Master’s programme in Politics and Governance of Global Challenges

Climate change, sustainability, inequality, digitalization, migration, autocratization, security, health, food security are among the pressing global governance challenges whose causes and effects move across national borders. Global challenges are "wicked problems" because they affect us all, and solutions require coordination between local, national and global institutions. Responding to these increasingly complex challenges, policymakers at all levels - public and private - must negotiate and navigate competing goals, values, and priorities. How are policy problems and solutions in response to global challenges framed and how has such framing developed over time? What are the global regimes for governing migration, climate change, food security and other pressing challenges and how can we explain their structure and actions? How and why do national policies and local practices vary and how do these interact with the global governance of different challenges? What implications do the politics and governance of global challenges foster for global equality and sustainable development? In the MA Politics and Governance of Global Challenges, such policy issues and questions provide thematic hubs to discuss the complex multi-level governance of truly global, and often wicked, problems in the contemporary world. Throughout the program, students will explore the historical development of the transnational system for addressing global challenges and critically examine the interrelations among different actors in international, national and local arenas through various political science lenses. The students will develop advanced knowledge, skills and competences to understand, analyze and critically discuss global challenges from a politics and governance perspective, including working towards potential fair and sustainable solutions for addressing the complex issues facing our world today. Project-based learning is at the core of the programme. Students will learn to conceptualise the politics and governance of global challenges in an informed manner, design projects in that area, and justify methodological choices, and communicate findings and policy recommendations to diverse audiences (scholarly and policy world). The programme was awarded the 2025 Study Quality Award, and this project-based learning was one of the elements highlighted when the programme was given the award. This is a political science master's programme that integrates theories of politics and governance, and advanced social science methods education in project-based learning on real world global challenges. The programme includes options for international mobility, internships, or self-organised interdisciplinary studies at other UiB departments in the third semester.