Availability | Semester 2 |
Fees | Look up fees |
This subject 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 policy instruments for addressing global warming. The subject considers the rise of climate change as a policy problem. It reviews and analyses the history of climate change policy as it has evolved nationally and internationally. It examines the interactions between national and regional climate policy, including in Australia, the United States, the European Union and China. It analyses debates and concerns that have led to the evolution of the Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Kyoto Protocol, and more recent arrangements. Students will consider a range of policy instruments, including carbon taxes and emissions trading, and technologies that have been proposed or deployed to address this issue. This subject enables students to understand the evolution of a critical global environmental issue. It offers insights into technical, political, ethical and ecological issues that have framed climate change policy, particularly since 1992, and enables students to think critically about and participate in developing policy in this domain.
Intended learning outcomes
At the completion of this subject, students will be able to:
- Interpret the interaction between scientific, economic, normative and other influences that shape international and natural climate change politics and policy development processes; and
- Understand the key institutions and treaties that govern international and national climate change politics and policy.
- enhanced ability to analyse and think critically about public policy;
- enhanced conceptual understanding of the social, political, ethical and cultural contexts of policy; and
- enhanced practical skills such as written communication and research ability.
Last updated: 3 November 2022