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Geopolitics and Regionalism


Analysing Pacific Security: Methods and Techniques

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Description 

In 2018, the leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum described the security environment of the Pacific region as ‘crowded and complex’. The Pacific is crowded with external players who see a shared interest in the region and are often looking to assert their own agenda. The Pacific is complex because Pacific leaders assert that ‘securing the region’ requires a critical understanding of the interdependence between people, environment, culture and local capability. There is a clear requirement – particularly at the national and regional level – for the political leaders of the Pacific to have access to analysis that can support them as decision-makers amongst the noise and complexity. This capability needs to employed with a clear-eyed view of Pacific national and regional security interests. This micro-credential provides a baseline of skills and understanding of analytic tradecraft for application in the Pacific. The credential will support participants to grapple with the perennial problems of analysis: the complexity of international developments, incomplete and ambiguous information, and cognitive biases. The purpose of the credential is to inform the growth of analytic practice in the Pacific region – providing a shared language and skill base.

Topics 

  1. The purpose, function and characteristics of strategic analysis in Pacific contexts
  2. The need for strategic analysis in the Pacific islands
  3. Analytic processes – making the hard calls: what matters and why?
  4. Structured Analytic Techniques (SAT) – methods for security analysis
  5. Communication for impact
  6. Small group self-selecting databasing activity – analysis of a Pacific security issue
  7. Editing exercise: enhancing analysis drafting process

Learning outcomes 

Upon successful completion, enrollees will have the knowledge and skills to: 

  1. Demonstrate a baseline understanding of analytic concepts
  2. Demonstrate early capacity to conduct strategic analysis, framed by Pacific interests
  3. Lead and contribute to group analytic techniques

Indicative assessment

Participation in Structured Analytic Techniques activities: 50%; Links to LO: 1, 2 and 3

Final analysis – as part of a group or individual exercise - short verbal presentation on an analytical approach (5-10min) and written piece of analysis on a Pacific security issue (1500 words): 50%; Links to LO 1, 2 and 3

Assumed knowledge 

This Micro-credential is taught at graduate level and assumes the generic skills of a Bachelors or equivalent. 

Micro-credential stack information 

 This Micro-credential is currently not part of a stack.

Details 

  • Course Code: DPA07

  • Workload: Contact hours: 12 hours, face-to-face or online (eg via Zoom). Individual study and assessment: approx. 50-60 hours.

  • ANU unit value: 3 units

  • Course Code Level: 8000

  • Contact:  ANU Department of Pacific Affairs: dpa@anu.edu.au

This Micro-credential is taught at a graduate level.  This is not an AQF qualification. 

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Australia's Relationship with the Pacific Islands

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Description:

The Pacific "Step-up" has been one of the Australian Government's highest foreign policy priorities in recent years. How and why has this come about? This credential considers the extent to which current policy reflects longstanding themes in Australia's attitude towards the Pacific Islands (including PNG), dating back to the 19th Century, and the extent to which it represents a qualitative change of focus.

The credential will consider Australia's preponderant role as the primary security provider, and largest aid donor, in the region, alongside both its allies and friends in the region, and its strategic competitors. The credential material will also cover the nature of non-government links between Australia and the Pacific, and the impact that opening Australia's labour market to Pacific Islanders is having on relationships in the region. The credential has a strong policy orientation and draws heavily on practitioner as well as academic perspectives. It will expose participants to Pacific Islander views, perspectives and assumptions about Australia and Australian policy towards the region.

Topics:

  • Overview of the history of Australia's relations with the Pacific islands
  • Contemporary relations: the Step-up and its origins
  • Security cooperation between Australia and the Pacific Islands
  • Australian aid in the Pacific: challenges and choices
  • People-to-people links including labour mobility
  • How do Pacific Islanders perceive Australia?

Learning Outcomes:

Upon successful completion, enrolees will have the knowledge and skills to:

  1. Understand the key themes of, and constraints on, Australia's approach towards the Pacific Islands over time
  2. Understand the strengths and weaknesses of Australian whole-of-government cooperation in the Pacific
  3. Critically analyse and articulate Australian policy choices in its relations with the Pacific Islands
  4. Articulate ways in which Australian approaches and initiatives may be perceived, and critiqued, by Pacific Islands governments and decision-makers

Indicative Assessment:

Research essay: 200 words analysing a case study in Australian relations with the Pacific; 60%; links to Learning Outcomes 1, 4

Seminar presentation based on selected policy challenges; 40%; links to Learning Outcomes 2, 3

Assumed Knowledge:

This micro-credential is taught at graduate level and assumes the generic skills of a Bachelors or equivalent.

Micro-credential Stack Information:

 This Micro-credential is currently not part of a stack.

Details:

Course Code: DPA04

Workload: 62-72 hours

  • Contact hours: 12 hours
  • Individual study and assessment: 50-60 hours

ANU unit value: 3 units

Course Code level: 8000

Contact: ANU Department of Pacific Affairs: dpa@anu.edu.au

This Micro-credential is taught at a graduate level.  This is not an AQF qualification. 

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Framing Pacific Security: Contest, Resilience and Risk

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Description 

Pacific people and countries employ the concept of security with distinct characteristics. The ‘expanded security agenda’ laid out in 2018 Boe Declaration by the Pacific Islands Forum brings this into sharp relief with its emphasis on climate, environmental/resource, human and traditional security and the need for a more integrated and collaborative approach across sectors and jurisdictions. The expanded security agenda is the product of a long history in Pacific on political and security discourse. This micro-credential will allow enrollees to understand and explore Pacific outlooks on security. It will examine the convergences and differences between security, resilience and development, and their underlying principles and concepts. It will also examine some of the variations, differences and hairline fractures in the regional security outlook. While the people of the Pacific have endeavoured to frame their own definitions of security, the region has been buffeted by changes to the geopolitical landscape. The Pacific has become ‘crowded and complex’, as various external actors trial, test and push for influence. There are state and non-state actors all trying to shape the Pacific towards their interests. This credential will consider how Pacific people are leveraging the increased attention and hedging against the risks it poses to shape and build resilience to fit their context.This micro-credential has an applied public policy focus. The assessment challenges participants to take a Pacific lens to the analysis and development of public policy responses to security challenges.

Topics 

  1. Securing what for who?
  2. Security, Resilience and Development: Making the Connections
  3. Security narratives in the Pacific
  4. Regional declarations on Pacific security over time – convergences & differences
  5. Securitisation, or Putting people at the centre?
  6. Security Framing: Pacific Island Forum leaders’ Boe Declaration on Regional Security
  7. Expanded security concept: Climate, Resource/environment, Human, Traditional security
  8. Geopolitics of security
  9. Security architecture - Regional collaboration or competition?
  10. The future of security in the region
  11. Scenario exercise – a practical application of the concept

Learning outcomes 

Upon successful completion, enrollees will have the knowledge and skills to: 

  1. Understand the diversity and commonality in the way security is conceived in the Pacific Islands, including variations between regional security, national security, and security at the community level
  2. Understand the regional security priorities as framed by Pacific political leaders
  3. Critically examine the impact of the geopolitical contest on Pacific countries and consider their agency in response
  4. Explore the public policy levers available at a regional and national level the countries of the Pacific

Indicative assessment

Participation in scenario exercise: 50%; Links to LO: 1, 2, 3 ,4

Analytic essay: examination of a key security challenge from a Pacific perspective, including critical analysis of two regional security documents (2000 words) 50%; Links to LO: 2, 4

Assumed knowledge 

This Micro-credential is taught at graduate level and assumes the generic skills of a Bachelors or equivalent. 

Micro-credential stack information 

 This Micro-credential is currently not part of a stack.

Details 

  • Course Code: DPA06

  • Workload: Contact hours: 12 hours, face-to-face or online (eg via Zoom). Individual study and assessment: approx. 50-60 hours.

  • ANU unit value: 3 units

  • Course Code Level: 8000

  • Contact:  ANU Department of Pacific Affairs: dpa@anu.edu.au

This Micro-credential is taught at a graduate level.  This is not an AQF qualification. 

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Regionalism in the Pacific: Diplomacy, Development and Policy Making

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Description 

The study of regionalism has for a long time provided important theoretical contributions for the discipline of international relations and international politics. The emergence of regional projects as mechanisms to conform to international orders, have changed and adapted throughout the credential of history. This credential looks at the unique contributions from understanding regionalism in the Pacific. With the most extensive network of regional organisations and regimes in world, participants will explore the history, politics, institutions and the ideas that have been constructed from states choosing to cooperate with each other. It will take an in-depth approach to how the governments in Australia, Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Samoa have use regionalism one of its foreign policy tools. Furthermore, it introduces participants to key contemporary regional priorities/policies such as health, climate change, oceans, security, mobility, business and inclusivity by unpacking how regional organisations, member and partner countries work together. The credential will be co-taught by officials from government, regional organisations, private and civil society officials from the Pacific islands and Australia.

Topics 

  • Regionalism and New Regionalisms Approach: theoretical approaches and frameworks to understanding regionalism
  • The Pacific: region, regionalism(s) and regionalisation
  • Pacific Diplomacy and Regional Order – multilateral institutions diplomacy, development and security
  • Pacific Regionalism and Australia
  • Pacific Regionalism and Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Samoa
  • New Regionalism(s)- civil society and business networks

Learning outcomes 

Upon successful completion, enrollees will have the knowledge and skills to: 
  1. Demonstrate an understanding of theoretical approaches and frameworks in studying regionalism in international politics: purpose, policy and trajectory
  2. Identify and discuss the changing dynamics of regionalism(s) in the Pacific: history, institutions, purpose
  3. Identify and analyse critical contemporary environmental, political, economic and social development issues in the Pacific region
  4. Discuss and analyse the challenges and opportunities of regional diplomacy, security, development and policy making in the Pacific

Indicative assessment 

  • Quiz: 20%; Links to Learning Outcomes: 2, 3
  • Policy Briefing – 1,000 words: 30%; Links to Learning Outcomes: 2, 3, 4
  • Academic Essay – 2,5000 words 50%; Links to Learning Outcomes: 1, 2, 3, 4

Assumed knowledge 

This Micro-credential is taught at graduate level and assumes the generic skills of a Bachelors or equivalent. 

Micro-credential stack information 

This Micro-credential is currently not part of a stack.

Details 

  • Course Code: DPA03

  • Workload: Contact hours: 12 hours, face-to-face or online (eg via Zoom). Individual study and assessment: approx. 50-60 hours.

  • ANU unit value: 3 units

  • Course Code Level: 8000

  • Contact:  ANU Department of Pacific Affairs: dpa@anu.edu.au

This Micro-credential is taught at a graduate level.  This is not an AQF qualification. 

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The China Alternative? Changing Geopolitics in the South Pacific

No dates are currently scheduled.

 

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Description 

Over the last two decades the Peoples Republic of China has become a major aid donor, trade partner, and source of investment in the Pacific Islands. This is one of the most significant developments in the region in recent times with implications for the diplomatic priorities of Pacific Islands states as well as the aspirations of ordinary Pacific Islanders. This micro-credential looks at the history of China’s rise, the nature of its interests in the region, the diplomatic competition between China and Taiwan, as well as the response of more established external actors like Australia, New Zealand, and the United States to Beijing’s increased regional influence. This micro-credential will examine China’s changing role in the Pacific, with a focus on Pacific and Chinese perspectives. Enrollees will gain a comprehensive understanding of the People’s Republic of China’s motivations for engaging with the Pacific, with a particular focus on Chinese state and non-state actors involved in aid, investment, migration and diplomacy in the Pacific. Key questions include: how have Pacific Islands states benefited from or been disadvantaged by China’s increased regional profile? Will they be able to retain their sovereignty as the rivalry between China and the US intensifies? How do ordinary citizens view these developments, particularly as Chinese companies and Chinese nationals become more active in their communities?

Topics 

  • Introduction: Changing Geopolitics in the Pacific
  • The Belt and Road is here: China’s economic engagement with the Pacific
  • China Aid: Debt Traps, Win-Win and South-South Cooperation
  • Chinese Migration to the Pacific and Diaspora Management
  • The New Pacific Diplomacy: Island Responses to China’s Rise
  • Stepping Up and Resetting: Traditional Powers Respond to China’s Pacific Rise

Learning outcomes 

Upon successful completion, enrollees will have the knowledge and skills to: 
  • Describe and discuss important aspects of China’s rise as a global power, and the nature of its activities in Oceania.
  • Discuss the impact of China’s increased profile on existing relations of power in the region, particularly traditional Western diplomatic partners like the US, Australia, and New Zealand.
  • Analyse the institutional foundations underlying China’s aid, investment, migration and diplomacy in the Pacific.
  • Evaluate the implications of China’s rise for the present circumstances and future aspirations of ordinary Pacific islanders

    • Indicative assessment

    • Podcast script and episode: 30%; Links to Learning Outcomes: 1, 2, 3, 4
    • Research essay 70%; Links to Learning Outcomes: 1, 2, 3,4

    Assumed knowledge 

    This Micro-credential is taught at graduate level and assumes the generic skills of a Bachelors or equivalent. 

    Micro-credential stack information 

     This Micro-credential is currently not part of a stack.

    Details 

    • Course Code: DPA05

    • Workload: Contact hours: 12 hours, face-to-face or online (eg via Zoom). Individual study and assessment: approx. 50-60 hours.

    • ANU unit value: 3 units

    • Course Code Level: 8000

    • Contact:  ANU Department of Pacific Affairs: dpa@anu.edu.au

    This Micro-credential is taught at a graduate level.  This is not an AQF qualification. 

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