In addition to its range of shorter-term activities, the HC Coombs Policy Forum commissions longer translational research projects in close consultation with government. The Forum has developed a methodology for these projects which involves bringing together multi-disciplinary groups (both academic and government), conducting and publishing literature reviews to enable learning from past experience, and highlighting key future issues based on this evidence base and broad consultation. Each project culminates in a final synthesis report. Examples of projects now underway include:

• the potential for new visualisation technologies to assist with complex policy challenges
• integrated Natural Resource Management and regional policy and planning
• improving the methodology for the National Energy Security Assessment
• examining the implications of minority government.

Grappling with complex policy challenges: exploring the potential of visualisation technologies for analysis, advising and engagement

The HC Coombs Policy Forum, in partnership with the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG) and with the engagement of the Australian Public Service has committed to support a series of exploratory roundtables and publications during 2011 and early 2012 with practitioners and scholars that will:

• identify different modeling and visualisation techniques for capturing, analysing, and sharing information on complex policy challenges;
• review their advantages and limitations; and
• consider how different approaches can best be adapted for use in different policy analysis, policy advisory, and stakeholder engagement processes.

Documents

• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 2 — discussion paper (PDF, 355KB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 2 — background paper (PDF, 460KB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — graphic artist output (JPEG, 6.5MB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — presentation on APS2000 (PDF, 1.6MB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — presentation by Geoscience Australia (PDF, 3.6MB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — presentation by Professor Evert Lindquist (PDF, 6MB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — participants (PDF, 127kB)
• Policy Visualisation Roundtable 1 — agenda (PDF, 95kB)
• Draft discussion paper by Professor Evert Lindquist to inform roundtable discussions on policy visualisation” (PDF, 854kB)
• Draft background paper by Professor Evert Lindquist: Surveying the World of Visualization (PDF, 656kB)
• Policy Visualisation Reference Group — minutes of second meeting (PDF, 198kB)
• Policy Visualisation Reference Group — agenda for second meeting (PDF, 156kB)
• Policy Visualisation Reference Group — minutes of first meeting (PDF, 189kB)
• Policy Visualisation Reference Group — discussion paper (PDF, 203kB)
• Policy Visualisation — project overview (PDF, 156kB)

Reading material

• Chaomei Chen. Top 10 Unsolved Information Visualization Problems. In IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications (2005), http://hdl.handle.net/1860/854.
• Pak Chung Wong, Stuart J. Rose, George Chin Jr., Deborah A Frincke, Richard May, Christian Posse, Antonio Sanfilippo, Jim Thomas. Walking the path: a new journey to explore and discover through visual analytics. Information Visualization (2006) 5, 237–249, doi:10.1057/palgrave.ivs.9500133.
• Alan F. Blackwell, Rob Phaal, Martin Eppler, Nathan Crilly. Strategy Roadmaps: New Forms, New Practices. In Diagrammatic Representation and Inference (2008), doi:10.1007/978-3-540-87730-1. (PDF, 14.3MB)
• Michael Friendly. A Brief History of Data Visualization. In Handbook of Data Visualization (2008), doi:10.1007/978-3-540-33037-0. (PDF, 1.7MB)
• Daniel A. Keim, Florian Mansmann, Jörn Schneidewind, Jim Thomas, Hartmut Ziegler. Visual Analytics: Scope and Challenges. In Visual Data Mining (2008), doi:10.1007/978-3-540-71080-6. (PDF, 753kB)
• Chaomei Chen. Information visualization. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Computational Statistics (2010), 2: 387–403, doi:10.1002/wics.89. (PDF, 2.8MB)
• Peter Checkland, John Poulter. Soft Systems Methodology. In Systems Approaches to Managing Change: A Practical Guide 2010, doi:10.1007/978-1-84882-809-4_5. (PDF, 1.3MB)
• Professor Evert Lindquist, Presentation to Reference Group, May 2011. (PDF, 3.5MB)

Integrated Natural Resource Management and regional policy and planning

In response to a request from the Australian Government, the HC Coombs Policy Forum, in partnership with the Fenner School of Environment and Society, is supporting a joint initiative on integrated Natural Resource Management (NRM) and regional policy and planning.

The project is a collaboration between the Australian National University and the Australian Government Departments of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities (DSEWPaC) and Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF). It will inform the Australian Government’s major review of the Caring for our Country program, which is taking place in 2011.

Documents

• NRM Reference Group — project overview (PDF, 171kB)
• NRM Reference Group — literature review discussion document (PDF, 178kB)
• NRM Reference Group — minutes of first meeting (PDF, 199kB)
• NRM Workshop — Overview (PDF, 166kB)
• NRM Workshop — Leading issues and questions (PDF, 264kB)
• NRM Workshop — Synthesis of broad issues and opportunities (Document I) (PDF, 285kB)
• NRM Workshop — Literature Review (Document II) (PDF, 452kB)
• NRM Workshop — Workshop Report (Document III) (PDF, 349kB)

National Energy Security Assessment Methods Advancement Project (NESAMAP)

The HC Coombs Policy Forum is joining with the Commonwealth Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism (RET) for the National Energy Security Assessment Methods Advancement Project (NESAMAP). This project aims to support the methodological advancement of Australia’s NESA which was launched in 2007 and which provides an integrated picture of Australia’s energy security position covering the adequacy, reliability and affordability of liquid fuels, natural gas and electricity both currently and in the short to long-term. The Forum will work closely with the new Energy Change Institute (ECI) at ANU which draws together expertise in different aspects of energy technologies and policy.

On 10 May 2011 the HC Coombs Policy Forum held a scoping workshop on the NESAMAP project. The materials from this workshop are available here.

On 13 December 2011, Minister Ferguson released the 2011 National Energy Security Assessment (NESA) in conjunction with the release of the draft Energy White Paper .

These documents and further information are available on the NESA webpage of the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism