Our leading academic thinkers will discuss the big issues that matter to New Zealanders, in a multi-disciplinary discussion panel.
The Winter Symposium Series is held in Queenstown, Invercargill, Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland.
Join us in what will be exciting events on your Winter calendar.
Auckland – Thursday 1 August 2019
Our coasts and climate change - will the retreat be forced or planned?
One of the biggest issues facing New Zealand is the cost of climate change, and our poor preparedness as a society to foot the bill for climate-induced hazards on the coast such as sea level rise and increasing storm surges. Much of our infrastructure and many communities are located in coastal areas. We need creative thinking about how we respond to a changing climate, because who will pay when we are forced to go?
Panellists
Associate Professor Janet Stephenson
Janet is a social scientist with an interest in societal change and in the connections between people and place. She currently leads the Climate-Adaptive Communities project in the Deep South National Science Challenge researching how communities and councils are responding to the threat of flooding and sea level rise, with a particular focus on engagement and new ways of self-organising.
She has been Director of the Centre for Sustainability since February 2011. Her academic background is in sociology, planning and human geography.
Dr Ben France-Hudson
Ben is a legal scholar, with a background in legal practice. His expertise includes private property theory, land law and natural resource/resource management law. He has always been particularly interested in the interface of these different areas, which is acute in the context of climate change. His most recent project has considered the issue of extinguishing existing uses of land in the context of risk reduction. His current teaching includes Property Law and the law of Vendor and Purchaser.
He is also an associate member of the Property Law Section of the New Zealand Law Society and in 2018 was appointed to its Property Law Reform Panel.
Dr Caroline Orchiston
Caroline is a Research Fellow and Deputy Director of Otago University’s Centre for Sustainability. She joined the Centre in March 2016. Her research focusses on building a more resilient New Zealand by transforming how we prepare for and mitigate against rapid (earthquakes and floods) and slow onset (climate change-related) disasters.
Caroline is contributing to two projects relating to rural and cultural resilience in the Challenge programme.
Professor Lisa Ellis
Elisabeth (Lisa) Ellis teaches ethics, environmental philosophy, and philosophy, politics, and economics and is from the Department of Politics at Otago. She is the author of Kant’s Politics: Provisional Theory for an Uncertain World (2005) and Provisional Politics: Kantian Arguments in Policy Context (2008). She is a political theorist interested in collective action and democratic decision-making.
When thinking about the societal risks of climate adaptation, Lisa uses simple game theory and critical description methodology to analyse how our institutions mediate our moral relations to one another.
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Guyon Espiner
Guyon Espiner has been a leading journalist in print, television and radio for more than 20 years.
He recently stepped down as a host of Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report.
He continues working as an investigative journalist for Radio New Zealand.
Christchurch – Thursday 18 July 2019
Legalising cannabis - will it be wise, or why did we? Hear what the experts think
Cannabis is under the spotlight like never before. The Government introduced the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Act last year to increase access to medicinal cannabis and in 2020 the country will vote at the election referendum on whether to legalise personal use. Before you make up your mind, learn what the experts know.
Panellists
Professor Michelle Glass
Professor Michelle Glass is the Head of the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Otago.
Her research focuses on the molecular pharmacology of cannabinoid receptors, their role in disease, and as potential therapeutic targets.
Dr Joseph M. Boden
Dr Joseph M. Boden is an Associate Professor at the University of Otago, Christchurch, where he is Deputy Director of the Christchurch Health and Development Study, a longitudinal study of a birth cohort of 1265 individuals born in Christchurch in 1977.
Associate Professor Boden’s research interests include the psychosocial causes and consequences of substance use, abuse, and dependence; mental health and substance use epidemiology, and the application of statistical methods to analyse longitudinal data.
Tuari Potiki
Tuari Potiki is the Director of Māori Development at the University of Otago and current Chairman of the New Zealand Drug Foundation.
Dr Bronwyn Lennox Thompson
Dr Bronwyn Lennox Thompson is Academic Coordinator and Senior Lecturer of the Postgraduate Programmes in Pain & Pain Management in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery & Musculoskeletal Medicine at the University of Otago, Christchurch. Most of Bronwyn’s clinical career as an occupational therapist has been with people experiencing persistent pain.
Her research interests are understanding how people live well despite pain and in knowledge translation from research to clinical practice particularly via social media.
MC
Guyon Espiner
Guyon Espiner has been a leading journalist in print, television and radio for more than 20 years.
He recently stepped down as a host of Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report.
He continues working as an investigative journalist for Radio New Zealand.
Invercargill – Thursday 11 July 2019
Shake-up planned for NZ’s Health and Disability system. How to get this right?
A major review of the NZ Health and Disability System was launched last year, described by Health Minister David Clark as a “once in a generation opportunity to improve equity and outcomes for New Zealanders”. Can it make a difference? Panellist Professor Peter Crampton is a member of the Expert Review Panel on this, with an interim report expected soon….
Panellists
Professor Peter Crampton
Professor Crampton works in the Kōhatu Centre for Hauora Māori at the University of Otago. He started his professional life as a general practitioner and later specialised in public health medicine. He is a member of the Government-appointed Expert Review Panel for the review of the New Zealand Health and Disability system.
He was, up until last year the Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the Division of Health Sciences and Dean of the Otago Medical School.
Professor Sarah Young
Professor Sarah Young is an academic immunologist and current Head of the Pathology Department and Deputy Dean of the Dunedin School of Medicine. She has recently undertaken research projects with her Southland-based colleagues.
Her research focuses on the development of immune therapies, such as vaccines and cell therapies, for treating diseases such as cancer and autoimmune disease.
Associate Professor Konrad Richter
Associate Professor Konrad Richter is a Colorectal Surgeon and Surgical Oncologist based at Southland Hospital. He is a Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and a Member of the Foundation Board of the Colorectal Surgical Society of Australia and New Zealand. He is also the Associate Dean Southland, with the Dunedin School of Medicine.
His research and clinical interests include carcinogenesis of colorectal cancer, radiation enteropathy, surgical palliation & hospice, and health systems in other countries.
MC
Barbara Fountain
Barbara Fountain has been editor of the national medical newspaper New Zealand Doctor for the past 23 years and is highly regarded in both the health sector and among her journalist colleagues as a leader in health journalism. Ms Fountain began her journalism career as health reporter at the Otago Daily Times in Dunedin in 1990. In 2015, along with Anna Mickell, she set up The Health Media to purchase New Zealand Doctor and ensure its continued publication.
Ms Fountain has always been a champion of the media as the fourth estate, ensuring the Government and other key agencies are held accountable and transparent to the public.
Queenstown – Thursday 4 July 2019
Bitten by the FAANG – How to stem the flow
Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google know you better than you know yourself, so they say. Should you care? Calls for regulating these companies are increasing, in several economies and jurisdictions, and from both extremes of the political spectrum. Legislation has been enacted, notably in the European Union, and the “Christchurch Call” will see New Zealand as a central player. So what should we be calling for and why?
Panellists
Dr John Williams
John has been a staff member at the Department since 1996 and is a Senior Lecturer. Prior to that he was a student of Marketing at Otago since 1984.
His research and scholarly interests include research methods and philosophy of science; consumer behaviour; tourism; business ethics and 'social' marketing; also, information technology and its impact on business and society.
Marianne Elliott
Marianne Elliott is a researcher, writer and consultant who advocates for evidence-based solutions to the big challenges facing human rights and democracy. She was co-founder of ActionStation and is currently Co-Director of The Workshop. Trained as a human rights lawyer, she worked in Timor-Leste, New Zealand and the Gaza Strip before going to Afghanistan, where Marianne served in the United Nations.
Over the past decade she has accumulated experience in senior-level management and leadership, including in not-for-profit organizations.
Tom Barraclough
Tom is a Director of BrainBox Institute, a research firm specialising in the intersection between law, policy and emerging technologies. An Otago Alumni – graduating in 2013 with Bachelor of Laws (Hons) and a Bachelor of Arts (Politics). He’s also an affiliate of the Centre for Law and Policy in Emerging Technologies, and key member of AI Forum NZ’s Working Group on Law, Ethics and Society, working alongside other experts from science, technology, academia, business and government backgrounds to help develop strategies and projects that achieve the purpose of the AI Forum.
MC
Guyon Espiner
Guyon Espiner has been a leading journalist in print, television and radio for more than 20 years.
He recently stepped down as a host of Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report.
He continues working as an investigative journalist for Radio New Zealand.
Wellington – Wednesday 24 July 2019
Rethinking civil justice in Aotearoa – how to make it accessible
Civil Justice is broadly the arm of our legal system that doesn’t involve the Criminal Court or Family Court. This could involve disputes over property, debt recovery, finance and estate matters. A major problem with civil justice is the expense – the cost of achieving outcomes can be so high people often don’t get “justice” simply because they can’t afford it. This symposium will put forward a variety of recommendations to enable vastly improved access to civil justice in New Zealand.
Panellists
Dr Bridgette Toy-Cronin
Bridgette is the Director of the University of Otago Legal Issues Centre, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Law. Bridgette’s research has an empirical focus, furthering the Centre’s aims of investigating access to justice, the legal profession, judging, dispute resolution and civil procedure. She is interested in socio-legal research methods, as well as studying the intersection of civil justice and poverty. Bridgette has been the Director of the Legal Issues Centre since 2016.
The Honourable Justice Forrest (Forrie) Miller
Justice Miller was appointed to the High Court of New Zealand in 2004, and to the Court of Appeal in 2013. He was formerly chairman of Chapman Tripp, solicitors, where he had a commercial litigation practice focused on securities, regulatory and competition law. He was chairman of Unison Networks Ltd, the electricity distributor for the Hawkes Bay, Rotorua and Taupo regions, and the Wellington Girls College Board of Trustees. In the High Court he was executive Judge for the Wellington circuit. He designed and until 2013 managed the Earthquake List for the many cases arising from the Christchurch earthquakes. For this work he shared the Australian Institute of Judicial Administration Award for Excellence in 2013.
He chairs the Judicial Reference Group, a cross-bench committee working with the Ministry of Justice on an electronic content management system which will lead to electronic filing and case management systems in all New Zealand courts. The Honourable Justice Forrest (Forrie) Miller received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Otago this year. He was recognised for his contribution to the modernisation of the New Zealand court system.
Leo Watson
Leo is a part time lecturer at Otago’s Faculty of Law, and he is a legal practitioner with over 21 years’ experience in Indigenous Law including Treaty of Waitangi claims, Maori land, compulsory acquisition and public works, administrative law, fisheries, traditional knowledge and Intellectual property, employment and environmental law. Leo represents a range of clients in the Courts and Tribunals, mediation, facilitated hui, and commercial negotiations. His practice is focused on finding solutions, empathy for our whenua and natural resources, and a passion for justice.
MC
Guyon Espiner
Guyon Espiner has been a leading journalist in print, television and radio for more than 20 years.
He recently stepped down as a host of Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report.
He continues working as an investigative journalist for Radio New Zealand.
