Undergraduate - UnitATS3903 - Leaders, power and politics

This unit entry is for students who completed this unit in 2015 only. For students planning to study the unit, please refer to the unit indexes in the the current edition of the Handbook. If you have any queries contact the managing faculty for your course or area of study.

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6 points, SCA Band 1, 0.125 EFTSL

Refer to the specific census and withdrawal dates for the semester(s) in which this unit is offered.

Level	Undergraduate
Faculty	Faculty of Arts
Organisational Unit	Politics and International Relations
Offered	Clayton Second semester 2015 (Day)
Coordinator(s)	Associate Professor Paul Strangio

Synopsis

Leadership is indispensable to politics. Yet it is also a problematic concept within liberal democracies that have traditionally set out to constrain leadership authority. In recent times in Australia and other comparable parliamentary democracies debate has surfaced about the growth of leadership power (particularly that of prime ministers) as a result of institutional changes in the political system and other developments in the practice of politics. This unit examines changes in the nature and role of leadership in Australian politics. It also theorises political leadership, introducing students to political psychology that explores the complex relationship between leaders and followers.

Outcomes

On successful completion of the unit, students will be able to:

understand how liberal-democratic systems have traditionally addressed the issue of leadership;
understand debates about the augmentation of prime ministerial power in Australia and comparable parliamentary democracies;
understand some of the theoretical debates about leadership and political psychology and the relationship between leaders and followers;
apply theoretical understandings to a case study of Australian political leadership;
display developing skills in spoken and written communication in addressing questions of the changing relationship between leadership and politics;

Assessment

Within semester assessment: 70%
Exam: 30%

Workload requirements

Minimum total expected workload to achieve the learning outcomes for this unit is 144 hours per semester typically comprising a mixture of scheduled learning activities and independent study. A unit requires on average three/four hours of scheduled activities per week. Scheduled activities may include a combination of teacher directed learning, peer directed learning and online engagement.

Chief examiner(s)

Associate Professor Paul Strangio

This unit applies to the following area(s) of study

Politics

Prerequisites

Twelve credit points of second-year Arts units. It is highly recommended that students only take this unit after they have completed two gateway units in Politics.

Prohibitions

ATS2903