The historical background of political science in Macedonia

Before becoming an independent state after the break-up of Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) in 1991, undergraduate studies in political science were not taught in Macedonia. In order to obtain bachelor degree in political science interested students had to enrol on studies at other Yugoslav republics’ universities such as the University of Belgrade (Serbia), Zagreb (Croatia) or Ljubljana (Slovenia). During the same period, however, political science was taught at graduate levels − master and doctoral degrees in political science could be obtained at the oldest University in Macedonia, Ss. Cyril and Methodius Univerity in Skopje (USCM).

The first postgraduate (MA) studies in political science were established back in 1967, at the Institute for sociological, political and juridical research (ISPJR), Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, where Doctoral level studies by mentor system were also organized. Aside from students with BA degrees in political science, students with a degree in Law, Philosophy, Sociology and other social sciences enrolled to study political phenomena and processes (ISPJR, 2010).

Introduction

It is now 60 years since one of the dominant figures of international politics, Hans Morgenthau (1955, p. 439), observed that “today the curriculum of political science bears the unmistakeable marks of its haphazard origins and development.” We might expect that, well into the twenty-first century, this generalisation would no longer hold true: that decades of teaching and research would have resulted in a streamlined discipline with an agreed methodology and clearly defined priorities for analysis.

The current study of the state of political science in Ireland, however, will show that in this country, at least, this is not the case – that, as in other European countries, political science continues to be methodologically divided and extraordinarily diverse in focus.

Introduction

Political science in Slovakia seems to thrive at first sight and to be successful in achieving the status of a respected social science as common in many developed societies. The last twenty-five years of development led to a great increase of the number of departments offering university education in a discipline, which created a completely new pool of scientists, professionals, and experts untouched by the communist ideology. Political scientists appear in public and private media on a daily basis and regularly express their opinions on the most important issues concerning the society. Yet even if being a well-established and generally accepted field of study, from a closer perspective political science in Slovakia shows many signs that suggest internal division.

Summary: The chapter reports about the political science conditions in Italy in the past twenty years. The first and second sections report about Political science teaching in the Italian universities. The third section presents the Association of the Italian political scientists. The fourth and fifth ones briefly report about the Italian political scientists’ research topics and methods. The last two sections shortly deal with two boiling issues, the international university networks and the graduate job market. The concluding section summarizes the state of the Italian political science as it is undergoing through the bottleneck of the current economic crisis.

Introduction

Today, the Italian political scientists look to their place in the national community of high education and research with pride, confidence and some anxiety as well. On one side, they know their disciplines, political science and its sub-disciplines, were not on the schedule of any student attending social sciences programmes in Italy's universities around sixty years ago while today those disciplines are in the course list of a good number of bachelor and master programmes, and in some of these they enjoy the compulsory course and exam status. Italian political scientists remind themselves also that in the early past century empirical knowledge about politics was the content object of a few books, although of remarkable quality thanks to scientists like Mosca and Michels, while today the catalogues of social science publishers in Italy are regularly fed with political science studies and researches. On the other side, they know that social sciences do not enjoy the good reputation the hard sciences have in the mind of the policy-makers that appropriate resources to the institutions of high education and advanced research. business, and that the sociology disciplines are remarkably stronger in number and reputation than political science within the university departments. Last, there are good reasons for being uneasy with the future of political science as public spending cuts are on the present agenda of the governments to exit from the economic crisis.

Introduction

French political science has been the subject of several studies over the last few years. Scholars have investigated its history (e.g. Deloye, 2009; Boncourt, 2007), collected data on its current state (e.g. Favre, 1996; Blondiaux and Deloye, 2007; Deloye and Mayer, 2008) and assessed its strengths, weaknesses and future prospects. This increase in the number of available studies signals a revival of scientific interest in the history of the social sciences and the dynamics of knowledge circulation. However, it also hints at the strain the profession is currently placed under: in the context of a rapidly evolving French higher education landscape, political science faces challenges that could jeopardise its position and even lead to its progressive “de-institutionalisation” (Deloye and Mayer, 2008).

This article is a part of this collective effort to gather data on the discipline's history and current state. It strongly relies on previous studies cited above and aims to provide up-to-date information on the institutional and scientific structure of French political science. It has two main sections. The first focuses on the history of the discipline and briefly describes its evolutions since the late 19th century, with particular emphasis on post-World War II developments. The second section focuses on contemporary evolutions and describes the way in which the discipline's structures have been altered by higher education reforms in the early 21st century.

Summary: The chapter traces both the indisputable successes of Czech political science as well as persistent problems that have characterized the discipline since its founding in 1990. First, a descriptive overview of the discipline, its institutions, academic journals and students as well as its academic personnel is provided. Second, prevailing research practices and publication strategies of Czech political scientists are analysed. Two practices in particular are critically evaluated: academic inbreeding and publishing in domestic journals often run by the department of the author. The chapter is based on original data obtained through a survey of the heads of departments, coding of articles published in Czech political science journals, and participant observation by the authors.

Introduction

In the Czech Republic, the development of the academic discipline of political science is linked to the political changes that the country has experienced since 1989. The fall of communism resulted in the opening of academic space. With the brief exception of the 1960s during the short period of the Prague Spring, political science as such did not officially exist throughout the 41 years of the Czechoslovak communist regime. Such discontinuity has strongly impacted the development of Czech political science since 1989. The first departments were established only in 1990 at the Charles University in Prague, Palacký University of Olomouc and Masaryk University in Brno. Currently, Czech universities include fifteen departments of Political Science and/or International Relations (Kouba, 2011, p. 362) signalling a huge growth of the discipline. There are also centres of political science research unaffiliated to universities but carrying out political science research, such as the Institute of International Relations (Ústav mezinárodních vztahů) and the Institute of Sociology of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic (Sociologický ústav AV ČR).

Although the discipline currently enjoys a higher degree of institutionalization than in its founding period (Šanc, 2009), there remain many unresolved challenges that may hinder its development. Chief among them are the small portion of high quality research that would be internationally competitive, the limited dialogue of the Czech community with international political science, and limited cooperation even among those in the Czech political science community.

Introduction

New academic disciplines usually appear in relation to a specific level of development in a society or country, or to substantial changes therein. The development of political science in Latvia is linked to the period of National Awakening in the late 1980s. That was a period of fundamental changes in social and political processes in Europe and the USSR. The people of Latvia demanded an explanation of current phenomena and wanted to become aware of the country's ways and models of development in the future.

Introduction

For any in-depth and structured reflection on the development of political science it is essential to start with the key questions about the subject being studied, methods and boundaries. Those elements have been discussed within our discipline now for decades and as such there is no need to reiterate those debates here. In this article we adopt the pluralistic vision of political science as a discipline sharing the object of research with other social sciences and humanities. Political science defined this way is enriched by philosophical reflection present in axiological considerations affecting the political sphere, and by historical reflection which looks at trends and development directions in the political sphere from a historical perspective, and by scientific reflection which focuses on drawing observation-based conclusions that can be used in explaining and predicting political phenomena. Such a vision of political science would also see it as a field concerned with looking for practical applications of theoretical statements in the field of politics, and as such – a basis for rational actions (Krauz-Mozer et al., 2011, p. 14). All of those angles complement each other and used jointly and developed in research they translate into the richness of political science.