Peacebuilding and Mediation (MLitt) 2025 entry

Explore the relationship between formal and official peacebuilding and mediation initiatives and informal, unofficial, and community-based efforts.

Application deadline: Thursday 7 August 2025

Apply for 2025 entry Register your interest

Register your interest

Register your details with us and we will send you more information about programmes at the University of St Andrews.

The information collected in this form will be held and used only in the ways outlined in the University's privacy and data protection policies and notices.

Starts

September 2025

Duration

One year full time

School

School of International Relations

Fees

UK
£14,850
Rest of the world
£29,990

Why study this course?

The programme showcases the School’s world-leading research strengths in the broad field of peace and conflict studies, including in peacebuilding and mediation of conflict.

In this course, you will:

  • analyse bottom-up and top-down approaches to conflict mediation
  • conceptualise peace and its relationship to violence
  • analyse relationships between formal institutions of peacebuilding and parallel informal or unofficial processes 
  • identify key actors involved in peacebuilding and mediation efforts
  • engage with bottom-up approaches to building peace
  • explore feminist and decolonial critiques of formal peace processes
  • critically engage with temporalities and spaces of peace and violence

Highlights

  • The focus of this programme on peacebuilding and mediation ensures that the study of conflict focuses not only on violence, its actors, and modalities, but also on the different insights deriving from critical engagement with processes of peace.
  • The programme is strongly influenced by postcolonial, feminist and critical theory.
  • The programme locates and analyses both global and more local cases of peacebuilding and mediation.

Teaching

Delivered through lectures, tutorials, and seminars.

Assessment

A mix of coursework and exams.

Dissertation

A 15,000-word project with regular support from an assigned dissertation supervisor.

Modules

All Peacebuilding and Mediation students take two compulsory and two optional modules.

Course information may change. Module information and course content, teaching and assessment may change each year and after you have accepted your offer to study at the University of St Andrews. We display the most up-to-date information possible, but this could be from a previous academic year. For the latest module information, see the module catalogue.

    • Critical Approaches to Peacebuilding: explores the many meanings of peace. Drawing from both theoretical analyses and applied study of peacebuilding efforts worldwide, the module examines the actors, settings, temporalities, challenges, and opportunities involved in the making of peace.
    • Mediation: Community and Global Praxis: identifies the historical, conceptual, and theoretical underpinnings of conflict resolution practices; analyses diverse forms of mediation, including 'Track 1' diplomacy, third-party mediation, and state- and community-led approaches; and, evaluates differential outcomes of mediation processes based on literature review and case studies.
    • Armed Governance: examines the origins, motivations, and dynamics of armed governance, developing new multi-disciplinary perspectives and frameworks for understanding these governance arrangements.
    • The Changing Face(s) of Diplomacy: Emotions, Power and Persuasion in International Relations: highlights the role of emotions, persuasion, and communication technology into the diplomatic arena.
    • Critical Climate Justice: gives students a critical theoretical understanding and practical analysis of the meaning and significance of climate justice within the international system.
    • Feminist Political Economy: introduces students to feminist political economy, covering key concepts and theories, including social reproduction, and case studies. Including the European Union, trade, and global care chains.
    • Global Constitutionalism: explores global constitutionalism from a political theory perspective focusing on three concepts: law, power, and rights.
    • Global Politics of Everyday Life: critically interrogates how the global is situated and produced in the everyday, considering travel, fashion, and popular culture, among others.
    • Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict: familiarises students with different approaches that seek to explain how ethnicity and nationhood are created and maintained, how different forms of ethnic conflict and ethnic violence come about, and what possible mechanisms to contain nationalism and ethnic conflict are.
    • Political Economy of Conflict: provides a political economy perspective on conflict in a developing economy.
    • Prisons: Spaces of Power, Resistance and Peacebuilding: examines prisons as state responses to poverty, drugs and political dissent, and analyses differential impacts of incarceration, and modes of resistance to it.
    • Security and Development in East Asia: investigates growth and development in East Asian states, and seeks to understand if there is a uniquely Asian approach to security and development that produces distinctive regional patterns.
    • Security and Justice Institutions in World Politics: examines the role of different international institutions in governing world politics.
    • Terrorism and Liberal Democracy: addresses conceptual and definitional issues concerning terrorism; the relationship of terrorism to other forms of political violence; and the dilemmas and challenges of liberal democratic state responses to terrorism; and reviews case studies in terrorism and counter-terrorism.
  • The final element of the MLitt is a 15,000-word dissertation. The dissertation should focus on an area of peacebuilding or mediation in which you are interested. Each student is supported by a relevant supervisor from the School who will advise on the choice of subject and provide guidance throughout the research process.

    If MLitt students choose not to complete the dissertation requirement, there are exit awards available that allow suitably qualified candidates to receive a Postgraduate Diploma. By choosing an exit award, you will finish your degree at the end of the second semester of study and receive a PGDip instead of an MLitt.

What it will lead to

Careers

The MLitt programme purposefully prepares students for career prospects in a variety of fields. Students who graduate from this programme can expect to go on to work in various professional fields, including:

  • human rights
  • law
  • policy research 
  • NGOs
  • charities
  • international organisations
  • civil service
  • academia

The Careers Centre offers one-to-one advice to all students as well as a programme of events to assist students in building their employability skills.

Further study

Many graduates continue their education by enrolling in PhD programmes at St Andrews or elsewhere.

Why St Andrews?

Alumni

When you graduate you become a member of the University's worldwide alumni community. Benefit from access to alumni clubs, the Saint Connect networking and mentoring platform, and careers support.

Ask a student

If you are interested in learning what it's like to be a student at St Andrews you can speak to one of our student ambassadors. They'll let you know about their top tips, best study spots, favourite traditions and more.

Entry requirements

  • A 2:1 Honours degree in Political Science, International Relations, Social Sciences, Anthropology, Geography, History, Sociology, English, Comparative Literature, or other relevant disciplines. If you studied your first degree outside the UK, see the international entry requirements.
  • English language proficiency. See English language tests and qualifications.

The qualifications listed are indicative minimum requirements for entry. Some academic Schools will ask applicants to achieve significantly higher marks than the minimum. Obtaining the listed entry requirements will not guarantee you a place, as the University considers all aspects of every application including, where applicable, the writing sample, personal statement, and supporting documents.

Application requirements

  • CV
  • personal statement indicating your knowledge of the programme and how it will benefit you (500 words)
  • sample of your own, single-authored academic written work (2,000 words)
  • two original signed academic or professional references
  • academic transcripts and degree certificates

For more guidance, see supporting documents and references for postgraduate taught programmes.

English language proficiency

If English is not your first language, you may need to provide an English language test score to evidence your English language ability. See approved English language tests and scores for this course.

Fees and funding

  • UK: £14,850
  • Rest of the world: £29,990

Before we can begin processing your application, a payment of an application fee of £50 is required. In some instances, you may be eligible for an application fee waiver. Details of this, along with information on our tuition fees, can be found on the postgraduate fees and funding page.

Scholarships and funding

We are committed to supporting you through your studies, regardless of your financial circumstances. You may be eligible for scholarships, discounts or other support:

International relations scholarships

Legal notices

Admission to the University of St Andrews is governed by our Admissions policy

Information about all programmes from previous years of entry can be found in the course archive.

Curriculum development

As a research intensive institution, the University ensures that its teaching references the research interests of its staff, which may change from time to time. As a result, programmes are regularly reviewed with the aim of enhancing students' learning experience. Our approach to course revision is described online.

Tuition fees

The University will clarify compulsory fees and charges it requires any student to pay at the time of offer. The offer will also clarify conditions for any variation of fees. The University’s approach to fee setting is described online.

Page last updated: 27 May 2025