The Faculty awards about 15 PhD degrees each year to students who have
produced high-quality, original, and publishable research over a period
of three years. Faculty Members can supervise a broad range of research areas suitable for a PhD thesis.
The basic requirement for admission to the PhD programme
is that a student should have performed well in the Faculty’s MPhil programme,
or in an equivalent Master’s programme elsewhere.
Students already studying for the MPhil degree at Cambridge may apply
to continue to the PhD, and this is dependent on achieving a specified
standard in the MPhil examinations. The Faculty prefers students who continue
to the PhD to have taken the MPhil Economic Research, but it is
also possible to continue to the PhD having taken the MPhil Economics.
Applications for direct entry to the PhD from candidates with a
high-quality
Master’s degree in economics from other universities are also welcomed.
If an applicant’s previous training is not considered sufficient for
direct
entry, a PhD candidate may be considered for admission to the MPhil Economic Research degree. Applicants whose Master’s qualification is not
from
Cambridge must submit precise details of their Master’s training with
their
application, including the topics covered and the main required
reading.
PhD applicants must submit a statement of their proposed research with his
or her application. When preparing this statement please consult the research interests of Faculty members and, if possible, indicate possible supervisors for your PhD research.
PhD students are admitted from the beginning of October in the relevant
year. It is not possible to start the PhD at other times.
The First Year of Research
If accepted for the PhD degree, a student will be registered initially
for the Certificate of Postgraduate Study (CPGS) in Economics. In this
first year of research, the student will do a significant amount of additional
coursework and will write a substantial dissertation that is likely to
form the basis for one-third of the student’s eventual PhD dissertation.
Those students whose performance during the first year of research indicates
that they would be able to complete a PhD in reasonable time will be registered
for the PhD at the end of this year. A student who continues to the PhD
and wishes to count the CPGS year towards the residence requirement for
the PhD will not be awarded the CPGS. A student who is not upgraded to
PhD status at the end of this first year will be awarded the CPGS. A student
who is upgraded to PhD status but subsequently leaves before submitting
a PhD dissertation will also be awarded the CPGS.
The Certificate of Postgraduate Study in Economics will involve the
following four components:
- General research methods training. This involves attending the Faculty’s ‘How to do Economics’ course and may also,
depending on a student’s interests, be based on the Research Methods in
the Social Sciences course organised by the Schools of Humanities and Social
Sciences and Physical Sciences of the University of Cambridge.
- Advanced coursework - typically about 80-90 hours but previous graduate level coursework could offset these requirements. The coursework can be chosen from MPhil
modules, PhD courses and other
courses approved by the Graduate Studies Committee. The advanced
coursework will be assessed by the end of June in the first year of research.
- Writing a substantial dissertation (maximum length 20,000 words)
that involves original work and should be capable of forming the basis
for one third of the eventual PhD. The normal deadline for submission of
the dissertation will be the end of June in the first year of research,
although this may be extended by one month in exceptional circumstances.
- Attendance at: (i) a research workshop attended by Faculty members
and research students, at which research students present both their own
work and recent papers in the literature; (ii) research seminars given
by outside speakers and Faculty members.
Whether a student initially registered for the CPGS is upgraded to PhD
status at the end of the first year of research will depend on his or her
performance in the four components of the CPGS.
Second and Third Years of Research
Once upgraded to PhD status, a student concentrates on his or her PhD dissertation.
As research progresses, there will be opportunities to present work in
progress at research workshops attended by Faculty members and research
students. PhD students will also be required to attend research
seminars given by outside speakers and Faculty members.
