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Level

Master's level

Entry requirements

A Bachelor’s Degree within a social science field, e.g., Political Science, Peace and Conflict Studies, International Relations, Human Rights or a related major field. Equivalent of English 6 from Swedish secondary school.

Programme structure

The central focus of the programme is an interest in the various forms that politics takes at the transnational level, including its place within and effects upon particular societal contexts. The aim of the programme is to give students a basis for understanding and critically relating to four central tendencies within our contemporary world:

1. agental pluralism – that political decisions involve not just the nation-state but numerous actors at multiple levels, including Intergovernmental Organisations, interest- and issue-groups, businesses, epistemic communities, and other emergent forms of actor;
2. the transnationalisation of governance - a movement away from politics as structured in terms of top-down relations within nation-states towards more complex and networked forms of governance;
3. the transnationalisation of political contestation – that civil society and other actors seeking to change politics both work across national boundaries and see their political demands as going beyond purely national concerns; and,
4. the transnationalisation of policy problems – that there has been a shift in how policy problems are understood so that, for example, in the 1960s there was a shift from seeing environmental pollution within the confines of the nation-state towards identifying it as a transboundary phenomenon.

Programme contents

Semester 1, Autumn 2025

Semester 2, Spring 2026

Semester 3, Autumn 2026

Semester 4, Spring 2027

Qualitative targets

**Knowledge and understanding **

Following successful completion of the course students should be able to:

• demonstrate knowledge and understanding in the main field of study, including both broad knowledge of the field and a considerable degree of specialised knowledge in certain areas of the field as well as insight into current research and development work, and
• demonstrate knowledge and understanding of methodological approaches in the field of Global Politics and of their consequences for research outcomes.

**Competence and skills **

Following successful completion of the course students should be able to:

• demonstrate the ability to critically and systematically integrate knowledge and analyse, assess and deal with complex phenomena, issues and situations even with limited information
• demonstrate the ability to identify and formulate issues critically, autonomously and creatively as well as to plan and, using appropriate methods, undertake advanced tasks within predetermined time frames and so contribute to the formation of knowledge as well as the ability to evaluate this work
• demonstrate the ability in speech and writing to clearly report and discuss his or her conclusions and the knowledge and arguments on which they are based in dialogue with different audiences, and
• demonstrate the skills required for participation in research and development work or autonomous employment in some other qualified capacity.

Judgement and approach

Following successful completion of the course students should be able to:

• demonstrate the ability to make assessments in the main field of study informed by relevant disciplinary, social and ethical issues and also to demonstrate awareness of ethical aspects of research and development work,
• demonstrate insight into the possibilities and limitations of research, its role in society and the responsibility of the individual for how it is used, and
• demonstrate the ability to identify the personal need for further knowledge and take responsibility for her or his ongoing learning.

Degree

Master of Arts (120 credits) with a Major in Political Science requires completion of 120 credits, of which at least 90 credits must be on advanced level within the main field of Political Science and include a Master's Thesis of 30 credits.

Additional information

The course syllabi state the entry requirements for progression within the programme.

A decision to discontinue a programme will result in the programme syllabus ceasing to be valid. However, students will have the opportunity to complete their studies within the nominal period of study (calculated from the last admission to the programme's first semester) and during at least the following two semesters, known as the ’discontinuation period’.

The programme syllabus is a translation of a Swedish source text.