Climate Change, Natural Resources and Conflict
UndergraduateMUR-POL2032025
Course information for 2025 intake
Enrol today with instant approval and no entry requirements
- Study method
- 100% online
- Assessments
- 100% online
- Enrol by
- 20 July 2025
- Entry requirements
- No ATAR needed, No prior study
- Duration
- 13 weeks
- Start dates
- 28 July 2025
- Price from
- $2,125
- Upfront cost
- $0
- Loan available
- HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP available
Climate Change, Natural Resources and Conflict
About this subject
At the completion of this subject students will be able to:
- Communicate an in-depth knowledge of the security implications of climate change and resource competition.
- Research and report the principle perspectives on environmental conflicts and how they inform policy and research.
- Analyse a broad range of environmental conflicts, including their causes, dynamics and potential solutions.
- Identify and explain the role of environmental factors in peace processes.
- Intro: peace, conflict, security
- Historical debates about environmental security
- Resource scarcity and armed conflict
- Climate change and conflict
- Resource abundance, conflict resources and violence
- Environmental peacebuilding
- Critical approaches: Political ecology and securitisation
- Case study: Arab Spring/Middle East
- Case study: Mining in WA
- Case study: Environmental conflicts in Africa (DRC, Kenya, Nigeria)
- Case study: Violence against environmental defenders
- Case study: Water wars
The world is facing tremendous environmental challenges, including climate change, biodiversity loss, water scarcity and soil degradation. At the same time, states and companies race to secure supplies of valuable resources like oil, land, or metals. These developments have sparked concerns about the security implications of environmental stress, climate change and resource extraction. The UN Security Council recently hosted debates on climate change and security, peacebuilding missions mainstream environmental issues, and initiatives to deal with conflict resources are burgeoning. At the same time, there are intense debates about climate change as a driver of the Syrian civil war and violence against environmental defenders, among others.
This unit tackles the question of whether and how climate change and natural resource competition impact the dynamics of peace and conflict. It provides a comprehensive introduction to debates on environmental security, resource conflicts, climate change and violence, environmental peacebuilding, and political ecology. Insights are drawn from a broad range of cases, including the Arab Spring, rebel violence after storms in Southeast Asia, water conflict and cooperation in the Middle East, and conflict resources in Sub-Sahara Africa.
During the course of the unit, students will learn to identify and analyse various types of environmental conflicts. This knowledge is facilitated by lectures, readings, conflict analysis assignments and simulations.
Please Note: All students studying at Murdoch University will need to complete the compulsory unit, Murdoch Academic Passport (MAP100), which only takes 2-3 hours to complete online. Find out more: http://goto.murdoch.edu.au/MurdochAcademicPassport.
- Research Essay (50%)
- Tutorial Participation or Think Piece (10%)
- Research Plan Presentation (40%)
For textbook details check your university's handbook, website or learning management system (LMS).
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Entry requirements
No entry requirements
Study load
- 0.125 EFTSL
- This is in the range of 10 to 12 hours of study each week.
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What to study next?
Once you’ve completed this subject it can be credited towards one of the following courses
Bachelor of Global Security (Terrorism and Counterterrorism Studies)
UndergraduateMUR-BGS-DEG
Bachelor of Arts (International Aid and Development)
UndergraduateMUR-AID-DEG
Bachelor of Arts (Sustainable Development)
UndergraduateMUR-ASD-DEG
Bachelor of Arts (Community Development)
UndergraduateMUR-CDV-DEG
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