Bachelor of Arts in Social Thought and Political Economy

The Social Thought and Political Economy (STPEC) program is an interdisciplinary undergraduate major that encourages you to engage in a critical examination of society and to develop your own capacities for critical reading, writing, and thinking.

At UMass Amherst, you’ll cross disciplinary lines — such as Afro-American Studies, Anthropology, Communication, Economics, History, Legal Studies, Sociology, and Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies — to confront fundamental questions often ignored or neglected by traditional academic thought.

Your courses will cover a range of issues and perspectives, including freedom and the state, structural inequality in the economy, work and work relations, the relationship of Western to non-Western cultures, the interrelationship of racism, sexism, and class oppression, the psychodynamics of politics, and theories of social change.

The STPEC major is a hands-on field, so you’ll put theory into practice and develop your skills through internships in the community, playing a role in university and/or campus community affairs, and assuming active responsibility for the shape of your own education within the program.