Abstract
The article reports on an empirical small scaled interview study among junior and senior students in the political science programme in a Swedish University. The aim is to describe how students at various stages of their studies conceive of their education as well as their future professional life. Questions about their identity as students have also been posed. The results indicate that a programme with a major emphasis on political science appears to have two different faces as experienced by the students. The first half of the programme is experienced as traditional liberal arts studies, i.e., the students enrol in a ‘personal bildung project’ and conceive of political scientists as a kind of watchdog for democracy. Students in the latter part of their studies report an emerging identity as investigators and civil servants and an appreciation of the parts of the studies that enhance their generic skills.
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Acknowledgements
The study reported has been carried out as part of the project ‘Students as Journeymen between cultures of higher education and work life’, which has been financially supported by the European Commission within the Fifth Framework Programme. The authors also wish to express their gratitude to Dr. Anna Bjuremark and Henrik Nordwall, M.A., for valuable suggestions. Alexander de Courcy has efficiently assisted in checking the text for English.
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Johansson, K., Hård af Segerstad, H., Hult, H. et al. The two faces of political science studies—junior and senior students’ thoughts about their education and their future profession. High Educ 55, 623–636 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-007-9079-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-007-9079-z