Political Science Research
The political science department primarily investigates who get(s)? what? when? how? how
much? who wins, who loses, and why? In doing so, our faculty members study socio-political
processes, institutions and behaviour that lead to policy/decision making and implementation
– at macro, meso and micro levels. Besides, political scientists of Dhaka University have
been copiously publishing both on theoretical and pragmatic aspects of governance ranging
from analysis of political institutions, political participation and inclusivity, political
processes – in authoritarian, democratic, hybrid and interim regimes, political parties and
poverty alleviation to sustainability and inclusiveness.
The department boasts for the research a group of esteemed faculty members – such as Abdur
Razzaq, Muzzafar Ahmed Chowdhury, Rounaq Jahan, Talukder Moniruzzaman, Emajuddin
Ahmed, BK Jahangir and UAB Razia Akter Banu – who intensely studied the country’s
socio-political transformation with time. Talukder Maniruzzaman, who were concerned with
the security of the newly born independent country, its prospective foreign relations while
Harun-or-Rashid earned reputation for illuminating the political history and illustrating the
ideological and ideational foundation of Bangladesh state. Our teacher Sardar Fazlul Karim, a
left-leaning political leader, translated a wide range of classics of Western political thought in
vernacular language and thus contributed to the popularisation of liberal and progressive
ideals in Bangladesh.
Since 1980 research horizon of departmental teachers has broaden. Issues like gender,
migration, remittances, climate changes adaption entered departmental research bracket.
Nazma Cowdhury is one of the pioneer researchers of the department on gender. She
contributed in policy changes in respect to custody of children during divorce and restoration
of conjugal rights. Tasneem Siddiqui, the current chairperson of the department, has been the
trailblazer in studying migration and climate adaptation. Her research directly contributed to
several policy formulation.
Political science faculty members have also earned reputation in studying the interplay of the
myriad of societal forces – such as relationship between illegal land grabbing and local power
structure, partisan nature of Bangladeshi civil society, corrupt practices in the judicial system,
governance of the human and natural resources etc. Besides, the department has ongoing
research projects on gender and ethnic relations, human rights, political and domestic
violence, religion-inspired social and political movements etc. One of our colleagues is also
seeking to make political reading of the most popular Bangladeshi mystic singer – Lalon
Shai.
Currently, Bangladesh has been preparing for its graduation from least developed country to
middle income country. And one of the major locomotives of that journey is the participation
of the youth in development. Couple of our colleagues have been working on how to
effectively upskill, organise and utilise the youth force for national development.
In the coming decade, the department plans to intensively study the local threads of
normative political theory, Bangladeshi politics with special focus on electoral integrity of
the political parties and institutions, and methods and methodologies of studying political
phenomena.