DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE
- Undergraduate
- Honors Thesis
Award Winning Theses
The following theses are recent examples of outstanding work:.
- Avery Goods: "An Inconvenient Group: The Effect of Motivated Messages on Climate Change Attitudes and Behaviors of Skeptic Audiences" 2019 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Joshua Varcie: "The Artificial Incumbency Advantage: How Bipartisan Redistricting Schemes Protect Incumbents" 2019 Janda Prize Honorable Mention for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Benjamin Alan Weinberg: " Ballot Challenge: Explaining Voting Rights Restrictions in 21st-Century America" 2018 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Logan Scott Peretz: "How Hillary May Have Lost the White House: The Electoral Effects of Presidential Campaign Visits in 2016" 2018 Janda Prize Honorable Mention for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Aaron Gordon: "An Empirical Appraisal of the Liberty of Contract" 2017 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Hayley Hopkins: "Restrict the Vote: Disenfranchisement as a Political Strategy" 2017 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Matthew Gates: "Ideological Basis for the Gay Rights Movement" 2017 Janda Prize Honorable Mention for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Elena Barham: "Passing the Buck: World Bank Anti-Corruption Reform and the Politics of Implementation" 2016 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Remy Smith: "Inherently Unequal: The Effects of Equal Representation on Senate Policy Outcomes" 2016 Janda Prize Honorable Mention for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Laura Rozier: "The Media, the Innocent, and the Public: A Nuanced Look at Exonerations and Public Opinion of the Death Penalty" 2015 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Kaitlyn Chriswell: “Cross-cutting cleavages: Euskadi Ta Askatasuna, Terra Lliure, and the centrality of networks” , 2014 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Jordan Fein: "Searching for Health Care Reform: Studying Media Coverage and Framing Public Opinion of the 2009-2010 Health Care Debate" , 2011 Janda Prize Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Dylan Lewis: “Unpaid Protectors: Volunteerism and the Diminishing Role of Federal Responsibility in the National Park Service” , 2011 Janda Prize Honorable Mention for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Benjamin Zhu: “Resource Distribution in Post‐PRI Mexico: De‐Politicized or Re‐Politicized?” , 2011 Senior Marshall for Distinguished Honors Thesis
- Ben Armstrong: “Ne Touche Pas Ma Constitution: Pressures and Presidential Term Limits” , 2011 Barry Farrell Prize for Academic Achievement
- Jeffrey Paller: “Where are the people? The Relationship between Government and Civil Society in South Africa” , 2006 Janda Prize Co-Winner for Best Honors Thesis
- Samir Mayekar: “The Piquetero Effect: Examining the Argentine Government’s Response to the Piquetero Movement” , 2006 Janda Prize Co-Winner for Best Honors Thesis
Janda PRIZE for DISTINGUISHED Honors Thesis REcipients
The Kenneth F. Janda Prize for Distinguished Honors Thesis in Political Science is awarded annually for the best undergraduate Honors thesis of the year.
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- Theses from Previous Years
As you think about writing a thesis in Government, or commence your research on your thesis, you may wonder what a successful thesis looks like. We have collected some theses from previous years on this page; please peruse them and use them as examples of how to structure your own thesis.
Theory Thesis 1
Theory Thesis 2
Theory Thesis 3
Theory Thesis 4
Theory Thesis 5
Comparative
Comparative Thesis 1
Comparative Thesis 2
Comparative Thesis 3
Comparative Thesis 4
Comparative Thesis 5
Comparative Thesis 7
Comparative Thesis 8
American Thesis 1
American Thesis 2
American Thesis 3
American Thesis 4
American Thesis 5
American Thesis 6
American Thesis 7
American Thesis 8
International Relations
IR Thesis 1
IR Thesis 2
IR Thesis 3
IR Thesis 4
IR Thesis 5
IR Thesis 6
- Guide to Writing a Senior Thesis in Government
- Finding a Thesis Adviser in the Government Department
- Thesis Timeline
- Funding Resources
- Do I need approval from the Committee on the Use of Human Subjects (CUHS)?
- What is different about theses for a joint concentration?
- Senior Thesis Symposium
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- College of Arts & Sciences
- Graduate Division
- College of Liberal and Professional Studies
- Honors Thesis Program
- Undergraduate Program
- Undergraduate Research
The Honors Program offers the Political Science Department’s most accomplished seniors an opportunity to conduct original research on a topic of specific interest to them. Honors students work individually with a faculty mentor to complete a substantial work of original research (usually no shorter than 50 pages in length).
Honors students have the opportunity to share their research in a variety of ways, including with the campus community at the department’s annual Honors Poster Session Luncheon, as well as nationally at the annual conference of the Midwest Political Science Association (the country’s second largest professional meeting in political science). Furthermore, all honors theses are eligible for inclusion in Penn’s College Undergraduate Research Electronic Journal .
Students who complete their thesis with a grade of at least A- are awarded Distinction in Political Science upon graduation.
Admission to the honors program is by application only; applications are available to students in the spring of their junior year.
Interested students are encouraged to reach out to past thesis writers. For more information, please visit the Past Undergraduate Thesis Writers page .
Juniors who are interested in writing an honors thesis can look here for information about the application process. Applications to write a thesis in 2022-2023 are due on April 27, 2022. If you have questions about the application process, contact [email protected] .
Undergraduate Programs
Senior thesis.
Political science majors may choose to write a senior thesis – a project where students demonstrate their ability to conduct original research on a topic of their own choosing under the direction of a faculty member.
Theses are sometimes based on previous work, such as class papers or field projects; many students develop their own topic in consultation with faculty and graduate assistants. Finished theses are often used in applications to graduate schools and as the basis for future research, and some students have also successfully published portions of their work.
Preparation and assistance are provided in a two-class sequence that typically begins during the junior year: 17.801 (Political Science Scope and Methods), 17.803 (Political Science Laboratory). By the end of junior year, students interested in writing a thesis are encouraged to reach out to potential thesis advisors. Research formally begins in fall of senior year (17.THT) under the direction of a faculty advisor and continues in the spring (17.THU), culminating in a thesis defense with the advisor and a second faculty reader.
For thesis specifications visit the MIT Libraries Thesis Specifications website.
Important Thesis Dates and Deadlines for Spring 2022 (PDF)
Undergraduate Research
Undergraduate students interested in conducting original research should consider the political science honors program . During their senior year students in the honors program write a thesis on a topic of their choosing while being supervised by a political science faculty member.
2021-2022 Thesis Projects
Best Poster Award Winners: Kaylynn Kattiyaman
Best Thesis Award Winners: Thomas Ballard and Tyeese Braslavsky
Best Thesis Presentation Award (in place of “Best Thesis Poster”): Jessica Angel Best Thesis Award: Jessica Angel
View presentation videos here .
Best Thesis Presentation Award (in place of “Best Thesis Poster”): Casey J. Griffin & Jonathan Bonaguro
Best Poster award winners: Rebecca Laurent and Valerie Peterson Best Thesis award winner: Rebecca Laurent (Honorable Mentions: Adam Camp, Sara O'Malley, and Valerie Peterson)
Matthew Rice was selected as the winner of Best Poster and Best Thesis for his project titled "Personality's Role within the World's Greatest Deliberative Body: How the "Big Five" Factors Drive the Rise of United States Senators to Legislative Success?"
Thesis Award Winners
The 2016 Best Thesis award winner is Collin Schumock for his thesis "Intraparty Factions and Interparty Polarization."
Thesis Awards
The 2016 Best Thesis Award winner is John Knoblett for his thesis "From the Washington to the Beijing Consensus: China's Economic Rise and the IMF."
The 2016 Best Poster Award winner is Mekenah Merrill for her thesis poster, "Voting in Taiwan and China: A Comparative Analysis on the Impact of Educational Attainment on Voter Turnout in Taiwan and China."
The 2015 Best Thesis Award winner is Jenine Saleh for her thesis "A Perpetuating Negative Cycle: The Effects of Economic Inequality on Voter Participation."
The 2015 Best Poster Award winner is Irem Karacal for her poster presenting her thesis "Political Violence, Ethnic Fractionalization, and the Ratification of the Rome Statute."
- Research Areas
- Research Institutes and Centers
- PS 496: Thesis Submission Instructions
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COMMENTS
The Kenneth F. Janda Prize for Distinguished Honors Thesis in Political Science is awarded annually for the best undergraduate Honors thesis of the year. Student name. Year. Kelly Miller. 2022. Andrew Myers (Honorable Mention) 2022. Julian Freiberg. 2021.
As you think about writing a thesis in Government, or commence your research on your thesis, you may wonder what a successful thesis looks like. We have collected some theses from previous years on this page; please peruse them and use them as examples of how to structure your own thesis.
Africa, Political Science, Public Policy: Stephen J. Winkler. 2020. "Information's Effect on Public Opinion, Social Institutions, and Political Behavior" Graduate, Dissertations: Political Psychology, Political Science: Sean Kim Butorac. 2020. "States of Insurrection: Race, Resistance, and the Laws of Slavery" Graduate, Dissertations: Postcolonial
Undergraduate Program. Undergraduate Research. Honors Thesis Program. The Honors Program offers the Political Science Department’s most accomplished seniors an opportunity to conduct original research on a topic of specific interest to them.
Political science majors may choose to write a senior thesis – a project where students demonstrate their ability to conduct original research on a topic of their own choosing under the direction of a faculty member.
Undergraduate students interested in conducting original research should consider the political ...