Faculty of political and social science

Partners and projects

Opened in 2001 the Faculty of political and social sciences has successfully completed the process of its formation.

Three chairs have been opened at the Faculty: the chair of political science, the chair of international relations and the chair of sociology and social work.

1. The project “Public administration” realized together with the Vermont University was the most significant project aimed at professional development of the Faculty’s staff. It allowed all the teachers of political science of the Faculty to participate in the series of trainings, to study the credit system, to take part in the work of scientific seminar, to submit their presentations opened to joint discussions of the contemporary problems of political science together with American colleagues. The seminar had been working during the two-year period of the project realization. During the training period of the PetrSU teachers in the USA and the period of work of the Vermont University professors the lectures for students and meeting with Karelian politicians had been organized. The project allowed simultaneously to commence the process of acquisition of the chair’s at the beginning and then the department’s library. All the equipment required for work has been purchased. This cooperation made possible the creation of the specialization “Political science” and promoted the opening of the Center for political and social research.

2. The project realized together with the University of Tampere (Finland) and Umea (Sweden) made possible the verification of the educational systems and training of the specialists in the frames of credit system and general educational standards. This joint activity resulted in rapprochement of political science courses content in Europe and Karelia. All the teachers of political science and sociology had the opportunities to attend lectures in the University of Umea, work in its library which contains new stocks of the latest literature on Social sciences printed in English.

3. Together with National Research and Development Center for Welfare and Health (Helsinki, Finland, www.stakes.fi ) the Faculty implemented an important research project “Health and well-being of citizens in a transforming society” in 2002. Students and teaching staff of the Faculty participated in conducting a massive sociological survey of citizens of the Republic of Karelia, interpreting and analyzing of the results obtained and describing the results of the project in a series of articles published afterwards.

4. The Faculty actively cooperates with the European University at Saint-Petersburg in the frames of the project “Regional network of social sciences” supported by the Carnegie Corporation in New York. The realization of the project was led by the European University and Michigan University. Graduates form the European University had the opportunity to read several courses of lectures for students in Petrozavodsk. The cooperation with this institution is going on for the time being. Jointly with the Center for European Studies of the European University the realization of the project “Understanding European Governance in North-Western Regions of Russia (UNEGO)” has commenced.

5. The project “Cross-border University” which is being implemented together with six Finnish universities and two universities in Saint-Petersburg is of great importance for the Faculty since it set a task of pilot introduction of Master program in international relations as well as overall reforming of the educational process in accordance with Bologna process.
The main subjective of the project is general rapprochement of studying plans in IR to European well-known and recognized study programs in this sphere. Students of IR are studying in the framework of the specially elaborated Master program in IR and according to the high standards of European education which also includes student mobility. For more information please visit http://www.joensuu.fi/cbu/ .

For the time being several projects on social work are in process of implementation.

The Faculty is open to any kind of proposals on the part of foreign counterparts. As it has been defined the strategy of the Faculty is to extend the international cooperation aimed at improving of teaching facilities and curriculum development in the filed of social sciences.