The Department of Political Social Sciences is an academic community of full and associate professors, lecturers, teaching assistants, scholars and doctorate students who teach and do research in the fields of Political Science Administration, Public Management, Sociology, Demography and Social Psychology. The team is completed by a competent secretary’s office responsible for the administrative tasks.
The staff of our department is heterogeneous, composed by a balanced combination of senior and junior academics, researchers with ICREA and Ramon y Cajal contracts, visiting professors from foreign universities, and professionals working in administration and government who bring in their experience as part-time lecturers.
The Department stands out for:
1) Its strong international composition, given that an important part of their members hold PhD titles from foreign universities, European (to name a few, Oxford, London School of Economics, European University Institute, Leuwen University, Bielefeld University) as well as American (The Johns Hopkins, Wisconsin or Northwestern, for example). Master and PhD programs are taught completely in English, and an important part of our students are foreigners.
2) Its dynamism in research funded through competitive projects granted by the European Union and MEC (Spanish Ministry for Science Education) and through collaboration agreements with administrations, companies and institutions. We are currently one of the first research centers in Social and Political Science of the country.
3) The quality of its postgraduate programs that has been awarded from the start with the ANECA Quality Mention granted by the Spanish Education Ministry.
4) Its support to students mobility and exchange, made easier by the existence of exchange agreements with a selected group of high-ranked international universities with whom the department’s members have also established collaborative research projects. These Universities are: Harvard University, Ohio State University, Konstanz University, Essex University, Milano University, Siena University, Central European University and Varsovia University.
5) Its transversal educational activities, according that the department coordinates the teaching of courses in different official programs of the UPF. At present its members teach in the undergraduate programs of: Political Administration Science, Labor Sciences, Journalism, Audiovisual Communication, Translation and Interpretation, as well as in the Labor Relations Diploma.
This is a relatively small department, but well consolidated. It was formally created in 1996 with the implementation of the Political Administration Sciences Degree and the Doctorate Program in Social and Political Sciences. However, an initial group existed since 1991 when the Diploma in Public Administration Management was implemented. All through these years its directors were: Ferran Requejo (1996-1998), Rosa Virós (1998-2000), Carles Ramió acting director (2000), Vicenç Navarro (2000-2002), Francesc Pallarès (2002-2004), Mariano Torcal (2004-2007) and Clara Riba ( from 2007).
On this web site you can find information about the Department, its members, activities and research.