Should I do a PhD in Political Theory?

Let me be honest. You should pursue a PhD in political theory only if you can’t think of any better way to spend the next five to seven years of your life than exploring foundational political questions, with no guarantee of an academic job at the end.  In thinking about this, try to imagine yourself at the end of the PhD.  You’re likely nearing 30, some of your friends from college may have stable jobs, houses, and kids. You will be in a very different situation.

If you still want a career in academia after finishing your PhD (some people don’t, which is both understandable and completely fine), you will be taking a chance on an extremely tight academic job market.  You face three types of scenario.

1. The best-case scenario is any tenure-track position (this includes positions in parts of the country or the world where you might never have imagined living). The competition for these jobs is fierce and, once a certain quality threshold is passed, there is a lot of luck involved.  Those of us who have been the beneficiaries of this luck ought to be honest about it and humbled by it.    

2. The middle-range scenario is a series of itinerant academic positions (postdoctoral fellowships, visiting assistant professorships, quasi-administrative positions) that require frequent moves and a willingness to endure a fair bit of financial uncertainty.  On the positive side, these positions present a chance to build an academic and intellectual network and to live in new and interesting places.   

3. The worst-case scenario is no academic job at all.  Some people who end up in this position regret having studied political theory rather than, say, empirical political science or data science, which might have better prepared them to pursue well-paying private sector jobs. Others may wish they had gone to law school.  (If you think you might eventually feel this way, consider a joint JD/PhD now).  

You do not have to take my word for it.  Anyone considering a PhD in academia with the aim of getting an academic job should do some research about the academic job market. To better understand the demand in the North American and some parts of the global academic job market, you can consult the American Political Science Association’s job reports for the past few years (the 2019-20 report is here).  To better understand the supply of candidates, you can consult the lists of graduate students who are on the job market in the top 10 or 20 political theory programs around the country.  Most department websites list students who are on the market and indicate their subfields. Take note of how many of them are theorists and when they received their PhD. It is also worth looking at these candidates’ CVs.  You’ll notice that many of them have top journal publications and some of them have published a book. The competition is impressive.  (Of course, by the time you’re on the market, you may be quite impressive, too!)  

If, after doing this research, you still want to pursue a PhD in political theory, that’s great! Working on foundational political questions within a subfield that connects to so many other disciplines (empirical political science, philosophy, history, law, literature, etc.) is fun and rewarding.      But it’s best to do it with your eyes open.