Practitioner-Focused Degrees in Politics

Abstract

This article aims to explore practitioner-focused degrees in politics. It begins by defining the term and outlining the key features in comparison to other politics degrees. The underlying pedagogical principles that inform the design of teaching, learning, and assessment are then explored, before the article moves on to discuss the development of a suite of practitioner-focused degrees at the University of Huddersfield in the United Kingdom. The implications for wider political science education are considered, before the article moves to a conclusion.

Keywords:

• civic engagement
• experiential learning
• political science education
• service learning

Notes

The author was a member of the politics faculty at the University of Huddersfield from August 2001 to February 2010, when he moved to Teesside University. The author would also like to acknowledge the work of Prof Brendan Evans and Dr. Georgina Blakeley in developing these courses.

In the United Kingdom, local authorities constitute the lowest tier of government. In England it is directly below the U.K. central government, while in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland there is an intermediate tier of devolved government. Local authorities are multifunctional organizations responsible for providing a wide range of services to local people, relating to areas such as schooling, social services, local highway, refuse collection, and housing. In additional to the provision of such services, local authorities also have broader responsibilities for promoting the social, economical, and environmental well-being of an area by leading in areas such as regeneration and scrutinizing public provision by other state authorities that provide health and policing. Local authorities vary in size and can serve a population from less than one hundred thousand people up to half a million. For a good up-to-date survey of the U.K. local government systems see Wilson and Game (2006).

Modernization is the term used in Britain to refer to a package of public sector reforms introduced under the New Labour governments after 1998. As a policy package, it reflects many of the themes presented in Osborne and Gaebler (1992).