Course Overview

Our postgraduate degrees are an excellent way to enhance your expertise and career prospects and provide a foundation for many career options. For example, you may seek to use your knowledge to work in government service, international organizations, or areas of political research and journalism. Or you may opt to look for employment in fields such as banking, business, or teaching, where your MA will be respected as a postgraduate qualification.

You may also want to consider further research after you graduate. For example, political Research graduates specializing in political research find that the research skills the degree fosters are invaluable. As a result, they now occupy posts as lecturers, research associates, and assistants.

Students taking postgraduate degrees offered by the Politics and International Relations at Leicester have gone into careers in the civil service, business, the law, the police, banking, journalism, management consultancy, librarianship, and teaching. Others have gone on to doctoral research. The course will introduce you to differing concepts of order in the post-Cold War world. It will enable you to think critically about the nature of international relations: the extent to which Western interests, institutions, and culture dominate the world system and the challenges and responses generated by that dominance. The course focuses on both theoretical and empirical approaches to this subject.

You will complete one core module, critically examining how the West maintains its concept of 'Order' and non-Western responses to it. You can then choose three option modules, which, along with your dissertation, allow you to specialize in areas that interest you or complement your professional goals.

As well as equipping you with a detailed understanding of contemporary international relations, this degree will develop your ability to think analytically and critically and produce reasoned arguments encompassing your increased knowledge and experience of the issues. It will also develop your practical, transferable skills, including conducting independent research, verbal and written communication, and presenting and planning.

General Eligibility

2:1 degree or equivalent in politics, history, international relations, or other related subjects.

Part Time Work Details

20 hours of work permit weekly for international students.

Language Requirement

• IELTS 6.5 or equivalent. If your first language is not English, you may need to prove your English ability. If you do not yet meet our requirements, our English Language Teaching Unit (ELTU) offers a range of courses to help you to improve your English to the necessary standard.