Charles and Louise Travers Department of Political Science

The Travers Department of Political Science has long been regarded as one of the finest places to study politics and government. From the telling insights of bargaining models in international conflicts to the pivotal role of critical junctures and path dependence in political change to fresh readings of Thomas Hobbes and the concept of tolerance, many of the most influential developments in the discipline are associated with UC Berkeley Political Science. The Department has also educated generations of undergraduates and graduate students, many of whom are now eminent scholars, public servants, and community leaders. There are approximately 45 faculty, 1,000 undergraduate students and 125 PhD students in the department. We offer an unusual combination of depth and breadth in the major subject areas of political science, covering not only the traditional subfields of American politics, comparative politics, international relations, and political theory but supplementing those subfields with substantial strength in areas such as formal theory, methods, organizations and public policy, political behavior, and public law, as well as the politics of every major region across the globe.