Zahar Berkut

GopherGrad,

Fair questions you raise. The only issue though is that the status quo in terms of faculty hiring, fairly recently I think, has been that only PhDs teach. However, teaching has not necessarily been the purpose of the PhD. As I established earlier, the real purpose of the PhD is to research; that's what the degree was "crafted" for. Similarly, I agree, the JD was crafted for the practice of law (part of which is also research). Since neither degree was crafted exclusively for teaching why should the JD not also be considered for teaching relevant course work when a JD holder also has the substantive preparation to teach the areas I previously mentioned? The answer, "well, that's just the way it is, if you want to teach go get a PhD, even though you may be qualified already, but go get one anyway," just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I think sinister is a fair description of such a system.

I will never dispute that training and specialization leads to better and more productive professionals. I am also not characterizing lawyers as the downtrodden, but acknowledging that law school provides more than enough adequate training for those degree holders who want to teach course in areas of American government, public law and other areas, and such prospective professors should not be denied for reasons that are irrational.

I don't think you know the proper characterization of a weasel. Weasels tend to dart in and out, hide, dissemble, and double cross people. I believe anything "inflammatory" I have said is upfront and direct, very un-weasel like. Further, I (and most professors) don't suffer fools lightly, and since they exist a plenty on this board and on the net you are witness to my much more aggressive argumentative tendencies. Finally, humility is a trait good for religious messiahs not successful people, and in the real world people who are intelligent and useful, not agreeable, get jobs.

Oh and to illustrate the naivety of this statement "For all of your proclaimed familiarity with the academic literature, you've missed out on the one essential attribute of all successful social scientists: humility," and to stay on topic with the thread; I invite you to read John Mearsheimer's piece The False Promise of International Institutions, and then the sequence of responses and his responses to them. You will quickly see that the Academy is not all the clouds and sunshine that you seem to think it is buttercup.

What's funny to me is that literally every post you make is intended to be inflammatory. For all of your proclaimed familiarity with the academic literature, you've missed out on the one essential attribute of all successful social scientists: humility. So good luck getting a job even if your doctorate is from Harvard. I'm sure everyone will want to hire an arrogant weasel as their colleague.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

I forgot to add an edited volume, The Lord's Resistance Army, by Allen and Vlassenroot. Beyond that, I need a few in-depth studies of particular rebel movements in the Great Lakes. Does anyone have recommendations on the RCD, FDLR, LRA, or ADF?

I am a tenured associate prof in political science at a large state university. I posted this several years ago under the screen name "realist" when I first learned about this forum. At the time, I read through the threads and couldn't help but think about all the things that I wish that I had known before entering my PhD program. So with that, I thought that I'd give you all some advice from an actual PhD. I've made a couple small changes from the original version but this is basically the same as what I wrote before. While some of this may be hard to read, I offer it as-is, with only the thought that more knowledge is better than less knowledge.


CHOOSING GRADUATE SCHOOL

Your graduate school choice is probably the most important choice that you'll make in your career. Do not take this lightly. There are many reasons, but they boil down to some uncomfortable truths.

1. Only the best schools place students in academic jobs. While there are thousands of universities in the United States, there are many many many thousand more political science PhDs. 5-7 years is a very long time to spend in a low-paying job (which is what graduate school is) only to realize that you have very little chance for promotion. Even at top 10 institutions, a good half of entering students do not end up with a PhD and a tenure track job. Is it fair that this is the case? No. Are there very smart graduate students that are not at top departments? Absolutely, there are literally thousands of them. But this is how the world works. And you have no chance to change it from "the inside" unless you are already at a top department.

2. Advisers are fickle beings. Especially outside of the top institutions, they are busy and pressed for time, and they cannot offer you the type of guidance and support that you may believe that you are going to get. I had a very close relationship with a very influential adviser, and saw him for about 10 minutes once every two or three weeks. This is the norm. Do not assume or expect that you will have a different experience (although there is a small chance that you will). Moreover, good scholars are often terrible advisers. I think that one of the worst aspects of our profession is that at middle-range departments, top scholars often will not even acknowledge graduate students.

3. Graduate school is an unequal partnership between students, who receive very little and give very much, and faculty, who have many other things to do but rely on students to do things that are in the university's best interests. Graduate students are (1) essentially powerless and (2) extremely cheap labor. Universities have an incentive to keep a lot of graduate students around to fill instructor slots and TAships. This means that they will keep on a lot of graduate students who will never have a chance at a tenure-ladder job. This is a pathological system of incentives, and I find it repugnant, but this is the reality.

So what sort of advice does this lead me to give? First off, above and beyond almost anything, you need to go to the best possible graduate school. It doesn't matter if you don't like Ann Arbor as much as Athens or Austin, graduate school matters tremendously for your future ability to get a job. At nearly every university or college, a PhD from Michigan will get your file looked at when applying for jobs. I know that this sounds harsh, but for most jobs, a job file from a school out of the top 25 won't even be considered. It will just go on the trash. Let this sink in.

As a corollary, you need to think long and hard about graduate school if you do not have the opportunity to go to a top one. You should understand that you may not have a good chance of landing a tenure track job. The one's available to you, moreover, will likely be at "directional institutions" (think Northern X State) or small, low-ranked liberal arts colleges in the middle of nowhere. Even there, you will be competing with Harvard and Berkeley PhDs for a job. It's hard. It's not as hard as English or History, but nevertheless it's really hard. You should know this and plan accordingly.

The academic job market has gotten much harder in the two years since I first wrote this. There are thousands of students right now chasing a couple hundred jobs, and every year it gets worse because most people who strike out in one year go back on the job market the next year. Do not assume that the academic job market will get easier in 5-7 years, when you are going onto the job market. First, there will still be a substantial backlog of unplaced PhDs. Second, trends in academia are leading to more adjunct and lecturer positions and fewer tenure-track positions in all but the very best schools (and it's starting to happen there too). I would not still be in academia if I didn't have a tenure-ladder job.

Let's say you don't want to go be professor. Maybe you want to work in a think tank or a political consultancy. OK, fair enough: but in this case, I would recommend against getting a PhD in political science. There is little that you can gain from a PhD in political science that a think tank will find attractive that you cannot also have gotten from a good MPA/MPP/etc. program. Outside of academia, the PhD has little value-added over most professional masters degrees. Given the opportunity cost, the only people who should get PhDs in political science are people who have a passion for college teaching, or those who have a passion for academic research AND who are willing to settle for college teaching if the academic research thing doesn't work out.

Do not choose graduate school based on one individual who you "want to work with." Instead, you should choose the best program (by subfield) that you can. Why? Let's say that you identify one faculty member whose research interests match yours perfectly. For this to be the person upon whom you rely for your entire PhD course of study, it must be the case that (1) your research interests don't change (which is rare), (2) that your potential adviser is a nice and approachable person (which is about a 50-50 shot to be honest), (3) that your own research is interesting to that potential adviser (which you should not assume, regardless of what is said on recruitment weekend), and (4) that that adviser doesn't leave (which is common, especially for productive faculty at top-50-ish departments). If you chose a program based on that individual and any of these don't work out, you're in trouble. If you've chosen the best program, you'll be OK because there are other options; if you've banked on one faculty member, you're out of luck.

You should be flattered by faculty who are nice and approachable during recruitment weekend. But recruitment weekend is not like the other 51 weekends a year. Remember, faculty are approachable during recruitment because you provide them with an unlimited supply of discount labor. They have their own worries and incentives, and these rarely align with yours.

Likewise, funding matters. My general advice is that outside of a top 25 institution, you should not go to graduate school unless you have a full ride and a stipend large enough to live on. Without these, graduate school is a long and expensive process with little reward. There is a constant demand for doctors, so doctors can pay for medical school and still come out ahead. $200,000 in debt and only qualified for a very low paying job is a terrible situation that many PhDs find themselves in.

It is tempting to think that a potential adviser's kind words mean that you are special. You are special, but so are many many others. Wherever you are, you will likely not even be the smartest or most successful member of your cohort. Do not fool yourself into thinking that you are the one who will buck the trends that I have described. It's just not likely.

Finally, I have made a big point about top 25 schools. We all know that Stanford is and Purdue isn't, but what's the definitive list? Simply put, if you have to ask, your school is not in the top 25. And of course subfield matters more than overall ranking. Emory is not a top-25 theory department so think long and hard about going there for theory. JHU is not a top-25 American politics department but it's a different story altogether for political theory. If you need to convince yourself that your program is a top-25 program, it's almost certainly not.


YOUR CAREER

If you decide to go to graduate school, congratulations. I mean this sincerely. You are embarking on the most intellectually rewarding period of your life. (Of course, intellectually and financially rewarding are not the same, as I mentioned previously.) Here are some brief tips.

The best political scientists are the following five things: smart, creative, diligent, honest, and nice. Smart is obvious. The rest are not.

The best political scientists are creative. They look at old problems in new ways, or they find new problems to look at. A good way to land a middling job (or no job) is to find a marginal improvement on an existing estimator, or take lessons from Paraguay and apply them to Uruguay. The best political scientists show us how our estimators are incorrect, or better yet, find new things to estimate.

The best political scientists are diligent. They think about problems for years and years, they rewrite their draft papers repeatedly, they collect giant datasets from scratch, and they go into the field, learn the language, and stay there until they have learned something. There are no quick research trips, there are no obvious philosophical points, and there are no datasets that you can download with results you can write up in a week.

The best political scientists are honest. There are many points at which you might fudge your work: creating a new dataset from scratch, during fieldwork, in writing up your results. You will be astounded at how frequent this is in our profession. Don't do it, for it always hurts you in the end. Being wrong and honest about it is OK. Being wrong and hiding it never works.

Finally, the best political scientists are nice. It is tempting to be prickly to make yourself seem smart or to protect your ego. But the same person you criticize today might be in a position to give you a job tomorrow. As they say, make your words soft and sweet, for you never know when you may have to eat them.

************

I hope this helps you all. I wish you the very best of luck with your careers.

I think most people intrinsically groan when they hear about a recommender dropping the ball.

I'm concerned to some extent that it will make me look less worthy; as though the prof just decided he couldn't stomach attaching his name to someone like me. But then, he agreed in the first place, so... I imagine most people will blame him for irresponsibility. It helps that I'm approaching with a solution already in hand, so it doesn't seem like I'm looking for a handout, even if I kind of am.

Also, I adopted a 2 month old lab/hound puppy this fall, and I've been attaching photos of him titled "reject me and you'll never pet him".

The problem with polls like this is a lot of people don't know about "university X" so they pick some mediocre school that they do know about over it. Or they don't know much about either university and guess because one sounds better than the other. Or they go upon past reputations.

For example, University of Toronto is an excellent Poli-Sci institution, and I believe it has the largest Poli-Sci faculty in North America, but it's rated with Pittsburgh (!!!!!!???????) on this poll.

Another example is having to compare Claremont Graduate University to American University (as an example). Obviously American University being in DC should rank higher than Claremont...I mean, seriously? Claremont. They're good? However, Claremont has a wonderful reputation for theory, but most people don't know that so they go ahead and pick American University.

Finally there's the example of UC Berkeley. Berkeley was once a poli-sci powerhouse and pumped out good quality professors (especially in Theory); however, despite still having that reputation their faculty has really gone down in quality. People may pick Berkeley because it's a big name with a past great reputation.

. "Well, you should tell that to the folks at Harvard where they cover Kingdon's theory of public policy and various theories of public opinion and political behavior (in the Classics... reader) and the folks at Berkeley (the Principles and Practice of American Politics reader is full of works that contribute to our understanding of the theories I listed in my previous post). I'm pretty sure if I asked my colleagues in American politics if the theories I listed were "useless" for the understanding of American government, etc. that they would literally laugh in my face and tell me that they were, in fact, central to that understanding."

Reading your post, one would think there's consensus within the political science community regarding research methods and theories. In reality, however, there's not! So while some PhDs might draw upon the theories you mention in teaching political science, even other PhDs (not just JDs) would not. In short, I'm keeping with my earlier statement in saying that some of these theories are INESSENTIAL (not necessary) to explain political institutions, processes and phenomena, and a JD can teach any of the courses on these topics well.

Tufnel,

This is the political science forum, is it not? Since this forum is intended for discussions on political science, it's appropriate to continue this discussion in the appropriate forum. All are welcome to share their perspectives as they please and when they please. If you'd like to let it go (or stop following), please, by all means, feel free to do so. I, however, am still interested in the topic, and encourage others also interested in the topic to share their insights and perspectives. Thanks for your thoughts.

Dude, just let it go.

hello folks,

i am doing an important reasearch in my class , and i would like your help on some of the question:

1- compare and contrast realism with liberalism

2- accordin canada and art

3- does hegemony , proponderence or balance of power creates better peace .

4- the biggest international coaportaion problem

5-according to the alliance theory , what are possible problems witha possible military alliance between russia and canada today

6-which level of analyis and theory describes the best explanation for the causes of the first world war .

thanks

Accordion art in Canada has long been one of the most important modes of Inuit self-expression. During the Iqualivittnutyflavin War of 1877 (known variously as the Hoser-eh War by English speakers and le Conflique Mirepoix by Francophones), the Inuit used accordions to drive the polar bears, and pretty much everyone else, out of Nunavut.

While accordion art in Canada has recently lost precedence to other art forms, such as pouring fatty foods on french fries and complaining about America, it remains an important means of communication in northern areas, where nearest neighbors live farther away than a voice carries. A visitor to Yellowknife in the spring will tell you that accordion art remains alive both as an artistic form and means of political comment, similar to hip-hop in East St. Louis.

I will address your other questions as time permits.

In my opinion, if you are having serious doubts about your desire and motivation to start a PhD, then it probably isn't the right time for you. I've had plenty of friends who were 100% committed to earning their PhD and still burned out in the process, so I can't imagine starting the process and already doubting whether it was a good path for you. Whatever you decide - best of luck.

A 3.6 is hardly out of the running, especially when paired with a great GRE.

Please immediately forget about approaching any admissions chairs.

Look, I'm not going to sugar coat it for you, in part because I'm applying at extremely competetive schools with a 3.4. Here's how I see it: if there's some other applicant out there equal but for s/he didn't fuck up and drop a C- in Intro to Visual Arts, Princeton is probably going to take her over me.

That being said, admissions committees know that people make mistakes and grow because of them. If your research interests are compelling and your professors back up your research potential (and you don't bomb the GRE), you will be in the same starting pile as the rest of the go-getters.

Believe me, I wish that I could dress up as the GopherGrad of Application Seasons Yet to Come, travel back in time and show the GopherGrad sleeping through his Origins of English Words lectures how he's turning my hair grey (sort of) prematurely. But I can't turn back the clock and niether can you. Do everything you can, including this semester, to get great grades, then sell yourself to admissions as the person you are.

And, yeah, have some fun. Trust me, life is much better when achievement isn't the only order of the day. You might not want to take that as far as I did, though.

I don't want to press you on something personal, but I couldn't help but notice from your blog: "What I wouldn't give to go back in time to April 29th, 2009. All I had to do was mail in the MAPSS card and say I wouldn't be attending."


Is there anything you would want applicants to Chicago's 1 year MA's like MAPSS to know?

Going against my better judgment/previous promise to be silent...

I think that if you asked most political theorists, you would find that many of them believe that teaching a good intro course is the biggest pedagogical challenge that a political theorist faces. OP, you don't seem to understand that political theory =/= history of ideas/study of great ideas. You just can't call reading Plato and discussing whatever comes to mind "political theory." The texts in an intro to theory course need to be specifically organized and presented to students in such a way that the students understand (among other important things) the content/context of the texts; how the competing definitions of concepts like justice and equality were generated; and how political theory connects to other subfields in political science. In order to accomplish these goals (and more), you need to have a knowledge of political theory and the questions that are important to political science as a discipline as well as a strong command over the content/context of the Western canon. One learns these things by earning a Ph.D. in political science and taking political theory as the major subfield.

As for American government and its theories--while my primary subfield is not American politics so I cannot speak with the highest expertise, it seems that my colleagues in American draw upon a number of theories when they lecture in their intro courses, such as the median voter theorem, Mayhew's theory of Congressional re-election behavior, Kingdon's theory of public policy formation, Mancur Olson's theory of collective action, various theories about how public opinion works, and maybe some political psychology theories about political behavior.

Welcome back, LACProf! Glad to have your insights and zeal for the integrity of your field!

I concede your points about a good political theory course being best taught by a PhD in political science with a major subfield in political theory (hardly anyone would dispute that). Certainly, more context facilitates more understanding of the political theory. I do, however, believe that it is the intention of some programs to have intro to political theory courses that are essentially that "history of ideas course" you referenced. What in your view would be the drawbacks to this at the undergraduate level?

I am willing to be wrong or corrected on this point (as I'm not an expert in this area), but my understanding of an undergraduate intro to political theory/philosophy course is that it is a study of ideas and perspectives of great (influential) classical and western thinkers. Furthermore, it appears that by studying these great philsophers in sequence (through excerpts, primary and secondary texts) the undergraduate student will encounter "the competing ideas of justice and equality," as well as the ideal polity, since these various philosophers (e.g., Socrates, Aristole, Plato, Cicero, englightenment philosphers, etc) present their personal theories on these matters.

Also, the secondary texts used in political theory courses usually, I think, provide at least some context as to why such theorists began to question and challenge a system that no longer made sense---the general origin of political theory. In addition, the secondary texts that would be used in such a course, whether taught by by a JD or PhD, would also obviously be written by a PhD with a major subfield in politial theory. So it still seems at least plausible that a JD given their background and understanding of government could teach the course, though a PhD in poli theory would more likely, in most cases, be a better choice for this particular subfield. Just as a JD would more likely, in most cases, be a better choice for the subfield of public law, that isn't to say that a political theory PhD couldn't do a good job in teaching intro to American government or even constitutional law/history.

".....median voter theorem, Mayhew's theory of Congressional re-election behavior, Kingdon's theory of public policy formation, Mancur Olson's theory of collective action, various theories about how public opinion works, and maybe some political psychology theories about political behavior."

These all look like theories that would be relevant to a specific political science course (perhaps a public policy one at the graduate level) but completely inessential (even useless) in terms of understanding how the system works or government in general. In other words, none of these theories are important in order to understand the following: American government, State and Local government, American Legal System, Intro to Public Policy, Administrative Law, International Relations, Int. Law, Int. Organizations, (I could go on).., etc. There are, however, important/essential theories that a JD could draw upon given his/her education (e.g. Iron Triangle which I referenced earlier).



* In previous posts, I granted that a JD probably would not have much substantive training in the subfields of comparative government and political theory (without additional training such as an LLM, advanced law degree, in Comparative Law). They certainly have substantive background in American government, public law, and internation relations.

Well, a course in political theory is a political science course--there should be a focus on the way that the central texts help address political questions.



This is a primary goal of such a course, but not the only goal. You have to help students see that those ideas and perspectives influence contemporary ethical and/or political positions, and you have to help students decide what ideals they want to privilege in their own ethical and/or political positions. You also have to get students to see that going with the set of normative assumptions that you find in one particular group of theorists tends to lead to a set of political institutions with specific qualities (i.e., if you buy classical liberal assumptions you'll want one set of institutions, but if you buy social assumptions you'll want a set of institutions that looks different). It's this second part--the part about institutions--that tends to fall out when people equate political theory to the history of ideas. However, the study of institutions is so critical to the discipline of political science as a whole that I think it is really important for political theory classes to emphasize the link between normative concepts and the form of institutions.



I don't know anyone who uses secondary texts [by this I mean textbooks or other readings designed to "simplify" classic texts] in anything but the most minor way in their intro to political theory courses. The primary texts are always at the center and there are too many primary texts to go through [whether those texts are in a reader or otherwise] during the course of a semester. Contextualization comes from the professor.



This type of resource isn't that common. I'm not even aware of anything like a "textbook" for political theory that isn't just a reader (and since I haven't had some goddamned textbook rep incessantly calling me, showing up unbidden at my office door, or wasting precious natural resources by mailing me copies of a book I will never use, it wouldn't surprise me if there isn't one). There are two major secondary sources for helping students understand the entire Western canon as a whole--the books by Sabine and Strauss. However, both of those books are sophisticated works in their own right, and since both Sabine and Strauss were writing from very particular interpretive perspectives the guidance of a Ph.D. with knowledge of the history of the subfield is necessary, even if you use these secondary sources.

ETA: I actually found two "Introduction to Political Theory..." books that are like standard textbooks. Both are fairly recent, and, as far as I can tell, not commonly used. Sometimes they are on a "recommended" list or suggested for students who are struggling (an Ohio State Intro to Theory syllabus uses one of the texts this way). A number of political theorists have written "Introduction to..." or "History of..." books, but I am of the opinion that people who read those books and are not acquainted with the subfield of political theory would still benefit from the contextualization that a Ph.D. in the classroom can provide.




I'm still not willing to concede this.



Well, you should tell that to the folks at Harvard where they cover Kingdon's theory of public policy and various theories of public opinion and political behavior (in the Classics... reader) and the folks at Berkeley (the Principles and Practice of American Politics reader is full of works that contribute to our understanding of the theories I listed in my previous post). I'm pretty sure if I asked my colleagues in American politics if the theories I listed were "useless" for the understanding of American government, etc. that they would literally laugh in my face and tell me that they were, in fact, central to that understanding.

"Well, you should tell that to the folks at Harvard where they cover Kingdon's theory of public policy and various theories of public opinion and political behavior (in the Classics... reader) and the folks at Berkeley (the Principles and Practice of American Politics reader is full of works that contribute to our understanding of the theories I listed in my previous post). I'm pretty sure if I asked my colleagues in American politics if the theories I listed were "useless" for the understanding of American government, etc. that they would literally laugh in my face and tell me that they were, in fact, central to that understanding."

Kingdon's theory of public policy isn't useless, and I actually didn't have that in mind. However, I personally find various theories I've encountered to be at least verbose and inessential (perhaps useless is not an overstatement). "Political psychology" (?)

Additionally, Kingdon's theory deals with public policy and primarily, I think, legislative politics (best addressed at the graduate level). Juris Doctors who should be able to teach public policy should have no problem teaching these concepts. Again, many of these ideas coincide with topics covered in administrative law, at least. For example, you will have case studies on how an issue is raised to the legislative agenda due to a public crisis for which the legislature enacts "enabling legislation" to establish regulatory agenices, etc... (sound like Kingdon?). I'm a fan of Martha Derthick and Kingdon, and their insights regarding government are captured in some law or law-related courses.

I was actually looking at the catalog of a political science department in New York, and was interested to see that business law is now one of the offerings in the political science department, as well as environmental law. I wonder which faculty in the political science department will be teaching these courses. Very interesting.