Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Major

Program Director: Dan Moller, Ph.D.  

The Philosophy, Politics, and Economics major brings together insights and methods from several different disciplines to help students think rigorously and creatively about pressing social and political questions. The major not only combines classes from distinct disciplines (Philosophy, Government and Politics, Public Policy, and Economics), it features courses specifically designed to integrate material from them. The skills developed in the major will be useful for careers in law, government, business, or any field that requires rigorous reasoning with a diverse set of insights, tools, and methods. 

Program Objectives

The Philosophy, Politics, and Economics program aims to:

1. equip students with methods from the disciplines of philosophy, political science, and economics;
2. encourage students to apply these methods to a diverse array of topics and questions across disciplinary boundaries, especially to normative topics and questions;
3. combine these methods in productive ways to carry out thoughtful, original research;
4. equip students with the ability to write clearly and concisely, read and distill information carefully, and construct arguments in an organized and convincing manner; and
5. inspire a love for learning from a diverse array of scholarly disciplines.

Program Learning Outcomes

1. Students will be able to competently apply basic methods from philosophy, political science, and economics to their reasoning about difficult social and political questions.
2. Students will be able to write and think clearly and in an organized fashion about difficult social and political questions.
3. Students will be able to engage in original research to present convincing arguments for their views on difficult social and political questions.

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A student may petition the Program Director to have an individual course (300-level or above) count as an elective contributing to that student's completion of the  major.

For a course to count toward a student's major, the grade in the course must be "C-" or above. The average of all grades counted toward the major must be 2.0 or greater. Therefore, grades of "C-" will have to be balanced with higher grades. (C- counts as 1.7 toward the GPA.)

Click here for roadmaps for four-year plans in the College of Arts and Humanities.

Additional information on developing a four-year academic plan can be found on the following pages:

• http://4yearplans.umd.edu
• the Student Academic Success-Degree Completion Policy section of this catalog