Programme Introduction

Contemporary academic research and policy-making both focus heavily questions of the causes and consequences of political violence (i.e., domestic and transnational terrorism, civil and international war). Moreover, there is an increasing recognition that a range of problems and dilemmas with a global scope (including global warming, the spread of infectious disease, and widening gaps between the world's rich and poor populations) fundamentally affect human security. The MSc in Security Studies combines empirical and normative approaches to the causes of political violence, the application of military force, humanitarian intervention, and the provision of global public goods. Attention will be placed upon introducing students to skills essential to the analytical study of politics at the transnational level.

Objectives

By the end of the programme students will:

• Be familiar with the theoretical approaches and debates in security studies—especially the relationship between International Relations theory, theories of political violence, and public policy making.
• Be able to offer answers to questions of how domestic, transnational, and international forms of political violence (riots, terrorism, civil war, insurgency, and war) emerge, interact, are managed, and (ultimately) are resolved; these answers will rest upon identifying a role for international institutions, decision-making frameworks, pluralistic political systems, and social movements in the international system.
• Possess the skills required to collect and use empirical evidence in a selective and systematic way, and to question the explanatory power and reassess the validity of the most authoritative works in political science, particularly in international relations, comparative politics, and public policy.

 The programme is made up of the following elements, to total 180 credits:

1.   You are required to do the following four compulsory modules:

• International Peace & Security (30 credits)
• Introduction to Qualitative Methods (15)
• Introduction to Quantitative Methods (15) OR Advanced Quantitative Methods (15)
• Dissertation - 10,000 words (60)

2.   Choose two of the following 15 credit modules (the others remain options to choose in step 3):

• Conflict Resolution and Post-War Development (15)
• Empirical Studies of Civil Conflict (15)
• Empirical Studies of Human Rights (15)
• Governing Divided Societies (15)
• Terrorism (15)

3. Choose any two further modules worth 30 credits in total (the following is a list of all courses available within the department):

Students may take graduate modules from cognate subjects available elsewhere in UCL but must seek approval from the Programme Director in the first instance.