The global community has over the last few years alone seen an unprecedented series of crises that have posed significant challenges to policymakers and practitioners. From the COVID-19 pandemic and its devastating impacts on local communities and the global economy, to climate-related floods and bushfires, to rapid changes to the ways we work and connect, and most recently the escalating conflicts engulfing many regions in particular the Middle East and Eastern Europe. These challenges exacerbate polarizing tensions and instability at the global level, but are also a call to remake politics, society and economy in ways that support equality and justice.  Scholars in the humanities and social sciences (HASS) have important contributions to make in finding solutions and remaking futures that support global flourishing.   

This conference aims to engage with these urgent issues from the perspective of robust HASS research. The pandemic, climate crisis, technological change and regional/global geo-political tensions are all sites where sociopolitical understandings are essential to make real change. The conference will provide a unique platform to engage with and discuss the role of HASS research in unpacking critically these important debates and in providing empirical evidence for carefully calibrated policy responses.    

• Migration, diversity and the future of mobility  
• Climate change and sustainability  
• Indigenous rights and the challenge of recognition and justice  
• Public health crises and the social implications 
• Technology and digital transformation  
• Justice and power in international relations  

Professor Loretta Baldassar 

Loretta Baldassar is Professor of Anthropology and Sociology, Vice Chancellor’s Professorial Research Fellow, and Director of the Social Ageing (SAGE) Futures Lab at Edith Cowan University (ECU) in Perth, Western Australia. Baldassar was recently named Australian Research Field Leader in Migration Studies and in Ethnic and Cultural Studies. She is lead Chief Investigator on a Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) Dementia and Migrant Communities project; social support stream lead on the MRFF National Frailty Kit project, and co-Chief Investigator of the ARC DP Youth Mobilities project with Professor Anita Harris (Deakin). Her work is widely acknowledged as foundational to the field of Transnational Family Studies, including her most recent book, Transnational Families in Africa (with Marchetti-Mercer & Swartz, 2023). She has also published extensively on ageing across the life course, social care and the role of social support networks to support wellbeing, cultural safety, digital ageing, intergenerational relations, and co-design of social interventions for CaLD communities. Her research team is leading innovation in social care across the life-course, contributing social science perspectives and methodologies to the creative and caring professions.  Her work has been devoted to better understanding the impact of migration on families and communities, with a focus on the role of social support networks, intergenerational relations, and the social uses of new technologies.

Professor Pam Nilan 

Pam Nilan is a social science youth researcher who holds an Honorary Professor position in the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalization at Deakin University, and also in the School of Humanities, Creative Industries and Social Sciences at the University of Newcastle. For 35 years she has conducted research on youth in Australia, Indonesia and Fiji, winning a number of research grants. Notable books include Young People and the Far Right – Palgrave 2021, Muslim Youth in the Diaspora: Challenging Extremism through Popular Culture – Routledge 2017, Adolescents in Contemporary Indonesia – Routledge 2013, and Global Youth? Hybrid Identities, Plural Worlds – Routledge 2006. In 2024 she delivered the annual Fay Gale Lecture for the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia on ‘Youth, Masculinity and the Far Right in Australia’. She is currently writing a book titled Decolonizing Social Science Research in Southeast Asia – New Ways of Knowing – Palgrave, forthcoming 2025.