About Us
Programme Mission
- To enable students to develop multiple interpretive perspectives (religious and philosophical) on perennial and contemporary issues in different contexts of public affairs.
- To help students appreciate and respect diversity within modern society in order to assess and handle conflicting values in critically informed and creative ways.
- To help students further develop and reflect on their own values, so that they will be able to justify their own decisions, judgments and convictions, and so become informed and responsible citizens in their community, nation and the world.
- To stimulate the students’ interest in, and a reflective understanding of, public affairs.
- To enhance awareness and knowledge of the value dimensions of discourses on economic, political, legal, social, cultural, and environmental affairs.
- To provide a transition to the eventual pursuit of further studies in various disciplines.
Special Features
- Issue-based and Multiple teaching methodology
To ensure students to have a good command of subject matter, multiple teaching methodology (Including lecture, guest speakers’ sharing, group discussion, case study, site-visit and movie appreciation) will be adopted.
- Flexible Teaching Schedule to Cater for Students’ Need
To meet the needs of different students, this programme provides two streams: full-time (1 year) and part-time (2 years).
- Scholarship
Outstanding graduates will be granted a scholarship (maximum top 3).
Admission
Admission Requirements：
Applicants should possess a bachelor's degree from a recognized university or comparable institution. Proof of English proficiency is required for all applicants whose bachelor’s degrees were obtained from non-English medium institutions. These applicants must meet the following minimum requirements for English proficiency:
- a score of 74 (Internet-based test) in TOEFL; or
- an overall band score of 6.0 in IELTS; or
- a score of 450 in the College English Test band 6 (CET-6) of China
* The test result provided should be within two years from the date of issuance of the Admission Offer letter. TOEFL iBT Home Edition, IELTS Indicator or other English test reports are not accepted.
Programme Fee：
- The tuition fee for the entire programme is HK$ 130,000
- (Full-time in two installments; Part-time in three installments)
Application Starts：
- 7 October, 2024
Application Deadline：
- 1 February (1st batch), 4 June (2nd batch) &
- 24 July, 2025 (for local students only).
Application Procedures：
- Applications should be submitted online via the online application system.
Applicants are required to submit the following supporting documents along with their application:
Photocopies of
Essential
- HKID card (for local applicants); Passport or other identity documents of home country (for non-local applicants). Please click here for details,
- Degree certificate(s)/graduation diploma(s),
- Transcript(s) for academic qualification(s) supporting the application,
- English proficiency test results (e.g. TOEFL/IELTS results).
For details of application information, please click here .
* For the Cumulative GPA and Overall GPA of Institution/ University in Mainland China, please indicate the full marks out of 100. (e.g. Cumulative GPA: 80, Overall GPA: 100)
Contact Us：
- Tel: (852) 3411 5822 (Programme Information)/ (852) 3411 5127 (Admission)
- Fax: (852) 3411 7379
- Email: ma_epa@hkbu.edu.hk
- Address: MAEPA, Room 1001, 10/F, Christian Education Centre, Department of Religion and Philosophy, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Course Description
- LSE 7010 Approaches to the Study of Values
In order to enable students to develop multiple interpretative perspectives on perennial and contemporary issues as well as to appreciate and respect diversity within modern society, the course will introduce different moral theories and principles in allowing students to achieve a comprehensive understanding of various approaches in resolving moral conflicts.
- LSE 7120 Critical Thinking for Public Affairs
Critical thinking is important not only for individuals but also society. We need to think critically about our personal matters. But as citizens, we also have to think critically about issues in public affairs. The course aims to help students understand what critical thinking is and what conceptual tools and principles are involved in critical thinking.
- LSE 7130 Social Justice
This course introduces basic concepts of social and political philosophy, including the justification of the state, the nature of social life, the relation between individuals and the collective, the ideas of liberty, right, good, etc. It focuses on major philosophical theories of distributive justice, especially the debates among Rawlsian liberalism, libertarianism and communitarianism. It will also explore the implications of these debates upon various concrete social issues, particularly under the Hong Kong context.
- LSE 7140 Law, Liberty and Morality
Liberty is important for individuals as well as for society. Yet liberty should not become complete license, so it has to be regulated by both morality and law. This course will explore the dynamics between criminal law, liberty and morality by discussing the merits and demerits of four liberty-limiting: (1) harm to others; (2) offense to others; (3) harm to oneself; and (4) legal enforcement of morality even if there is no victim. Relevant real life case studies will be discussed.
- LSE 7070 Public Health and the Common Good
Public health issues such as abortion, euthanasia and medical resources allocation are often hotly debated in the public sphere. The course aims to help student understand public health and the related issues from both a medical and an ethical point of view.
- LSE 7080 Science, Technology and Environmental Ethics
This course deals with the ethical dilemma of modern application of science and technology. Science and technology have greatly enhanced the quality of human lives and productivity. Yet they do at the expense of the environment and other life forms including human future generations. The ethical problems of the effects of science and technology on the environment will be tackled from the perspectives of different moral theories.
- LSE 7040 Values and Socio-cultural Issues in Hong Kong Today
This course seeks to employ theories in modern sociology and cultural studies to study important socio-cultural issues in contemporary Hong Kong. It begins with a historical introduction to formation of contemporary Hong Kong. The course will emphasize multiple perspectives on important socio-cultural issues related to public life in Hong Kong like identity, collective memory, disparity between the rich and the poor, consumerism, social movement, public affairs and political participation.
- LSE 7050 Traditional Values and Moral Challenges in Contemporary China
This course begins with an introduction to the background of the economic reform and open-up of China since 1978, and then examines how the reform and open-up reshape the economic, political, and cultural life of the people. It ends with a critical analysis of the impact of modernization/globalization as well as the future development of China from the perspective of moral and ethical challenges in contemporary public life with special attention to the current economic and political policies and social stratifications.
- LSE 7060 Globalization: Cultural and Ethical Issues
How do you make sense of people when they argue that they are “pro-“ or “anti-globalization”? Why are financial and environmental crises now increasingly experienced as global crises? How does globalization change politics locally and globally? How do they relate to national sovereignty? Why does increasing global interconnectedness between countries lead to greater inequality in countries? This course aims to help you answer these questions by examining different aspects of globalization.
- LSE 7150 Human Rights in a Multicultural World
The course will help students reflect on the idea of human rights from the perspectives of major philosophical and religious traditions in the contemporary multicultural world. The contents will cover basic concepts of rights, the historical development of these ideas, and the perspectives of different philosophical traditions (such as liberalism, utilitarianism, and communitarianism), and world religions like Confucianism, Buddhism, and Christianity. Finally, the ethical foundation of rights, the balance between individual rights and good society, and conflicts between different kinds of human rights will be discussed.
Career and Further Studies
All our students have a bachelor degree in various fields. After finishing MAEPA, they can continue to pursue their original fields but now they are better equipped. First, they get a further qualification. Second, they will have a broader and deeper knowledge about the society and many public issues. Third, they will have an enhanced capacity for critical thinking and careful analysis. These three aspects of improvement will be quite helpful for basically all professions. Moreover, if the original field is related to social policy or philosophy (e.g. social work, law), a further training in the ethics of public affairs will strengthen the student’s area of expertise and open up new directions in career like working in the government and the NGOs, teaching, further study and so on. Most students came from Mainland China.
Most of the graduates went back to China, and started working in areas like government, banking and secretarial work. Some of them stayed behind and found jobs in various areas, e.g. education, media (editorial for newspaper), marketing, accounting, administration and secretarial work. On the other hand, the local graduates worked as teachers in secondary schools. According to the results of Graduate Employment Survey for Taught Postgraduate Programmes which was conducted by the Career Centre of Office of Student Affairs, four students found jobs in administration/ management and three found jobs in public relations & advertising, others in various areas, e.g. editorial/ journalism, human resources, insurance services and others. On the other hand, the local graduates worked as teachers and teaching assistants in schools, editors in mass media and officers in government.
