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Here is a list of people that is incomplete but might get you started: Harvard (Peter Hall), Yale (Peter Swenson), Berkeley (Paul Pierson, Jonah Levy), MIT (Kathleen Thelen), Duke (Peter Lange). Not all of them are focused on Western Europe or entirely qualitative though.

Sorry changeisgood, that was poorly put on my part. There are a lot of really smart people (smarter than me for sure) at just about every place you go. People also have different goals for what they want from a PhD and their life.

Wow! I'm sorry you had to go through this. It sounds like a really toxic department culture and like things really sucked. I haven't posted or visited this place in maybe 8 years since I was applying to grad school but this post made me want to share some thoughts. I've now finished my Ph.D. (at a top USNWR 5 place) and am now an assistant professor at a very nice place. Yes, I got very, very lucky and my experience is not representative of the typical applicant. But here are some thoughts: 1. I picked dissertation committee members based partly on their not being jerks. I did not work myself to the bone. Mostly, I worked the equivalent of 9 to 5 hours. Nine hours of real productivity and focus (i.e. with absolutely no internet, email, etc) is probably more than enough for most Ph.D. programs. The tough part is getting that focus. There are exceptions of course: when there was a tough game theory problem set due or the last frenzied two months of dissertation writing. 3. I made sure to give myself options. I came into grad school a qualitative scholar and left with some hard data science-type skills and I worked hard to hustle some consulting gigs. I don't really agree with the previous posts about consulting (at least after coursework is over). 4. I am not sure what field BigTenPoliSci is in, but to me the description of a star-focused job market sounds more like American politics and less like Comparative. I wouldn't try to actively persuade anyone to go to graduate school, given the probabilities involved, but at the same time if you want a lottery ticket to the TT and you have a funded offer from a place in the USNWR top 10, you're probably not making a huge mistake.

For an MA program, my advice, for what it's worth, is to flow where the money is. It might be possible to work around the Korea problem. For instance, you could work with some of the professors at Berkeley who do top-drawer work on China or Japan. Work very hard, get letters from them and you might do well with PhD applications. (What could you write about? Maybe China-Korea or Japan-Korea linkages.) But don't trust anonymous forums either. Ask whoever your department contact is about people who have come before you who do Korean history. Ask to be put in touch with them. Also, keep in mind that while Harvard has great intellectual resources (just like Berkeley, Stanford and Columbia) there's always the chance that you and the awesome Korea person at Harvard might not click intellectually over the long haul.

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I'm was in a similar fix. I graduated from undergrad with a degree in literature/history and then moved abroad. Then I did an an area studies masters degree, and discovered I liked poli sci. A. It can be done! With a lot of luck, and good letters from poli sci faculty (who I worked with in my masters program), I got into a good school. Fingers crossed for getting into a few more schools, but with my undergrad grades, I'm not so sure! B. Depends on the program. But rarely, I think, do schools accept credit from masters, and my sense is only if you get your doctorate at the same school. I wouldn't worry about your age, but that's me. I'll be about 28 when I start.