Strategic Communications MA PG Dip

Overview

Students will learn how states and their governments communicate in international politics and how they shape long term strategies in a range of fields from military to diplomatic to aid and development. This includes preparing for conflict between states or with insurgent groups, communicating a path during hostilities, and transitioning through post-conflict situations. It further analyses how states use diplomacy, culture and economics to manage the peace and avoid conflict, and engage in treaty and trade negotiations. Students will also encounter crisis communications: how to shape strategic responses to natural disasters, terror attacks, and military invasions. To appreciate this complex field from multiple perspectives, students will further discover how insurgent and revolutionary movements think about and put into practice their communications strategies with populations and states.

These themes will be taught through a set of challenges that represent some of the most significant that strategic communicators will face in the coming decade. We aim to prepare them with suitable skills.

Along with subject matter expertise, students will develop transferable analytical, research, and practical skills in a dynamic and rigorous, intellectual environment.

The course is associated with the King’s Centre for Strategic Communications (KCSC) - a global network of government agencies, media and marketing companies, and alumni.

Description

The aim of this Masters programme is to enhance your knowledge of national and geopolitics today as seen through the lens of strategic communications.

The course is available to both full- and part-time students.

The MA comprises modules that total 180 credits. You will take two required modules – Theory & Concepts, and the practical Applied Strategic Communications. Each is worth 40 credits. You will take a further 40 credits of optional modules. This can be made up of a single 40 credit module or two 20 credit modules. MA Strategic Communications students are also required to write a 15,000-word research dissertation on a topic of Strategic Communications (60 credits). Students entering the FT PG Dip will be required to complete the above module structure, without a 60 credit dissertation.

This MA is based in the Department of War Studies, one of the only academic departments in the world to focus solely on the complexities of conflict and security. War Studies is an interdisciplinary department and all War Studies students benefit from research-led teaching in such subjects as the history and evolution of war and grand strategy, arms control and non-proliferation, migration, strategic thought, cyber, conflict and the environment, the influence of science and technology on international security, along with regional specialisms covering Africa, Asia (East and South), Russia and elsewhere.

Career prospects

This year four students joined the UK Cabinet Office as Strategic Communicators after completing the MA programme. Over the last 3 years, 14 of our students have enjoyed internships at the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, Riga, Latvia, and several others have interned with and later been employed by communications companies in London.

This new MA course equips students to think conceptually about Strategic Communications in the dynamic world of global affairs, then how to apply particular practices and techniques to working in the field.

Students can also exit with PGDip Awards.

Distance Learning option is also available.