List of requirements

• Students are expected to read the required readings for each lecture. Compulsory readings for the course are to be found in the Study Materials folder of the Information System.
• Students are expected to attend each lecture, with exceptions stated by the Masaryk University Study and Examination Regulations.
• Sessions of Week 10, 12 and 13 are designed as interactive seminars, with compulsory attendance.
• Students are required to write and present a research design, based on their area of interest using knowledge and skills gained throughout the course (for detailed information see the “Research Design” chapter below).
• Students are required to prepare and present a feedback report on a fellow colleague’s research design (for detailed information see the “Feedback report” chapter below).
• Students have to pass a final exam based on required readings and class presentations.
• Students will be split into two groups. This is necessary due to the number of students, who are expected to deliver research design presentations. Students are assigned to their respective group randomly. The list of groups is going to be available in the Information system on 15 March 2020.

Details on individual requirements

Research Design

The research design is an integral part of the course. By preparing the research design the students will get more familiar with the theoretical and methodological tools of their interest and internalize the good practices of the research planning, which they will be expected to demonstrate throughout their study at their program. The expected length of the research design is 10 to 15 standard pages.

The research design shall consist of the following:

• Introduction, in which the students introduce the research topic, explain why it is relevant from the standpoint of the international relations and/or the energy studies, justify the choice of the research topic, outline the main argument followed by the research, and introduce the research question addressed by the resarch.
• Literature review: An overview of the existing approaches towards the selected issue will be presented. The review shall be prepared in form of a discussion that would use the existing literature to justify the validity of the main argument of the research and provide main synthesis of the relevant knowledge on the topic of interest. The literature review is expected to cover at least 30 relevant journal papers.
• The role of theory: The way the theory will be used will be described – as a goal in inductive research or as a tool in the deductive one. The necessary concepts, their operationalization, hypotheses, and variables shall be introduced as well, if applicable. After a consultation with a course lecturer, the role of theory may be interconnected with the literature review.
• Data: The nature, collection and initial processing of the data will be described in the greatest possible detail. All these steps must be consistent with the role of theory.
• Methods: The nature and process of data manipulation and interpretation will be described in the greatest possible detail. If specific method is chosen, all steps which are expected to be taken by the researcher should be explained and justified.
• Expected outcomes: What is expected to arise from the data interpretation? The section should cover two major areas: a) expected outcomes of the analysis (i.e. what are the results you expect to see after the analysis); and b) their content, which could be reasonably expected at this stage of the proposal (i.e. likely/unsurprising results that can be reasonably guessed without conducting the research itself).
• Weak points: What are the threats to the successful conduction of the research? How the students plan to deal with them? These should address primarily non-trivial issues. Students should be very specific about possible problems and should suggest remedies/contingency plans.
• References: All used sources, including the data, shall be mentioned as citations.

The submitted design is expected to be feasible. The evaluation of the research design is going to emphasize the choice of the proper topic and the research question, depth of the literature review, appropriate theoretical grounding and choice of the method of data collection and analysis, and consistency of individual parts of the design.

Initial (draft) design should be submitted as close to completion as possible. The draft design has to include all chapters with reasonable depth. Following of citation standards is required, including proper citations and complete list of references. Research design drafts without citation standards or apparently incomplete drafts will be rejected.

Students are also advised to approach the research design as the first step in drafting their diploma theses.

Research design presentations

Each student is expected to prepare and deliver a 5 to 7-minute long presentation of their research design. Presentations will be delivered during the last two seminar sessions. The presentation should introduce the most important features of the research design. Students should focus on the explanation of individual building blocks of the research, and pay attention to the consistency of the design.

It is expected that at the first presentation session, half of the group will be presenting and the other half providing feedback. At the second session, the roles will be switched. Other program lecturers might join these presentations.

Feedback report

Each student is expected to prepare a feedback report for a research design of one of their colleagues. The primary goal of these reports is to provide constructive feedback on the research of other students.

The extent of the feedback shall be 2-3 standard pages. The feedback report is going to be presented immediately after the presentation of the respective research design. The presentation of the feedback report should highlight only the most important points and take no longer than 3 minutes.

Prior to the reviewing process, students are invited to study carefully as many review articles as possible to gain a solid understanding of the review genre. Studying reviews on publications the students are already familiar with is certainly advisable. Review articles can be downloaded at jstor.org or any other available database of electronic resources.

Final exam

The final written exam is going to consist of four open-ended questions.

The main goal of the exam is to check, whether students understand main concepts and ideas behind the research design formulation, and whether they can use the acquired knowledge in the applied setting.