The Girl on the Roof:
the life of a change-maker
Buy ebook
The Girl on the Roof:
the life of a change-maker
Overview
Nine decades, one life — a remarkable memoir by an Australian living treasure.
Valerie Brown was a bookish, rebellious child who had made an important discovery when she escaped to the roof of her large family home. As she watched the activities of her family down below, she found that they did not match the ideals her parents had taught to her. Nor did her family’s actions meet the ideals put forward in the books she was reading.
This simple observation led to a lifetime of concern about the damage done to a society when there are gaps between their community’s good intentions and their practices. She and her team delivered pioneering change programs to bridge such gaps — in partnership with a prime minister, each of the three levels of government, four universities, multiple communities, and several activist groups.
Her interests in health and the environment led her to design and deliver initiatives such as the first Australian science degree in health education; change an outdated public health department into the emerging New Public Health; design and deliver the country’s first national drug summit; and establish community health training for doctors and nurses at Tribhuvan University in Nepal. After a stroke in her eighties, she recovered to supervise doctoral students and co-author five books on social change, including the highly successful Tackling Wicked Problems.
Valerie Brown AO is still promoting, discussing, and thinking about positive social changes. After nine decades, she is still that girl on the roof.
Details
- Format
- Size
- Extent
- ISBN
- RRP
- Pub date
- Rights held
- Paperback
- 2100mm x 135mm
- 224 pages
- 9781761382208
- AUD$32.99
- 2 June 2026
- World
Praise
Praise for Tackling Wicked Problems (co-authored with John A. Harris and Jacqueline Russell):
‘I am really delighted to see a work that provides a philosophical foundation for Post-Normal Science, while enriching and expanding its vision. Valerie Brown and her colleagues — really comrades — have achieved the new synthesis for a scientific practice that is so necessary for the current age. At last there is a statement for science that leaves behind the linear logic and truncated self-awareness that was the heritage of Descartes. With its themes of plurality, paradox, complementarity and ethical commitment, Tackling Wicked Problems provides the means for science to make a creative response to the challenges of our time.'
Praise for Tackling Wicked Problems (co-authored with John A. Harris and Jacqueline Russell):
'One of the critical questions posed by the ecological crisis concerns the nature of the knowledge we need to deal with it. Tackling Wicked Problems tackles the problem by offering a unique transdisciplinary approach to inquiry, one that is capable of integrating the natural and social sciences. Integrating both empirical and normative investigation, it offers a framework that is at the same time theoretical, epistemological and practical. The book brings together the full range of separate but yet interconnected perspectives that have to be brought to bear on the most challenging questions of our time.'
About the Author
Valerie A. Brown AO is an Australian scholar known for pioneering interdisciplinary and collective-thinking approaches to complex social and environmental problems. As the foundation director of the Local Sustainability Project at the Australian National University, she led research integrating science, policy, and community knowledge. The author of numerous books on collective decision-making and sustainability, she has advised governments, NGOs, and international agencies. Her work focuses on strengthening democratic processes, enabling community engagement, and supporting cross-sector collaboration to address global challenges.
