What are the admission requirements?
1. External funding
External funding may be:
- A PhD fellowship at a university college/another university
- Other employment at a research institution that allocates time for own research
- The Research Council of Norway’s Industrial PhD or public sector PhD
- ARENA, SUM, KHM and STK count as external for application purposes, as they do not have their own specialization in the PhD program at SV and must therefore comply with application deadlines
- Funding from outside of Norway, with the exception of the European Research Council, is not normally accepted.
The Faculty of Social Sciences does not accept funding by private banks or external business funding. The candidate must be employed in a relevant and active research environment throughout the entire admission period.
Applicants should take into account that they have to reside in Norway for at least half the period of study and that Norway is an expensive country.
It is a requirement that the external funding covers necessary operating expenses for your project, including any research trips.
2. Previous education
- A minimum of five years’ at bachelor’s and master’s degree level (master’s degree or equivalent). In exceptional cases the faculty may allow admission based on a one-year master’s degree.
- Average grades of A or B in your master’s degree
- The master’s degree must have been completed at the time of application. It is not possible to send references and certificates at a later date.
- For applicants to the programme options in Economics and Political Science, special recommendations applies.
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Good English skills are required for all participants in a doctoral programme. Applicants must document this, based on the following tests with the following results or better:
- TOEFL – Test of English as a Foreign Language, with a minimum result of 550 on the Paper-based Test (PBT), or 80 on the Internet-Based Test (iBT).
- IELTS – International English Language Testing Service, with the result 6.0.
For more information, see the Regulations for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor (PhD) at UiO.
3. Project quality
Admission to the PhD programme is based on an individual project proposal and an assessment of your qualifications to complete the project.
In the assessment we place emphasis on academic quality, feasibility and the project’s capacity to contribute to new knowledge within the subject area. The project proposal must be thoroughly elaborated and reflect your academic insight. As an applicant you are encouraged to familiarize yourself with recent literature in the field, and you can seek advice from within your academic community in connection with your work on the project proposal. It is also a prerequisite that the project meets the ethical requirements for research, and that you have applied for the necessary permits before the project can commence.
The project proposal shall be formulated in accordance with the faculty’s guidelines for project proposals. The project proposal may be written in Norwegian (Danish or Swedish, if relevant), or English.
4. Supervision and affiliation with a research community
Admission with external funding is contingent upon your affiliation with a relevant, active research community. This affiliation may be one of the following:
- A workplace at a university college, university or other research institution that is deemed relevant, or
- A workplace at one of the faculty departments. This presupposes that the department has the capacity for this and wishes to make a workplace available. You must contact the relevant department yourself.
If you have been admitted with external funding, you may participate in organized research training activities on the PhD programme and your supervision takes place at the Faculty of Social Sciences. You will not receive financial support from the faculty.
You should submit your application without any formal connection to a supervisor. Supervisors are allocated as part of the admissions process. Admission to the PhD programme is contingent on the faculty having the competence and capacity for supervision in the academic field in which your thesis will be written.
The faculty has overall responsibility in the admissions period to ensure that all PhD candidates are part of a relevant research community. Some disciplines stipulate a duty to reside at the department/centre for certain parts of the admissions period (residential requirements). For other disciplines, provision may be made for residence at departments/centres for those who wish or need to do so.
When is the application deadline?
- Economics: May 1st
- Sociology, Human Geography, Psycology, Social Anthropology, Political Science and TIK: May 1st and November 1st
Where should I send my application?
- All applications are submitted electronically.
What should the application consist of?
- A completed application form
- Project proposal
- A list of academic works, if relevant
- CV and copies of relevant certificates/references
- Necessary permits and assessments for carrying out your research (REK, Sikt etc)
- Documentation of funding
- Declaration of intent from employer
- Candidates not employed by UiO need to fill in Agreement with external part (Avtale for gjennomføring av doktorgradsutdanning i samarbeid med ekstern part) and have it signed by the employer / themselves
- Candidates applying with funding from the Public Sector PhD scheme and industrial PhD Scheme should not fill in the agreement above. Kindly contact the PhD advisor at the Department to obtain a template for the collaboration agreement.
Choice of programme option (discipline)
The faculty has a PhD programme in social science subjects. When you apply for admission to the programme, you select which discipline you wish to be affiliated with. Applications for admission are assessed by the relevant department/centre. The programme options comprise the parameters for research training, and include PhD courses, supervision, seminar activity and work on your thesis.
The PhD programme is organized into seven programme options (disciplines), each with their own independent structure:
- Psychology
- Human Geography
- Economics
- Social Anthropology
- Sociology
- Political Science
- Technology, Innovation and Culture
How is my application assessed?
The discipline for which you are applying for admission undertakes an academic assessment of your application and submits its report to the faculty. The faculty itself makes the decision, based on an overall assessment of the application.
What happens if I am accepted for admission?
You are normally enrolled on the programme for three years without required duties or for four years with 25% required duties (teaching work). Your employer decides whether there is a need for required duties.
You will take the required Faculty courses the semester after you have been admitted. This means that if you apply by the deadline of 1 February, you will complete the compulsory Faculty courses the following autumn semester.
Admission to the PhD programme is formalized through an admission contract. This is sent to you as soon as the admissions decision has been made. You sign the contract and send this back to your department/centre. A separate contract is also entered into between the faculty and your external employer.