PhD Politics

This course aims to support PhD students in the early phase of the doctoral programme by introducing key concepts and issues in designing a politics research project (semester 1) and by providing knowledge of and engagement with advanced quantitative, qualitative, mixed methodologies, and theory-driven Politics research (semester 2).

This course aims to support the development of your research design for your PhD project, and to provide knowledge and engagement with the variety of advanced research methods practiced across Politics research. To get you started with your research design, this course will cover broad issues of research design within the context of a PhD in Semester 1. These include: the components of a research design, planning and managing the project, refining your research question/puzzle, the use of theory and literature, and methodological and analytical choices. The course will help you to write a feasible and achievable research design, support the production of your research plan for your year 1 mid-year review, and lay the groundwork for the successful completion of your PhD at Manchester.

Upon completion of the course, students will:

1. Understand the core components of research design in Politics research.
2. Be able to apply these components to their own research project.
3. Be able to adapt research design as may be required across the phases of research development.
4. Be familiar with the variety of methodological approaches practiced within the discipline of Politics.
5. Be able to identify their own methodological needs.
6. Be able to assess how advanced quantitative, qualitative, mixed, and theory-driven methods link to different types of research questions and modes of generalisation practiced within the discipline of Politics.
7. Have gained skills in oral presentation, scholarly Q&A, and conference proceedings.

In Semester 2, staff members within the Politics Department will present and discuss with us the research methodologies they deploy in their own research. You will be introduced to and reflect in a reflection journal on the mechanisms, advantages and drawbacks of cutting-edge ways of conducting advanced quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods and theory-driven politics research. You will also gain knowledge about and assess the various theoretical commitments that inform how such methods are deployed, as well as the types of generalisations they do or do not allow. This will lay the groundwork for your ability to assess your own methodological needs and to adapt your research design as your PhD progresses.

Before the Easter Break, you will partake in the one-day 1st Year PHD Conference, where all Y1 PhD students present their revised research plans on thematic, sub-disciplinary or methodological panels (depending on how it makes sense to organise panels in a given year). Your supervisors are invited to attend. The Conference gives you first-hand experience of how academic conference and scholarly workshops are conducted and serves as annual review prep. 

The course is taught through twelve two-hour seminars, six per semester, and a one-day conference in S2. There will be one piece of reading for each of the seminars, which is compulsory and will form the basis of the discussion in the seminar (S1), and of your own reflections in your reflection journal (S2). We will also draw on any previous training or experience you have had in this area and give you the opportunity to apply what we have discussed to your own PhD research project. The seminars will be mostly discussion-based, with the opportunity to discuss both key concepts and issues and research design and methods, and your project in particular, with the rest of your cohort.

Estelle M Phillips and Derek S Pugh (2000) How to get a PhD (3rd Edition) (Open University Press)

Rowena Murray (2002) How to Write a Thesis (Open University Press)

Attendance at all seminars is compulsory; please let the convenor know in advance if something prevents you from attending a session.