Admissions for the academic year 2025/2026 open!
Admissions for the academic year 2025/2026 open!
Applications for full-time or combined study must be submitted by Wednesday, 30 April 2025.
APPLICATIONS
We welcome highly motivated applicants with a consistently strong past academic track record. A pre-condition for being accepted is the completion of a Master's degree.
The following documents must be provided:
- online application,
- curriculum vitae,
- dissertation thesis project.
All documents which are not originally in Czech, Slovak or English must be accurately translated into English.
The admission committee evaluates the quality of the dissertation thesis project in terms of its content and form, the candidate’s ability to justify the topic of his/her choice, to clearly define it while placing it in a larger time/factual/research framework. The candidate must convincingly demonstrate that his/her topic contributes to the current state of the research, i.e. that it brings new empirical and theoretical knowledge or that it applies original methodological procedures, etc. The admission committee considers also the candidate’s academic background, namely his/her past teaching and publication activities.
We recommend contacting the head of the doctoral programme, Prof. Ota Konrád, in advance and consulting with him about the intended topic of the dissertation. In case of questions regarding the organization of the admission procedure, you can contact the administrator of the field.
GENERAL REQUIREMENTS
Admission criteria
Applicants who have completed their university studies in the master's program may be admitted to doctoral studies at the Institute of International Studies (IMS). They shall prove this fact at the latest when enrolling for studies with a higher education diploma or certificate of recognition of higher education acquired abroad.
Foreign Language Knowledge
A mandatory part of the candidate’s qualification is his/her knowledge of English at the level of at least C1. Candidates document their command of English during the entrance examination. They do so either by presenting an internationally recognised certificate on the completion of language exams, a record in the university credit book of a language course certificate, or proof of having completed university studies in English.
Dissertation Thesis Project
The candidate submits his/her dissertation project as an attachment to an electronic or paper application. The project typically ranges from 6 to 7 standard pages. It must include the following: a brief introduction to the topic, definition of the topic itself, research aim and working hypothesis, necessary theoretical and methodological approaches, proposed structure of the thesis, and a brief analysis of the state of the art, including a list of secondary or primary sources.
Candidates should consult their topics in advance (by email or during office hours) with the academic supervisor of the PhD study programme (Doc. Ota Konrád; ota.konrad@fsv.cuni.cz). This consultation primarily aims to assess the extent to which the dissertation topic aligns with the IIS FSV UK research focus and/or with its current research projects.
Entrance Examination
Successful completion of the entrance examination conditions admission. The entrance examination consists of a discussion about the dissertation project, the purpose of which is to assess the quality of the submitted project and its adherence to IIS FSV UK research focus.
The admission committee evaluates the quality of the project in terms of its content and form, the candidate’s ability to justify the topic of his/her choice, and to clearly define it while placing it in a more significant time/factual/research framework. The candidate must convincingly demonstrate that his/her topic contributes to the research's current state, i.e., it brings new empirical and theoretical knowledge or applies original methodological procedures, etc. The admission committee also considers the candidate’s academic background, namely his/her past teaching and publication activities.
Evaluation and Results
Candidates may earn a maximum of 80 points for the entrance examination. The overall score is calculated as follows: quality of the project (maximum of 30 points), originality of the topic (maximum of 20 points), ability to justify the topic and place it in a broader research context (maximum of 20 points), formal design of the project (maximum of 5 points), past teaching and publication activities (maximum of 5 points).
The Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, sets the number of points necessary to be admitted, taking into account the number of applicants and the capacity of the programme.
