Guide to Doctoral Study in Political Science

The departmental Guide to Doctoral Study in Political Science contains information on admissions requirements, financial awards, residency requirements, curricular requirements, advising, evaluation, comprehensive examinations, and other information about our graduate program.

You may print out an Adobe Acrobat version of the Guide to Doctoral Study in Political Science here.

GRADUATE STUDY IN POLITICAL SCIENCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF IOWA

The Department of Political Science at the University of Iowa offers a rich program of graduate study that has as its foundation a group of faculty members who are committed to first-rate research and teaching. The University of Iowa Political Science Department ranks among the best in the country in terms of scholarly quality as measured by faculty publications in the leading professional journals. The primary areas of expertise, along with three representative publications, are listed below for each of our distinguished faculty members.

Students receive graduate training through seminars, through collaborative work with other faculty, and through daily interaction with other students. The result is that graduates from the University of Iowa frequently enter the job market with publications in hand. According to our past experience, after obtaining the doctoral degree, graduates can expect to find employment in high quality colleges and universities.

Graduate students can choose from six fields of study: American Politics, International Politics, Comparative Politics, Political Theory, Formal Theory and Research Methods. The Department of Political Science at the University of Iowa offers comprehensive study in each of these fields, it provides training in a variety of methodological and theoretical approaches, and it provides opportunities for individualized programs of learning. After having completed a sequence of study, each graduate student can expect to be prepared to teach and conduct research in three fields. Because of the importance of statistical methods for the conduct of political science research, the first year course curriculum includes a compulsory sequence in quantitative methods. Advanced graduate students have a wide array of seminars from which they can select and build a general program of study. The Department of Political Science at the University of Iowa focuses on training skilled researchers. Graduate students can expect to receive rigorous training and complete professional preparation.

The Comparative Legislative Research Center is housed within the department and it publishes the Legislative Studies Quarterly, the official journal of the legislative studies section of the American Political Science Association. The Department also includes several faculty who are active in the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies, which is a designated National Resource Center of the U.S. Department of Education.

Department rules and procedures described in this Guide, together with the general University rules set forth in the University of Iowa Bulletin and the rules of the Graduate College set forth in the Manual of Rules and Regulations of the Graduate College, constitute the body of regulations which govern students pursuing a Ph.D. degree in Political Science.

ADMISSIONS REQUIREMENTS

Because the number of positions available in this program is limited, the competition for available openings is keen. Those not having majored in political science or not being acquainted with quantitative research methods, however, are not at a disadvantage.

The deadline for application, to be considered for assistantships/fellowships, is February 1—all materials must be on file with the department, including GRE scores. A normal admission requires a combined Verbal and Quantitative GRE score of 1200 (at least 540 of the points must come from the verbal examination) and an analytical writing score of 4.5 or higher.

Other normal admission requirements include a bachelor's degree, an undergraduate grade point average of at least 3.3 on a four point scale (or its equivalent for foreign applicants), and three letters of recommendation from persons who can comment upon the applicant's academic ability and motivation. Foreign students whose native language is not English must achieve a TOEFL score of at least 600. For applicants who have done graduate work elsewhere, we require a graduate grade point average of at least 3.5.

With respect to the GRE and GPA requirements, it should be noted that achievement well above our minimum on one may help compensate for a score somewhat below our minimum on the other.

Because of the structure of our curriculum, new doctoral students must enter the program at the beginning of autumn term.

FINANCIAL AWARDS

The Department makes financial awards (Departmental or University fellowships) to about six entering students each year. Pending funding available to the department those students who do well continue to receive financial assistance in years two, three, four and five. During that time, most will serve as teaching assistants, and in that capacity will lead discussion sections, grade examinations, and give occasional lectures to undergraduate classes. Some, however, will be invited to work as research assistants on a grant-funded faculty project.

The Department strives to ensure that all students making satisfactory progress toward the Ph.D. receive financial aid. However, awards may be terminated at any time if a recipient is not satisfactorily performing all duties connected with the appointment or stops making satisfactory progress toward a graduate degree. A student who fails to maintain "good standing" (see the section on Good Standing, Satisfactory Progress…) is not making satisfactory progress toward a degree.

Normally, no student will be given more than ten semesters of departmental financial support. In some extraordinary circumstances, however, a student may receive additional support. These extraordinary appointments are made based upon the following criteria that are ranked in order of importance:

1) The teaching and other program needs of the Department
2) Faculty and student evaluation of the student’s prior instructional performance
3) Evidence that the student is making very strong progress towards completing the dissertation. This could include completed chapters of the dissertation, data collection and/or analysis, or other evidence that the dissertation will be finished in a timely manner.

RESIDENCY REQUIREMENT

The doctorate is granted on the basis of achievement rather than on the accumulation of semester hours of credit. However, the University of Iowa expects a candidate to complete at least three years of residence in a graduate college. Part of this residence must be spent in full-time involvement in one's discipline at this University, beyond the first 24 semester hours of graduate work. All doctoral programs will contain a minimum of 72 semester hours of graduate work. (See the Graduate College Manual.)

CURRICULAR REQUIREMENTS

The following courses are required during the first year of graduate study.

Fall semester:

30:200 Political Analysis 4 s.h.
30:201 Introductory Methodology 4 s.h.
30:2--- Field Required Seminar 4 s.h.

Spring semester:

30:301 Intermediate Methodology 4 s.h.
30:2--- Field Required Seminar 4 s.h.
30:2--- Field Required Seminar 4 s.h.

The following course is required during the second year of study:
30:303 Advanced Methods 4 s.h.

The following course is required during the third year of study:
30:302 Writing Political Science 4 s.h.

Students must complete the appropriate 200-level course before enrolling in a 300-level course. For example, students choosing International Relations as a field must complete 30:260 before enrolling in a 300-level IR course. The same rule applies for all of the other fields as well. In unusual circumstances and with the permission of the instructor teaching the 300-level course, a student may enroll in that course and the relevant 200-level course concurrently. The 200-level courses are:

30:205 Introduction to Formal Models in Political Science
30:210 American Politics
*
30:240 Comparative Politics
30:260 International Politics

*Students choosing political theory as a field should be familiar with core texts in the history of political thought. For those lacking such knowledge, this requirement can be met by enrolling in one of the following 100-level courses for graduate credit: 30:131, 30:132, 30:133, 30:138. Students should consult with the theory faculty to select a course that fits their interests and program of study in political theory.

Graduate students are expected to take at least twelve hours of course work per semester through their second year of graduate study.

Students will normally be expected to take regularly scheduled courses (rather than Readings courses) during their second and first half of their third years.

Doctoral students are limited to 12 hours of credit in readings courses (not counting hours accumulated in summer terms, when readings courses are often all that is available). In one semester of qualifying examinations, students are free to enroll for readings courses only.

Graduate students in political science earn credit hours only in those courses offered specifically for graduate students. In Political Science that means courses numbered 30:200 and above -- with one exception: 100-level political theory courses in the Department will be counted if approved by the instructor.

By the second semester of the third year, graduate students must complete a four-credit seminar on Writing Political Science (30:302). In the first part of the semester, the writing seminar helps students turn earlier research projects into papers for submission to disciplinary journals. In the second part of the semester, the writing seminar guides students, in consultation with their dissertation directors, in completing first drafts of dissertation proposals. Each project would have a faculty mentor for substance and methods in addition to the seminar leader, who would offer more general guidance on the tasks at hand.

The Quantitative Methods Requirement

All doctoral students must demonstrate at least minimal competence in quantitative methods. This is achieved by earning no lower than B in 30:201, 30:301, and 303. Students who do not meet this requirement must satisfy it by taking a substitute course selected by faculty members who teach the quantitative methods courses.

Teaching and Research Training

Each Ph.D. candidate in political science is also expected to acquire at least four semesters of supervised training in teaching and/or research. This instruction is normally given in association with the student's service as a teaching assistant or research assistant.

Dissertation Research Tools

Any special competencies needed for conducting dissertation research--e.g., in a foreign language, in econometrics, or in experimental design--must be acquired before taking qualifying examinations. If in doubt about the need for such skills this should be discussed with the student's faculty adviser before beginning the third year of Ph.D. training.

Ph.D. Postcomprehensive Registration

Graduate College regulations require that a student be registered each semester after passing the qualifying examination until the degree is awarded, and that this registration "accurately reflect the amount and type of work undertaken, the use of University facilities, and the amount of consultation with the faculty." This normally means that after passing the comprehensive examination, students doing their dissertation research should register in 30:398 (Ph.D. Dissertation, using the faculty instructor number of their dissertation advisor as the section number for the course) for the number of hours normally considered a full load for persons in their status.

Doctoral Dissertation

The dissertation represents the final stage of doctoral study. Its purpose is to show that the student can do important original research. No more than 30 semester hours of credit (30:398) are granted for the preparation of dissertations. The regulations governing thesis format and procedures for its submission are set forth in the Graduate College publication, Requirements for Graduate Theses.

ADVISING AND PROGRAM PLANNING

All graduate students should formulate their academic plans, long-term and semester-by-semester, in consultation with their faculty adviser. The Director of Graduate Study is faculty adviser for first year students. However, by the end of the second semester of study, each student should choose a faculty advisor who is in the area of her or his primary interest.

Students are encouraged to seek advice and information about any aspect of their program and work from any relevant faculty member as their studies continue.

STUDENT EVALUATION

Course Grades and Instructors' Evaluation Reports

Grades in graduate courses can run from A through F, but the meaning of each grade is not the same as that found at the undergraduate level. Any grade below B represents an inadequate performance. Although some variance occurs from instructor to instructor, a student is well advised to regard A- as the minimum grade indicating a good performance in a class.

Course work is expected to be completed in a timely manner, that is, by the end of the semester. This expectation should only be set aside in unusual circumstances. In such instances, students may be assigned an Incomplete.

Normally, incompletes must be removed during the student’s next semester of registration by the date established in the academic calendar, or the incomplete automatically becomes an F. Grades of F can result in a student being placed on academic probation.

Instructors in graduate courses submit, in addition to a letter grade, an individual written report on the student's performance. These reports become a part of the student's departmental file and collectively provide an important basis for future guidance and evaluation by advisers and committees.

The work of students employed as teaching assistants is similarly evaluated at the end of each semester by the faculty member in charge of the course or research activity to which the student is assigned.

First-Year Evaluation

After the completion of one academic year of study, the record of each student is evaluated. The evaluation is conducted by a committee made up of all faculty members with whom the student has worked. If the student involved does not already have an M.A. from another institution, the committee will choose among four alternatives: (1) to advance the student into the Ph.D. program without the need for additional course work; (2) to postpone the decision concerning the Ph.D. program until additional course work (as specified by the committee) is completed; (3) to allow the student to complete a terminal M.A. (with no continuance in the Ph.D. program); or (4) to refuse the student further enrollment in the graduate program. If the student involved has an M.A. from another institution, the committee's choices normally will be limited to the first and fourth of the above alternatives.

GOOD STANDING, SATISFACTORY PROGRESS, PROBATION

To be eligible for the Ph.D. degree a student must be in "good standing" (and must be registered in the University in the semester during which the degree is to be awarded). Good standing requires that a doctoral student show promise of scholarly distinction by maintaining high quality written work and by achieving beyond that indicated by a grade-point minimum of 3.4. In addition, graduate students in political science must meet the general requirements of the Graduate College.

Students may be placed on probation if they fail to show promise of scholarly distinction and achievement. Consequences of probation include:
1. ineligibility to take examinations for the Ph.D.,
2. ineligibility for admission to candidacy for an advanced degree,
3. ineligibility for renewal, and possible termination, of financial awards, and
4. dismissal from the graduate program if probation continues for two consecutive semesters following that in which the deficiency occurred. (Summer sessions do not count for this purpose.)

Students on probation will be returned to good standing:
1. immediately, if probation was for failure to maintain a satisfactory grade-point average and if that average--both semester and cumulative--is raised to the required level in the semester following that which led to probation; or
2. at the discretion of the department if probation was for failure to show promise of scholarly distinction and achievement.

DISMISSAL AND REVIEW

The Director of Graduate Study, on behalf of the Department, will advise a student immediately by letter of any decision placing the student on probation, denying the student permission to enroll for further graduate study (e.g., following recommendation by a First-Year Evaluation Committee), or dismissing the student from the graduate program. The letter will state clearly the reasons for any action terminating the student's enrollment.

It is the right of every student receiving such notification to seek further clarification from individual instructors, members of any examining committee concerned, the Director of Graduate Study, and the Chair of the Department. If after these informal discussions the student believes the decision to have been unjust, that student may ask for and receive a formal review of the decision. The student must request such a formal review in a letter to the Department Chair, outlining the grievances in detail, and describing any prior informal efforts to secure redress. The student's letter should also nominate two faculty members and two political science graduate students to constitute half of an ad hoc panel described below. Upon receipt of such a request, the Department Chair solicits nominations for two additional faculty members and two political science graduate students to the ad hoc panel from the Director of Graduate Study. Four members of an ad hoc review committee are selected from the eight members of the panel as follows: the student selects one faculty member and one graduate student from the panel members nominated by the Director of Graduate Study; similarly, the Director of Graduate Study selects one faculty member and one graduate student from the panel members nominated by the graduate student. The Department Chair, ex officio, is the chair and fifth member of the ad hoc review committee, unless the student requests that some other department member be chair. In that case, the Department Chair appoints as review committee chair one of two department members nominated by the student.

The committee must be constituted expeditiously, and its chair must convene the committee and conduct its business as quickly as possible. Normally it is expected that the review process will be completed within two weeks of formal initiation by the student. The student requesting the review shall have the opportunity to discuss the grievances directly with the committee and to provide it any supporting material relevant to its review. The committee shall itself determine what additional information or consultation is necessary to complete its review.

Upon review of all the relevant information, the ad hoc review committee communicates its recommendations and its reasoning in writing to the student and to the Department. Final decision rests with the faculty of the Department.

QUALIFYING EXAMINATIONS and COMPREHENSIVE EXAMINATION

Qualifying examinations are conducted by committees appointed for that purpose by the Director of Graduate Study in consultation with field faculty.

For the purpose of qualifying examinations, political science is divided into six subfields:

1. American Politics
2. Comparative Politics
3. International Politics
4. Political Theory
5. Formal Theory
6. Research Methods (Theoretical or Applied)*
*Students must have a 3.4 GPA in first-year methods courses to enter this field.

Candidates for the Ph.D. must pass written qualifying examinations in three of the five sub-fields listed above prior to taking the comprehensive examination (oral defense of the dissertation proposal). The format of the qualifying examinations follows:

AMERICAN POLITICS: The qualifying examination will be a closed-book, four-hour examination.

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS: The qualifying examination will be a take-home examination to be picked up at 9:00 AM from 341 SH and returned by 4:30 PM of the following day to room 341 SH. The exam must be typed. You will be permitted to use whatever notes, references, etc. that you wish. The questions will cover broad theoretical concepts and debates in the field of International Relations, as well as topical areas such as international conflict and cooperation, international political economy, foreign policy, international organizations, and methodology. The international politics faculty will expect a correspondingly higher level of detail in the essay answers than has generally been possible in the four-hour format.

POLITICAL THEORY: The qualifying examination will be a take-home examination and will be picked up at 9:00 AM from 341 SH and returned by 9:00 AM two days later (i.e., picked up on Friday and returned on Monday).

FORMAL THEORY: The qualifying examination will be a take-home examination to be picked up at 9:00 AM from 341 SH and returned by 4:30 PM of the following day to room 341 SH. You will be permitted to use whatever notes, references, etc. that you wish. The questions will test knowledge of and ability to use important concepts and tools of analysis. The formal theory faculty will expect a correspondingly higher level of detail in the essay answers than has generally been possible in the four-hour format.

COMPARATIVE POLITICS: The comparative politics qualifying exam will have a written and an oral component. The written component will count for 70% of the overall evaluation and the oral component will count for 30%.

A. Written Component (Major Field)
1. The written exam will be a four-hour in-house exam.
2. No notes or references sources of any kind are allowed in the exam room.
3. Each student will be provided a computer to be used for writing the exam.
4. Questions on the exam will allow students to demonstrate broad knowledge of basic processes, phenomenon and institutions of comparative politics. (Within questions, students may demonstrate their own thematic or geographic areas of specialty.)
5. The exam questions will cover broad areas as identified on the comparative politics reading list.
6. The exam will have two sections: One devoted to methods questions and one devoted to substantive questions. Students will be required to answer one question from the methods section and two from the substantive section.

B. Oral Component (Major Field)
1. The oral exam will be two hours.
2. Each student will be prepared to discuss any material related to the questions
on which s/he chose to write in the written component.

Minor Field: in Comparative: The student shall write a paper, followed by an oral defense. Effective Fall 2008.

METHODS: Methods is offered as both a Major and a Minor field, with the following requirements:

Minor Field: The student shall write a paper, followed by an oral defense. The oral defense is not necessarily limited to topics covered directly in the paper.

Major Field: In addition to the requirements for a minor field, the student must also take a written examination. Topics covered in the written examination may also be addressed in the oral defense.

OUTSIDE FIELD: For students taking a qualifying examination in an outside (specialty) field, the qualifying exam for an approved outside field exam should have no overlap with any other exam taken by that student--i.e., the part of the outside field which overlaps with the inside field should not be asked about in the inside field exam. The format of the examination will be determined at the time the student submits the request to take the qualifying examination.

Individual courses cannot be used to "double count" as satisfying two field requirements, e.g., formal theory and international relations. Candidates must have a minimum of three courses in the fields in which they choose to be examined. The Methods field, however, only requires two courses in addition to the core courses required of all students. These two courses must be approved by the Methods Committee.

No course for which the student has an Incomplete can be counted towards meeting a field requirement until the course is completed with a passing grade.

There are two tiers of fields. Major fields certify readiness for teaching and research; minor fields certify readiness for teaching but not necessarily research. Students must complete at least three fields, at least two of them major, in order to qualify for writing a Ph.D. dissertation. Course requirements as stated above must be met in both major and minor fields.

A student who wishes to be examined in a specialty field outside of the six standard fields of Political Science petitions the Department no later than the third semester of residence, and explains why this specialty field is crucial to the student's doctoral program. A form is provided for this petition. The petition will be voted upon by the entire faculty. If the specialty field is approved, the qualifying examination committee must include a faculty member from the department in which the specialty field is based and at least one faculty member from inside the Department of Political Science. The qualifying exam for an approved specialty field exam can have no substantive overlap with any other qualifying exam taken by that student.

Timing and Composition of Qualifying Exams:

Students must complete all courses required for a field before they may take the qualifying examination in that field. All fields require three courses, except Methods. Methods requires 1) two courses which must be approved by the Methods Committee in addition to the core courses required of all students, and 2) a student must have at least a 3.4 GPA in the first-year methods courses to enter this field. A student who attempts the Methods Major field requirements, but fails to pass the written examination may, at the discretion of the committee, receive certification in Methods as a Minor field if that student passes the paper and the oral defense requirement.

Students do well to take more courses than the minimum.

To qualify for writing a Ph.D. dissertation, students must complete qualifying examinations that are prepared and graded by field committees (the qualifying exam committee). The exam committees are appointed each semester by the Director of Graduate Study in consultation with faculty in the field.

Written qualifying exams for each field will be composed by a Qualifying Exam Committee for that field. As staffing allows, each qualifying exam committee will consist of a chair and two other members from that field appointed by the Director of Graduate Study (DGS) in consultation with field faculty. Questions may be submitted by any faculty member from that field. Concentration and Specialty field exceptions are described below.

Students ordinarily complete their three qualifying fields by the end of their third full year of graduate work. By the second semester of the third year, they must complete a four-credit seminar on Writing Political Science (30:302). In the first part of the semester, the writing seminar helps students turn earlier research projects into papers for submission to disciplinary journals. In the second part of the semester, the writing seminar guides students, in consultation with their dissertation directors, in completing first drafts of dissertation proposals. Each project would have a faculty mentor for substance and methods in addition to the seminar leader, who would offer more general guidance on the tasks at hand.

Written qualifying examinations will be offered twice each year, normally once in the fall semester and once in the spring semester, the timing to be determined by the Director of Graduate Study in consultation with the relevant faculty members and students. Students may take their three qualifying field examinations in one semester, or over two or three consecutive semester examination periods, provided that all examinations have been completed by the end of their sixth semester in the program (not including summer sessions).

Minor Field:

Students may, with permission of the faculty in the field, complete a minor field with a comprehensive paper that is due at the same time as qualifying examinations in that semester. In consultation with each student and faculty members in the field, the Director of Graduate Study names faculty in the field to assess the student’s proposal for a paper and, if these faculty approve, to supervise the paper’s preparation and to grade it. The paper committee must be arranged no later than the semester prior to the semester in which the paper is due. The field faculty provide the student with written standards for the paper’s purpose, coverage, and quality; and the student should consult with committee members while writing the paper. Note that the methods and comparative politics fields require an oral examination (for comparative politics this is effective Fall 2008).

Concentration Within a Field:

Students may declare a sub-field within one field as their area of concentration. That declaration ensures that the students will have the opportunity to answer at least one question in that sub-field. The qualifying exam committee for each field with a declared concentration will include at least one faculty member with expertise in that concentration.

Grading of Exams:

Students' answers will be graded by the qualifying exam committee for each field. The students will receive a grade of "pass with distinction," "pass," "pass with reservations," or "fail" based on their written answers. Oral reviews of those exams will be used only if the qualifying exam committee cannot decide whether to pass or fail the student. Students who fail any exam will be allowed to retake it one time in the next semester. A second failure of any field exam constitutes grounds for dismissal from the program.

COMPREHENSIVE EXAM (DISSERTATION PROPOSAL) PROCESS

After successfully passing qualifying exams in three fields, students begin the comprehensive exam process. The student must complete a dissertation proposal and successfully defend it to a comprehensive examination committee. The comprehensive examination committee continues on as the student’s dissertation committee. Students ordinarily complete the oral defense (comprehensive examination) of their dissertation proposals by the middle of the first semester of their fourth year. The Director of Graduate Study works with students and their dissertation committees of faculty members to insure the timely completion of this requirement. See below for further details.

Composition of Comprehensive/Dissertation Committee:

Each student shall compose a committee of at least five faculty members, four from within the Department of Political Science and one outside member. This committee will then serve as the final Ph.D. defense committee. The committee is approved by the Director of Graduate Study and by the Graduate College.

Timing of Dissertation Proposal:

Following successful completion of all three field qualifying examinations, students ordinarily complete an oral defense of their dissertation proposals by the middle of the first semester of their fourth year.

Evaluation of Dissertation Proposal:

Following successful completion of all three field qualifying examinations, the student shall submit the dissertation proposal to the adviser and comprehensive exam committee for an oral defense ordinarily by the middle of the first semester of their fourth year. As a part of the process of evaluating the proposal, members of the committee also assess the student’s knowledge of scholarship relevant to the dissertation. It is after this stage that a report is submitted to the Graduate College by the comprehensive exam committee as to whether the student passes, fails or passes with reservations all aspects of the examination.

A grade of "satisfactory with reservations" means that in some significant respect the performance was marginal and that it will be declared satisfactory only after the student meets a requirement, fixed by the committee, specific to that deficiency. The requirement may concern the dissertation proposal or any scholarship relevant to the dissertation. Until the reservations are cleared, progress on the dissertation will be delayed. Failure to clear the reservations within three months will constitute unsatisfactory progress and be grounds for immediate loss of financial support.

The student may begin work on her or his dissertation after successful completion of the qualifying examinations and the comprehensive examination (oral evaluation of the dissertation proposal), working toward the final stage of the doctoral program which is the dissertation defense.

FINAL PH.D. DISSERTATION DEFENSE

After the first deposit of the dissertation with the Graduate College (see the Graduate College Thesis Manual for official dissertation formatting instructions, available only on their website http://www.uiowa.edu/~gradcoll/thesismanual.html), the candidate must pass an oral examination by her or his dissertation defense committee (the comprehensive exam committee). The examination is open to the public. It covers the candidate's doctoral dissertation and research and all matters relating to it. It must be taken no later than five years after passing the comprehensive examination. Failure to meet this deadline entails the re-examination of the candidate to determine the student's qualifications for the final dissertation defense. The final defense is graded as satisfactory or unsatisfactory. The requirements for the doctoral degree are met after first passing this dissertation defense and then making the final dissertation deposit with the Graduate College.

Note: Deadlines for degree application, first deposit of thesis, final examination and final thesis deposit are noted on the Graduate College website and are available from the Registrar’s Office.

GRADUATE COURSE OFFERINGS

CORE GRADUATE COURSES

30:200 Introduction to Political Analysis 4 s.h.
Conceptual problems of political analysis; empirical research strategies and philosophy of science.

30:201 Introductory Methodology 4 s.h.
Introduction to quantitative techniques in political science. Selected topics include set theory, probability distributions, estimation and testing. Emphasis will be placed on establishing the mathematical prerequisites for doing more advanced quantitative work in political science.

30:205 Introduction to Formal Models in Political Science 4 s.h.
Introduction to the use of formal mathematical models in political science. Discussion of current modeling techniques and overview of applications in American politics, comparative politics, and international politics.

30:210 American Politics 4 s.h.
Review and analysis of major literature of American politics, stressing comparative, systemic, and behavioral studies.

30:230 Political Theory 4 s.h.
Methods of political theory, the epistemological and moral foundations of political inquiry. The terms of political discourse, e.g., power, legitimacy, equality, and the ideological foundations of politics. Schools of thought and current controversies in political theory.

30:240 Comparative Politics 4 s.h.
Current approaches to comparative analysis of political systems; special attention to conceptual and other methodological issues.

30:242 Crossing Borders Seminar 3-4 s.h.
Same as 008:231, 01H:247, 016:247, 044:286, 045:285, 048:247, 113:247, 129:231. Political Science graduate students should register for 4 s.h.

30:243 Crossing Borders Pro-seminar 1 s.h.

30:260 International Politics 4 s.h.
Emphasizes various approaches to the study of international politics.

ADVANCED GRADUATE COURSES

30:301 Intermediate Methodology 4 s.h.
Analytical techniques of data analysis; statistical models, and relationship of models to hypotheses to be tested. Prerequisite: one semester of intermediate statistics.

30:302 Writing Political Science 4 s.h.
Exercises in planning and completing political inquiries, with an emphasis on writing for scholarly publication. Students refine prior research projects for submission to disciplinary journals, then draft dissertation proposals. Open only to doctoral students in political science or to others with consent of instructor.

30:303 Advanced Methodology 4 s.h.
Introduction to regression techniques for limited dependent and qualitative variables in political science. Topics include logit, probit, multinomial logit and probit, ordered logit and probit, event history models and event count models. Emphasis will be on understanding how and when to apply these models when doing quantitative work in political science.

30:304 Experimental Methods 4 s.h.
Introduction to the methods and techniques used in political science experiments.

30:306 Topics in Methodology 4 s.h.
Application of advanced statistical techniques in political science; limited dependent variable regression techniques, simulation methods, missing data techniques, history/rare event analysis and maximum likelihood, and topics tailored to students’ research; focus on learning how and when to apply these techniques. Repeatable with consent of instructor.

30:307 Qualitative Research Methods 4 s.h.
The course will train political and other social scientists in the expanding formal literature on qualitative research methodology. Methods to be developed in the course will include, but will not be limited to, synchronic and diachronic variate comparative methodology, classic Weberian sociological methodology, process tracing, historiography, ethnomethodology and ethnography, genealogy, and discursive textual and content analysis.

30:310 Modeling American Politics 4 s.h.
Main questions to be explored in this course: How well do formal models explain the real world? In what ways can the fit between formal models and the real world be improved?

30:311 Representation and Elections 4 s.h.
This seminar is to provide a thorough overview of the current research on political representation in a democratic polity. The focus of the course will be on three distinct areas. First, we will ask what constitutes “democracy” and “representation” by examining core texts from political philosophy that speak to that issue, and assess whether America’s political system meets the criteria. Second, we will examine party and electoral systems in a comparative context, trying to ascertain how they interact with policy-making institutions to facilitate or thwart the representation of varying interests in the society. Third, we will try to identify the principal problems and obstacles to full representation in America, including the circumstances of American minorities, the problem of divided government, and the intervention of organized interest groups.

30:315 The Presidency 4 s.h.
Analysis of the American chief executive: history, recruitment, behavior, roles, responsibilities, powers and relationships with other institutions.

30:317 Minority Politics in America 4 s.h.
This seminar is intended to provide a foundation for thinking about the question of minority status in American politics. Specifically, examining the historic and contemporary struggles of American minority groups for political power and social acceptance, we will attempt to address such broad questions as the nature of bias and stereotype, its affect on political behavior, comparing the current political dilemmas and strategic situations of African-Americans, Latinos, and homosexuals, their political behavior, the specific policy issues important to each group, and disputes within minority groups over what their political/social goals should be and how best to accomplish them.

30:319 Problems in American Politics 4 s.h.
Selected problems in the study of the American political system, including structures, functions, and behavior. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:338 Colloquium in Political Theory 4 s.h.
Continuing consideration of issues and works in political theory. No subject repetition in any given period of six consecutive semesters. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:339 Problems in Political Theory 4 s.h.
Selected problems of prescriptive and explanatory political theory. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:340 Politics of Europe 4 s.h.
Selected European political systems or political phenomena common to several such systems.

30:341 Democracy and Democratization 4 s.h.
Competing conceptions of democratic governance and competing theoretical frameworks for the study of successful or attempted regime change from authoritarian rule towards democracy. Emphasis is on reading and critically analyzing diverse approaches.

30:342 Religion, Ethnicity and Politics 4 s.h.
Survey of theories and empirical work on the relationship between religions and politics, including issues of law and political behavior. Review of the development of theoretical models in the study of ethnicity, and nationalism. Topics include: religious and national identities in modern society; and opportunity structures and resource mobilization in the context of religious and national movements.

30:343 Asian Political Systems 4 s.h.
Comparative study of democratic, transitional, and totalitarian types of government in Asia; special emphasis on leadership recruitment, social control, political participation.

30:344 European Union 4 s.h.
The course examines politics of the European Union. It begins by focusing on the European Union’s institutional characteristics, and builds on the institutional discussion with an examination of major political issues in the European Union, including popular and national responses to European integration.

30:345 The State 4 s.h.
The state has been called “the vexed institution that is the ground of both our freedoms and our unfreedoms.” In this and countless other respects, the apparatus of government remains a central concern in our discipline, as it has been for political thinkers from Socrates and Aristotle to the postmodernists. This graduate seminar surveys major theoretical and empirical work on the state, drawn especially from comparative politics. Topics include state-building, bureaucracy, “developmental” and “predatory” states, state-society relationships, failed states, and more

30:347 Associations, Networks & Trust in the Realm of Politics 4 s.h.
Explores the role of associational life in politics. The following questions will be addressed: What is the role of citizens’ organizations in enhancing the quality of democratic governance, or in bringing about change within authoritarian systems? How useful are concepts like “civil society” and ”social capital,” and do they work the same way in different cultural and institutional contexts? In what ways, if any, are non-governmental and non-profit organizations reshaping the political landscape domestically and internationally? Goals are to become familiarized with the main currents and contributions within these debates and to assess them critically, identifying avenues for future research. Approach will be broadly comparative.

30:349 Problems of Comparative Politics 4 s.h.
Selected problems in comparative analysis of politics. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:352 Legislative Behavior 4 s.h.
Systematic analysis of legislative institutions, processes, and behavior, which may focus on United States, Europe, or developing countries. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:353 Political Psychology 4 s.h.
The study of political phenomena from a psychological perspective. The individual level political behaviors examined will include decision making by elites and masses, evaluations of political candidates, mass mobilization, and response to the mass media. A number of psychological theories previously employed to explain these behaviors will be discussed. Among the psychological concepts examined are stereotyping, social cognition, attitude, group identification, and attribution.

30:357 Public Opinion and Electoral Behavior 4 s.h.
Analysis of political attitudes and beliefs in mass publics; voting behavior, functioning of electoral systems.
30:361 Foreign Policy 4 s.h.
Foreign policy making & international behavior in relation to theories and findings from selected countries.

30:362 International Conflict and Cooperation 4 s.h.
Recent theoretical and empirical debates in international relations literature; emphasis on formal and quantitative research.

30:363 Dynamic Models of International Politics 4 s.h.
Overview of several dynamic modeling techniques used to study international relations; modeling assumptions, the kinds of information models can provide, evaluation of models.

30:367 Theories of International Political Economy 4 s.h.
An examination of various theories focusing on the international system, the state, bureaucracies, interest groups, international organizations, bargaining processes, and distributive norms.

30:368 International Systems and Global Governance 4 s.h.
Literature of international systems and international organization; major schools of thought in international relations theory, their utility in explaining evolution of the international system and recent developments in international organization and global governance.

30:369 Problems in International Politics 4 s.h.
Intensive examination of selected issues of international politics, emphasizing problems of theoretical analysis. May be repeated with consent of instructor.

30:390 Readings Tutorial arr.
Independent individual study. Prerequisite: consent of supervising faculty member. May be repeated.

30:393 Research Tutorial arr.
Individual training in applied research. May be repeated with consent of instructor. Consent of supervising faculty member required.

30:398 Ph.D. Dissertation arr.
Consent of supervising faculty member required.