Politics

Our BA/BSc Politics course offers a demanding and stimulating programme of study covering international politics, comparative politics, and political theory, with an emphasis on developing your analytical and research skills.

Key benefits

• You will learn to think critically and independently about key issues in politics and develop a range of skills to support your intellectual, vocational and personal development.
• Given the interdisciplinary nature of the department, you will also have many opportunities to explore the interplay between politics and economics.
• In your first year, you’ll learn about the core concepts and issues in politics and about the statistical techniques we employ. Your second and third years will feature a wide range of options, plus some further required modules, depending on whether you choose the Politics BA or BSc degree. You’ll consider how you could investigate the important problems we face in politics, and produce your own proposal for a piece of research. Building on these skills, you will conduct and write up your own piece of original research on a subject of your choice for your third-year dissertation.

Year 1

Your first year will comprise the following compulsory modules:

• Fundamentals of Politics Research (15 credits)
• World Politics Since 1945 (30 credits)
• Comparing Political Systems (30 credits)
• Introduction to Political Theory (30 credits)
• Statistics for Political Science (15 credits)

Year 2

After year 1, you will choose whether to read for the BA or the BSc.

The following 15-credit modules are required for this course:

• Research Methods for Politics

If you choose Politics BSc, you will also be required to take these modules:

• Game Theory & Strategic Decision-Making (15 credits)
• Statistics for Political Science II (15 credits)

Optional Modules

You will then select further modules to bring your total credits to 120 for the year from a wide range of options, each of which typically carries 15 credits. To ensure that we continue to provide an exciting and stimulating range of options, we review our provision of modules regularly. Please check here for updates or contact the department for more information:

• Issues & International Politics
• Political Economy: Approaches, Concepts & Issues
• The International Politics of Energy
• History of Political Thought
• Political Change in Europe
• The Political Theory of Capitalism
• Stability & Change in Post-Colonial Nations
• Institutions, Economics & Change
• Ethics, Economics & Environmental Protection
• The Economics of Politics
• Extended Essay

As a second-year student you also have the option to study abroad with one of our partner institutions for the second semester of the year. These currently include:

• Hong Kong University (Faculty of Economics & Business)
• National University of Singapore
• 3 Campus Programme (students attend Keio, Yonsei and HKU)
• University of North Carolina
• Georgetown University
• Sciences Po, Paris (you would basic French language for this option although a significant number of English-language taught modules are now available) – this option is not appropriate for BSc students because the required economics modules are not guaranteed.
• University of California – this option is not appropriate for BSc students because the required economics modules are not guaranteed.

Year 3

Required Modules

• Dissertation (30 credits)

Optional Modules

You will then select further modules to bring your total credits to 120 for the year from a wide range of options, each of which typically carries 15 credits. To ensure that we continue to provide an exciting and stimulating range of options, we review our provision of modules regularly. Please check here for updates or contact the department for more information: 

• Political Economy: Advanced Analysis
• Democracy & Its Critics
• Religion & Politics
• Commerce, Liberty & Virtue
• Democracy & Development
• The Politics of Culture & Identity
• Advanced Issues in International Politics
• The Economics of Crime
• Economic Policy-Making
• Advanced Issues in International Politics
• Behavioural Political Economy
• Liberalism
• Global Power Europe
• International Institutions & Global Governance

• The Attestat o Srednam Obrazov is not considered suitable for direct entry to our undergraduate degrees without further study (such as international A-levels, IB, or the first year of a degree with high grades in any compulsory subjects). Please consider our International Foundation Programmes (see below) as a route to our undergraduate degrees.
• Students with the High School certificate should consider applying for our International Foundation Programmes.
• IELTS 
• TOEFL iBT