WISENET Journal No. 17, February 1989, p. 16-17
I am currently a water policy analyst in intergovernment relations with the NSW Department of Water Resources. I've held a number of academic posts in geography and environmental policy until mid 1988 when I decided to put my theory of the importance of public sector experience in academic analysis to the test. I have researched and taught at The University of Newcastle, New England and more recently at The Australian National University. My formative years were spent at Maitland Girls High School where I discovered the real educational value of all girls schools and the world of science and humanities/arts and ultimately joined them together in my research.
I was very interested in zrivers and erosion and the spectrum of earth sciences and wanted to be all sorts of scientists -- a very early aptitude test suggested if I worked hard I could be OK in an office or perhaps even a nurse. Many teachers at the time couldn't have observed raw ambition if they fell over it. My geography teacher was uniquely inspiring and with that encouragement I was on the right track for the rest of my career.
As a Research Fellow at the Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies, ANU I researched water, land and energy resource management futures. This analysis suggested to me a substantial gap between what tertiary environmental policy research and teaching was delivering and its relevance for public and private sector needs. My current work in the public sector has as one aim to facilitate better water planning decisions and it gives opportunity for insight into political agendas and organisational cultures in decision making. Over the past decade I've moved from pure research in catchment hydrology and geomorphology to indeed the applied end. I decided that many can do the scientific research but more is needed in the social planning end of resources management. So this is the area I've chosen to work in.
A number of research awards have assisted my work including several from the Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering for work on environmental isotopes in hydrology and land degradation research. Also several grants from the Australian Water Research Advisory Council (AWRAC) have facilitated detailed work on river regulation and its impacts on the environment and how we must plan to protect our riverine resources. A second AWRAC grant was for a study of urban water demand management and how new policies such as pricing changes and new management affect organisational cultures and the public.
I've published scientific papers on erosion, river management and in a range of applied water and land planning areas. In 1986 the ANU published my book on coal and energy production and the import for the environment and water resources planning in particular. Books edited cover environmental quality control futures and environmental and social planning options for regional resources development. In what can be said to be spare time I've begun a book with a different approach to water politics and quite separately a fun book -- for women of all ages -- on how to make yourself a happier and more succesful life.
I am an editor of the new Australian Journal of Soil and Water Conservation which is certainly timely, and am a NSW Government representative on the Planning Committee of the Australian Water Resources Council. I am also a Convocation Member of Council of the University of Newcastle.
One of my concerns is the improvement of undergraduate and postgraduate courses in resource and environmental management. We need more realistic structures in tune with the changing demands of both public and private sectors. We need a closer view of the real determinants of public policy -- better frameworks for analysis -- better liaison between academics and government and more work on conflict resolution and the role of politics in planning. I am further concerned however about the blatant technocratisation of the Australian University system -- many academics seem to enjoy feeble sheep behaviour. The 'Consumer' driven purge on the tertiary sector has a most insufficient regard for the full social planning charter of the social and humanitarian sciences. Many benefits of the Dawkins papers are, in charity, ambiguous and poorly defined.
There is a great need for increased numbers of women in senior academic and bureaucratic posts and on boards of management. There are opportunities. However, the old (usually literally, and grey) boys network and its sheer ignorance of available female talent remains a pervasive problem in getting more gender equity in research, teaching and social planning generally. Certainly more women in politics is a vital need in this regard. The Registers of Women in a number of States for placement on Government boards have not done well.
Some of my out of hours pursuits include eating devonshire teas and writing about them, getting away from urban areas as frequently as possible, reading everything, being at the coast and travelling (in Australia).