PhD without related degrees?

[hendersoniswaiting]

hey everyone,

i'm applying to phd programs in political theory but don't have a degree in political science. my ba was in philosophy (ethics) and am currently getting an ma in theology (ethics) at boston college. is this a pretty fruitless effort, or do political science departments accept phd applicants who have little experience in the field sometimes?

also, where does georgetown stand in terms of political theory? i can find few rankings that go beyond the top 10.

thank you very much. peace.

[tskinner]

hey everyone,

i'm applying to phd programs in political theory but don't have a degree in political science. my ba was in philosophy (ethics) and am currently getting an ma in theology (ethics) at boston college. is this a pretty fruitless effort, or do political science departments accept phd applicants who have little experience in the field sometimes?

also, where does georgetown stand in terms of political theory? i can find few rankings that go beyond the top 10.

thank you very much. peace.

I would say philosophy and political theory are pretty related.

I got a BS in Applied Economics and a BA in International Affairs and Commerce (not political science, by any means). I took two political science courses in my undergrad (Intro to. and International), and I got into a PhD program.

I asked one of the professors at my new program if I would be at a big disadvantage from day one, and he said "undergrad political science is basically advanced high school civics anyway, don't worry."

I don't know if I'd go that far, but I think he was saying that the grad school will train you, as long as you can prove you can be trained.

[hendersoniswaiting]

hey, thank you. i am really confused as to what schools to be applying to. my gre combined is a 1290 with a writing score of 6, my gpa in grad school is 3.85, and i count on having strong recommendations. is georgetown shooting too high? boulder? i assume berkeley is a bit out of my reach. i know this all varies with how the student matches up with the department, but what level should i be looking at? actually, ucsd is on my list.

if i go 'down' to the level of uc davis or university of washington, what are the chances of getting a tenure-track position if i perform strongly in the phd program for political theory?

thank you very much. peace.

[poli90]

I think that is a fairly common switch, and I think search committees won't find it strange so long as it is clear why you belong in a political science program doing political theory. Now for the bad news: political theory is by far the hardest subfield to get a tenure track job in, and this is the case even for students coming out of the very top programs. So the reality is that coming out of a program like Georgetown, it will be a challenge to get a job, no doubt about it. UCSD or Washington: chances really are not good. Keep in mind, though, that getting a job isn't just about having a big name school behind you - it's also a product of the stronger education and higher caliber of professors you will have an opprotunity to work with, as well as being in a cohort with focused and ambitious classmates. As an aside, a problem I've heard with Georgetown is that they aren't able to be as generous with their funding, and you definitely should not do a political theory PhD without full funding.

As for where else to apply, my sense is that theory roughly breaks into three tiers (my classification will be controversial), and I know there are more programs that could be considered third tier that I'm not really thinking of. That said, I personally haven't heard of many schools other than the one's listed that have a credible theory program. Maybe McGill or Brown?

First tier: Chicago, Princeton, Harvard, Yale, Berkeley, WUSTL

Second tier: UCLA, Columbia, Northwestern, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Notre Dame

Third tier: Georgetown, Virginia, Cornell, Toronto, NYU etc...

My advice: apply to all of them, or as many as you can afford and where you have some fit. Just going on your stats, you have a shot at them. As theory is usually such a small part of a program, and because it is at the same time quite diverse, you really need to have at least a couple of professors who you could seriously see working with and whose interests line up with yours. The short term costs of applying widely are nothing compared to the long term consequences of where you get your PhD, what quality of training you receive, etc. If you can't get into one of those programs (and my list isn't totally exhaustive - I'd love to hear about some other mid-level programs with good theory programs and job placement), you may want to reconsider a PhD in political theory...

[Waytooyoungtheorist]

Political Theory PhD's come from a lot of different academic backgrounds, so it shouldn't be a problem.

On a side note, Duke's program does a lot of religion and politics stuff, and they have a world class divinity school there if you wanna integrate your theology background with politics.