Understanding world affairs and preparing for careers that have global reach and global impact

www.bucknell.edu/InternationalRelations

Career Paths

International relations majors can secure challenging professional positions in government, international organization, international business, nongovernmental organizations and law. Recent alumni have secured positions with the following organizations and companies:

  • World Health Organization
  • T. Rowe Price
  • Booz, Allen, and Hamilton
  • City Year
  • United States Army
  • AmeriCorps
  • Airbus
  • U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
  • Teach for America
  • Deutsche Bank
  • Peace Corps
  • Center for Strategic and International Studies
  • United States Department of State
  • United Nations
  • Ohio State University
  • Securities and Exchange Commission
  • U. S. Department of State
  • Cornell University

Selected Faculty Publications

Recent faculty scholarship includes:

Jason Cons, "Narrating Boundaries: Framing and Contesting Suffering, Community, and Belonging Along the India-Bangladesh Border." Political Geography, Forthcoming

Jason Cons, "Histories of Belonging(s): Narrating Territory, Possession, and Dispossession at the India- Bangladesh Border." Modern Asian Studies. 46:3. 527-558. To be reprinted in Borderlands in South Asia: People, State, and Nation at the Margins. Edited by David Gellner. Forthcoming. Duke University Press, 2012.

Jason Cons and K. Paprocki, "Contested Credit Landscapes: Microcredit, Self-Help, and Self- Determination in Rural Bangladesh." Third World Quarterly. Volume 31, No. 4. 637-654. 2010.

David Mitchell, "Does Context Matter? Advisory Systems and the Management of the Foreign Policy Decision Making Process." Presidential Studies Quarterly, Forthcoming December 2010.

David Mitchell, "Anatomy of Failure: Bush's Decision Making Process and the Iraq War." With Tansa G. Massoud, Foreign Policy Analysis, 2009.

Emek Uçarer, "Justice and Home Affairs," in European Union Politics 3rd ed, edited by Michelle Cini and Nieves Perez-Solorzano Barragán, Oxford University Press, 2010.

Emek Uçarer, "Safeguarding Asylum as a Human Right: NGOs and the European Union," in Multi-Level Governance and Civil Society: Comparing the Role of NGOs in the United Nations and the European Union, edited by Jutta Joachim and Birgit Locher, Routledge 2009.

Emek Uçarer, "Negotiating Third-Country National Rights in the European Union," in Diversity in the European Union, edited by Elisabeth Prügl and Markus Thiel, pp. 59-75, Palgrave 2009.

Hilbourne Watson, "Alienation and Fetishization: A Critical Analysis of 'Radicalism and Innovation' in the New World Group's Approach to and Rejection of Metropolitan Intellectual and Political Hegemony", Nordic Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, 2008.

Hilbourne Watson, "Raciology, Garveyism and the Limits of Black Nationalism in the Caribbean Diaspora," Shibboleths 2.2 (2008): 85.

Zhiqun Zhu, China's New Diplomacy: Rationale, Strategies and Significance, Ashgate, 2010.

Zhiqun Zhu, Global Studies: China (13th edition), McGraw-Hill, 2009.

Zhiqun Zhu, Understanding East Asia's Economic "Miracles," Association for Asian Studies, 2009.

Internships

International relations students can gain career experience through internships in the United States or abroad during the summer. Students have recently interned at:

  • Brown Brothers Harriman
  • French embassy
  • U.S. embassy in Turkey
  • European Union
  • Missionaries of Charity
  • Evangelical Hospital and U.S. Commercial Services
  • Harris Corporation
  • U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
  • The American Academy of Diplomacy
  • European Diagnostic Manufacturers Association
  • SmithBarney
  • Macedonian Red Cross
  • Catholic Charities
  • Washington DC offices of senators and representatives
  • Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
  • United Nations Association of the United States
  • Women for Women (Kigali, Rwanda)
  • United States Trade and Development Agency (USTDA)

Quick Facts

Number of full-time faculty: 4.5
Average number of majors per class year: 45

Study Abroad

Nearly all international relations majors study abroad in a country related to their area of concentration.

A large majority of international relations majors study off campus for at least one semester, either in a foreign study program (in Europe, Russia, Latin America, India, Africa, China, Japan or Washington, D.C.) or in academic/internship programs (in U.S. foreign policy, international development or peace and conflict resolution). Recently, students have studied in:

  • Argentina
  • Australia
  • Chile
  • China
  • Ecuador
  • Egypt
  • France
  • Germany
  • Ghana
  • Jordan
  • Morocco
  • Russia
  • South Africa
  • South Korea
  • Spain
  • Switzerland

Related Student Organizations and University Programs

Curriculum Details

  • International relations is a multidisciplinary major that offers courses from a variety of departments and programs including East Asian studies, economics, environmental studies, geography, history, international relations, Latin American studies, political science, sociology and modern languages.
  • Students can obtain a major or a minor in international relations.
  • Through the area concentration, students can receive specific knowledge of the history, language, society and foreign policy of a world region or country through the area study concentration.
  • The thematic tracks allow students to concentrate on and gain expertise in issues, problems, and solutions that cut across geographic regions. Students can pursue one of three thematic tracks: Foreign Policy and Diplomacy, Sustainability and Development, and Global Governance and Conflict Resolution.
  • Most international relations majors become fluent in a foreign language.
  • International relations has special curricular strengths, including East Asia, Europe, Latin America, Africa, the Caribbean, conflict and peace, international political economy, Third World development, sustainable development and policy studies.
  • Students proceed through a carefully and uniquely constructed set of courses - three core courses in international politics, international economics, and globalization, theories of international relations, an area concentration, a thematic concentration, and a senior culminating experience.

Core Faculty

Seven professors with doctorates in economics, history, international studies, and political science form the core faculty of the department, although professors from other departments teach in the program, particularly in the area concentrations and the thematic tracks. Three of these professors also hold joint appointments with another department.

Jason Cons, international relations
B.A.Wesleyan University, PhD. Cornell University
Scholarly interests: borders, state formation, South Asia (particularly Bangladesh), international development, humanitarianism, ethnography, agrarian change, contemporary and classical social theory.

David Mitchell, international relations and political science
B.A. Michigan; Ph.D. Syracuse
Scholarly interests: U.S. foreign policy, comparative foreign policy, theories of international relations

Alejandra Roncallo, international relations
Ph.D. York University
Scholarly interests: Interdisciplinary approach to the IPE of the Americas.

Emek Uçarer, international relations
B.A. State University of West Georgia; M.A., Ph.D. South Carolina; recipient of 2005 American Association of University Women Postdoctoral Fellowship
Scholarly interests: international organization, nongovernmental organizations, the United Nations, international law, human rights, global migration, the European Union

Richard Waller, history and international relations
B.A. Cambridge; M.A. London; Ph.D. Cambridge
Scholarly interests: social history of Africa, European imperialism, European diplomatic history

Hilbourne Watson, international relations
B.A., Ph.D. Howard
Scholarly interests: international relations theory, international political economy, global restructuring, the Caribbean, political philosophy

Zhiqun Zhu, international relations and political science
B.A. Shanghai International Studies University; M.A. Indiana State University; Ph.D. University of South Carolina
Scholarly interests: Chinese politics, international relations of East Asia, U.S.-China relations


Supporting Faculty

A number of other faculty members from across the campus contribute regularly to and enrich the multidiciplinarity of the international relations curriculum.

Winston Griffith, economics
B.S. West Indies; M.A., Ph.D. Howard
Scholarly interests: international economics, Third World development, the Caribbean

Tansa Massoud, political science
B.A. Union College; M.A., Ph.D. New York
Scholarly interests: international conflict, conflict resolution, Middle East politics, international relations

Gregory Sanjian, political science
A.B. UCLA; Ph.D. Indiana
Scholarly interests: American foreign policy, American national security policy, mathematical modeling of foreign policy decisions

Paul Susman, geography
Ph.D. Clark
Scholarly interests: Economic geography; development and the environment; Caribbean geography; Caribbean; Cuba

Numerous faculty teaching in the Department of Foreign Language Programs, Department of Spanish, and Department of East Asian Studies

Undergraduate Research

Many Bucknell students engage in undergraduate research projects with their professors. Each year, some international relations majors write honors theses under the supervision of a professor. Recent research and honors project titles include:

  • India's Foreign Policy
  • Microcredit and the Grameen Bank
  • The Changing Post-Cold War System
  • Women and Human Rights
  • Reproductive Health and Development

Facilities & Resources

  • Students may complete the University Program in Justice and Social Change, which has an international emphasis.
  • Qualifying students may join Sigma Iota Rho, the international relations honors society.
  • A well-developed alumni directory on the web is available for majors to chat and network with alumni in international careers.
  • Once a semester, the department publishes its newsletter, "IR Matters!"
  • Faculty from International Relations support the Global Residential College.

Courses Offered

The international relations program offers a large and diverse number of courses. The main courses, primarily devoted to interactions among state and non-state actors, and draw from a number of disciplines including with course offerings in East Asian studies, economics, English, geography, history, international relations, Latin American studies, management, political science, sociology and University courses.

Area concentration course lists encompass more than 100 courses on Africa, Asia, Europe, Russia and Eurasia, Latin America, and the Middle East, . Thematic track course lists encompass more than 50 courses on Development and Suatainability, Foreign Policy and Diplomacy, and Global Governance and Conflict Resolution.

The international relations program offers the following courses for its majors:

American Foreign Policy
Conflict Resolution
Comparative Foreign Policy
East Asian International Relations
Ethics and International Relations
Gender and International Relations
Global Governance
Globalization in the 21st Century
Human Rights
Independent Study
International Law
International Political Economy
International Relations of Europe
International Relations of the Caribbean
International Relations of East Asia
International Relations of the Third World
International Relations: Topics
Modern Africa
Peace studies
Political Economy of Global Resources
Political Economy of Contemporary Globalization
The Political Economy of International Relations
Seminar: Topics in International Relations
Seminar: Environmental Sustainability and the Global Economy
Seminar: Global Restructuring
Seminar: International Relations of Migration
Seminar: Latin America in Transition
Seminar: Theories of International Relations
U.S.-China Relations
United Nations in the 21st Century

Graduate and Professional School

Approximately 50 percent of international relations majors eventually attend graduate school, including law school, master’s programs in international affairs, public policy or business administration and doctoral programs in political science, economics, modern languages or international relations.

The international relations program has an excellent record in placing students in top graduate programs, including the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, and the School for Advanced International Service at Johns Hopkins. They have also attended prestigious law schools at Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, Duke and Chicago.

Recently, students have gone on to:

  • Hofstra University
  • Tufts University
  • George Washington University
  • American University School of International Service
  • New York University
  • American University
  • Villanova University
  • Harvard University
  • University of Minnesota
  • Cornell University
  • Penn State University