PhD Courses in Denmark

Applied Research in Military and International Security Studies (ARMIS)

The PhD School at the Faculty of Business and Social Sciences at University of Southern Denmark

 

Registration:

To sign up for this course, please send an email to daol@fak.dk
Deadline for registration is October 1st, 2025.


A. Course description:

The PhD-course Applied Research in Military and International Security Studies (ARMIS)

helps PhD candidates understand conceptually the roles, methods, and distinct practical

issues that characterize knowledge production in (inter)national security matters. This

includes historical and sociological knowledge of the knowledge production system,

introduction to the key distinction between pure and applied sciences as well as student

work on applied practical and policy research within the domain, as well as publication and

impact strategies.

 

Based on papers prepared by the participating students, and submitted before the beginning

of the course, the course helps situate and develop the candidates own PhD projects as

objects of knowledge production specific to studies of security in national and international

settings (military, police, intelligence and security organizations). Moreover, the course

provides hands-on knowledge about how to tackle the numerous challenges related to the

selection of methodical techniques for generating and analyzing data in an (inter)national

security context, including the practical and ethical issues. Finally, the course addresses

strategies for how PhD projects can have impact in terms of scientific knowledge security

matters as well as impact within academic and non-academic audiences.

 

The course will be taught by broad range of relevant researchers from the Center for War

Studies, University of Southern Denmark and the Royal Danish Defence College as well as

invited external internationally recognized scholars. The researchers’ diversity in intellectual

background and scholarly foci serve as a fruitful point of departure for interactions and

discussions that will improve the course participants’ ability to thoroughly ground their

doctoral research in an academic discipline while elucidating ways to become agents of

political and practice change. Additionally, the course provides an international academic

network useful for future scholars in military and (inter)national security studies.

 

 

 

B. Course content

 

The course consists of four main parts.

 

Part 1 introduces the diverse landscape of knowledge production in past, current, and future

military and national security studies to define what demarcates it from other fields of

research. Moreover, Part 1 discusses what demarcates scientific from non-scientific

knowledge production and introduces the various roles the researcher plays in knowledge-production and dissemination of knowledge with respect to pure and applied sciences.

 

Part 2 attends to the various ways research questions can be formulated and the different

considerations going into the process of formulating research questions in military and

international security affairs. In this second part, the students present and discuss their own

research questions in syndicates.

 

Part 3 presents the participants with hands-on examples of how different methods were used

successfully to generate and analyze data about military and international security affairs,

including practical and ethical issues. Moreover, during Part 3, good examples from military

and international security studies are discussed in relation to the papers shared by students.

 

Part 4 deals with impact strategies. During this final part of the course, participants develop

impact strategies for how to get their research findings across to relevant academic and nonacademic audiences.

 

C. Course Format

 

The course will run a full week (Mon-Fri) with physical attendance at Frederiksberg Slot in

Copenhagen, mixing lectures from course leaders and guest lecturers, syndicate work on

attendees’ own research cases, and exemplary cases supplied by the teachers.

 

D. Preparation before Course Start

 

Preparation for the course consists in a) reading roughly 600 pages regarding policy analysis

and applied research within military and national security affairs, b) preparing an 8-page PhD

project outline, including:

 

  1. A section where you motivate and state your research question

 

  1. A section on how you plan to/have already generate(d) the needed data, including the challenges and opportunities you faced or see ahead

 

  1. A section on how you plan to conduct your analysis or have conducted your analysis, including considerations about choice of method(s)

 

  1. A section on whom you are writing for and how you plan to have your research make an impact on academic and non-academic audiences.

 

E. Exam

 

Participants are graded passed or not passed. The evaluation is based on active participation in the discussions and presentations in the course.

 

F. Course outline
 

Monday: The knowledge production system in military and international security studies

Time

Activities

09:00-10:30

Welcome and introduction to the course

 

Lecturers: Daniel M. Ølgaard & Jonas G. Kaas

 

10:30-11:00

Coffee Break

11:00-12:00

The Sociology of the Western Knowledge Production System

 

  • Pure and applied research
  • Mode 1 and 2 research
  • The gray zone of applied social science research

 

Lecturer: Henrik Breitenbauch

 

12:00-12:45

Lunch

12:45-13:45

The Sociology of the Western Knowledge Production System (continued)

 

Lecturer: Henrik Breitenbauch

 

13:45-14:00

Coffee Break

14:00-15:30

Military and International Security Studies as Disciplines: Past, Present, and Future

 

  • Academic discipline
  • Interdisciplinarity
  • Narrating a discipline

 

Key questions: What is special about military studies? How does it relate to (inter)national security studies and war studies? Is it important?

 

Lecturers: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel Møller Ølgaard

 

15:30-17:00

Walk and talk

 

Walk in pairs of 2 or 3 and please reflect upon the following questions:

  1. Is it possible to position your research project within the disciplines of (Inter)national Security Studies?
  2. Where would you position your project in terms of pure and applied science?
  3. How can positioning your project in terms of pure/applied science be a creative challenge to develop ideas about impact?

19:00-21:00

Dinner

 

Frederiksberg Slot, Riddersalen

 

Tuesday: Research questions in military and (inter)national security studies

 

Time

Activities

09:00-09:30

 Introduction and Recap

 

 Lecturer: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel Møller Ølgaard

 

09:30-11:00

 What makes research questions “good” in military and (inter)national   security studies?

 

  • Gap-spotting vs. problem-solving

 

  Lecturer: Henrik Breitenbauch

 

11:00-11:15

  Coffee Break

11:15-12:00

  “Research questioning” as an iterative process during the PhD Project— insights from a newly defended PhD dissertation

 

  • A conversation with Per J. Lindgaard and Karen P. Larsen

 

 Moderator: Amelie Theussen

 

12:00-13:00

Lunch

13:00-16:00

RQ Workshop

 

Instruction:

  1. 45 minutes: Read the research questions of all syndicate members and develop a constructive critique of the research questions, with reference to the applied/pure distinction
  2. 75 minutes: Share your constructive critique with your syndicate
  3. 30 minutes: Revise & resubmit your own research question based on the critique received from your syndicate

 

Syndicate leaders:

  1. Amelie Theussen
  2. Per J. Lindgaard
  3. Karen P. Larsen
     

 

 

 

Wednesday: Generating data in military and (inter)national Security Studies

 

Time

Activities

09:00-09:30

 Introduction and Recap

 

 Lecturer: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel M. Ølgaard

 

10:30-11:00

 How to generate your data in Military and International Security Studies?

 

  • Data and evidence
  • Methodology and methods
  • Navigating secrecy and classified research settings
  • Practical and ethical issues in generating data

 

 Lecturer: Anne R. Obling & Kira V. Rønn

 

11:00-11:15

 Coffee Break

11:15-12:00

How I generated my data: Challenges and opportunities when encountering the “real” world

 

  Lecturer: Nina Wilén

 

12:00-13:00

Lunch

13:00-16:00

Data Workshop

 

Instruction:

  1. 30 minutes: Reread your own part about data generation in your project and prepare a 5-minute oral presentation about the biggest challenges for generating your data (ethical, practical etc.)
  2. 75 minutes: Presentations of the biggest challenges
  3. 45 minutes: Finding solutions to the identified challenges in syndicates
  4. 30 minutes: Revise your section on data generation based on the deliberations in the syndicate

 

Syndicate leaders:

  1. Anne R. Obling
  2. Kira V. Rønn
  3. Nina Wilén

 

 

 

Thursday: Analyzing data in military and (inter)national Security Studies

Time

Activities

09:00-09:30

 Introduction and Recap

 

 Lecturer: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel M. Ølgaard

 

09:30-11:00

Roundtable 1: Data is generated, now what? Hands-on examples of analytical techniques when writing up the analysis

 

  1. Thomas Crosbie
  2. Elias Götz

 

11:00-11:15

 Coffee Break

11:15-12:15

 Workshop

 

  Instruction:

 

  1. 30 minutes: Reread your own part about how you plan to conduct the analysis in your project and prepare a 5-minute oral presentation about its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats
  2. 30 minutes: Presentations of SWOT analyses

 

  Syndicate leaders:

 

  1. Thomas Crosbie
  2. Elias Götz

 

12:15-13:00

Lunch

13:00-14:30

Roundtable 2: Data is generated, now what? Hands-on examples of analytical techniques when writing up the analysis

 

  1. Kristin A. Eggeling
  2. Troels Henningsen

 

14:30-14:45

 Coffee Break

14:45-16:00

  Data Workshop

 

  1. 30 minutes: Collective brainstorm with the purpose of finding solutions to identified data challenges in the syndicate            
  2. 30 minutes: Revise how you plan to conduct the analysis in your project

 

  Syndicate leaders:

 

  1. Kristin A. Eggeling
  2. Troels Henningsen

 


 

Friday: Research impact in military and (inter)national Security Studies

Time

Activities

09:00-09:30

 Introduction and Recap

 

 Lecturer: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel M. Ølgaard

 

09:30-11:00

Roundtable: Research Impact

 

  • Impact in pure and applied science
  • Researchers as change agents
  • Dealing with academic and non-academic audiences
  • Q&A

 

Participants: Olivier Schmitt (moderator), André K. Jakobsen, Henrik Breitenbauch, and Rebecca Adler-Nissen

 

11:00-12:15

Impact workshop

 

Instruction:

30 minutes: Turn two of the participants’ projects into articles

30 minutes: Presentations of article drafts and feedback in plenum

 

Syndicate leaders:

  1. Olivier Schmitt
  2. André K. Jakobsen

 

12:15-13:00

Lunch

13:00-14:30

Roundtable: How to get published – the editor’s dos and don’ts

 

  • Dealing with editors and academic journals
  • Q&A

 

Participants: Jonas G. Kaas (moderator), Olivier Schmitt, Simon Schmitt & Daniel M. Ølgaard

 

14:30-15:00

Course Conclusion

 

  • Course wrap-up
  • Evaluation
  • Farewell

 

Lecturer: Jonas G. Kaas & Daniel M. Ølgaard

 

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