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Posted

Hello everybody,

I am currently in my senior year at a British university, was admitted for a Masters in IR and I am toying with the thought of doing my PhD in the US instead of Britain. I am primarily interested in the application of social constructivism to IR, like so many, but I have heard that many US universities are quite sceptical about it because it is less quantitative than rational choice and similarly dull theories. (Not that I would write that in a SOP ;)) I would like to know whether there are certain universities that are outright hostile towards or uninterested in people who would do that kind of work, I could safe myself the trouble of applying. I am aiming at grades that are pretty close to a 4.0 GPA, I will have a summer of relevant research experience when I apply, I wrote a senior thesis and will have written a masters thesis and my GRE result according to the ETS Powerprep thingy might end up being 1500. All suggestions are welcome.

Posted

You can do constructivism and IR at a few places. Off the top of my head, look into Ohio State, Minnesota, Johns Hopkins, and Northwestern.

Posted

I am in the same boat as you are, actually, there is still some social construcvtivism being done in the states (see list above), I was particularly interested in John Hopkins. However, I'm not simply looking for social constructivist IR, I'm really interested in the critical IR including postructuralism, postcolonialism... I'm still debating whether I should stay in Canada (where a lot of that work is being done) or going to the U.S. Another option is finding specific profs you want to actually work with, unfortunately for me, they all seem to be in the UK, Australia or here. William Connolly and Siba Grovogui are interesting at JHP. I'm probably going to end up applying there.

Posted

Katzenstein is at Cornell, Ruggie is at Harvard, Finnemore is at GWU, Sikkink is at Minnesota etc etc

Posted
jackassjim said:
Rochester has a very strong constructivist faculty

Not that I would suggest that constructivism is necessarily anti-quantitative but my impression from what I have read was that Rochester is quite formal modelling heavy. Wouldn't that contradict that?

swr22 said:
Katzenstein is at Cornell, Ruggie is at Harvard, Finnemore is at GWU, Sikkink is at Minnesota etc etc

I know that some of the big names are spread out over the whole top tier, however, does that mean they generally accept people interested in constructivism? They might be only a few.

natofone said:
You can do constructivism and IR at a few places. Off the top of my head, look into Ohio State, Minnesota, Johns Hopkins, and Northwestern.

Thank you. :)

Canofbeans said:
I am in the same boat as you are, actually, there is still some social construcvtivism being done in the states (see list above), I was particularly interested in John Hopkins. However, I'm not simply looking for social constructivist IR, I'm really interested in the critical IR including postructuralism, postcolonialism... I'm still debating whether I should stay in Canada (where a lot of that work is being done) or going to the U.S. Another option is finding specific profs you want to actually work with, unfortunately for me, they all seem to be in the UK, Australia or here. William Connolly and Siba Grovogui are interesting at JHP. I'm probably going to end up applying there.

I would assume that most really critical IR is actually done over here in the UK and Europe in general, its not just a few scattered profs. Any reason why you wouldn't want to cross the pond? Employment prospects?

Posted

Ruggie is not in the Government Department at Harvard - I wouldn't apply there if I planned to work with him. And unless I'm confused, the post about Rochester is either a misstatement or a joke. I'd also probably steer clear of Princeton and Columbia given your interests.

Posted
I am in the same boat as you are, actually, there is still some social construcvtivism being done in the states (see list above), I was particularly interested in John Hopkins. However, I'm not simply looking for social constructivist IR, I'm really interested in the critical IR including postructuralism, postcolonialism... I'm still debating whether I should stay in Canada (where a lot of that work is being done) or going to the U.S. Another option is finding specific profs you want to actually work with, unfortunately for me, they all seem to be in the UK, Australia or here. William Connolly and Siba Grovogui are interesting at JHP. I'm probably going to end up applying there.

I would assume that most really critical IR is actually done over here in the UK and Europe in general, its not just a few scattered profs. Any reason why you wouldn't want to cross the pond? Employment prospects?

Posted
Rochester has a very strong constructivist faculty

its a joke. though incidentally I did read Wendt's critique of anarchy in an IR class. um yeah, no go for constructivism here.

Posted

best places for constructivism in IR: cornell, minnesota, ohio state. other places have top faculty (i.e. finnemore at GW), but in terms of the best departments, those are probably the cream of the crop.

Posted
best places for constructivism in IR: cornell, minnesota, ohio state. other places have top faculty (i.e. finnemore at GW), but in terms of the best departments, those are probably the cream of the crop.

I am sure it is not incidental that those school are not among the most highly ranked ones. Having employment prospects in mind it might not be such a smart choice then? (I am asking not stating, don't know that much about the situation in the US yet)

You're right a lot of it is being done in the UK and Europe (particularly France would be interesting). Much of is also done in Canada. I think one of the main issues that would make it difficult are financial constraints. I'm still considering certain places.. Cambridge possibly and Science Po Paris (except their profs tend to have around 20 - 30 PhD students, so it wouldn't make it convenient to work with.)... Bigo particularly has like 20 students at the moment -- it doens't make it the best place to complete a PhD. University of Exeter is also interesting, I wouldn't mind working with Steve Smith, but he's president of the University now so that disqualifies him as potential supervisor.

I am sure you would also find people at LSE and some other British universities who are less overworked. I will be in Cambridge for my Masters, so maybe I will just stay there. We will see...

I am still open for more suggestions. :)

Posted

Many of those universities are actually highly ranked, Cornell and WUSTL are definitely top school for Polisci. So is Georgetown. Also in terms of future employment prospects in the academic field, this is advice I have received from professors here, is that a PhD from Europe (UK, Germany or France), or an Dphil is not highly viewed here. The training process at the PhD levels that students get in Europe differs a lot from the one you would receive in the US or Canada (there's less courses, work on methodology, less training on actual teaching etc.). So unless you plan on working in the UK, I would think about that. But again, I would also be hesitant on studying critical IR in the US, partially because even the constructivism that is developed there, is limited where some would argue that it's still falls in within a relatively positivist approach. The really critical work (postcolonial, postmodern or postructuralist IR) is fairly marginal there, from my perspective.

Posted

If you really want to do poststructuralist IR then your employment prospects in the US are limited anyway, so it wouldn't matter whether you do it over here. On the other hand, are they really that limited? Der Derian is at Brown for example, he must have gotten there somehow, right? The training is a bit different but I think looking down upon European PhD is simply snobbish. Fair enough, it is only three years long but at least in the social sciences it requires a masters so effectively it is four year. And that masters is usually loaded with research/methodology classes which are compulsory if you want to get funding for the PhD afterwards (which contains even more methodology/statistics etc). The only difference is that you have less coursework outside your major. The extent to which that is bad is debatable.

Posted

If you want to do what is normally considered "fringe" IR (in the states, at least), there are ways to hedge your bets to make yourself more marketable for employment. The most obvious route is to be prolific, the more you get your name out there, the more likely someone will scoop you up. Second, perhaps it would be a good idea to target non-R1 schools, I would imagine you would be more successful looking at SLACs or smaller private colleges, where their chief concern is teaching, and gear your coursework around preparing to teach a wide range of courses (in addition to doing your research). This way you can write about what you want to and the department will be less concerned with what you say or how you say it, as long as your students are happy.

Posted

I wasn't devaluing a European degree, simply saying in terms of job prospects, many profs have discouraged me from completing a PhD in Europe, simpy because it's harder to get hired here. I would assume it's the same in Europe, were a European degree is probably mroe valued than a Canadian one. Obvioulsy that's not the only thing that comes into play when you are looking for a job anyways. It's not like you're not going to find a job if you have an amazing list of publications and experience but with a PhD from Cambridge or SciencePo. It's not impossible, some people do get hired here with those degrees, simply saying its more difficult, and to what extent that is true in the US, i'm not sure.

Posted
I wasn't devaluing a European degree, simply saying in terms of job prospects, many profs have discouraged me from completing a PhD in Europe, simpy because it's harder to get hired here. I would assume it's the same in Europe, were a European degree is probably mroe valued than a Canadian one. Obvioulsy that's not the only thing that comes into play when you are looking for a job anyways. It's not like you're not going to find a job if you have an amazing list of publications and experience but with a PhD from Cambridge or SciencePo. It's not impossible, some people do get hired here with those degrees, simply saying its more difficult, and to what extent that is true in the US, i'm not sure.

Oh, I didn't see your comment as an attempt to devalue European PhDs. It was more of a general rant. ;) I completely agree with what you said, that is what I have heard too.

I am still open for more suggestions from the general public btw. :)

Posted

I think the problem is one of not knowing how to prepare their students for the US job market. I would be very happy to do a Cambridge PhD, but also expect to do a post-doc in the States before applying to schools. I would also be tough on them in terms of getting good quant training. Europeans are less positivist than their cousins over the Atlantic...

Posted

I think as far was critical IR is concerned, I found myself looking pretty much at Canada and the UK. I just don't think most American departments are accepting of heterodox thinking, and didn't bother applying. I did manage to get a placement in Alberta, who were very welcoming of critical/constructivist approaches.

Posted
I think as far was critical IR is concerned, I found myself looking pretty much at Canada and the UK. I just don't think most American departments are accepting of heterodox thinking, and didn't bother applying. I did manage to get a placement in Alberta, who were very welcoming of critical/constructivist approaches.

I second that. Although I didn't think Alberta was a critical department, then again they do have R.B.J. Walker.. or is he at Vancouver now? Anyhow, York has a really strong critical department, McMaster and I would say Simon Fraser. uOttawa is also very critical, I think its IR department is quickly growing but the school as a whole in general is usually off the radar, but they have a few really strong professors that I think will be leaving their marks in a few years or so.

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