Economics: Research Degrees

• to encourage and enable students to complete an original thesis in the expected time.
• to provide training and experience in fieldwork and across a variety of schools of economics and in a variety of statistical techniques.
• to allow flexibility in training to suit students with different backgrounds and subsequent research needs.
• to make available and to monitor first class research supervision with the involvement of at least two members of staff through individual Research Student Committees.
• to encourage knowledge of other relevant disciplines and the adoption of an interdisciplinary approach where appropriate.
• to equip students with the ability to assess one another's work critically, whether in response to written or spoken presentation.
• to obtain language skills as appropriate.
• to ensure a congenial and productive environment for the conduct of research through availability of a wide range of facilities and full participation in the intellectual life of the Department and School. Library facilities are outstanding and computing facilities are attuned to student needs.
• to emphasise the relevance of research to theoretical, empirical and policy issues.
• to draw upon the Department's particular strengths, especially its expertise in different approaches to economic problems and its experience in problems of development, specific regions, and comparative analysis.
• to involve students in the specialised Centres of the School where appropriate.

The Department of Economics at SOAS has become one of the most outstanding sites for undertaking a research degree in economics and is unique in a number of respects:
• The Department’s own MSc programme is offered as a foundation for undertaking a research degree, together with the MSc in International Development. The core courses in economic theory, the political economy of development, and econometrics are wide-ranging in scope and oriented towards theoretical, empirical, and policy issues, especially where concerning the developing economies. Its special subject options are varied and provide the highest level of expertise on a large number of more specialised topics. Even those who have already completed an MSc in Economics at other institutions have found it worthwhile to follow courses on the MScs at SOAS.
• In addition to access to the Department's own MSc courses and the weekly dedicated research student seminar for all research students, first year students in the Department also benefit from a programme of research student training in political economy, method and methodologies, and different schools of thought.
• The training needs of each research student are individually assessed and provided through a combination of generally available courses and individual tuition.
• Departmental staff have rich experience in supervising research degree students, matched by their success in bringing students' theses to timely completion. Whilst the Department has a strong commitment to students' early completion of their theses, it also considers it has a responsibility to see that all of its research students obtain a broader training than in their narrowly defined topic and that they also gain skills in theoretical, empirical and policy analysis, in the writing and communication of research results, and in evaluating the work of others.
• Research students are expected to form part of the academic community of the Department, participating where appropriate in collaborative research with members of staff, with some opportunities for teaching.
• Members of the Department are committed to interdisciplinary research as well as to specialised research. SOAS offers unique opportunities for interdisciplinary and regional research, and the scope to learn or improve a language where appropriate.
• Whilst each member of staff is an expert in particular fields of economics, and most are experts in specific geographical areas, the Department welcomes research students who do not have a regional specialisation.
• The Departmental Empirical Support Committee (DESC) offers targeted advice to individual students undertaking empirical work.

Important notice regarding changes to programmes and modules