Master of Public Policy and Management (Coursework)
ObjectivesGraduates will be equipped with the skills necessary for advanced public sector and community sector management and policy making, including the skills to: * understand the institutions, processes and problems of modern government and policy making; * critically appreciate a range of key drivers in contemporary public policy; * understand governance and public management and its applications; * understand public sector management and its application in selective case studies.
Academic titleMaster of Public Policy and Management (Coursework)
Subject Semester Credit Points
166-419 Policy Design
This subject examines policy making from a number of different theoretical perspectives, introduces a range of methods and approaches to examining public policy, and develops policy design skills. It introduces students to how policy is made, through... Semester 1 12.50
166-470 Contemporary Issues in Governance
This subject examines contemporary issues in public policy in Australia and internationally. Students will investigate traditional and emerging governance models, with an emphasis on the changing nature of governance in the network society. The subje... Semester 1 12.50
166-423 Organisations and Management
This subject examines the modern public sector management function through a range of practical and theoretical perspectives. Focusing on placing public sector management into surrounding historical and quasi-ideological debates, the subject explores... Semester 2 12.50
166-442 Rights and Public Policy
This subject aims to assist students with the development of skills relevant in the policy-making process. This is carried out by familiarising students with legal and political developments within a variety of rights fields and by requiring them to ... Semester 2 12.50
Elective subjects:
50 points
Subject Semester Credit Points
166-413 Communication and Governance
This subject critically investigates the changing forms of governance in democratic polities in the wake of the informational age. Using communication as a central analytical category, the subject considers how democratic political systems are coping... Semester 1 12.50
166-416 Justice, Democracy and Difference
This subject provides a critical examination of contemporary debates about ideas of justice, democracy and the politics of difference. The subject critically explores both the major liberal approaches to justice alongside critiques of liberal approac... Semester 1 12.50
191-420 Qualitative Research Methods
This subject forms an advanced overview of theories, methods and ethical issues in qualitative research. The subject will focus on the techniques of field studies, intensive interviewing, and case studies. Students will carry out small scale qualitat... Semester 1 12.50
166-453 Executive Internship
In this subject students will be placed in an organisation which either has governmental responsibilities or deals with government, where they will work under the supervision and guidance of a senior manager in the organisation. Students will be requ... Semester 1, Semester 2 25
191-438 Texts and Violence
Violence is an issue of great social, individual and cultural concern. This subject investigates some of the ways in which violence is represented, talked about, and interpreted. The subject focuses on two issues: how to interpret textual representat... Semester 2 12.50
191-440 The New Punitiveness?
This subject focuses on the idea that since the 1970s there has been a rise in punitiveness right across the developed nations of the west. The subject asks students to identify and understand the different domains in which punitiveness might reside ... Semester 2 12.50
102-497 A Century of Australian Social Policy
This subject explores the history of Australian social policy, interweaving five themes: the rise and fall of state-regulated wages, the ways that income support was shaped by this arbitration system, the gendering and de-gendering of the welfare sys... Semester 2 12.50
191-435 Drugs and Justice
This subject introduces students to a range of historical and contemporary issues surrounding the measurement of drug use and the popular and scientific construction of the health, crime and social consequences of drug use. The subject is concerned w... Semester 2 12.50
166-411 Australian Politics:Democracy & Justice
This subject will investigate how Australian constitutional democracy has been structured and how it has defined and developed citizenship and protected human rights. To address these issues students will investigate questions such as, How was Austra... Semester 2 12.50
166-499 Asia-Pacific: Zone of Conflict or Peace?
This subject provides an examination of some important issues in Asia-Pacific international politics in the light of relevant theorizing, interpretations and debates. The topics for study will normally include the China-US-Japan triangle, the Taiwan ... Semester 2 12.50
110-498 Political Economy of Asia
This subject will not be available in 2009 12.50
Second 100 points: Compulsory subjects
62.5 points
Subject Semester Credit Points
166-527 Advanced Public Management
This subject explores the strategies and instruments that public managers use to implement public policy. We will review several key aspects of the management role including: how public managers support the development and implantation of good public... Semester 1 25
316-685 Economics For Public Policy
This subject focuses on the relationship between economics and politics. It explores the role and limitations of economic analysis in public policy. Economics principles and methods are applied in order to analyse public policy issues and the importa... Semester 1 12.50
166-536 Advanced Policy Design
The subject provides an overview of the key elements of policy analysis and policy organization using an integrated design perspective. Key theoretical models are used to equip students to develop an analytical framework for conducting a detailed pol... Semester 2 25
Elective subjects:
37.5 points
Subject Semester Credit Points
191-543 Research and Criminal Justice Governance
How effective are criminal justice interventions in changing individual behaviour, reducing opportunities for crime, and increasing public safety? Why is there so much emphasis by government on the impact of criminal justice programs, and how does th... Semester 1 12.50
166-537 Health Politics, Policy & Governance
This subject focuses on critically analysing politics, policy and governance in relation to health. It asks students to examine the institutions, structures and organisations that shape the policy process in health, consider how health problems are d... Semester 1 12.50
166-554 Social Research Design and Evaluation
This subject provides a critical and practical engagement with social research design and evaluation, in a range of societal contexts including, but not limited to, social policy. As such, it provides theoretical frameworks and research skills for an... Semester 1 12.50
166-526 Managing Communications & the Media
This is a skills rather than a theoretical subject. It has two themes: how to understand and manage the media from the perspective of a communications manager, and how to build a communications strategy into the development of policy. While it is des... Semester 1 12.50
166-522 Individual Research Project
This subject involves focused, independent READING and research and the presentation of the findings in a scholarly manner, under the supervision of a member of the teaching staff in the MPPM or MSP programs. On completion of this subject students sh... Semester 1, Semester 2 12.50
166-517 Minor Thesis - Public /Social Policy
This subject involves a supervised thesis of 12 000 words, embodying the results of the student's own research. Semester 1, Semester 2 37.50
166-551 Governance & International Institutions
The subject will examine various dimensions of the conflict between national sovereignty and international interdependence which impinge on the nature and institutions of global governance. It will extend students knowledge of the diversity of the fo... Semester 2 12.50
166-553 Professional Practice in Policy
This subject will examine contemporary issues and debates in public policy making in a variety of contexts (Victorian, Australian, and international) through insights provided by professional public policy practitioners. Students will be offered a un... Semester 2 12.50
121-548 Climate Change Politics and Policy
This subject introduces introduces and analyses critical concepts and terms central to debates over climate change, including risk and uncertainty, adaptation and mitigation, burden sharing, and problems and issues relating to regimes, strategies and... Semester 1 12.50
110-553 Human Rights in Southeast Asia
This seminar will focus on human rights and its critics from a historical and comparative perspective. We will explore the factors that have given rise to radically different conception of rights and justice (i.e. political, economic, cultural, relig... Semester 2 12.50
121-529 Social Impact Assessment and Evaluation
This subject develops the skills to understand and assess the social impacts of development. The different actors involved in shaping and implementing development projects and programmes (the state, international development agencies, non-government ... Semester 2 12.50
161-521 Issues in Professional & Applied Ethics
This course will examine some of the central debates in applied ethics, focussing on ethics and the law. Topics discussed may include ethical issues associated with intellectual property, self-regulation and meta-regulation, social responsibilty of t... Semester 2 12.50
166-520 Social Policy: Special Topics
The welfare system is a central focus of social policy studies. While social policy as an area of study is usually said to embrace education, health, housing, employment and social care as well as income security, it is income security which usually ... Semester 2 12.50
166-531 Comparative Social Policy
This subject uses a comparative approach to analyse key areas of contemporary social policy, with a focus on the reform strategies that emerged over the 1990s. The subject examines the different social policy responses that have characterised these s... Semester 2 12.50
166-546 Trade Policy and Politics
This subject examines the politics and governance of international trade. It explores the domestic and international dimensions of trade policy-making and the growing complexity of the 'trade agenda' in national and international politics. ... Semester 2 12.50
166-547 Politics and Business in post-Mao China
Over the past two decades, the role of the Chinese state in the country´s economic development has changed considerably. The state planning agencies no longer decide what and how much should the countryÂ&#x020... Semester 2 12.50
166-549 Business and Government
The respective roles and interactions between business and government are crucial for the political economy of a country. Because of its productive function, business enjoys a privileged position with government, while a major part of government is c... Semester 2 12.50
191-520 Compliance, Regulation & Crime
There is increasing public and political demand that harms and risks to people, the environment, financial systems, and the like, be reduced, if not eliminated altogether. Tighter regulation, including in some cases use of the criminal law, is often ... Semester 2 12.50