Social Anthropology and Politics

Anthropologists have studied the political systems of world societies since the early years of the discipline, and today, political anthropology is central to contemporary anthropological thought. Within the School of Anthropology and Conservation, we have a range of experts working on politics, in regions as diverse as the Middle East, Eastern and Western Europe, India, and Central America. Their research is foregrounded in specialist modules such as Violence and Conflict in the Contemporary World; innovative regional modules on European Societies and Southeast Asian Societies, and across a wide range of our core and optional teaching. A unique strength of anthropological study of politics is its comparative perspective – enabling students to grasp, in concrete ethnographic detail, how power is manifested in diverse cultural practices and institutions across the modern world.