The Political Theory Job Market
Here is my advice for preparing for and embarking on the political theory job market.
The long game: Preparing for the job market starts when you begin graduate school. This is true in at least three ways. First, most competitive job candidates have academic journal publications when they go on the market. This means that any promising seminar paper, conference paper, or article-length dissertation chapter that you write is something you should consider polishing and submitting to a journal. Talk to your academic mentors and senior graduate students about this early and often. Find models of papers in your area that have been placed in top journals. What works about them? What could be better? How can you put these insights to work in your own papers?
Second, some departments run workshops or talk series where academics from other institutions are invited to present. Go to these. See how these scholars frame and present their research, take note of the sorts of questions that are being debated in various areas in political science, ask questions, watch how the presenter responds to questions in the Q&A. And if you get a chance to meet with the presenter and you’re interested in their work, take advantage of this opportunity. Being involved in the intellectual life of your department and the political theory field is one of the best things you can do to prepare for the academic job market.
Third, in North American PhD programs, graduate students will likely have the chance to attend several job talks during their time in the program. In some cases, graduate students also get the chance to meet with the job candidate. Take advantage of these opportunities as well. You can learn a lot about what makes for an interesting job candidate, an effective job talk, and a good campus visit by observing the process and by discussing your thoughts with other graduate students and faculty. When in doubt, ask!
Start early: In North America, most academic jobs advertisements get posted in the summer. You can find those postings on APSA’s eJobs site. Some jobs have deadlines in mid- to late-August and many others in September. Meet with your dissertation committee in the spring before you intend to go on the market and come up with deadlines for providing them with drafts of your job packet materials and final versions of those materials to inform their letters of reference. Be sure that you discuss how much lead time your committee members will need in order to write their letters.
Apply widely: The political theory market is tight (see Should I do a PhD in Political Theory?). This means that you should apply as widely as possible. At the very least, this means applying for tenure-track jobs and postdoctoral fellowships. It may also mean applying for non-tenure track positions. It means applying for jobs in places you might never have imagined living. When in doubt, apply. If you’re fortunate enough to get a job talk in one of those places, go with an open mind. Good and happy lives are possible between the coasts and in other countries.
Keep your committee members and letter writers in the loop: Communicate early and often with your committee members and letter writers about which jobs you’re applying for, when the application deadlines are, and how letter writers should submit their letters. Keeping a spreadsheet is a good way to manage this information.
Draft, revise, revise again: Treat your application materials (CV, cover letter, research statement, writing sample, teaching statement, diversity statement) like you would an academic paper. That is, write drafts, get people to read them, and revise accordingly. Then, do it all over again. When you’re drafting your materials, it’s helpful to have some models in front of you. Reach out to a political theorist you know who has been successful on the market. Ask them to share their materials. (Some programs also keep archives of these materials from former students).
Once you have drafts of your materials, seek out at least one non-political theorist to read them and give you feedback. Think about it. Most political science departments are primarily composed of empirical political scientists. This means that job search committees will tend to include non-theorists (in some cases, there may not be a single theorist on the committee). Your materials have to be clear and compelling to empirical political scientists.
The job talk: The same advice that applies to your job packet materials applies to your job talk. Draft it. Practice it on your own…repeatedly. Practice it in front of an audience (your department, your fellow graduate students, your committee members)…repeatedly. Make sure that you practice the talk at least once for an audience that includes non-theorists. This is crucial. Your audience at most departments will primarily be non-theorists. The talk has to be clear and compelling to them. Have a friend take notes during the practice Q&As. Go back through those questions and prepare polished answers to them. Run those answers by your committee. The more feedback you get and the more you practice, the better your talk will be.
Ideally, you should be able to put your job talk on “autopilot,” if need be. If there are distractions or you feel unwell, you will be able to continue to talk regardless. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best.
Finally, the Q&A is often the most challenging part of a job talk. Here again, practice helps (see above). The best piece of advice I got was from an International Relations scholar: “Determine in advance what the core and periphery of your argument are. When faced with good objections, be willing to make concessions at the periphery. Failure to do this makes you seem inflexible and difficult. But defend the core of your argument to the very end. Failure to do this makes you seem uncommitted.”