The rigorous training and applied nature of the Division of Politics & Economics core offerings and several doctoral fields listed below. The department’s various programs provide the analytical expertise and practical experience for both academic and research-based positions. 

Admission requirements are detailed in the Admission section of the Bulletin.

Degree Requirements

Coursework.  A minimum of 80 units are required for the doctorate degree.  In addition to the tools requirements, students are required to complete six-course sequences in two of the program’s field offerings.

Research Tools.  Satisfactory completion of research tool requirements through our core methods courses.

Transdisciplinary Requirement. Doctoral students are required to complete a Transdisciplinary course (T-Course) within the first two years of their program or by the completion of 48 units in their program. The course will count as 4 units towards the doctoral degree requirement. It will not add any additional units to the student’s degree requirements nor count against the total number of transfer units from previous graduate coursework.

Qualifying Examinations.  Successful completion of the written qualifying examinations in each of two major concentrations (one from the Department of International Studies and one from the Department of Politics and Government). Qualifying examinations are offered once in each of the fall and the spring semesters. An oral examination, if required, is administered within two weeks of the written examination.

Dissertation.  Campus policies and procedures are detailed in the Doctoral Degree Regulations section of the Bulletin and on the registrar’s Completion of Degree webpage.

University Policies.  University policies detailed in the Academic Policies section of the Bulletin apply.

Practical Experience Milestone

Research Tools

Take the following sequence if your primary department is the Department of International Studies (16 units):

• INST 481 - Statistical Methods for Social Sciences
• INST 483 - Multivariate Analysis in International Studies Using SAS
• INST 487 - Advanced Topics in Applied Econometrics
• INST 489 - Advanced Research Design

Take the following sequence if your primary department is the Department of Politics & Government (16 units):

Take the following three classes (12 units):

• PP 480 - The Nature of Inquiry
• PP 481 - Introduction to Statistical Analysis
• PP 482 - Multivariate Regression Analysis

AND Take a qualitative course (4 units) such as:

• PP 483 - Legal Research Methods
• SP&E 485 - Qualitative and Mixed Methods Research (offered every 2 years)
• Another qualitative course approved by your advisor such as: Oral History, Archival Analysis, Text and/or Content Analysis, Field Research and Ethnographic Methods, Corpus Linguistics, a foreign language, etc.

Transdisciplinary Requirement

One class (4 units).

Doctoral students are required to complete a Transdisciplinary (TNDY) course (T-Course) within the first two years of their program or by the completion of 48 units in their program. The course will count as 4 units towards the doctoral degree requirement. It will not add any additional units to the student’s degree requirements nor count against the total number of transfer units from previous graduate coursework. See the class schedule for TNDY classes.

 

FIELDS (Department of Politics & Government)

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American Politics 

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Core Course Requirement (4 units)

• PP 300 - American Politics & Institutions 

American Political Thought & Development (4 units)

• PP 301 - American Political Development
• PP 310 - The Presidency and the Constitution
• PP 315 - Deliberative Democracy
• PP 319B - Perspectives on Judicial Powers
• PP 319E - Judicial Review, Democracy, and the Constitution
• PP 451 - The Federalist

Governmental Institutions (8 units)

• PP 326 - American Constitutional Law I: Civil Liberties or PP 327 - American Constitutional Law II: National Powers
• PP 305 - Executive-Congressional Relations
• PP 306 - Legislative Process & Public Policy
• PP 307 - The Modern Presidency
• PP 311 - American Presidency
• PP 316 - The Administrative State
• PP 318 - American Politics, Courts, and Public Policy

Individual & Collective Behavior (8 units)

• PP 301 - American Political Development
• PP 302 - Political Behavior
• PP 308 - Political Psychology
• PP 309 - Women, Politics, and Policy
• PP 313 - Representation and Elections
• PP 314 - Political Parties in the U.S.
• PP 323 - Racial & Ethnic Political Behavior
• PP 329 - Public Opinion
• PP 341 - US Immigration Policy

Political Philosophy

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 Core Course Requirement (4 units)

• PP 450 - Major Works in Political Philosophy

Subfields (12 units)

Choose one course from each of the following subfields listed below:

Ancient & Medieval Political Philosophy (4 units)

• PP 304 - Ethics and Politics
• PP 456 - Topics in Ancient Political Philosophy: Plato’s Laws
• PP 461a - Classical Political Philosophy: Aristotle
• PP 461b - Classical Political Philosophy: Cicero
• PP 465 - The Philosophic Arts of Reading and Writing
• PP 466 - Basic Concepts in Political Philosophy: Plato’s Republic

Modern Political Philosophy (4 units)

• PP 451 - The Federalist
• PP 453 - Idealism and Nihilism
• PP 457 - The Political Philosophy of John Locke
• PP 457a - The Political Philosophy of Rousseau
• PP 457b - The Political Philosophy of Machiavelli
• PP 457c - Political Philosophy of Montesquieu
• PP 458 - Machiavelli’s Discourses on Livy
• PP 459 - Individualism and Communitarianism

Contemporary Political Philosophy (4 units)

• PP 454 - Contemporary Figures in Political Philosophy: Ortega y Gasset and Arendt
• PP 455 - Feminist Theory and Epistemology
• PP 462 - Contemporary Political Philosophy
• PP 463 - The Political Philosophy of Heidegger 
• PP 464 - Comparative Political Philosophy

Expertise in Depth (8 units)

Complete two courses in one of the subfield areas.  One course should be a thematic or issues course.  The second course should focus on the work of one theorist.

Public Policy

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Core Courses (24 units)

• PP 330 - Public Policy Process
• PP 331 - Policy Evaluation
• PP 338 - Policy Design and Implementation
• SP&E 313 - Microeconomics and Public Policy
  • Note: If students have an equivalent college-level course in Microeconomics, this requirement may be met, but units may only transfer if the Microeconomics course is a graduate-level course that meets the institutional transfer standards. See your advisor for details.
• SP&E 318 - Cost-Benefit Analysis
• SP&E 410 - Foundations of Political Economy

Substantive Track (4 units) 

Policy Emphasis 1: Diversity Policy

• PP309 - Women, Politics, and Policy
• PP323 - Racial & Ethnic Politial Behavior
• PP341 - US Immigration Policy
• PP366 - Political and Economic Development in Latin America
• SPE371 - Globalization
• REL472 - Race and Religion in America
• ED699 - Educating Minority Students in Urban Schools: Policy & Practice
• EA86 - Environmental Justice (this Pitzer course requires instructor agreement to add
• additional work for graduate students)
• Or other courses approved by your faculty advisor

 

Policy Emphasis 2: Evaluation with Division of Behavioral and Organizational Sciences

• PSY326 - Foundations of Evaluation (2-unit course)^
• PSY315z - Comparative Evaluation Theory
• PSY315ee - Evaluation Procedures*
• SPE348 - Regulatory Policy OR another course approved by your faculty advisor

^ Note that a 2-unit elective is usually offered to complement PSY 326

* 326 and 315z should be taken before 315ee

 Policy Emphasis 3: Education with School of Educational Studies

• EDUC 407 - Educational Policy
• EDUC 630 - Policy, Practice and High Performing Schools
• EDUC 635 - Special Education Trends, Issues, and Policy Development
• EDUC 650 - Federal Higher Education Policy
• EDUC 654 - Higher Education and the Law
• EDUC 676 - The Politics of Urban School reform
• EDUC 699 - Educating Minority Students in Urban Schools: Policy and Practice
• Or another course approved by your faculty advisor

Policy Emphasis 4: Health Policy  with School of Community and Global Health

• CGH 300 - Theoretical Foundations in Health Promotion and Education
• CGH 302 - Epidemiology

Student-Designed Emphasis - Consult with advisor

Research Methodology

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Core Course (4 units)

• PP 487 - Applied Data Analysis
  • ​Note: The substantive focus of the course varies from semester to semester (e.g. categorical data analysis, machine learning methods, methods for causal identification, etc.)

Professional and Applied Courses (12 units) 

• PP 331 - Policy Evaluation
• SP&E 318 - Cost-Benefit Analysis
• IST 370 - GIS Essential Concepts OR IST 371 - Introduction to Solution Development AND IST 372 - GIS Analytics and Solution Development
• IST 344 - Data Analytics an dInformation Visualization
• IST 340 - Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining
• IST 302 - Databases and Big Data
• ONT105 - Research Methods for Community Change
• Other applied methods courses as approved by your advisor

Foundational Courses for Social Science Research (12 units) 

• Econ 381 - Probability and Statistics
• Econ 382 - Econometrics I (prerequisite: Econ 381)
• Econ 317 - Game Theory and Asymmetric Information
• SP&E 485 - Qualitative and Mixed Methods Research
• PP 483 - Legal Studies
• HIST 304 - Introduction to Oral History, Methodology, and Theory
• CLST 415 - Ethnographic Field Research Methods in Cultural Studies
• Psych 315J - Survey Research Methods (students must commit to both semesters of this course; 2 units per each semester)
• Other foundational methods as approved by your advisor
  • Note: In conferral with an advisor and as appropriate, students can take courses related to research methodology from any department at CGU.

Comparative Politics

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Core Courses (12 units)

• SP&E 350 - Theories and Issues in Comparative Politics
• SP&E 351 - Comparative Institutional Analysis
• SP&E 352 - Comparative Political Economy

Complete at least 3 additional classes with Faculty Advisor approval from the following (12 units):

• SP&E 485 - Qualitative and Mixed Methods (recommended)
• PP 353 - Comparative Parties & Elections
• PP 354 - Politics of Developing Countries
• PP 356 - Politics of Non-Democratic States
• PP 364 - Democracy & Development
• PP 366 - Latin American Politics
• POST 225 - Politics of Africa
• TNDY 405C - Wealth, Poverty and Inequality
• Other courses can be taken with the approval of the field chair
  • Note: Consult with Faculty Advisor to select best courses for your goals. Pre-approval of electives is required.

Public Law

Core Courses (12 units)

Choose three courses from the following. Students may choose to take additional courses from this section to count towards their electives. PP483 cannot count towards the field if used to satisfy other graduation requirements:

• PP 318 - American Politics, Courts, and Public Policy
• PP 326 - American Constitutional Law I: Introduction to the Law of the Constitution
• PP 327 - American Constitutional Law II: Major Constitutional Developments since the Civil War
• PP 328 - Rise & Operations of the Administrative State
• PP 483 - Legal Research Methods

Electives (12 units)

Choose three courses as electives from the following. Substitutions require Field Chair approval:

• PP 303 - Religion, Law, and American Politics
• PP 305 - Executive-Congressional Relations
• PP 306 - Legislative Process and Public Policy
• PP 307 - The Modern Presidency
• PP 310 - The American Presidency
• PP 312 - The Supreme Court as a Political Institution
• PP 316 - State and Local Institutions
• PP 319 - Special Topics (including Perspectives on Judicial Power, National Security and Decision-Making, and Judicial Review)
• PP 321 - Representative Democracy in the US
• PP 325 - Judicial Power & the Growth of Government
• PP 456 - Plato’s Laws

 

FIELDS (Department of International Studies)

 

Comparative Politics 

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Core Courses (16 units)

• SP&E 350 - Theories and Issues in Comparative Politics
• SP&E 351 - Comparative Institutional Analysis
• SP&E 352 - Comparative Political Economy
• One regionally-based course (for example, Africa, Asia, Middle East, Latin America, etc.)

Complete at least 2 additional classes with Faculty Advisor approval from the following (8 units):

• PP 353 - Comparative Parties & Elections
• PP 354 - Politics of Developing Countries
• PP 356 - Politics of Non-Democratic States
• PP 364 - Democracy & Development
• PP 366 - Latin American Politics
• POST 225 - Politics of Africa
• TNDY 405C - Wealth, Poverty and Inequality
• Other courses can be taken with the approval of the field chair

Note: Consult with Faculty Advisor to select best courses for your goals. Pre-approval of electives is required.

Computational Analytics

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Core Courses (16 units)

• SP&E 316 - Computational Agent-Based Modeling
• SP&E 317 - Seminar in Formal Models
• SP&E 448 - Seminar in Social Network Analysis
• SP&E 486 - Data Analytics and Visualization

Complete at least 2 additional classes with Faculty Advisor approval from the following (8 units):

Computational Analytics

• SP&E 488 - SAS Programming and Multivariate Analysis in International Studies
• SP&E 318 - Cost-Benefit Analysis
• ECON 321 - Advanced Topics in Experimental Economics
• Psych 315J - Survey Research Methods
• IST 382 - Introduction to GIS Solution Development
• IST 333 - Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining
• Other approved elective from faculty advisor

Mathematics

• MATH 352 - Nonparametric & Computational Statistics
• MATH 354 - Reliability Theory
• MATH 251 - Probability
• MATH 256 - Stochastic Processes
• MATH 366 - Data Mining
• Other approved elective from faculty advisor

Policy Context

• INST 401 - World Politics
• SP&E 408 - Political Demography
• SP&E 430 - Seminar in Conflict and Peace
• SP&E 350 - Theories and Issues in Comparative Politics
• SP&E 351 - Comparative Institutional Analysis
• SP&E 352 - Comparative Political Economy
• SP&E 411 - International Political Economy
• SP&E 418 - Political Economy of International Development
• Other approved elective from faculty advisor

Note: Consult with Faculty Advisor to select best courses for your goals. Pre-approval of electives is required.

Methods

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Special transdisiplinary field by pre-approval only. Requires a pre-approved Ph.D. Exam Committee. Cannot be taken concurrently with Computational Analytics. Please contact your advisor for guidance on course sequences and specialization prior to transferring into this field.

World Politics 

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Core Courses (16 units)

• INST 401 - World Politics
• SP&E 430 - Seminar in Conflict & Peace
• SP&E 410 - Political Economy of International Development
• SP&E 411 - International Political Economy

Complete at least 2 additional classes with Faculty Advisor approval from the following (8 units):

• SP&E 408 - Seminar in Political Demography
• SP&E 429 - Political Economy of China
• TNDY 404U - Energy & the Environment
• INST 420A-H - Foreign Policy Courses
• Other courses can be taken with the approval of the field chair

Note: Consult with Faculty Advisor to select best courses for your goals. Pre-approval of electives is required.

International Political Economy

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This field is available only for students in the Department of International Studies who are interfield with the Department of Economic Sciences.

Core Courses (12 units)

• SP&E 350 - Theories and Issues in Comparative Politics
• SP&E 410 - Political Economy of International Development
• INST 401 - World Politics

Complete at least 2 additional classes with Faculty Advisor approval from the following (8 units):

• PP 353 - Comparative Parties & Elections
• SP&E 408 - Political Demography
• PP 353 - Comparative Parties & Elections
• PP 354 - Politics of Developing Countries
• PP 356 - Politics of Non-Democratic States
• PP 364 - Democracy & Development
• PP 366 - Latin American Politics
• POST 225 - Politics of Africa
• Other approved elective from faculty advisor

Electives

8 units - 12 units depending on coursework plan. See your academic advisor and Program Coordinator for details.