Politics combines well with broader humanities and social science programs, such as history, philosophy, sociology, or mass communications. It is a useful addition to an economics degree and has close affinities with the study of law.

Politics is a valuable preparation for many careers. Foreign Affairs and administrative trainees in the Commonwealth and State Public Services have often included some study of Politics in their degrees. A Politics degree also aids entry to more directly political occupations, such as parliamentary staff. In the private sector, many Macquarie politics graduates are employed in non government organisations including foreign aid agencies, trade unions, in the rapidly growing field of public affairs management and as journalists. Politics is also an appropriate area for teachers, particularly with the introduction of new Civics and Asian Studies streams in primary and secondary school curricula.

We know that many students will not specialise in Politics but will take a few Politics units in the course of studying in another field such as history, economics, law, mass communications or sociology. For this reason we endeavour to teach at all levels in an accessible way and seek a balance between loose prerequisite structures that would undermine the rigour of our 300-level teaching on the one hand and tight ones that exclude all except students specialising in Politics on the other. (Entry to a given unit may sometimes require prior completion of another unit, known as a prerequisite. In some cases the prerequisite to a course is either a certain number of credit points or some specified unit; this allows earlier entry to students who have done a specifically relevant preparatory course, whereas other students have to wait until later, when it is assumed that their greater experience in university study will enable them to do the course successfully.)

Our staff have a broad variety of interests, contributing to a diverse study program. We offer a range of courses, with detailed course information available online at all levels.

Politics units at Macquarie can be listed under four main headings:

• Australian politics and foreign policy,
• international relations,
• political theory (concerned with philosophical questions arising in the study of politics) and
• area studies (focusing on other countries or regions of the world).

Since knowledge cannot be neatly divided into separate compartments, some units recur under more than one heading. The program is structured to encourage students to sample a variety of approaches and areas of study. Particular areas in which Macquarie is strong include public policy (we offer a coursework Masters degree in Public Policy), media politics, Australian foreign policy, the international relations of the Third World (we offer a coursework Masters degree in International Relations), current debates in political theory, and the history of political thought. Area studies include Europe and the Middle East. Macquarie's Middle East Politics program has won awards for its use of the Internet in developing Simulation games with overseas universities.

[Back to top]