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Welcome

Welcome to the School of Social Sciences, where we do our best to provide good quality education, inspire our students to excel, and promote a vibrant environment for learning and research!

Whether you're a current student or potential student, an existing client or recent visitor, I invite you to know more about the degree programs we offer, the research we do, and the activities we engage in. I'm sure you will find something that is of interest or benefit to you.

In a nutshell, we offer:

We actively engage in research through individual staff and collaborative research projects, through thesis research of our students at the postgraduate and Honours levels. Our School publications form part of the achievements documented in the Research section of this website.

I hope your visit, or extended stay with us, will (always) be a pleasant experience!

Associate Professor Rogelia Pe-Pua
Head of School

What’s On

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Seminar # 3 - Democratic Dialogue: An Exercise in Deliberation or Agonism?When: 30th MayWhen: 30th MayDemocratic Dialogue: An Exercise in Deliberation or Agonism? Sarah Maddison – UNSW Wednesday 30th May 2012, 3-4pm, Goodsell Building, Room LG19 International experience demonstrates that democratic dialogue - also known as civic or participatory dialogue - has the ability to facilitate reconciliation, social integration and change. In conflict and post-conflict societies around the world, including Israel, Palestine, India, South Africa, Northern Ireland and many countries in Latin America, dialogue using various methodologies has proved to be an important element in processes designed to facilitate social change and create a more just and inclusive society, including for disadvantaged, marginalised and vulnerable groups and individuals. In the field of normative political theory there appears to be an emerging consensus that dialogue is a crucial element in struggles to achieve more just and ethical relations among cultural groups. In light of these imperatives, this paper revisits debates between deliberative and agonistic democracy theorists, seeking to locate different dialogical methodologies and reconciliation practices within these debates. Further, the paper argues for the specific characteristics necessary for democratic dialogue if it is to avoid the potentially exclusionary aspects of deliberative practice. Sarah Maddison (BA (Hons) UTS, PhD Sydney), is an Australian Research Council Future Fellow based in the School of Social Sciences at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Her areas of research expertise include social movements (including the women's and LGBTI movements), Indigenous political culture, Australian democracy and democratic participation, gender politics, and democratic dialogue. She has published widely in these areas, and her recent books include Activist Wisdom (with Sean Scalmer, UNSW Press 2006), Silencing Dissent (Allen & Unwin 2007, co-edited with Clive Hamilton), Black Politics (Allen & Unwin 2009), Beyond White Guilt (Allen & Unwin 2011) and Unsettling the Settler State (Federation Press 2011, co-edited with Morgan Brigg). Sarah’s fellowship project is a four country comparative study exploring processes of dialogue and reconciliation in South Africa, Northern Ireland, Guatemala, and Australia.Goodsell Building, Room LG19