Global Politics, Economy and Society doctoral training programme

The Global Politics, Economy and Society doctoral training programme at Oxford Brookes University has been developed in response to the proliferation of issue areas under the analytical remit of international studies.

International studies faces a situation characterised by complexity, turbulence and contingency in its very foundation, raising profound questions about the very identity of its actors. The current financial crisis – revealing highly complex relations between high finance, corporate governance, geopolitics between the US and China, and mortgages in middle-class aspiring everyday life – is only one manifestation of this character of globalisation; the ‘war on terror’, linking conventional security question and the legal right of states to intervene militarily to Pakistani slums, and clashes of cultures and civilizations, is another; as are the complexities of global warming.

Interdisciplinary collaboration

Rapidly expanding research in International Studies at Oxford Brookes, taking place within the inter-disciplinary Department of International Relations, Politics and Sociology, the Department of Law, as well as in the Business School, is at the forefront of recognising the methodological implications of these developments. Treating identity as something to be explained, rather than being taking for granted a priori, and facing contingency, requires interpretative, ethnographic and qualitative research methods and techniques.

State-of-the-art research training

Given the importance of rigorous research methods and research methods training for PhD studies and research, doctoral candidates are offered training that is both state-of-the-art and specific to the field, for instance in narrative interviewing, ethnographic techniques and interpretative and discursive modes of inquiry.

DTP students benefit from:

• Full membership of at least one of our research groups to gain experience and learn good academic practice
• Research student colloquiums for presenting work in progress and gaining valuable feedback
• Participation in our weekly seminar series to explore and debate leading research in the field
• Fieldwork master classes, based on the knowledge of experienced field-researchers
• Interdisciplinary expertise across politics, sociology, business and law
• Generic research training and support from the Graduate School
• A choice of supervision areas from within the fields of International Relations, Politics, Sociology, Law and Business