Research Program Principles

The Institute's research programs are devised to provide research that is intellectually credible, evidence based and/or action–oriented enabling the incorporation of lessons learned directly into the decision-making process. The latter objective is pursued by most but not all Research Programs and is achieved by ensuring that each program is comprised of an interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral knowledge network comprised of experts from academia, practice and the private and third sectors brought together to problem-solve on critical governance issues on the basis of hard evidence. The research outputs from this process of collaborative learning are also used in the delivery of professional education to ensure that our professional development programs are underpinned by the highest quality evidence-based research which is directly relevant to the world of practice.

Role

The role of Institute Research Programs is to:

• produce research outputs of national and international leading class (as determined by the capacity of the Program Team);
• facilitate interdisciplinary or disciplinary research culture where appropriate;
• foster national and/or international research collaboration (as determined by the capacity of the Program Team);
• increase research income from national and international sources for class 1, 2, & 3 research funding depending on the capacity of the programme team;
• where appropriate act as a think tank to the ACT government;
• attract high quality research students;
• contribute to conferencing and regular seminar activity in areas of research strength; and,
• contribute to interdisciplinary MPA coursework programmes where appropriate and desirable.

Principles of selection

Research programs are determined by the following criteria. They should:

• encompass Governance related research;
• possess linkages with teaching programmes at the postgraduate level in the Faculty of Business and Government or the Faculty of Law;
• display evidence of concentrated or developing research strength;
• demonstrate willingness for active engagement in pure or action-based research and related development activities;
• they can include ‘horizontal’ (cross-cutting issues such as ‘social exclusion’) and ‘vertical’ themes (e.g. Local Government); and,
• Institute scholars are encouraged to join more than one program