About the Graduate School of Law
The major in jurisprudence and international relations in the Graduate School of Law, Hitotsubashi University comprises master’s and doctoral programs. The curriculum of the Major is designed to pursue jurisprudence and international relations as a field of social sciences and build high expertise and research ability on general and specialized education. Through the curriculum, the Major aims to nurture students’ ability to contribute to the progress and development of culture and arm them with the sophisticated expertise and skills required to engage in highly specialized professions in the future.
1 Master’s Program
With the aim of completing a master’s thesis, students in the Master’s Program receive two years of consistent intellectual training via seminars and research guidance by supervisors. Moreover, students who wish to broaden their own intellectual horizons can take some courses offered by the Faculty of Law and other Graduate Schools in addition to the cutting-edge courses offered by the Graduate School of Law.
2 Doctoral Program
The Doctoral Program is divided into a researcher development course and an applied research course. The researcher development course targets students who wish to engage in research and education in the future at universities or other institutions and aims to nurture the ability to carry out advanced research based on basic theories and thereby prepare them to become independent researchers. On the other hand, the applied research course targets students who wish to work at research institutes, international organizations, or enterprises as professionals with high expertise, and aims to develop students’ ability to implement advanced applied research from a practical perspective.
With the aim of completing a doctoral dissertation, students in each course receive three years (in principle, two years for graduates of professional law schools) of consistent intellectual training through seminars and research guidance by supervisors. For the applied research course, however, the curriculum is designed to allow more latitude in the implementation of seminars and research guidance in light of its being a course open to mature-aged students.
3 EU Interdisciplinary Research Program
In 2013, the EU Interdisciplinary Research Program opened in the Graduate School of Law as one of the cross-graduate school programs that the graduate students of Hitotsubashi University can take as a minor. This minor program is open to all students enrolled in the master’s, doctoral, and professional degree programs (except The School of Law) of all graduate schools, and a certificate is conferred on those who have completed the program.
In the EU Workshop, a required course, four faculty members from each of the Graduate School of Law, Graduate School of Commerce and Management, Graduate School of Economics, and Graduate School of Social Sciences jointly conduct seminars. The Program also offers courses where students study issues related to the EU and Europe and acquire skills to share information in these areas, such as EU Research Skills I & II, a required course from a foreign instructor, and European Studies I to III, a compulsory elective.
Moreover, since the EU Interdisciplinary Research Program belongs to the Graduate School of Law, the number of credits required to finish the Program is fewer for students in the Graduate School of Law than for students at other graduate schools. We hope that students in the Graduate School of Law will take advantage of this privilege, acquire additional skills, and fully utilize such skills in their future research or work.