PhD Studentships Centre for Citizenship, Civil Society and Rule of Law (CISRUL), University of Aberdeen

The Centre for Citizenship, Civil Society, and Rule of Law (CISRUL) studies the life in the world of political concepts.  The interdisciplinary Centre examines how political principles function within and beyond the contemporary West. Concepts such as citizenship, civil society, and the rule of law are used as often by journalists, social movements, artists and policy makers as by scholars.

CISRUL brings together an extraordinary range of researchers, including PhD students, to study these and other political principles, including democracy, human rights and pluralism. We consider how they have been fostered historically, debated philosophically and in politics, fought over by social movements, codified in law, transmitted through education and the media, and lived out in everyday life.

CISRUL supports a vigorous community of PhD students, who take a leading role in our many activities. Each year, CISRUL provides funding for its PhDs to design and host a major international conference on a topic proposed by them. Recent conferences were on Conceptualizing Political (2019), Conceptualizing Difference (2021) and Conceptualizing Community (2022).

You may apply for CISRUL funding for a PhD in Anthropology, Divinity, Economics, Education, English, Film & Visual Culture, French & Francophone Studies, Geography & Environment, History, Law, Philosophy, Politics & International Relations, Sociology, or Spanish & Latin American Studies. Or you may instead apply to the inter-disciplinary PhD programme in Citizenship, Civil Society and Rule of Law.

Our CISRUL studentships include tuition fees (home or overseas), an allowance for research and conference travel (£1000/year), partial maintenance (£6600/year), and generous funding to design and host workshops and/or conferences at CISRUL.

Applicants must hold or be close to completing a postgraduate Masters degree in a relevant field. In most cases, we will be looking for the equivalent of a First Class or Distinction in the Masters, especially in the dissertation.

For further details, please see https://cisrul.blog/2023/04/11/cisrul-phd-studentships-to-start-in-october-2023/