Program Overview

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Overview of Geopolitics (PgDip)

Geopolitics is the study of how people, governments, international institutions, and the environment interact. It is becoming increasingly important to understand the fundamentals of these interactions as the international scene becomes more complex. The MA in Geopolitics at QUB is an innovative interdisciplinary programme that seeks to build the knowledge and skills needed to engage these challenges.

Course Structure

The programme has two different components: Core modules and Elective modules. Students undertake two core modules in each taught semester, and a further optional module. Each taught module is worth 20 CATS points. The Postgraduate Diploma requires successful completion of 120 CATS points. Upon passing all taught modules, students enrolled on the Postgraduate Diploma in Geopolitics may opt to transfer to the MA in Geopolitics and complete a 60CATS Dissertation over the summer.

Core Modules

Critical Geopolitics (20 credits)

• Introduce students to the central theoretical frameworks and conceptual debates underpinning the study of political geography.
• Identify and critically reflect on some of the questions that are informing current research in global politics and have shaped today’s research agendas.

APPROACHES TO RESEARCH DESIGN (20 credits)

• Introduce key approaches to research design, while also introducing some of the contemporary debates in research in the social sciences and humanities.
• Provide students with an introduction to some of the key practical research skills they will find of use when designing and conducting their academic research.

Geo-power: States, Sovereignty, Territory (20 credits)

• Introduce students to some of the latest research in critical geopolitics exploring the spatial dynamics operating within the frameworks of politics.
• Critically engage with key geopolitical concepts such as the nation, the state, sovereignty, government, identity, and belonging.

Culture and the Geopolitics of the Everyday (20 credits)

• Introduce students to some of the latest research in critical geopolitics, that understands geopolitics as embedded into the rituals, practices, and representations of everyday life and culture, affect and non-representational political geography.

Entry Requirements

Normally a 2.2 Honours degree or above, or equivalent qualification acceptable to the University in a Social Sciences, Humanities or Arts subject or a 2.2 Honours degree or above, or equivalent qualification acceptable to the University in any subject with relevant professional experience.

Tuition Fees

Northern Ireland (NI) 1 | £4,867 Republic of Ireland (ROI) 2 | £4,867 England, Scotland or Wales (GB) 1 | £6,167 EU Other 3 | £14,333 International | £14,333

International Students

Our country/region pages include information on entry requirements, tuition fees, scholarships, student profiles, upcoming events, and contacts for your country/region.

English Language Requirements

Evidence of an IELTS* score of 6.5, with not less than 5.5 in any component, or an equivalent qualification acceptable to the University is required. *Taken within the last 2 years.

Optional Modules

Conflict Mediation and Transformation (20 credits)

• Introduce students to key theoretical debates, issues, and practices in the field of conflict mediation and transformation.
• Engage with literatures and debates across International Political Economy, Human Geography, Business Management, International Relations, and Development Studies.

Global Development (20 credits)

• Provide a critical examination of the policies, theories, politics, and practices that comprise the field of international or ‘Global’ Development.
• Examine the colonial origins of the development regime, the pursuit of "development" alongside US power and hegemony in the mid-20th century, the role of "modernisation" discourses and "state-led" forms of development, development as a vehicle towards neoliberal capital accumulation, radical and post-modernist understandings on the means and ends of development, the rise of "new" actors and discourses such as Chinese and Indian "South-South Cooperation", the growing privatization of global development, and the ecological limits to the pursuit of development alongside "post-growth" alternatives.

Anthropology of Conflict: Ireland and Beyond (20 credits)

• Explore the development of anthropological approaches to conflict, examining what social and cultural anthropologists have added to our knowledge of conflict.
• Examine theories of ethnicity and nationalism, and the power and hegemony of the state.

Global Ireland (20 credits)

• Explore Ireland’s international experience, from the past to present, with a focus on three key relationships: that with Britain, with North America and with Europe.
• Discuss the intersection of these themes at key moments in Ireland’s recent past such as the 1990s, when the Celtic Tiger economy, peace process, and global popularity of U2 and Riverdance all demonstrated the importance of the Irish diaspora.

Social Injustice (20 credits)

• Examine the problem of social injustice in contemporary, plural societies.
• Discuss the practical implications of both social injustice and its potential solutions.

Democratic Challenges and Innovations (20 credits)

• Explore the relationship between citizens and political decision-making in contemporary democracies.
• Consider ways of supplementing (or even replacing) conventional processes and institutions with greater opportunities for citizen participation.

The UK and Europe (20 credits)

• Address core issues in Politics via a focus on the UK’s relationship with Europe in a time of flux.
• Examine the outcome of the 2016 Referendum (“understanding Brexit”).

Feminism(s), Gender and Global Politics (20 credits)

• Examine the centrality of gender and sexuality in shaping political dynamics at the local, national and global level.
• Approach the topic drawing upon feminist political thought; strategies for political mobilization and change; and feminist analyses of contemporary global politics.

Global Political Economy (20 credits)

• Examine the changing politics of the world economy, through the lens of the sub/inter-discipline, known as International Political Economy.
• Analyze a number of key topics and issues relating to the power and politics of economic organization and management.

Conflict Intervention (20 credits)

• Evaluate the changing nature of intervention, from unilateral forceful intervention to multi-lateral intervention, to humanitarian intervention, and third-party mediation.

The Politics and Political Economy of Energy and Low Carbon Energy

Transitions (20 credits)

• Take as its starting the concept of ‘Carbon Literacy’, its definition, measurement and development.
• Study policy-making, governance and institutional structures at International, national, regional and local levels through the selection of relevant case studies.

Ethnic conflict and consensus (20 credits)

• Examine concepts of ethnicity, national identity, multiculturalism as they relate to contemporary conflict.
• Provide a detailed and critical analysis of the political and constitutional options in societies beset by ethnic conflict.

Religion, Power and Peacebuilding (20 credits)

• Familiarize students with the field of religious peacebuilding, which is one of the growth areas within conflict transformation studies in the social sciences.
• Establish the nature of religious peacebuilding as it currently conceived and which has moved it intellectually significantly beyond inter-faith dialogue between the world religions.

Institutions and Politics of the European Union (20 credits)

• Explore the structure and institutions of the European Union (EU) as well as selected theoretical approaches to the study of European integration.
• Examine in detail the nature and roles of the EU’s main institutions.

Contemporary Security (20 credits)

• Examine the key theoretical approaches and practical issues and debates that have defined the evolution of Security Studies.
• Engage the changing definitions of security and approaches to understanding security.

The Politics and Institutions of Northern Ireland (20 credits)

• Explore contemporary developments in Northern Irish politics and discuss institutional design and politics in a changing Northern Ireland.
• Address topics such as the development of Northern Ireland’s consociational model of government, how institutions like the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive perform their functions.