was a lively discussion about ethical issues with various technologies such as drones used in warfare, Artificial Intelligence, the benefits and concerns with police body cameras, and machine learning.
This session’s speakers were: Dr Adam Henschke (National Security College; College of Asia & Pacific), Professor Marcus Hutter (Research School of Computer Science), Dr Emmeline Taylor (School of Sociology; College of Arts and Social Sciences), Associate Professor Lexing Xie (Research School of Computer Science).
The Conversations Across the Creek series is an initiative of the Humanities Research Centre and the Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. ‘Conversations’ seeks to highlight the commonalities and interesting intersections that exist across the university through TED-style talks delivered by academics from both sides of Sullivan’s Creek.
Books that Changed Humanity is a book club with a difference. Each month, the ANU Humanities Research Centre hosts an expert from one of a variety of disciplines, who will introduce and lead the discussion of a major historical text.
All of these texts, which are drawn from a variety of cultural traditions, has had a formative influence on society and humanity.
The series aims to highlight and revisit those books which have informed the way we understand ourselves, both individually and collectively, as human beings.
Dr McComas Taylor gave the inaugural lecture on The Ramayana, the Indian epic. Dr Taylor is a Reader in Sanskrit in the ANU College of Asia & the Pacific.
http://hrc.anu.edu.au/books-that-changed-humanity
The 2016 John Passmore Lecture for the ANU School of Philosophy By Professor Elizabeth Anderson, Arthur F. Thurnau Professor, John Dewey Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy and Women's Studies at the University of Michigan
How should a society of equals be organized?
Egalitarians themselves have been divided among three visions: individualism, small-scale communalist or cooperativist systems, and large-scale collectivism.
In this podcast, Professor Elizabeth Anderson examines why, during the 19th century, the dominant trend among egalitarians moved from individualist toward collectivist visions. Far from settling on the communalist vision as the best compromise between the two, egalitarians today favour a mix of individualist and collectivist institutions.
This talk considers why this is so, and discusses some challenges posed by this mixture.
Delivered by Professor Geoffrey Crossick, Director of the United Kingdom’s Arts and Humanities Research Council's Cultural Value Project and author, with Patrycja Kaszynska, of the major 2016 Report: Understanding the Value of Arts & Culture.
This talk highlights the diverse contexts of the value of culture and how the digital landscape is playing an increasingly larger role in shaping people’s engagement with arts and culture. Crossick asks: How should we understand the difference that arts and culture makes to individuals and to society? The case is too often presented in terms of benefits that are thought to be important to the government of the day while neglecting some of the more fundamental benefits that matter to us all.
Professor Crossick was Chief Executive of the Arts and Humanities Research Board from 2002–05, Warden of Goldsmiths College from 2005–10 and Vice-Chancellor of London University from 2010-12.
Most contemporary social epistemology takes as its starting point individuals with sophisticated propositional attitudes and considers (i) how those individuals depend on each other to gain (or lose) knowledge through testimony, disagreement, and the like and (ii) if, in addition to individual knowers, it is possible for groups to have knowledge.
In this podcast, Professor Sally Haslanger argues that social epistemology should be more attentive to the construction of knowers through social and cultural practices: socialization shapes our psychological and practical orientation so that we perform local social practices fluently.
Richard Fidler joins ABC 666 Canberra's Alex Sloan in conversation to discuss his new book, Ghost Empire, his popular ABC radio series, Conversations with Richard Fidler, and the Doug Anthony All Stars.
Recorded on 28 July 2016 at University House.
In this animated political discussion some of the University's most renowned public policy experts provide a final analysis of the election campaign prior to polling day.
Panellists
Professor John Hewson Tax and Transfer Policy Institute, Crawford School of Public Policy
Adjunct Professor Bob McMullan Crawford School of Public Policy
Dr Jill Sheppard ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods Star of 'Off the Hill', the University's weekly 2016 election wrap up
Dr Andrew Hughes Research School of Management, ANU College of Business of Economics Star of 'Off the Hill', the University's weekly 2016 election wrap up
Moderated by Paul Bongiorno AM contributing editor for Ten News.
The Vote: 2016 Federal Election Series is an opportunity to engage with ANU public policy experts during the 2016 Federal Election.
ANU is a leading centre for the study of climate change, energy change and the environment. In this event ANU experts discuss how these issues are being presented during the election.
Panellists:
Professor Ken Baldwin Director, Energy Change Institute, ANU
Professor Mark Howden Director, Climate Change Institute, ANU
Dr Paul Burke Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU
Lily Dempster Climate Campaigner and ANU student
Mark Kenny - moderator Chief Political Correspondent, Fairfax Media
The Vote: 2016 Federal Election Series is an opportunity to engage with ANU public policy experts during the 2016 Federal Election.
The ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences' Second Professoriate Lecture of 2016 - The periodical enlightenment & romantic literature
The opening decades of the nineteenth century, which we know as the Age of Romanticism in Britain, was also the great age of periodical literature – The Periodical Enlightenment – at the centre of which were the Edinburgh Review (est. 1802), the Quarterly Review (1809), Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine (or Maga) (1817), and the Westminster Review (1824), each offering a politically-inflected conspectus of current knowledge and creative literature that was often aggressively argumentative and assumed greater authority than either the author or the reader.
The big Reviews were by no means the only places where the Romantic reader could find clever, scathing, but often well-informed and well-argued reviews, which contributed to the high degree of literary self-consciousness we associate with Romantic literature.
This talk looks at the phenomenon of critical reviewing during the Periodical Enlightenment (aka the Romantic period), at the mythologies that grew up around critical reviewing as an institution, and at some of the ramifications of its severity for the evolution of creative literature.
Speakers: Dr Ann Evans Associate Dean (Research), College Dean, Professor Paul Pickering, and Professor Will Christie.
Will Christie is Head of the Humanities Research Centre and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.
The past five years have seen a concerted attempt by feminists in the literary world to reveal and shift gender bias in reviewing, awards and publishing. This discussion brings figures from across the literary landscape - writers’ festivals, publishing, reviewing, and academia - to discuss what this literary activism has achieved, and what is left to do. Is the gendering of literature in Australia changing, and why?
Speakers:
• Dr Julieanne Lamond, lecturer, School of Literature Languages & Linguistics (Facilitator) • Lisa Dempster, Festival Director at Melbourne Writers Festival • Dr Melinda Harvey, Monash University literary studies academic and critic • Imogen Mathew, ANU PhD candidate and 2015 Stella counter • Ashley Orr, ANU PhD candidate and 2015 Stella counter • Zoya Patel, Editor of feminist literature and arts journal Feminartsy and 2015 ACT Young Woman of the Year
This public discussion is presented by the ANU School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics and supported by the ANU Gender Institute.
Health policy is at the core of the 2016 Federal Election, regularly ranked as the issue most important to voters. In this event, ANU health policy experts discuss where the parties stand and what's missing from the debate.
Panellists:
Professor Sharon Friel Director, RegNet, ANU
Professor Art Sedrakyan Department of Health Services Research and Policy, Research School of Population Health, ANU
Professor Adrian Kay Director of National Professional Development, Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU
Moderated by Cath McGrath, Chief Political Correspondent for SBS TV
The Vote: 2016 Federal Election Series presented in partnership with the ANU Policy Forum is an opportunity to engage with ANU public policy experts during the 2016 Federal Election.
Join the ANU community at a weekly panel in the Molonglo Theatre at the ANU Crawford School of Public Policy as experts discuss a different public policy issue every week until the election.
The human right to privacy raises global policy, legal and political challenges in the information age. Issues such as data retention, data breaches and the interaction between public security versus private autonomy, are all creating a diversity of public debates in Australia and around the world.
In 2015 the UN Human Rights Council responded to these challenges with the appointment of the first Rapporteur for Privacy; Professor Joseph (Joe) Cannataci. His appointment is a significant global milestone in the protection of privacy as a fundamental human right and his work has already attracted significant new interest, debate and awareness of privacy issues.
In this talk, as part of Privacy Awareness Week 2016, Professor Cannataci provides his views as a world leading authority in privacy and data protection rights.
About the speaker
Professor Joe Cannataci: was appointed UN Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy in July 2015. He is the Head of the Department of Information Policy & Governance at the Faculty of Media & Knowledge Sciences of the University of Malta. He also holds the Chair of European Information Policy & Technology Law within the Faculty of Law at the University of Groningen where he co-founded the STeP Research Group.
In this event some of the social policy issues most important to voters will be discussed by an experienced group of policy makers and researchers.
Panellists:
Professor Matt Gray Director, ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods
Professor Peter Whiteford Crawford School of Public Policy
Sue Regan Crawford School of Public Policy
Associate Professor Sharon Bessell Crawford School of Public Policy
Moderated by 666 ABC Canberra's Genevieve Jacobs
The Vote: 2016 Federal Election Series is an opportunity to engage with ANU public policy experts during the 2016 Federal Election.
Join the ANU community at a weekly panel in the Molonglo Theatre at the ANU Crawford School of Public Policy as experts discuss a different public policy issue every week until the election.
Some of the University's most respected economic experts discuss the key tax and economic issues during the 2016 election campaign. Spoiler alert: there's slightly more to the Australian budget predicament than 'jobs and growth'.
Panellists:
Professor Miranda Stewart Director, Tax and Transfer Policy Institute
Associate Professor Maria Racionero Research School of Economics, ANU
Dr John Hewson Professor, Tax and Transfer Policy Institute at Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU Leader of the Liberal Party 1990 - 1994
Moderated by Steven Long, ABC
Three of the University's leading security and foreign affairs experts look at how the 2016 election might change the way Australia deals with the rest of the world.
Panellists:
Professor Rory Medcalf
Director, National Security College, Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific
Professor Michael Wesley
Director, Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific
Dr Jill Sheppard
Political scientist and survey researcher in the Australian Centre for Applied Social Research Methods, ANU College of Arts and Social Science
Moderated by Michael Brissenden, ABC
Watch vision of the event at https://youtu.be/0b09e9Qh2Hs
The third in the Conversations Across the Creek series was a lively discussion about neuroscience, the dangerous ideas and influences when performing Shakespearean plays in 19th century Australia, battles between invaders and hosts in bacteria, and the analysis and scalability of history and music.
This session’s speakers were: Professor Greg Stuart (Head of the Eccles Institute of Neuroscience at the John Curtin School of Medical Research), Dr Kate Flaherty (School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics), Dr Denisse Leyton (Research School of Biology) and Professor Paul Pickering (Dean, College of Arts and Social Sciences. Hosted by Director of the Humanities Research Centre Professor Will Christie.
The Conversations Across the Creek series is an initiative of the Humanities Research Centre and the Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. ‘Conversations’ seeks to highlight the commonalities and interesting intersections that exist across the university through TED-style talks delivered by academics from both sides of Sullivan’s Creek.
This diverse group of panel members from academia, public policy and the media offer their thoughts on the 2016 budget, particularly in the context of what needs to be done both to prepare Australia to deal with the current domestic and global environments and for the medium term future.
Convened by Mr Steve Sedgwick AO Deputy Chair, Sir Roland Wilson Foundation, Former Australian Public Service Commissioner
Speakers Ms Michelle Grattan AO Chief Political Correspondent at The Conversation & Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
Ms Jan Harris Board member, Bendigo Bank & former Deputy Secretary to the Treasury
Dr John Hewson AM Former leader of the Opposition & Chair, Tax and Transfer Policy Institute, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
Dr Mike Keating AC Former Secretary of the Departments of Prime Minister and Cabinet, and Finance
Prof Warwick McKibbin AO Chair, ANU Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
Prof Miranda Stewart Director of the Tax and Transfer Policy Institute, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
Rt Hon Patricia Hewitt, Professor Bruce Chapman and Dr Ken Henry reflect on their experiences of how power, politics and personality have influenced the ability to introduce innovative policy both here in Australia and in the UK.
Using examples such as the policy response to the Global Financial Crisis, the Higher Education Contribution Scheme and the UK’s Congestion Charge, they explore what did and didn’t work in these contexts, the personalities involved and what lessons can be drawn for introducing future complex policies.
There is a widespread view among analysts and policy makers in the Middle East region and beyond that President Barack Obama’s handling of the oil-rich but volatile Middle East has not been deft. His policy actions or lack of them have contributed to regional instability, and disillusioned some of America’s traditional Arab allies, most importantly Saudi Arabia. President Obama has been criticized for not containing the influence of Saudi Arabia’s regional rival, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and therefore the current American administration has been accused of playing into the hands of Tehran, whether in Iraq or Syria or Yemen.
The position of the United States has also suffered in other parts of the region. The Arab Spring has come and largely gone, leaving the United States in lower standing in Egypt. The US-led peace talks between Israel and Palestine have failed, despite Secretary Kerry’s energetic efforts. How does Obama’s policy in the Middle East compare to that of the two leading presidential aspirants, namely Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump? What are the best options open to President Obama’s successor?
About the speakers Amin Saikal AM, FASSA is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Public Policy Fellow, and Director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies (Middle East and Central Asia) at The Australian National University.
Cynthia P. Schneider, is a Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, teaches, publishes, and organises initiatives in the field of cultural diplomacy, with a focus on relations with the Muslim world.
Moderated by Mark Kenny Fairfax Media's chief political correspondent.
The Vote: 2016 Federal Election Series, presented in partnership with Policy Forum.net, is an opportunity to engage with ANU public policy experts during the 2016 Federal Election.
In this podcast, three ANU public policy experts offer a no holds barred overview of the election, looking at the policy, politics and predictions ahead of us for the next eight weeks.
Panellists include: - Quentin Grafton, Professor of Economics, ANU Crawford School of Public Policy, and Editor-in-Chief of PolicyForum.net - Sue Regan, researcher and policy analyst, ANU Crawford School of Public Policy - Bob Cotton, Visiting Fellow, ANU Crawford School of Public Policy
Moderated by Catherine McGrath, Chief Political Correspondent for SBS TV.
Iconic Australian, Ken Done talks about his new book, A Life Coloured In, an exuberant memoir by one of Australia's best-loved artists.
Ken Done has an extraordinary place in the hearts of Australians - many of whom have worn or decorated homes with his artwork. Taylor Swift was given a specially commissioned Ken Done artwork to commemorate her December 2015 Australian tour. Done donated his fee to UNICEF Australia, for which he is a Goodwill Ambassador.
Done's vivid, optimistic images are part of our collective consciousness and have helped define Australia to the world. But what do we know about the man behind the brush and the 'Ken Done' commercial art phenomenon? The sudden loss of his investments from a lifetime's hard work and a resultant stressful court case was closely followed by a shock cancer diagnosis. It was a dark time, but the powerful paintings that subsequently emerged have brought him long-overdue artistic acclaim.
Ken Done was awarded the Order of Australia (AM) in 1992 and was named Australia's Father of the Year in 1993.
This presentation looks at the unique characteristics of Generations Y and Z, and the implications of these characteristics for society and organisational security. The presentation also looks at the role of these two generations in terrorist groups.
Professor Clive Williams MG is an Honorary Professor at the ANU Centre for Military Security and Law, and a Visiting Fellow at the ANU Strategic and Defence Studies Centre. He has a career background in intelligence and security.
The second in the Conversations Across the Creek series was a lively discussion of the abstract beauty of mathematics, the crisis of too much data, the possibilities of a universal language, and the potentials of machine learning within the constraints of making something which doesn't not work. Also mentioned: hammers, certainty, ethics, and Proust.
This session’s speakers were: Professor Anna Wierzbicka (Linguistics, School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics), Dr Glenn Roe (Digital Humanities, Centre for Digital Humanities Research), Professor Bob Williamson (Machine Learning, Research School of Computer Science), and Dr Vanessa Robins (Computational Topology, Research School of Physics & Engineering). Hosted by Director of the Humanities Research Centre Professor Will Christie.
The Conversations Across the Creek series is an initiative of the Humanities Research Centre and the Centre for the Public Awareness of Science. ‘Conversations’ seeks to highlight the commonalities and interesting intersections that exist across the university through TED-style talks delivered by academics from both sides of Sullivan’s Creek.
Australians came to the ABC's 2015 TV series The Killing Season in their droves, their fascination with the Rudd-Gillard struggle as unfinished as the saga itself. 'The Killing Season: Uncut' takes readers behind the scenes with new on-the-record material and telling insights into the key players of this dramatic period in Australian politics.
Sarah Ferguson says "The making of The Killing Season matched the drama on screen and that's a story we wanted to tell. And now we have a place for the episodes of rich material we could have put into a 5-part series."
In this conversation Sarah is joined by Lenore Taylor, political editor for the Guardian Australia.
This talk was recorded at the launch of Dr Andrew Glikson's and Professor Colin Groves' latest book 'Climate, Fire and Human Evolution: The Deep Time Dimensions of the Anthropocene'.
Dr Glikson and Professor Groves were also joined by Professor Will Steffen and Professor Stephen Eggins to explore future climate trends and debate the philosophy of science.
'Climate, Fire and Human Evolution' uses Earth System science to explain pre-historic human evolution, give insight into the origins of the mastery of fire and broaden our understanding of climate change.
It outlines principal milestones in the evolution of the atmosphere, oceans and biosphere during the last 4 million years in relation with the evolution of primates to the genus Homo - which uniquely mastered the ignition and transfer of fire.
Stan Grant discusses his new book, Talking To My Country, a powerful and personal meditation on race, culture and national identity.
Talking To My Country is not just about race, or about Indigenous people but all of us, our shared identity. This is his very personal meditation on what it means to be Australian, what it means to be Indigenous, and what racism really means in this country.
Stan Grant, a Wiradjuri man, is one of Australia's leading journalists, having worked in Asia, the Middle East, Europe and Africa for the ABC, SBS, and the Seven Network. From 2001 to 2012 he was a CNN anchor in Hong Kong before relocating to Beijing as a correspondent. Since 2013, he has been the International Editor for SKY News. He is also Managing Editor of National Indigenous Television, and the Indigenous Affairs Editor at The Guardian. In 2015, he won a Walkley award for his coverage of Indigenous affairs.
Kerry O'Brien joined Lenore Taylor in conversation on 30 October 2015 to discuss his long awaited book, Keating.
As there will never be an autobiography nor a memoir from Paul Keating, this book is as good as it gets: funny, sweeping, angry, imaginative, mischievous, with arrogance, a glimmer of humility and more than a touch of creative madness.
This talk looks at Syria’s history since the First World War, the events leading up to the Arab Spring uprising in Syria, the nature of the Syrian conflict since 2011, and the reasons for the current refugee crisis.
Clive Williams is a Visiting Professor at the Centre for Military and Security Law at the ANU. He has worked extensively in conflict zones and was last in the Middle East in August 2015.
Despite the recent rhetoric about transferring responsibilities back to the States and ensuring each jurisdiction has sovereignty in its own sphere of responsibilities including to raise the revenues needed to meet its spending commitments, reform of the Australian Federation will hopefully take a more pragmatic form, building on the growing demand for national policies - and growing range of international requirements - to guide public services, improving the way in which shared responsibilities are managed, while allowing service delivery to respond to local and regional needs and preferences. Such a pragmatic approach requires a degree of bipartisanship and political leadership at both Commonwealth and State levels; it also entails engaging with the Australian public, promoting steady reform in the national interest and avoiding short-term or ideologically-driven political fixes.
About the speaker
Professor Andrew Podger AO is an Hon. Professor of Public Policy at ANU. He has been at the University since 2005 and has published articles on social policy and public management and coordinated workshops of academic experts and practitioners on issues of contemporary relevance to government.
This talk was held as part of The Order of Australia Association (OAA)-ACT Branch/The Australian National University Lecture.
Australia has offered an emissions reduction target for the Paris talks that is significantly below that of the European Union and which even falls short of the United States target. Australia needs to re-engage with the rest of the world, which is increasingly aware of the impact of dangerous climate change. It is simply too urgent to opt out - we need action now.
The Rt. Hon John Gummer, Lord Deben, is a former UK Secretary of State for the Environment and is currently the Chairman of the UK’s Climate Change Committee and Special Advisor to the United Nations on Carbon Pricing. His sixteen years of top-level ministerial experience also included Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Minster for London, Employment Minister and Paymaster General in HM Treasury.
Malcolm Walter, Professor of Astrobiology (retired) at the University of NSW and Founding Director of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology, presents the 2015 The David Cooper Memorial Lecture.
In this talk he examines where the best place to look for life on Mars would be and why discovering life on the Red Planet is so important.
David Marr joins Laura Tingle in conversation to discuss his new quarterly essay on Bill Shorten – Faction Man Bill Shorten's Path to Power.
David Marr is the nation's leading writer of political biography. His Quarterly Essay profiles of Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott were national bestsellers. This controversial and brilliant new essay looks at the making of Shorten. It also addresses a key question: how does the union movement for good or ill continue to shape the Labor Party?
May contain some brief coarse language.
Ten years after his internationally bestselling The Weather Makers, acclaimed scientist and author Tim Flannery argues that Earth's climate system is approaching a crisis. Catastrophe is not inevitable, but time is fast running out. In the lead-up to the United Nations Climate Change Summit to be held in Paris in December, Atmosphere of Hope provides both a snapshot of the trouble we are in and an up-to-the-minute analysis of some of the new possibilities for mitigating climate change that are emerging now.
In The Luck of Politics, The Hon Dr Andrew Leigh MP weaves together numbers and stories to show the many ways luck can change the course of political events.This is a book full of fascinating facts and intriguing findings. Why is politics more like poker than chess? Does the length of your surname affect your political prospects? What about your gender?
The Hon Dr Andrew Leigh MP is the Shadow Assistant Treasurer and Federal Member for Fraser in the ACT. Prior to being elected in 2010, Andrew was a professor of economics at The Australian National University.
When Dr Neil deGrasse Tyson was on campus last month he sat down for a conversation with Nobel laureate Professor Brian Schmidt to discuss the importance of science, the democratisation of space and the possibility of alien life.
Chris Bowen speaks about his latest book 'The Money Men' an in-depth look at the twelve most notable and interesting men to have held the office of Treasurer of Australia.
This talk brings a unique insider perspective to the lessons learned from the successes and failures of those who went before him.
The Hon Chris Bowen was appointed Treasurer by Kevin Rudd in 2013 and is the current Shadow Treasurer.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report is the world's most comprehensive evaluation of climate change, its potential impacts and the choices we have for responding to it.
The report provides leaders with a scientific basis for developing strategies to address climate change. Most importantly, it will be the leading scientific document to inform negotiations at the Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (COP 21) in December 2015, at which negotiators will try to reach a global climate agreement.
Whilst the report finds that human influence on the climate system is clear, we do have the means to limit climate change and build a more prosperous, sustainable future.
Speakers:
Professor Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, IPCC Vice-Chair: Overview of the Fifth Assessment Report
Dr Youba Sokona, IPCC Co Chair Working Group III: Mitigation of Climate Change
Dr Andy Reisinger, IPCC Lead Author: Climate Change Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability: focus on Australia
Dr Debra Roberts, IPCC Lead Author: Urban Areas and Climate Change Adaptation
To discuss the Australian relevance in more detail:
Dr Mark Howden, Director, ANU Climate Change Institute and IPCC Lead Author, Agriculture
Associate Professor Frank Jotzo, Deputy Director, Crawford School of Public Policy, ANU and IPCC Lead Author, Social, economic and ethical concepts and methods
Professor Sir Richard Evans talks about German history and his advice for budding historians.
Sir Richard Evans is Regius Professor Emeritus of History and President of Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, and Provost of Gresham College, London. His publications include Altered Pasts: Counterfactuals in History; The Coming of the Third Reich; The Third Reich in Power; The Third Reich at War; Telling Lies about Hitler and In Defence of History.
On average, people who live, or have lived, in a Mr Fluffy house probably have higher exposure to asbestos than other Australians. How much this higher exposure increases their risk of asbestos-related disease is uncertain. There is very limited evidence on the level of asbestos exposure in Mr Fluffy houses. Most of the evidence on the health effects of asbestos comes from studies of people heavily exposed to asbestos in their workplace; and extrapolating from effects at high levels of exposure to effects at low levels requires uncertain assumptions.
In this lecture, Professor Bruce Armstrong reviews background evidence on health effects of asbestos and their importance in Australia, discuss what is known of the frequency of these effects at low levels of exposure, make an estimate of the risk of mesothelioma to people who live or have lived in a Mr Fluffy house, and briefly describe research currently being done to permit more certain estimates.
Australia is a world leader in tobacco control and currently has one of the lowest rates of smoking in the world. Reliable quantitative evidence on the relationship of tobacco smoking to mortality in Australia has not been previously available, and has the potential to contribute to what is known internationally about the contemporary risks of smoking.
Professor Emily Banks presents data on the smoking epidemic, and its health consequences, internationally. It will provide details of a large-scale prospective cohort study involving 204,953 individuals aged 45 years and over from the general population of New South Wales: the 45 and Up Study.
This study found that current smokers were three times more likely to die during the 4 year follow-up period than people who had never smoked. Smokers are estimated to die an average of 10 years earlier than non-smokers and up to two-thirds of deaths in current smokers can be attributed to smoking. These findings show that the harms of smoking in Australia, and the benefits of quitting, are substantially greater than previously thought.
The specter of massive inequality is haunting modern capitalism, with a small elite – the 1%, 0.01%, 0.001% of billionaires and financiers and the like – gaining the bulk of the benefits of modern economic growth and using their wealth to dominate economies and politics. In virtually every country, labor's share of income has fallen and inequality has increased massively. What, if anything, can we do to restore a more egalitarian distribution of income, with a strong middle class, and restore the historic link between growth of productivity and real wages? This talk argues that the answer lies in wider ownership of capital and worker participation in decisions at their workplace and firm. It gives the evidence that this solution works and lays out ways to get from here to there.
Richard B. Freeman holds the Herbert Ascherman Chair in Economics at Harvard University and is currently Faculty co-Director of the Labor and Worklife Program at the Harvard Law School. He directs the National Bureau of Economic Research / Sloan Science Engineering Workforce Projects, and is Senior Research Fellow in Labour Markets at the London School of Economics' Centre for Economic Performance.
From one of the leading thinkers of our time comes a landmark book on the case for constitutional reform - No Small Change: The Road to Recognition for Indigenous Australia by Frank Brennan.
This timely book is a stark reminder of the tainted relationship between successive governments, lawmen and Indigenous Australians, but also a provocative lesson on what we can learn from the past. Brennan unpacks the laws and philosophies from terra nullius, protectionism and forced assimilation to the 1967 referendum, land rights, self-determination and beyond.
Rigorous, accessible, and insightful, No Small Change is a profound document that has the power to change our nation's future.
Frank Brennan is a Jesuit priest, professor of law at the Australian Catholic University, and adjunct professor at the ANU College of Law and the ANU National Centre for Indigenous Studies. Professor Brennan has been actively committed to Indigenous reconciliation, justice and recognition for over 30 years.
Along with the increase in focus on the need for policymakers and the community to implement and support initiatives on countering violent extremism, there has been a tendency to put migration high on the agenda too. The phenomenon of foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria – small in number but significant in political impact – is at risk of dominating the migration and security discussion.
Recent events in Australia and Europe are causing some to reflect on the apparent failures of integration that have radicalised some immigrants and their descendants. There may be some who are drawing a line uncritically between irregular migration, asylum and the risk of importing terrorism. Each of the links between migration and violent extremism is relevant and needs to be understood and confronted; but to cast migration as only a negative influence would be erroneous.
In this talk, Dr Koser will outline key aspects of the broader migration and security discussion and how it is changing as well as discuss some ideas about how migration should be part of the solution.
Dr Khalid Koser MBE is Executive Director of the Global Community and Engagement Resilience Fund (GCERF) and Non-Resident Fellow at the Lowy Institute. Dr Koser is also Associate Fellow at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Associate Fellow at Chatham House, Research Associate at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, and extraordinary Professor in Conflict, Peace and Security in the Faculty of Humanities and Sciences at the University of Maastricht. He is also chair of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Migration, and editor of the Journal of Refugee Studies. Dr Koser is a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).
Are we headed for a geological event horizon?
Dr Andrew Glikson explains how the rise of atmospheric greenhouse gases of 2-3 parts per million CO2 per year has reached an order of magnitude similar to rates associated with mass extinctions of species.
Dr Andrew Glikson, an Earth and paleo-climate scientist, graduated from the University of Western Australia. He has conducted geological surveys of the oldest geological formations in Australia, South Africa, India and Canada, studied large asteroid impacts, including effects on the atmosphere, the oceans and the mass extinction of species.
Michael Cooney was Julia Gillard's speechwriter for most of her time in office. He came to the job a true believer in every sense, with years of Labor experience behind him, including Policy Director to Federal Labor leaders Kim Beazley and Mark Latham. But this was the prime minister's office. The stakes were high and the game had changed.
From mining to the economy to Afghanistan, Cooney wrote the speeches that helped to define the Gillard project: the prime minister's program and vision for the country. He was there at the coalface of decisions on the carbon 'tax' and the budget surplus; in the lead-up to the 'misogyny' speech and the 'we are us' Labor conference speech. He cried and laughed and swore as Australia's first female prime minister got through a record number of pieces of legislation in the time she had. This is his story, and hers.
One in five of the world's population is Chinese, 300 million Chinese are under 30, and of these, most are only children as a result of the One Child Policy. What do these only children think and do? A generation burdened with high expectation and unprepared for responsibility.
With journalistic acumen and a novelist's flair, Xinran tells the remarkable stories of men and women born and raised under China's single-child policy. Xinran shows how these generations embody the hopes and fears of a great nation at a time of unprecedented change. Buy Me the Sky provides an illuminating glimpse of the face of modern China.
In this talk Professor John C Turner, from the School of Psychology at The Australian National University, poses the basic question, "what is the nature of "prejudice"?
If Australian politics and public policy debates are a war of ideas, the National Press Club (NPC) is the battleground.
For the past half-century, the NPC has been the epicentre of political and social debate in Australia. Leaders and opinion-makers have used its stage to launch leadership bids, rattle the cage of public opinion with courageous and sometimes outrageous ideas, and make a stand.
Stand & Deliver author Steve Lewis joins political historian Frank Bongiorno in conversation to discuss some of the NPC's most powerful, controversial and entertaining speeches of the past fifty years.
Steve Lewis has been reporting politics in Canberra since 1992 and has survived the near collapse of the Fairfax media group, three prime ministers, Mark Latham and a career switch from The Financial Review to the News Ltd tabloids. Steve now writes freelance and works for Newgate Communications.
Associate Professor Frank Bongiorno is an Australian labour, political and cultural historian who teaches at the ANU.
The South China Sea is a major strategic waterway for trade and energy shipments to Asia’s major economies. It has been the focus of maritime disputes which have continued for more than six decades, with competing claims from China, Vietnam, the Philippines and others. In recent years, growing Chinese assertiveness in pressing its claims has unsettled the regional security order, drawing the attention of the United States, Australia and other powers concerned about freedom of navigation and a rules-based order.
The springboard for this discussion is the recently published book, edited by Leszek Buszynski and Christopher Roberts, which examines the South China Sea as an ongoing maritime dispute which has become a potential conflict zone. This volume is the final outcome of a National Security College collaborative research project, which involved a number of present and former academic staff from both the College and the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at ANU. The book examines the conflict potential of the current dispute, discusses how the main claimants and the United States view the issue, and assesses the prospects for resolution or management of the problem.
The panelists discuss the arguments of the book in the light of recent developments, such as China’s ‘island-building’ activities and the Philippines case before the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea. There is a particular focus on four questions:
· What are the security risks arising from continuing tensions in the South China Sea, including to Australia’s interests?
. What are the contours of a possible resolution to the South China Sea disputes?
· Is resolution a realistic option?
· Do dispute management and confidence-building measures comprise a more feasible set of options for preventing conflict, and how would these work?
When Kate Grenville’s mother, Nance Russell, died she left behind many fragments of memoir. These were the starting point for One Life, the story of a woman whose life spanned a century of tumult and change. Nance’s story reflects the changing patterns of the twentieth century which offered a path to new freedoms and choices.
One Life is an act of great imaginative sympathy, a deeply moving homage to her mother by one of Australia’s finest writers. It provides an illuminating window into Australia’s social history, including attitudes to Aborigines, the role of women and the impact of politics and class.
“Evocative and fascinating, this brave and heartfelt tribute will appeal to anyone interested in their own family story, Australian history, or the lives of women”. Joanne Shields, Australian Books and Publishing.
Kate Grenville is one of Australia’s most celebrated writers. Her bestselling novel The Secret River received the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Miles Franklin Literary Award. A TV mini-series based on the novel will be broadcast in late 2015. The Idea of Perfection won the Orange Prize. Grenville’s other novels include Sarah Thornhill, The Lieutenant, Lilian’s Story, Dark Places and Joan Makes History.
Grenville is an Honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of New South Wales and the University of Sydney.
Kate Grenville was joined in conversation by Canberra author Marion Halligan.
Halligan is one of Australia’s best known literary figures and has been awarded an AM for services to literature.
The belief that China will soon become the dominant power in Asia is based on assumptions that its continued and rapid economic rise, and its emergence as a regional peer of America’s in military terms is all but assured. Such a belief underpins arguments that a fundamental strategic reorganisation of Asia is inevitable, and that it will be necessary and perhaps even desirable to concede to China significant ‘strategic space’. Dependent largely on linear extrapolations about the future, such arguments ignore the implications of China’s economic, social and national fragilities, its lack of major friends or allies in the region as well as the considerable military deficiencies and challenges faced by the People’s Liberation Army. With the Defence White Paper due for release in 2015, the government should bear in mind that planning for an era of Chinese dominance in the region—or even its emergence as an American strategic peer in Asia—would be premature if not improbable. Australia should not design its defence force for war with China, but it should be able to counter Chinese coercion and contribute to Allied military operations if necessary.
This talk was delivered by Emeritus Professor Paul Dibb and Adjunct Associate Professor John Lee.
ANU/Canberra Times meet the author event with Anna Bligh in conversation with The Hon Tanya Plibersek MP
Anna Bligh knows something about hard knocks and high walls. She was raised by a single mother in the working class Gold Coast, a young girl with a soon-to-be-estranged dad who struggled with alcoholism. She spent over 17 years in the rough and tumble of the Queensland Parliament (seven of them as either Deputy Premier or Premier). In 2011, she led Queensland through the devastation of Australia's largest natural disasters. Her Party then lost the 2012 State election and Anna stepped down to start a new life, only to find herself diagnosed with cancer.
Writing with her trademark honesty, warmth and humour about the challenges that public and private life have thrown her, Anna reflects candidly - as a wife, mother, daughter, friend and political leader - on the lessons of leadership, resilience, community and family.
Anna Bligh became Deputy Premier of Queensland in 2005 and Premier in 2007. In March 2009 Anna made history, becoming the first woman to lead a party to victory in a State election in Australia. After losing the election in 2012, she stepped down and is now the CEO of the NSW YWCA.
Anna Bligh was joined in conversation by The Hon Tanya Plibersek MP, Federal Member for Sydney, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, and Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Australian Parliament.
Antibiotic resistance is rapidly rising internationally. Many bacterial infections are now very difficult, and sometimes impossible, to treat. Gram negative bacteria are the pointy end of this growing problem, including very common bacteria such as E. Coli.
Antibiotic resistance is proportional to use. The more antibiotics used, the more resistance develops and spreads. This is both in individuals (e.g. with the pneumonia bacteria - pneumococcus) and for populations in different countries.
Decreasing the total amounts of antimicrobial used in people and agriculture, decreasing corruption in countries around the world, adopting a One Health approach and ensuring people and food animals have access to “safe” water will all make major contributions to controlling antimicrobial resistance.
Presented by Professor Peter Collignon AM. Exec Director, ACT Pathology. Infectious Diseases Physician and Microbiologist, Canberra Hospital. Professor, ANU Medical School.
The incoming Head of the ANU National Security College, Professor Rory Medcalf, offers some assessments on the long-term policy choices Australians and their governments will need to make to advance their country’s security interests in the uncertain decades ahead.
Professor Rory Medcalf commenced as the Head of the National Security College in January 2015. His professional background spans diplomacy, intelligence analysis, think tanks and journalism. Most recently he was the Director of the International Security Program at the Lowy Institute for International Policy from 2007 to 2015.
His Excellency Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão is the Minister of Planning and Strategic Investment for the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste. He has served as President of his country for five years, Prime Minister for seven and a half years and was a central figure in his country’s 24-year struggle for the restoration of independence.
In this public address he discussed Political Transition and National Unity: The Timor-Leste Story, exploring the lessons of nation building and transition in Australia’s ‘near neighbor to the north’. He reflected on the ways Timor-Leste’s experience relates to international experience and present his views on how emerging global trends are impacting developing nations and fragile States.
His Excellency Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão is the Minister of Planning and Strategic Investment of the Government of Timor-Leste. Until stepping aside in February 2015 to facilitate a generational leadership transition, he was the Prime Minister of his country for seven and a half years. Prior to this role as Prime Minister he served as the first elected President of the Republic after being sworn in on the 20th of May 2002, the day marking Timor-Leste’s official restoration of independence.
Xanana Gusmão was a central figure in the quest for independence and after the Indonesian occupation began in 1975 he became deeply engaged in the resistance struggle. In 1981 he was elected leader of the Resistance and Commander-in-Chief of the National Liberation Armed Forces of Timor-Leste. He went on to conceive and implement the Policy of National Unity bringing together all to work cooperatively to achieve the goal of national sovereignty.
In November of 1992, after 17 years of active resistance, Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão was captured in the capital Díli and even though imprisoned in Indonesia until September 1999, he continued to lead the struggle to achieve freedom for his people.
On release he returned to see his dream of an independent Timor-Leste realised and turned his efforts to the task of national reconstruction, continuing his life-long work of service to uphold the independence and dignity of the people of Timor-Leste.
Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão has received recognition around the world for his humanitarian work and his role as a champion of peace and reconciliation.
ST Lee Lecture
The ST Lee Lecture on Asia and the Pacific was established in 2007 thanks to the generous support of Singaporean businessman and philanthropist Dr ST Lee.
The lecture provides an opportunity for a distinguished figure from the Asia Pacific to speak on developments or trends in the region.
Internationally acclaimed author David Malouf joins Gerard Vaughan AM in conversation for a discussion featuring art, literature and music.
After exploring the idea of home, where and what it is in A First Place, what does it mean to be a writer and where writing begins in The Writing Life, David Malouf moves on to words, music, art and performance in Being There. With pieces on the Sydney Opera House - then and now - responses to art, artists and architects, and including Malouf’s previously unpublished libretti for Voss and a translation of Hippolytus, this is an unmissable and stimulating collection of one man’s connection to the world of art, ideas and culture. David Malouf’s Collected Stories won the 2008 Australia-Asia Literary Award and his most recent books are A First Place and The Writing Life.
Dr Gerard Vaughan AM is the Director of the National Gallery of Australia, a position he has held since November 2014.
The rise of the so-called Islamic State (IS) on vast swathes of territories in Syria and Iraq, and the US-led military response to it, have introduced another complex dimension to an oil-rich but already very volatile Middle East. The old correlation of forces in support of maintaining the status quo, especially following the Iranian revolution more than 35 years ago, has been changing.
A set of new alignments and realignments along multiple regional fault-lines, including sectarian divisions and geopolitical rivalries at different levels, has come to redefine the region and possibly change its traditional political and territorial contours. IS has confronted all the regional states, from the Islamic Republic of Iran to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, with a common enemy. Yet, it is the United States and its Western allies that have taken the lead in launching a military intervention to ‘degrade and eliminate’ IS, despite lacking a laudable past record in this respect.
This raises a number of questions. Should the problem of IS have been left to the regional actors to handle? Whilst IS may be containable, can it be defeated? Even if IS is eliminated, what guarantee is there that another extremist group won’t replace it? Can IS become a franchise, as al-Qaeda has? What is the possible best way to deal with religious extremism in the Middle East? What can be expected of the on-going air campaign against IS in terms of its consequences for the region, and the US and its allies?
This conversation will focus on these questions in an attempt to unpack the nature of the mess that is the Middle East – a region so turbulent and yet so rich from which the world cannot simply disentangle itself.
Amin Saikal AM, FASSA is Professor of Political Science, Public Policy Fellow, and Director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies (Middle East and Central Asia) at ANU.
He has been a Rockefeller Foundation Fellow in International Relations, and Visiting Fellow to Princeton University, Cambridge University and the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex. He is an awardee of the Order of Australia (AM) ‘for service to the international community and education through the development of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, and as an author and adviser’, and is an elected Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia.
Professor Saikal was joined in conversation by Virginia Haussegger.
Virginia Haussegger AM is an award winning journalist and social commentator. With more than 25 years in news broadcasting, her work has taken her around the globe – from the Middle East, Iraq, Europe, Afghanistan and Washington - reporting for Australia’s leading current affairs programs on Channel 9, the 7 Network and the ABC.
Science has evolved over thousands of years of human enquiry to provide a rational basis for understanding and predicting what happens in the world around us.
We rely on science to enhance our standard of living, to keep us healthy and to address the problems and challenges that we face. Science has put men on the moon, probed distant planets, discovered DNA and cured disease.
And yet, there are many who still question the value and legitimacy of science which raises the question: when and why does science matter?
Four of the world’s most eminent scientists come together at ANU for one night only to discuss and deliberate on the biggest challenges facing the science community today. If you don’t think science matters to you, you may think again.
Professor Steven Chu was the co-recipient of the 1997 Nobel Prize for Physics. He has devoted his recent scientific career to the search for new solutions to our energy and climate challenges. In December 2008 Dr Chu was selected by then President-elect Barack Obama to serve as Secretary of Energy, a position he held until April 2013.
Professor Brian Schmidt AC is an Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow and astrophysicist at ANU. Professor Schmidt was jointly awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the accelerating Universe.
Professor Lawrence Krauss is theoretical physicist and the author of several bestselling books, including The Physics of Star Trek and A Universe from Nothing. He is an advocate of scientific scepticism, science education and the science of morality.
Professor Lisa Randall studies theoretical particle physics and cosmology at Harvard University. Her research connects theoretical insights to puzzles in our current understanding of the properties and interactions of matter. Professor Randall was on the list of Time Magazine's "100 Most Influential People" of 2007 and was one of 40 people featured in The Rolling Stone 40th Anniversary issue that year.
Presented by http://physics.anu.edu.au & http://energy.anu.edu.au
In today’s classrooms academics and teachers are increasingly expected to incorporate new communication technologies into their curriculum. However, by adopting these new mediums are we reducing the quality of students’ educational experience or is this just the way of the classrooms of tomorrow?
In the final ‘blow up the lecture’ event for the year, our panel of experts examine the future of education in an online world addressing questions such as: What digital resources can we harness to enhance our massive open online courses (MOOCs)? Are there any resources that need rapid development? What is our single most relevant hurdle to fully harnessing digital education What are the key target populations for ANU in online learning? What do you think are the measures of success for MOOCs?
Armando Fox is a professor in Berkeley's Electrical Engineering & Computer Science Department and the Faculty Advisor to the UC Berkeley MOOCLab. With his colleague David Patterson, he co-designed and co-taught Berkeley's first Massive Open Online Course on "Engineering Software as a Service", offered through edX, through which over 10,000 students in over 120 countries have earned certificates of completion.
Gabriele Bammer is a professor at the ANU National Centre for Epidemiology & Population Health and ANU Research School of Population Health. She is developing the new discipline of Integration and Implementation Sciences (I2S) and is working with Michael Smithson from the Research School of Psychology on an ANU edX MOOC on “Ignorance!” which will go live in 2015.
Benjamin Niles is the President of the ANU Postgraduate and Research Students' Association (PARSA). Ben studied at Melbourne High School and went on to complete a Bachelor of Commerce at Monash University. In 2013 he commenced the Juris Doctor with the College of Law. Prior to commencement at the ANU he has worked as an auditor for PricewaterhouseCoopers and as a Coordinator for the not-for-profit tutoring organisation Embrace Education.
Sam Parkinson is a year 8 student from Telopea Park School.
The conversation was facilitated by Philip Clark ABC Canberra Breakfast Presenter.
Professor Steven Chu gives the plenary opening at the Light, Energy and the Environment Congress held on 5 December 2014.
The Australian community has, to an unprecedented extent, become involved in reconciliation through Reconciliation Action Plans and other initiatives. There is acceptance that there is a broad responsibility beyond governments to help close the gap. At the same time we have sharpened political and government focus with a Prime Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, massive reorganisation of how the Commonwealth goes about its business, and all-party support for Constitutional recognition. In these respects, it can be said to be the best of times. But the wide community support this suggests is support for equality, that we all become the same in a social and economic sense. Reconciliation is about more than equality. It involves recognition of the possibility of continuing difference as well. The continuing place of the world's oldest living cultures is still unfinished business. Reconciliation here requires more than the legally mandated post-Mabo requirement to deal with the Aboriginal native title collectives identified by Indigenous law and custom. It requires a largeness of both mind and heart and preparedness to allow space for Indigenous people to determine what collective identities they wish to maintain as they rightly enjoy equal citizenship. Beyond that, we need to settle the relationship between those first nations and the rest of us. Are we big enough to see beyond assimilation?
The Hon Fred Chaney's hard work in support of often marginalised people has never faltered. As founding co-chair of Reconciliation Australia and an early advocate for Aboriginal voting rights, Fred's contribution includes establishing the Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia and, between 1978 and 1980, serving as Federal Minister for Aboriginal Affairs. For many years, Fred was Deputy President of the National Native Title Tribunal and, more recently, chaired the Board of Central Desert Native Title services. He was instrumental in establishing the Graham (Polly) Farmer Foundation, which supports Indigenous young people to reach their potential, and is the current Chair of Desert Knowledge Australia. Fred's long history of public service is rooted in his fierce commitment to social justice and a belief in the inherent equality of people. In all his leadership roles, Fred inspires others to work collaboratively, respectfully and ambitiously to overcome the barriers that inhibit people's full economic and social participation in Australian society.
The Annual ANU Reconciliation Lecture is hosted annually by NCIS in conjunction with Reconciliation Australia, ANU College of Law, and National Film and Sound Archive, Australia. The lecture is presented by an eminent member of the Australian community, who speaks on their topic of expertise as it relates to reconciliation in Australia.
In his valedictory address, outgoing Head of College Professor Michael L'Estrange argues that the NSC is a good example of how the worlds of public policy and academia can best work together.
In this podcast ANU classics expert Dr Ioannis Ziogas delivers the 2014 Last Lecture.
Classics, the study of the ancient Greek and Roman world, deals with the traditional literature of Greece and Rome and the themes of history, philosophy, and culture.
Dr Ziogas says it makes it a multi-faceted and diverse subject for students to learn, especially since the topic is always on the news and in movies.
“It actually covers a lot of motifs that are appealing to this young age group – the coming of age, the challenges within families, discovering yourself – all these lie at the heart of Greek myth and all these issues appeal to the young students.”
The Last Lecture is an initiative supported by the Dean of Students, the ANU Students' Association (ANUSA) and the Postgraduate and Research Students' Association (PARSA). Around 1,200 students voted in the Last Lecture process. They chose from 100 lecturers who made it through to final nominations.
This talk was given at The Australian National University on 22 October 2014.
The Art of Belonging advances the argument put forward in Mackay's bestselling The Good Life: a 'good life' is not lived in isolation or in the pursuit of independent goals; a good life is lived at the heart of a thriving community, among people we trust, and within an environment of mutual respect.
Drawing on 50 years' experience as a social researcher, Mackay creates a fictional suburb, Southwood, and populates it with characters who - like most of us - struggle to reconcile their need to belong with their desire to live life on their own terms. He chronicles the numerous human interactions and inevitable conflicts that arise in a community when characters assert their own needs at the expense of others.
The Art of Belonging is the book that will reignite the conversation about how we want to live; it will provide the framework for those who argue for a particular vision of community, one that sustains, protects and nurtures the many, and not just the few.
Hugh Mackay is a social researcher and the author of 16 books, including, most recently, The Good Life, a 2013 bestseller, and his sixth novel, Infidelity. He is a Fellow of the Australian Psychological Society and the recipient of several honorary doctorates from Australian universities.
The 2014 OAA-ANU Lecture
The world’s tallest flowering plants – the Mountain Ash forests – lie just 90 minutes’ drive north-east from the Melbourne Cricket Ground. They are the world’s most carbon dense ecosystems. They yield almost all of Melbourne’s water supply and are a critical environment for a wide range of native plants and animals. Mountain Ash forests are also subject to widespread logging, primarily for paper production and were the scene of the 2009 Black Saturday wildfires – the worst natural disaster in Australian history.
The ANU has conducted key research programs on forest ecology, biodiversity conservation and disturbance (logging and fire) impacts in these forests since mid-1983 leading to a major body of new knowledge and an array of exciting scientific discoveries. In this lecture Professor David Lindenmayer summarises some of the extra-ordinary ecology of Mountain Ash forests and some sobering recent research results highlighting links between past logging operations and the elevated severity of the 2009 fires.
Remarkably, very few Australians know about these forests – or of the enormous economic benefits that could accrue from strategic tourism investment and infrastructure. The final part of this Lecture outlines an exciting new vision for the regions lie north-east of Melbourne – a vision that ultimately may be critical to the very long-term persistence of this majestic forest itself – with resultant benefits for all Australians.” Academic, media, business, professional, political, community leaders, Association members - and guests are invited to participate in this ecological expose that has the potential to impact on each and every one of us - now and into the future.
One of the major questions raised regarding many protracted and violent intergroup conflicts is why the adversaries do not succeed in reaching a settlement that seems obvious and easily attainable to outsiders. This question is of special importance because despite great losses, destruction, and personal suffering, many members of societies engulfed in these conflicts remain entrenched in their conflict supporting narratives that prevent peace making process and cannot go easily through a societal change that is required in order to achieve peaceful settlement of the conflict. These conflict-supporting narratives are propagated over many years by various channels of communication and various institutions in each involved society, including the educational system. They become pillars of culture of conflict and leaders with the help of the societal institutions make all the efforts to maintain them. Various societal mechanisms are employed to prevent transmission and dissemination of alternative information that contradict conflict supporting narratives that offer a new view on the conflict and the rival. As a minimal necessary condition, only a view that the conflict can be resolved peacefully by compromises as well as that the rival is a partner being legitimized and humanized, can open a way for the meaningful peace making process.
Daniel Bar-Tal's research interest is in political and social psychology studying socio-psychological foundations of intractable conflicts and peace building, as well as development of political understanding among children and peace education. In this lecture he will explore the question of why it is difficult to resolve protracted and violent intergroup conflicts.
Presented by the Freilich Foundation and the Research School of Psychology.
Seventeenth Geoffrey Sawer Lecture 2014
Geoffrey Sawer was the first Professor of Law at The Australian National University, appointed in 1950 at the age of 40. His fluid and incisive writing, especially on Australian constitutional law and politics, has had a significant impact on succeeding generations of academics, practitioners and judges. In 1998, two years after Sawer’s death in 1996, in honour of this pioneering scholar, the Dean of the ANU College of Law, Michael Coper, with then Centre for International and Public Law Director Hilary Charlesworth, inaugurated the annual Sawer Lecture. Since then, the annual lecture has been delivered by such luminaries as Sir Ninian Stephen, Sir Gerard Brennan, and Professor Leslie Zines.
Ms Deborah Glass OBE is the current Victorian Ombudsman. She was appointed in March 2014; the appointment is for a term of 10 years.
Deborah has recently stepped down as Deputy Chair of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) of England and Wales, completing a 10-year term with the IPCC in March 2014. She was also the IPCC Commissioner for London, responsible for many high profile criminal and misconduct investigations.
Raised in Melbourne and a graduate of Monash University, Deborah practiced as a lawyer in Melbourne before joining Citicorp Investment Bank in Switzerland in 1985. She was appointed to the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission at its inception in 1989 and was instrumental in raising standards for the Hong Kong investment management industry, becoming Senior Director. Upon moving to London in 1998 she was Chief Executive of the Investment Management Regulatory Organisation, which was a self-regulatory body being merged into the Financial Services Authority, until the completion of the merger in 2000. She was then appointed to the UK Police Complaints Authority, and in 2004, became a Commissioner of the newly constituted IPCC. She was appointed Deputy Chair in 2008. Deborah was awarded an OBE for services to the IPCC in the New Year Honours List 2012.
After enacting an array of new anti-terror laws in the years following the September 11 attacks, Australia is now seeking to introduce additional laws in response to the threat posed by fighters returning from conflicts in Syria and Iraq.
This talk will examine whether these measures are needed, exploring whether Australia already has the laws in place to protect the community from home-grown terrorism?
Drawing from current examples, Professor George Williams will consider if changes need to be made. This includes such measures as the collection of metadata on calls and internet use, reversing the onus of proof by deeming a person guilty of an offence if they travel to certain locations, and making it easier for government to ban organisations (and jail their members) based on their speech about terrorism.
George Williams AO is the Anthony Mason Professor at the University of New South Wales.
As an Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow, Professor Williams is engaged in a multi-year project on anti-terror laws and democracy. He has written and edited many books, including Australian Constitutional Law and Theory, The Oxford Companion to the High Court of Australia and Global Anti-Terrorism Law and Policy.
As a barrister, Professor Williams has appeared in High Court cases dealing with matters such as freedom of speech, freedom from racial discrimination and the rule of law. He has served on several public inquiries, and as chair of a public consultation committee, helped bring about Australia’s first State bill of rights, the Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities. Professor Williams is a regular columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald.
Graeme Simsion talks about his latest book, creative processes and adapting the Rosie Project for the big screen.
The Rosie Project was an international publishing phenomenon, with more than a million copies sold in over forty countries around the world. Now Graeme Simsion returns with the highly anticipated sequel, The Rosie Effect.
Don Tillman and Rosie Jarman are now married and living in New York. Just as Don is about to announce that Gene, his philandering best friend from Australia, is coming to stay, Rosie drops a bombshell: she’s pregnant.
In true Tillman style, Don instantly becomes an expert on all things obstetric. But in between immersing himself in a new research study on parenting and implementing the Standardised Meal System (pregnancy version), Don’s old weaknesses resurface. And while he strives to get the technicalities right, he gets the emotions all wrong, and risks losing Rosie when she needs him most.
Graeme Simsion was born in Auckland and is a Melbourne-based writer of short stories, plays, screenplays and two non-fiction books. The Rosie Project began life as a screenplay, winning the Australian Writers Guild/Inscription Award for Best Romantic Comedy before being adapted into a novel. It went on to win the 2012 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript and has since been sold around the world to over forty countries. Sony Pictures have optioned the film rights with Graeme contracted to write the script. It won the 2014 ABIA for Best General Fiction Book and overall Book of the Year.
Authoritarian regimes are under siege in many parts of the world. Some have already given way and others are likely to follow. Building democracies in their place will not be easy or quick, and in some cases it will not happen in the medium term. Much has been learned about how to organize free and fair elections, but building the other institutions and the habits of democratic governance inevitably takes time. Some countries in transition face intense divisions that make democracy challenging to achieve. But the historic possibility of decisive movement from exclusionary and repressive rule toward more open, inclusionary and accountable democratic governance beckons in North and sub-Saharan Africa, Western Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Caribbean. Learning how unexpected transitions toward democracy were accomplished should be of great interest to those who want to understand, undertake or support democratic transitions today.
Abraham F. (Abe) Lowenthal has combined two careers: as an analyst of Latin America, US-Latin American relations, comparative democratization and California’s global role, and as the founder and chief executive of three prestigious organizations—the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Latin American Program, the Inter-American Dialogue, and the Pacific Council on International Policy. He has also served as vice-president and as director of studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (New York), and as an official of the Ford Foundation in Latin America. He took his A.B., M.A. and Ph.D. degrees at Harvard University and completed one year at Harvard Law School. He is a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and an adjunct research professor at Brown University’s Watson Institute. He is currently preparing a book on “Rethinking US-Latin American Relations in an Age of Transformations,” and has co-edited a symposium volume on “Scholars, Policymakers and International Affairs” to be published by Johns Hopkins in 2014.
This event was chaired by Professor the Hon Gareth Evans AC QC, Chancellor of ANU.
With unprecedented access to their hitherto sealed records, David Horner tells the real story of Australia's domestic intelligence organisation, from shaky beginnings to the expulsion of Ivan Skripov in 1963. This is the first volume of a remarkable official history of ASIO - a revealing and authoritative account of the early years of Australia's national security intelligence service.
With unfettered access to the records, David Horner’s research sheds new light on the Petrov Affair, and documents incidents and activities that have never previously been revealed. This authoritative and ground-breaking account overturns many myths about ASIO, and offers new insights into broader Australian politics and society in the fraught years of the Cold War.
David Horner AM is Professor of Australian defence history in the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at The Australian National University, Australia’s oldest, largest and highest ranking academic institute for strategic studies research, education and commentary.
This podcast was recorded at ANU on Thursday 3 October. Annabel Crabb is in conversation with Samantha Maiden, National Political Editor Sunday Telegraph.
Working women are in an advanced, sustained, and chronically under-reported state of wife drought, and there is no sign of rain.
But why is the work-and-family debate always about women? Why don't men get the same flexibility that women do? In our fixation on the barriers that face women on the way into the workplace, do we forget about the barriers that – for men – still block the exits?
The Wife Drought is about women, men, family and work. Written in Annabel Crabb's inimitable style, it's full of candid and funny stories from the author's work in and around politics and the media, historical nuggets about the role of ‘The Wife' in Australia, and intriguing research about the attitudes that pulse beneath the surface of egalitarian Australia.
One of Australia's most popular political commentators, Annabel Crabb is the ABC's chief online political writer.
Australia asserts sovereignty to 42 per cent of the Antarctic continent and has a long involvement in Antarctic exploration and science. Australia also has important economic and environmental interests in the Great Southern Ocean. We are an original signatory to the Antarctic Treaty which, among other things, establishes all that part of the globe below 60 degrees South as a region free of military conflict and nuclear arms.
While Australia has been a leading player in Antarctic affairs for more than a century, Australian leadership should not be taken for granted as new countries emerge as significant participants in the Antarctic treaty System. This NSC public seminar will explore the emerging issues in Antarctica and their implications for the Antarctic Treaty System and for Australia’s Antarctic policy.
Dr Tony Press is the Chief Investigator for the Australian Government’s 20 Year Australian Antarctic Strategic Plan and Adjunct Professor at the University of Tasmania. Until July this year, he was the CEO of the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre in Hobart. Prior to that, from 1998 to 2008, he was the Director of the Australian Antarctic Division, Australia’s Commissioner to the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, the Australian Delegate for the Antarctic Treaty and the Australian Representative to the Committee on Environmental Protection (as well as its Chair from 2002 to 2006). Dr Press has had a long career in public administration and has a particular interest in the links between science and policy.
The National Security College is a joint initiative of the Commonwealth Government and ANU.
In the past decade more than 150 books with ‘Anzacs’ in the title have been published. But for Australians there was much more WWI than battles and fighting. The war bitterly divided Australian society and politics, along fault lines that would last for at least a generation. In all of today’s national commemoration we should remember these others ‘wars’—between pro and anti-conscriptionists, between ‘loyalists’ and those whom they stigmatised as ‘disloyal’, and between the labour movement and an increasingly authoritarian government. Within the labour movement, too, there was a war which tore it asunder, in ways that stalled its emergence as a party of reforming government at the national level.
Professor Joan Beaumont is an internationally recognised historian of Australia in the two world wars. Her most recent book Broken Nation: Australians and the Great War (Allen & Unwin, 2013) has been shortlisted for the WA Premier’s Award (non-fiction) and the NSW Premier’s (Australian History) Award.
The Government’s decision to commission a new Defence White Paper – the third in just in just five years – suggests that Australian defence policy is in trouble.
That comes as no surprise, because Defence policy is never easy. But the new White Paper will only fix the problems if we understand why the last two failed, and avoid the same mistakes.
Professor Hugh White AO, ANU Public Policy Fellow delivered a keynote address during ANU Public Policy Week 2014.
Born in the United States to immigrant Chinese parents, Amy Tan is an internationally celebrated writer. Her novels The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses, The Bonesetters Daughter, and Saving Fish from Drowning, are all New York Times bestsellers. She is also the author of a memoir, The Opposite of Fate, and two children's books. Her work has been translated into 35 languages.
Join Amy Tan and Colin Steele, Emeritus Fellow, ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences as they discuss the collapse of China’s imperial dynasty to the inner workings of courtesan houses in her new novel Valley of Amazement.
With her characteristic wisdom, grace, and humour, Amy Tan conjures a story of the inheritance of love, its mysteries and senses, and its illusions and truths.
Alastair Walton, Chairman of BKK Partners and a former Co-Chairman of Goldman Sachs Australia, discusses Australia’s financial sector in the context of global developments impacting the industry.
Visiting international academic and influential science blogger Professor Jim Coyne gives a provocative talk at ANU Research School of Psychology.
Greg Combet has been central to some of the biggest public struggles of our time—on the waterfront, the collapse of an airline, compensation for asbestos victims, the campaign against unfair workplace laws and then climate change. From an idyllic childhood on the Minchinbury estate in the western suburbs of Sydney, Combet's world changed dramatically with the early death of his wine-maker father. The shy child was uprooted to the suburbs and an uncertain future. A scholarship allowed him to study engineering and saw him appreciate first hand the role of unions in the workplace.
He rose to lead the Australian trade union movement and become a senior minister in the Rudd and Gillard Labor governments. Along the way he has battled his own struggles, with political ideology, the impact of work on families and the loneliness of the parliamentary life. His story is not just a personal memoir; it is an insight into how power works in Australia, who holds it, how it is used and the ruthless ways in which it is snatched.
Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women, in conversation with Virginia Haussegger
The Curtin Medalist for Excellence in Medical Research for 2013, Canberra’s Centenary Year, is Nobel Laureate Emeritus Professor Rolf Zinkernagel. The Medal was presented to Professor Zinkernagel for a Lifetime of Achievement at a ceremony at JCSMR. Professor Zinkernagel then presented a Public Lecture on his work entitled 'Why do we not have a vaccine against HIV or TB?'
Professor Zinkernagel was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1996 for his research, carried out in conjunction with Professor Peter Doherty at The John Curtin School in the 1970s. The Prize was for their discoveries concerning the specificity of the cell mediated immune defence.
The United Nations Human Rights Council established the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights on the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) in 2013, tasked with investigating the alleged systematic, widespread and grave violations of human rights in North Korea, with a view to ensuring full accountability, particularly for violations which may amount to crimes against humanity. The Hon Michael Kirby was appointed as Chair of this Commission. As part of its investigations, the Commission conducted public hearings with more than 80 victims and other witnesses in Seoul, Tokyo, London and Washington D.C. The Commission’s report was made public in February 2014 and detailed many alleged crimes against humanity arising from ‘policies established at the highest level of State’ and called for urgent action from the international community. In this public lecture, Mr Kirby will be talking about his work on the Commission and the human rights situation in North Korea.
What if the traditional lecture became a thing of the past?
Are there some forms of learning that are better suited to computers than the classroom?
Do students want to be talked at or talked to?
Technology is opening up new ways to teach and learn and we want your opinion on what the classrooms of the future might look like.
Featuring panellists:
Professor Sanjay Sarma Director of Digital Learning, MIT
Dr Joe Hope Physics Education Centre, ANU
Ms Laura Wey Education Officer, ANUSA
Chaired by ABC 666 Mornings Presenter Ms Genevieve Jacobs
Director-General of the World Trade Organisation, Ambassador Roberto Azevêdo delivered a public lecture on the 17th of July 2014 at ANU entitled, New momentum: can the success in Bali transform the WTO?
Ambassador Azevêdo discussed where the WTO should go next and reflected on how trade issues might play into the G20 process — a timely discussion in the lead up to Australia's hosting of the G20 Summit in November.
Ambassador Azevêdo is the sixth Director-General of the WTO. In 2008 he was appointed Permanent Representative of Brazil to the WTO and other international economic organisations in Geneva. His appointment as Director-General of the WTO took effect on 1 September 2013 for a four-year term. Ambassador Azevêdo's expertise is international economics and he has published numerous articles on these issues.
The ANU book with Brookings Institution - The G20 Summit at Five: Time for Strategic Leadership, as well as a similarly-themed East Asia Forum Quarterly, was launched on the day of the lecture.
This public lecture was presented by the East Asian Bureau of Economic Research at Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.
What causes some eruptions to be more explosive than others? Is it the total driving gas fuel, or how fast the gas escapes? This lecture examines both the volatile content and the speed of magma ascent immediately prior to eruption. Chemical zonation preserved inside glass pockets and crystals provides one of the fastest clocks in geology.
These timescales of chemical diffusion operate over minutes to hours in the run-up to eruption. Initial results show that more explosive eruptions may result from higher rates of magma ascent.
Terry Plank is the Arthur D. Storke Memorial Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University. She is a geochemist who studies magmas associated with the plate tectonic cycle. She is known particularly for her studies of subduction zones: the inputs on the ocean floor, the temperatures attained beneath volcanoes, the melting process in the mantle, and the water contents of magmas before they erupt.
Plank was born in Wilmington, Delaware in 1963, where she attended the Tatnall School. She graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in earth sciences, and received a doctorate from Columbia University in 1993. She was on the faculty of the University of Kansas and Boston University before joining Columbia University in 2008. Plank received the Houtermans Medal from the European Association for Geochemistry, the Donath Medal from the Geological Society of America, is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the Geochemical Society, the Geological Society of America, and the Mineralogical Society of America. In 2012 she was named a MacArthur Foundation Fellow, and in 2013 elected to the US National Academy of Sciences.
Claiming the body as property has been represented as the best way to ensure control over our own choices and lives; a crucial way of asserting our rights to bodily integrity; and an important means of protection against the abuse of our bodily materials by today's biotechnology companies. Refusing to see our bodies as property, it is argued, reflects either a religious view of the body as belonging to God, or a misguided sentimentalism that blocks clear thinking about matters such as prostitution, surrogate motherhood, and the sale of spare kidneys. Since we trade in our bodies whenever we work for a wage, there is no reason to view markets in sex or reproduction as a problem.
Drawing on feminist arguments about the self as embodied, I argue that it is indeed a problem to think of the body as property, and a problem to view the body as a marketable substance. My minimal claim is that we do not need to assert property in the body in order to express what we mainly care about when we say ‘it’s my body’, which is bodily integrity. My maximal claim is that our ability to think of others as our equals is very much bound up with our bodies. The point at which some people’s bodies become the means to patch up the bodies of others – most dramatically, in the use of one person’s body parts to save or enhance the body of another – is therefore deeply threatening to equality.
About the presenter:
Currently a visitor to RSSS at ANU, Anne Phillips is Professor of Political and Gender Theory in the LSE Gender Institute and the Graham Wallas Professor of Political Science in the Department of Government and was Director of the LSE Gender Institute until September 2004. She is a leading figure in feminist political theory, and writes on issues of bodies and property, democracy and representation, equality, multiculturalism, and difference. Much of her work can be read as challenging the narrowness of contemporary liberal theory. In 1992, she was co-winner of the American Political Science Association's Victoria Schuck Award for Best Book on Women and Politics published in 1991 (awarded for Engendering Democracy). She was awarded an honorary Doctorate from the University of Aalborg in 1999; was appointed Adjunct Professor in the Political Science Programme of the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, 2002-6; and was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2003. In 2008, she received a Special Recognition Award from the Political Studies Association, UK, for her contribution to Political Studies. In 2012, she was awarded the title Graham Wallas Professor of Political Science.
The Gender Institute marked its 3rd anniversary on Friday 21 March 2014 with an inspirational lecture and discussion with Sex Discrimination Commissioner Ms Elizabeth Broderick from the Australian Human Rights Commission, who spoke on;
"Progressing gender equity and the role of male champions of change"
Commissioner Broderick was introduced by ANU Vice-Chancellor Professor Ian Young, AO who lauded her committed advocacy and confirmed ANU support for her goals:
preventing violence against women and sexual harassment, improving lifetime economic security for women, balancing paid work and unpaid caring responsibilities, promoting women’s representation in leadership, and strengthening gender equality laws, monitoring and agencies. Over 100 people attended the event and enjoyed a light lunch in the Hedley Bull reception area prior to proceedings. The 2013 student prizes for excellence in gender research were awarded by the Vice-Chancellor. The Gender Institute extends congratulations to all this years recipients and their supervisors for their excellent work.
The European project was an attempt to pursue a strategic objective by economic means: continental peace by way of coal and steel. More than 60 years on, if measured against that original set of goalposts, it has been a successful project. Indeed, the lure of European peace and prosperity has been so attractive that the EU has grown dramatically in the last two decades. Yet Europe has many detractors, who point to the challenges of monetary without fiscal union and responding to Russian aggression as failures of the supra-national model initiated by Robert Schuman. What lessons can Australia’s region, the Indo-Pacific, draw from the European experiment.
Mr Varghese took up his position as Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade on 3 December 2012.
Prior to this appointment, Mr Varghese was Australia’s High Commissioner to India from 2009 to 2012. Between 2004 and 2009, he was Director-General of the Office of National Assessments. Before that he was the Senior Adviser (International) to the Prime Minister. Mr Varghese was Australia’s High Commissioner to Malaysia from 2000 to 2002. He has also served overseas in Tokyo (1994), Washington (1986-88) and Vienna (1980-83).
Mr Varghese has held a wide range of senior positions in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Canberra, including as Deputy Secretary (2002-2003), First Assistant Secretary of the International Security Division (1997), Head of the White Paper Secretariat (1996-97) which drafted Australia’s first white paper on foreign and trade policy, First Assistant Secretary of the Public Affairs Division (1994-96), and Assistant Secretary of Staffing (1991-92). He was seconded to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet as First Assistant Secretary of the International Division (1998-1999).
He was appointed an Officer in the Order of Australia (AO) in 2010 for distinguished service to public administration, particularly in leading reform in the Australian intelligence community and as an adviser in the areas of foreign policy and international security. He was awarded a Doctor of Letters honoris causa by the University of Queensland in July 2013 in recognition of his distinguished service to diplomacy and Australian public service.
Former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, AC CH, has used a talk at ANU to argue for Australia to step back from the Australia-US ANZUS military alliance.
Mr Fraser said Australia made a major strategic error and betrayed its national interest by not showing strategic independence from the United States after the fall of the Soviet Union.
He warned that Australia needs to be careful not to follow the US into another war, which could potentially be in the Pacific and involve China.
"I don't want Australia to follow America into a fourth war, blindly, unthinkingly, with little regard for Australia's national interest and little regard for our security," he says.
His talk, at the ANU Crawford School of Public Policy, was based on his new book Dangerous Allies.
Mr Fraser, Prime Minister from late 1975 until 1983, drew on his contribution to the flagship journal of the Crawford School, Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies (APPS).
In his APPS piece, Mr Fraser writes that the country made a serious mistake by aligning itself closer to the US in the post-Cold War era, and the problem has been compounded through wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
A copy of Mr Fraser's commentary from APPS, Australia's role in the Pacific is available online.
Dr John Blaxland, from the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, said an end of the Australia-US alliance would have major implications for Australia and the Asia-Pacific region.
"The world isn't either-or, black or white, peace or war -- it's shades of grey," Dr Blaxland said.
"My biggest concern is that the ramifications of a detachment from the US to Australia's interactions with Asian nations and the US's relationship with Asian nations are unfathomable."
Governments and society are increasingly reliant on cyber systems. That reliance makes us vulnerable to cyber attacks, which can have powerful impacts on people's lives. Because of this, in liberal democratic societies governments have a duty to ensure cybersecurity in order to protect their citizens and, arguably, the people of other nations. But as recent events following the revelations of Edward Snowden have demonstrated, there is a risk that their pursuit of cybersecurity might overstep the mark and subvert the fundamental right to privacy.
In this NSC seminar, the presenters will demonstrate that managing the risks of cybersecurity involves trade-offs: between security and privacy; individual rights and the good of a society; and between the types of burdens placed on particular groups in order to protect others. These trade-offs are often ethical in nature, involving questions of how we act, what values we should aim to promote, and what means of anticipating and responding to the risks are reasonably -- and publicly -- justifiable.
Associate Professor Mick Keelty is an Adjunct Professor at the Australian Graduate School of Policing and Security, CSU in canberra. He was commissioner of the Australian Federal Police (AFP) from 2001 to 2009. He served two terms as AFP commissioner and has thirty five years of policing experience at local, national and international levels.
Dr Adam Henschke works in the areas of ethics and cybersecurity. He is a Research Fellow at the National Security College, Australian National University, a Research Associate with the Centre of Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, CSU Canberra, and was recently a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration, University of Hong Kong. He co-edited The Routledge Handbook of Ethics and War and is currently co-editing a book on the ethics of cyber warfare.
Mr Shannon Brandt Ford is a Lecturer in Intelligence and Security Studies with the Australian Graduate School of Policing and Security, CSU Canberra. He spent ten years as a Defence Strategist and Intelligence Analyst, and has taught at the Australian National University, the Australian Defence Force Academy (University of NSW) and the Australian Defence College. Mr Ford was the Chief Investigator on a recent National Security College funded research project on the ethics of cybersecurity.
Energy lies at the heart of the world's sustainability challenge. On the one hand, abundant, accessible, low-cost energy is vital for economic prosperity. On the other hand, the world's pattern of energy use, based on fossil fuels, threatens massive future climate change with devastating potential consequences. The greatest sustainability challenge, therefore, is to meet the energy needs of a growing world economy while moving to a safer pattern of energy use. In this talk Jeffrey Sachs will discuss strategies for creating a road map on deep decarbonisation to ensure the world can have the energy that it needs for prosperity while reducing CO2 emissions drastically. Jeffrey D Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, a leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 80 countries. He serves as Director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University, as well as Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development and Health Policy and Management. He is Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on the Millennium Development Goals, having held the same position under former UN Secretary- General Kofi Annan. He is co-founder and Chief Strategist of the Millennium Promise Alliance, and is director of the Millennium Villages Project. He has authored several books including three New York Times bestsellers: The End of Poverty (2005), Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet (2008), The Price of Civilization (2011), and To Move the World (2013). This lecture is presented by the Centre for Climate Economics and Policy at Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University, in partnership with the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) and the Monash Sustainability Institute at Monash University, as well as Canberra Urban and Regional Futures (CURF). It relates to Australia's contribution to the UN SDSN Deep Decarbonisation Pathways Project, led by ClimateWorks Australia and ANU.
As Indonesia's economy grows, it is increasingly being referred to as a rising middle power and there is mounting speculation that Indonesia might eventually join the ranks of Asia's great powers. Regardless of just how far Indonesia will rise, its government and the will of its people will become increasingly influential in terms of its regional leadership and the values and norms Jakarta espouses. What are the domestic opportunities and constraints that inform Indonesia's rise and how will various domestic contexts affect Indonesia's foreign policy and the values it espouses? Meanwhile, the image of Indonesia as a more stable and democratic nation has contributed to a significant deepening of security ties with some other nations (such as Australia) and these nations may well grasp the opportunity to continue doing so as Indonesia rises. But how might this be perceived amongst our other Southeast Asian neighbours and how might this affect our relations with them? Within Southeast Asia, what will the rise of a more independent and potentially assertive Indonesia mean for the future of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)? Will it serve to strengthen this body as Indonesia adopts what many regard as its natural leadership role or will it threaten ASEAN's continued viability as a more assertive and independent Indonesia opts increasingly to 'go it alone.' And what will Indonesia's rise mean for the Asian balance of power more generally? Will the Indonesian archipelago, for instance, become a theatre for great power competition? Will a rising Indonesia substantially influence the Asian balance by siding with either the US or China? Or might Jakarta seek to maintain an equidistant position between them, thereby acting as a Southeast Asian 'swing state'? In this project, Dr Christopher Roberts (Senior Lecturer, National Security College, ANU), Dr Derry Habir (Bakrie University) and Associate Professor Leonard Sebastian (Head, Indonesian Studies Program, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies) explore these questions.
This year the annual Pamela Denoon lecture will be presented by Wendy McCarthy AO under the title:
Past victories, present challenges: Has Feminism failed Australian women?
Further event details to follow.
About the lecture
The Pamela Denoon Lecture was inaugurated in 1989 as a tribute to the memory of Pamela Denoon and as a reminder that the gains that have been made by women over the years have only been possible because of the enormous dedication of women like Pamela.
Pamela Denoon worked tirelessly to promote equality for women and was the National Coordinator of Women’s Electoral Lobby from 1982-84. She actively lobbied for women’s rights in Canberra during the 1980s and her bequest helped establish the National Foundation for Australian Women and the Pamela Denoon Trust.
The Pamela Denoon Lecture is a regular event during International Women’s Week in Canberra. Speakers have included politicians, academics and a few more well-known personalities such as Judy Horacek, Anne Summers and Julie McCrossin.
The Lecture aims to inspire and motivate women to find out more about issues for women in Australia and encourage some of them to get involved in a local organisation that works to promote women’s rights and other major women’s issues.
The Golson Lecture was delivered at ANU by Professor Graeme Barker (Disney Professor of Archaeology and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge) on the 21st May, 2014.
Jack Golson's excavations at Kuk in New Guinea have been a fundamental contribution to one of the greatest research problems in archaeology: why did our ancestors become farmers? Ten thousand years ago most people on the globe lived by hunting and gathering. Five thousand years ago most people lived by farming, or by combining farming with hunting and gathering. Today most of the world's population depends for their food on half a dozen plants and, if they are rich enough, on the products of half a dozen animals. So why did our ancestors first become farmers? Did people choose to experiment with domesticating plants and animals, and if so why? Were they pushed into becoming farmers by forces beyond their control like climate change or population pressure? How important were hard-to-study things like ritual, ideology and religion? The lecture will take a global perspective, showing how our understanding has been transformed in recent decades by new scientific approaches, new archaeological theories, and unexpected discoveries, findings increasingly relevant for the sustainability of the present-day agricultural systems on which we depend
Graeme Barker is Disney Professor of Archaeology and Director of the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research at the University of Cambridge, and Professorial Fellow at St John's College Cambridge. After training in archaeology at Cambridge his career took him to the University of Sheffield, the British School at Rome and the University of Leicester, before he returned to Cambridge in 2004. He has researched extensively on the long-term interactions between people and landscape, and on the lessons of the past for present and future sustainability, a theme he has investigated through major field projects in arid, semi-arid and tropical landscapes (he is currently working in Borneo, Libya and Iraqi Kurdistan). He has published more than 30 books and 250 papers.
Is it time to reimagine how we learn? Should we be moving from lecture halls to e-spaces – from books to tablets?Technology is opening up new ways to teach and learn. It is also opening up new ways to understand how we learn.
Australian universities are increasingly rethinking the delivery of their educational programs by making the foray into Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs).
MOOCs are a growing phenomenon in the higher education sector – complementing existing face-to-face courses and opening doors to students who might not have had the means to pursue tertiary-level education.
Will edX and other MOOCs providers change the face of education forever?
Join us for a special panel conversation examining these questions and more.
Featuring panellists:
Professor Anant Agarwal President of edX and social entrepreneur Professor Brian Schmidt AC Astrophysicist, Nobel Laureate and co-leader of the first ANU edX course
Chaired by Julie Hare, Editor of the Higher Education section for The Australian.
Is the traditional lecture on the way out?
What will the classroom of the future look like?
Will the digital world transform the physical world of learning?
Will edX and other Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) providers change the face of education forever?
Technology is opening up new ways to teach and learn. It is also opening up new ways to understand how we learn.
What do you think the future of learning should look like at ANU?
Featuring panellists Professor Anant Agarwal President of edX and social entrepreneur Dr Inger Mewburn (The Thesis Whisperer) Director of Research Training at ANU Dr Paul Francis Astrophysicist and co-leader of the first ANU edX course Professor Andrew Walker Deputy Dean, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific Mr Cam Wilson ANUSA President
Chaired by ANU Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) Professor Marnie Hughes-Warrington