'Universities serve to make students think: to resolve problems by argument supported by evidence; not to be dismayed by complexity, but bold in unravelling it'.  (What are universities for? by Geoffrey Boulton and Colin Lucas).   This course takes up this challenge by offering latter year students from any part of the ANU the opportunity to explore a series of complex issues. The connections between economic, historical, social, legal, scientific, engineering and environmental and moral dimensions of complex problems will be explored.    

The course will examine the linked themes of  'collapse' and 'resilience'.  Case studies will include the collapse of empires, contemporary development, health and environmental issues, engineering and network failures and the moral and legal dimensions of all these issues.  

The course will encourage students to share their existing disciplinary perspectives to develop deep understandings of how to go about effective team based approaches to unravelling complex issues.

1. Enhanced ability to analyse complex issues;
2. Knowledge of different methodologies for analysing complex issues;
3. Ability to apply more than one method in order to unravel complex issues.

• Reflective learning portfolio that also includes evidence of preparation for each of the student run seminars/tutorials (Stage I 15 per cent, Stage II 30 per cent)

• facilitating a tutorial/seminar to maximise classmates learning (Preparation 5 per cent, Delivery 20 per cent)

• identifying a complex problem and developing a policy for addressing it. This will be done in
  multidisciplinary groups and will be assessed in several stages during the last four weeks of the
  course (30 per cent).

Four hours contact a week, made up of a two-hour lecture and a two-hour tutorial (attendance compulsory) and six hours independent learning a week

Students need to have completed 96 units toward their degree.

Before the course starts students should read the open access course web site including past student assessment items and read one of the following books:

• Bammer, Gabriele and Michael Smithson 2008, Uncertainty and risk: multidisciplinary perspectives, Earthscan
• Brown, Valeria, John Harris and Jacqueline Russel 2010, Tackling wicked problems:through the transciplinary imagination, Earthscan
• Bar-Yam, Yaneer 2004, Making things work: solving complex problems in a complex world, NECSI Knowledge Press
• Harris, Graham 2007, Seeking sustainability in an age of complexity, Cambridge University Press
• Mitchell, Melanie 2009 Complexity a guided tour, Oxford University Press

Lecture theatre with digital audio (and if possible video) recording facilities

Please register your application online at https://apollo.anu.edu.au/apollo/default.asp?pid=6023&script=true

Poll closes  Monday 13 July 2012