example of undergraduate dissertation

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Dissertation examples

Listed below are some of the best examples of research projects and dissertations from undergraduate and taught postgraduate students at the University of Leeds We have not been able to gather examples from all schools. The module requirements for research projects may have changed since these examples were written. Refer to your module guidelines to make sure that you address all of the current assessment criteria. Some of the examples below are only available to access on campus.

• Undergraduate examples
• Taught Masters examples

Dissertation Structure & Layout 101: How to structure your dissertation, thesis or research project.

By: Derek Jansen (MBA) Reviewed By: David Phair (PhD) | July 2019

So, you’ve got a decent understanding of what a dissertation is , you’ve chosen your topic and hopefully you’ve received approval for your research proposal . Awesome! Now its time to start the actual dissertation or thesis writing journey.

To craft a high-quality document, the very first thing you need to understand is dissertation structure . In this post, we’ll walk you through the generic dissertation structure and layout, step by step. We’ll start with the big picture, and then zoom into each chapter to briefly discuss the core contents. If you’re just starting out on your research journey, you should start with this post, which covers the big-picture process of how to write a dissertation or thesis .

*The Caveat *

In this post, we’ll be discussing a traditional dissertation/thesis structure and layout, which is generally used for social science research across universities, whether in the US, UK, Europe or Australia. However, some universities may have small variations on this structure (extra chapters, merged chapters, slightly different ordering, etc).

So, always check with your university if they have a prescribed structure or layout that they expect you to work with. If not, it’s safe to assume the structure we’ll discuss here is suitable. And even if they do have a prescribed structure, you’ll still get value from this post as we’ll explain the core contents of each section.  

Overview: S tructuring a dissertation or thesis

• Acknowledgements page
• Abstract (or executive summary)
• Table of contents , list of figures and tables
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Literature review
• Chapter 3: Methodology
• Chapter 4: Results
• Chapter 5: Discussion
• Chapter 6: Conclusion
• Reference list

As I mentioned, some universities will have slight variations on this structure. For example, they want an additional “personal reflection chapter”, or they might prefer the results and discussion chapter to be merged into one. Regardless, the overarching flow will always be the same, as this flow reflects the research process , which we discussed here – i.e.:

• The introduction chapter presents the core research question and aims .
• The literature review chapter assesses what the current research says about this question.
• The methodology, results and discussion chapters go about undertaking new research about this question.
• The conclusion chapter (attempts to) answer the core research question .

In other words, the dissertation structure and layout reflect the research process of asking a well-defined question(s), investigating, and then answering the question – see below.

To restate that – the structure and layout of a dissertation reflect the flow of the overall research process . This is essential to understand, as each chapter will make a lot more sense if you “get” this concept. If you’re not familiar with the research process, read this post before going further.

Right. Now that we’ve covered the big picture, let’s dive a little deeper into the details of each section and chapter. Oh and by the way, you can also grab our free dissertation/thesis template here to help speed things up.

The title page of your dissertation is the very first impression the marker will get of your work, so it pays to invest some time thinking about your title. But what makes for a good title? A strong title needs to be 3 things:

• Succinct (not overly lengthy or verbose)
• Specific (not vague or ambiguous)
• Representative of the research you’re undertaking (clearly linked to your research questions)

Typically, a good title includes mention of the following:

• The broader area of the research (i.e. the overarching topic)
• The specific focus of your research (i.e. your specific context)
• Indication of research design (e.g. quantitative , qualitative , or  mixed methods ).

For example:

A quantitative investigation [research design] into the antecedents of organisational trust [broader area] in the UK retail forex trading market [specific context/area of focus].

Again, some universities may have specific requirements regarding the format and structure of the title, so it’s worth double-checking expectations with your institution (if there’s no mention in the brief or study material).

Acknowledgements

This page provides you with an opportunity to say thank you to those who helped you along your research journey. Generally, it’s optional (and won’t count towards your marks), but it is academic best practice to include this.

So, who do you say thanks to? Well, there’s no prescribed requirements, but it’s common to mention the following people:

• Your dissertation supervisor or committee.
• Any professors, lecturers or academics that helped you understand the topic or methodologies.
• Any tutors, mentors or advisors.
• Your family and friends, especially spouse (for adult learners studying part-time).

There’s no need for lengthy rambling. Just state who you’re thankful to and for what (e.g. thank you to my supervisor, John Doe, for his endless patience and attentiveness) – be sincere. In terms of length, you should keep this to a page or less.

Abstract or executive summary

The dissertation abstract (or executive summary for some degrees) serves to provide the first-time reader (and marker or moderator) with a big-picture view of your research project. It should give them an understanding of the key insights and findings from the research, without them needing to read the rest of the report – in other words, it should be able to stand alone .

For it to stand alone, your abstract should cover the following key points (at a minimum):

• Your research questions and aims – what key question(s) did your research aim to answer?
• Your methodology – how did you go about investigating the topic and finding answers to your research question(s)?
• Your findings – following your own research, what did do you discover?
• Your conclusions – based on your findings, what conclusions did you draw? What answers did you find to your research question(s)?

So, in much the same way the dissertation structure mimics the research process, your abstract or executive summary should reflect the research process, from the initial stage of asking the original question to the final stage of answering that question.

In practical terms, it’s a good idea to write this section up last , once all your core chapters are complete. Otherwise, you’ll end up writing and rewriting this section multiple times (just wasting time). For a step by step guide on how to write a strong executive summary, check out this post .

Need a helping hand?

Table of contents

This section is straightforward. You’ll typically present your table of contents (TOC) first, followed by the two lists – figures and tables. I recommend that you use Microsoft Word’s automatic table of contents generator to generate your TOC. If you’re not familiar with this functionality, the video below explains it simply:

If you find that your table of contents is overly lengthy, consider removing one level of depth. Oftentimes, this can be done without detracting from the usefulness of the TOC.

Right, now that the “admin” sections are out of the way, its time to move on to your core chapters. These chapters are the heart of your dissertation and are where you’ll earn the marks. The first chapter is the introduction chapter – as you would expect, this is the time to introduce your research…

It’s important to understand that even though you’ve provided an overview of your research in your abstract, your introduction needs to be written as if the reader has not read that (remember, the abstract is essentially a standalone document). So, your introduction chapter needs to start from the very beginning, and should address the following questions:

• What will you be investigating (in plain-language, big picture-level)?
• Why is that worth investigating? How is it important to academia or business? How is it sufficiently original?
• What are your research aims and research question(s)? Note that the research questions can sometimes be presented at the end of the literature review (next chapter).
• What is the scope of your study? In other words, what will and won’t you cover ?
• How will you approach your research? In other words, what methodology will you adopt?
• How will you structure your dissertation? What are the core chapters and what will you do in each of them?

These are just the bare basic requirements for your intro chapter. Some universities will want additional bells and whistles in the intro chapter, so be sure to carefully read your brief or consult your research supervisor.

If done right, your introduction chapter will set a clear direction for the rest of your dissertation. Specifically, it will make it clear to the reader (and marker) exactly what you’ll be investigating, why that’s important, and how you’ll be going about the investigation. Conversely, if your introduction chapter leaves a first-time reader wondering what exactly you’ll be researching, you’ve still got some work to do.

Now that you’ve set a clear direction with your introduction chapter, the next step is the literature review . In this section, you will analyse the existing research (typically academic journal articles and high-quality industry publications), with a view to understanding the following questions:

• What does the literature currently say about the topic you’re investigating?
• Is the literature lacking or well established? Is it divided or in disagreement?
• How does your research fit into the bigger picture?
• How does your research contribute something original?
• How does the methodology of previous studies help you develop your own?

Depending on the nature of your study, you may also present a conceptual framework towards the end of your literature review, which you will then test in your actual research.

Again, some universities will want you to focus on some of these areas more than others, some will have additional or fewer requirements, and so on. Therefore, as always, its important to review your brief and/or discuss with your supervisor, so that you know exactly what’s expected of your literature review chapter.

Now that you’ve investigated the current state of knowledge in your literature review chapter and are familiar with the existing key theories, models and frameworks, its time to design your own research. Enter the methodology chapter – the most “science-ey” of the chapters…

In this chapter, you need to address two critical questions:

• Exactly HOW will you carry out your research (i.e. what is your intended research design)?
• Exactly WHY have you chosen to do things this way (i.e. how do you justify your design)?

Remember, the dissertation part of your degree is first and foremost about developing and demonstrating research skills . Therefore, the markers want to see that you know which methods to use, can clearly articulate why you’ve chosen then, and know how to deploy them effectively.

Importantly, this chapter requires detail – don’t hold back on the specifics. State exactly what you’ll be doing, with who, when, for how long, etc. Moreover, for every design choice you make, make sure you justify it.

In practice, you will likely end up coming back to this chapter once you’ve undertaken all your data collection and analysis, and revise it based on changes you made during the analysis phase. This is perfectly fine. Its natural for you to add an additional analysis technique, scrap an old one, etc based on where your data lead you. Of course, I’m talking about small changes here – not a fundamental switch from qualitative to quantitative, which will likely send your supervisor in a spin!

You’ve now collected your data and undertaken your analysis, whether qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods. In this chapter, you’ll present the raw results of your analysis . For example, in the case of a quant study, you’ll present the demographic data, descriptive statistics, inferential statistics , etc.

Typically, Chapter 4 is simply a presentation and description of the data, not a discussion of the meaning of the data. In other words, it’s descriptive, rather than analytical – the meaning is discussed in Chapter 5. However, some universities will want you to combine chapters 4 and 5, so that you both present and interpret the meaning of the data at the same time. Check with your institution what their preference is.

Now that you’ve presented the data analysis results, its time to interpret and analyse them. In other words, its time to discuss what they mean, especially in relation to your research question(s).

What you discuss here will depend largely on your chosen methodology. For example, if you’ve gone the quantitative route, you might discuss the relationships between variables . If you’ve gone the qualitative route, you might discuss key themes and the meanings thereof. It all depends on what your research design choices were.

Most importantly, you need to discuss your results in relation to your research questions and aims, as well as the existing literature. What do the results tell you about your research questions? Are they aligned with the existing research or at odds? If so, why might this be? Dig deep into your findings and explain what the findings suggest, in plain English.

The final chapter – you’ve made it! Now that you’ve discussed your interpretation of the results, its time to bring it back to the beginning with the conclusion chapter . In other words, its time to (attempt to) answer your original research question s (from way back in chapter 1). Clearly state what your conclusions are in terms of your research questions. This might feel a bit repetitive, as you would have touched on this in the previous chapter, but its important to bring the discussion full circle and explicitly state your answer(s) to the research question(s).

Next, you’ll typically discuss the implications of your findings? In other words, you’ve answered your research questions – but what does this mean for the real world (or even for academia)? What should now be done differently, given the new insight you’ve generated?

Lastly, you should discuss the limitations of your research, as well as what this means for future research in the area. No study is perfect, especially not a Masters-level. Discuss the shortcomings of your research. Perhaps your methodology was limited, perhaps your sample size was small or not representative, etc, etc. Don’t be afraid to critique your work – the markers want to see that you can identify the limitations of your work. This is a strength, not a weakness. Be brutal!

This marks the end of your core chapters – woohoo! From here on out, it’s pretty smooth sailing.

The reference list is straightforward. It should contain a list of all resources cited in your dissertation, in the required format, e.g. APA , Harvard, etc.

It’s essential that you use reference management software for your dissertation. Do NOT try handle your referencing manually – its far too error prone. On a reference list of multiple pages, you’re going to make mistake. To this end, I suggest considering either Mendeley or Zotero. Both are free and provide a very straightforward interface to ensure that your referencing is 100% on point. I’ve included a simple how-to video for the Mendeley software (my personal favourite) below:

Some universities may ask you to include a bibliography, as opposed to a reference list. These two things are not the same . A bibliography is similar to a reference list, except that it also includes resources which informed your thinking but were not directly cited in your dissertation. So, double-check your brief and make sure you use the right one.

The very last piece of the puzzle is the appendix or set of appendices. This is where you’ll include any supporting data and evidence. Importantly, supporting is the keyword here.

Your appendices should provide additional “nice to know”, depth-adding information, which is not critical to the core analysis. Appendices should not be used as a way to cut down word count (see this post which covers how to reduce word count ). In other words, don’t place content that is critical to the core analysis here, just to save word count. You will not earn marks on any content in the appendices, so don’t try to play the system!

Time to recap…

And there you have it – the traditional dissertation structure and layout, from A-Z. To recap, the core structure for a dissertation or thesis is (typically) as follows:

• Acknowledgments page

Most importantly, the core chapters should reflect the research process (asking, investigating and answering your research question). Moreover, the research question(s) should form the golden thread throughout your dissertation structure. Everything should revolve around the research questions, and as you’ve seen, they should form both the start point (i.e. introduction chapter) and the endpoint (i.e. conclusion chapter).

I hope this post has provided you with clarity about the traditional dissertation/thesis structure and layout. If you have any questions or comments, please leave a comment below, or feel free to get in touch with us. Also, be sure to check out the rest of the  Grad Coach Blog .

Psst... there’s more!

This post was based on one of our popular Research Bootcamps . If you're working on a research project, you'll definitely want to check this out ...

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36 Comments

many thanks i found it very useful

Glad to hear that, Arun. Good luck writing your dissertation.

Such clear practical logical advice. I very much needed to read this to keep me focused in stead of fretting.. Perfect now ready to start my research!

what about scientific fields like computer or engineering thesis what is the difference in the structure? thank you very much

Thanks so much this helped me a lot!

Very helpful and accessible. What I like most is how practical the advice is along with helpful tools/ links.

Thanks Ade!

Thank you so much sir.. It was really helpful..

You’re welcome!

Hi! How many words maximum should contain the abstract?

Thank you so much 😊 Find this at the right moment

You’re most welcome. Good luck with your dissertation.

best ever benefit i got on right time thank you

Many times Clarity and vision of destination of dissertation is what makes the difference between good ,average and great researchers the same way a great automobile driver is fast with clarity of address and Clear weather conditions .

I guess Great researcher = great ideas + knowledge + great and fast data collection and modeling + great writing + high clarity on all these

You have given immense clarity from start to end.

Morning. Where will I write the definitions of what I’m referring to in my report?

Thank you so much Derek, I was almost lost! Thanks a tonnnn! Have a great day!

Thanks ! so concise and valuable

This was very helpful. Clear and concise. I know exactly what to do now.

Thank you for allowing me to go through briefly. I hope to find time to continue.

Really useful to me. Thanks a thousand times

Very interesting! It will definitely set me and many more for success. highly recommended.

Thank you soo much sir, for the opportunity to express my skills

Usefull, thanks a lot. Really clear

Very nice and easy to understand. Thank you .

That was incredibly useful. Thanks Grad Coach Crew!

My stress level just dropped at least 15 points after watching this. Just starting my thesis for my grad program and I feel a lot more capable now! Thanks for such a clear and helpful video, Emma and the GradCoach team!

Do we need to mention the number of words the dissertation contains in the main document?

It depends on your university’s requirements, so it would be best to check with them 🙂

Such a helpful post to help me get started with structuring my masters dissertation, thank you!

Great video; I appreciate that helpful information

It is so necessary or avital course

This blog is very informative for my research. Thank you

Doctoral students are required to fill out the National Research Council’s Survey of Earned Doctorates

wow this is an amazing gain in my life

This is so good

How can i arrange my specific objectives in my dissertation?

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How to write an undergraduate university dissertation

Writing a dissertation is a daunting task, but these tips will help you prepare for all the common challenges students face before deadline day.

Grace McCabe

Writing a dissertation is one of the most challenging aspects of university. However, it is the chance for students to demonstrate what they have learned during their degree and to explore a topic in depth.

In this article, we look at 10 top tips for writing a successful dissertation and break down how to write each section of a dissertation in detail.

10 tips for writing an undergraduate dissertation

1. Select an engaging topic Choose a subject that aligns with your interests and allows you to showcase the skills and knowledge you have acquired through your degree.

2. Research your supervisor Undergraduate students will often be assigned a supervisor based on their research specialisms. Do some research on your supervisor and make sure that they align with your dissertation goals.

3. Understand the dissertation structure Familiarise yourself with the structure (introduction, review of existing research, methodology, findings, results and conclusion). This will vary based on your subject.

4. Write a schedule As soon as you have finalised your topic and looked over the deadline, create a rough plan of how much work you have to do and create mini-deadlines along the way to make sure don’t find yourself having to write your entire dissertation in the final few weeks.

5. Determine requirements Ensure that you know which format your dissertation should be presented in. Check the word count and the referencing style.

6. Organise references from the beginning Maintain an alphabetically arranged reference list or bibliography in the designated style as you do your reading. This will make it a lot easier to finalise your references at the end.

7. Create a detailed plan Once you have done your initial research and have an idea of the shape your dissertation will take, write a detailed essay plan outlining your research questions, SMART objectives and dissertation structure.

8. Keep a dissertation journal Track your progress, record your research and your reading, and document challenges. This will be helpful as you discuss your work with your supervisor and organise your notes.

9. Schedule regular check-ins with your supervisor Make sure you stay in touch with your supervisor throughout the process, scheduling regular meetings and keeping good notes so you can update them on your progress.

10. Employ effective proofreading techniques Ask friends and family to help you proofread your work or use different fonts to help make the text look different. This will help you check for missing sections, grammatical mistakes and typos.

What is a dissertation?

A dissertation is a long piece of academic writing or a research project that you have to write as part of your undergraduate university degree.

It’s usually a long essay in which you explore your chosen topic, present your ideas and show that you understand and can apply what you’ve learned during your studies. Informally, the terms “dissertation” and “thesis” are often used interchangeably.

How do I select a dissertation topic?

First, choose a topic that you find interesting. You will be working on your dissertation for several months, so finding a research topic that you are passionate about and that demonstrates your strength in your subject is best. You want your topic to show all the skills you have developed during your degree. It would be a bonus if you can link your work to your chosen career path, but it’s not necessary.

Second, begin by exploring relevant literature in your field, including academic journals, books and articles. This will help you identify gaps in existing knowledge and areas that may need further exploration. You may not be able to think of a truly original piece of research, but it’s always good to know what has already been written about your chosen topic.

Consider the practical aspects of your chosen topic, ensuring that it is possible within the time frame and available resources. Assess the availability of data, research materials and the overall practicality of conducting the research.

When picking a dissertation topic, you also want to try to choose something that adds new ideas or perspectives to what’s already known in your field. As you narrow your focus, remember that a more targeted approach usually leads to a dissertation that’s easier to manage and has a bigger impact. Be ready to change your plans based on feedback and new information you discover during your research.

How to work with your dissertation supervisor?

Your supervisor is there to provide guidance on your chosen topic, direct your research efforts, and offer assistance and suggestions when you have queries. It’s crucial to establish a comfortable and open line of communication with them throughout the process. Their knowledge can greatly benefit your work. Keep them informed about your progress, seek their advice, and don’t hesitate to ask questions.

1. Keep them updated Regularly tell your supervisor how your work is going and if you’re having any problems. You can do this through emails, meetings or progress reports.

2. Plan meetings Schedule regular meetings with your supervisor. These can be in person or online. These are your time to discuss your progress and ask for help.

3. Share your writing Give your supervisor parts of your writing or an outline. This helps them see what you’re thinking so they can advise you on how to develop it.

5. Ask specific questions When you need help, ask specific questions instead of general ones. This makes it easier for your supervisor to help you.

6. Listen to feedback Be open to what your supervisor says. If they suggest changes, try to make them. It makes your dissertation better and shows you can work together.

7. Talk about problems If something is hard or you’re worried, talk to your supervisor about it. They can give you advice or tell you where to find help.

8. Take charge Be responsible for your work. Let your supervisor know if your plans change, and don’t wait if you need help urgently.

Remember, talking openly with your supervisor helps you both understand each other better, improves your dissertation and ensures that you get the support you need.

How to write a successful research piece at university How to choose a topic for your dissertation Tips for writing a convincing thesis

How do I plan my dissertation?

It’s important to start with a detailed plan that will serve as your road map throughout the entire process of writing your dissertation. As Jumana Labib, a master’s student at the University of Manchester  studying digital media, culture and society, suggests: “Pace yourself – definitely don’t leave the entire thing for the last few days or weeks.”

Decide what your research question or questions will be for your chosen topic.

Break that down into smaller SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound) objectives.

Speak to your supervisor about any overlooked areas.

Create a breakdown of chapters using the structure listed below (for example, a methodology chapter).

Define objectives, key points and evidence for each chapter.

Define your research approach (qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods).

Outline your research methods and analysis techniques.

Develop a timeline with regular moments for review and feedback.

Allocate time for revision, editing and breaks.

Consider any ethical considerations related to your research.

Stay organised and add to your references and bibliography throughout the process.

Remain flexible to possible reviews or changes as you go along.

A well thought-out plan not only makes the writing process more manageable but also increases the likelihood of producing a high-quality piece of research.

How to structure a dissertation?

The structure can depend on your field of study, but this is a rough outline for science and social science dissertations:

Introduce your topic.

Complete a source or literature review.

Describe your research methodology (including the methods for gathering and filtering information, analysis techniques, materials, tools or resources used, limitations of your method, and any considerations of reliability).

Summarise your findings.

Discuss the results and what they mean.

Conclude your point and explain how your work contributes to your field.

On the other hand, humanities and arts dissertations often take the form of an extended essay. This involves constructing an argument or exploring a particular theory or analysis through the analysis of primary and secondary sources. Your essay will be structured through chapters arranged around themes or case studies.

All dissertations include a title page, an abstract and a reference list. Some may also need a table of contents at the beginning. Always check with your university department for its dissertation guidelines, and check with your supervisor as you begin to plan your structure to ensure that you have the right layout.

How long is an undergraduate dissertation?

The length of an undergraduate dissertation can vary depending on the specific guidelines provided by your university and your subject department. However, in many cases, undergraduate dissertations are typically about 8,000 to 12,000 words in length.

“Eat away at it; try to write for at least 30 minutes every day, even if it feels relatively unproductive to you in the moment,” Jumana advises.

How do I add references to my dissertation?

References are the section of your dissertation where you acknowledge the sources you have quoted or referred to in your writing. It’s a way of supporting your ideas, evidencing what research you have used and avoiding plagiarism (claiming someone else’s work as your own), and giving credit to the original authors.

Referencing typically includes in-text citations and a reference list or bibliography with full source details. Different referencing styles exist, such as Harvard, APA and MLA, each favoured in specific fields. Your university will tell you the preferred style.

Using tools and guides provided by universities can make the referencing process more manageable, but be sure they are approved by your university before using any.

How do I write a bibliography or list my references for my dissertation?

The requirement of a bibliography depends on the style of referencing you need to use. Styles such as OSCOLA or Chicago may not require a separate bibliography. In these styles, full source information is often incorporated into footnotes throughout the piece, doing away with the need for a separate bibliography section.

Typically, reference lists or bibliographies are organised alphabetically based on the author’s last name. They usually include essential details about each source, providing a quick overview for readers who want more information. Some styles ask that you include references that you didn’t use in your final piece as they were still a part of the overall research.

It is important to maintain this list as soon as you start your research. As you complete your research, you can add more sources to your bibliography to ensure that you have a comprehensive list throughout the dissertation process.

How to proofread an undergraduate dissertation?

Throughout your dissertation writing, attention to detail will be your greatest asset. The best way to avoid making mistakes is to continuously proofread and edit your work.

Proofreading is a great way to catch any missing sections, grammatical errors or typos. There are many tips to help you proofread:

Ask someone to read your piece and highlight any mistakes they find.

Change the font so you notice any mistakes.

Format your piece as you go, headings and sections will make it easier to spot any problems.

Separate editing and proofreading. Editing is your chance to rewrite sections, add more detail or change any points. Proofreading should be where you get into the final touches, really polish what you have and make sure it’s ready to be submitted.

Stick to your citation style and make sure every resource listed in your dissertation is cited in the reference list or bibliography.

How to write a conclusion for my dissertation?

Writing a dissertation conclusion is your chance to leave the reader impressed by your work.

Start by summarising your findings, highlighting your key points and the outcome of your research. Refer back to the original research question or hypotheses to provide context to your conclusion.

You can then delve into whether you achieved the goals you set at the beginning and reflect on whether your research addressed the topic as expected. Make sure you link your findings to existing literature or sources you have included throughout your work and how your own research could contribute to your field.

Be honest about any limitations or issues you faced during your research and consider any questions that went unanswered that you would consider in the future. Make sure that your conclusion is clear and concise, and sum up the overall impact and importance of your work.

Remember, keep the tone confident and authoritative, avoiding the introduction of new information. This should simply be a summary of everything you have already said throughout the dissertation.

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Students in the School of Economics at the University of Nottingham consistently produce work of a very high standard in the form of coursework essays, dissertations, research work and policy articles.

Below are some examples of the excellent work produced by some of our students. The authors have agreed for their work to be made available as examples of good practice.

Undergraduate dissertations

• The Causal Impact of Education on Crime Rates: A Recent US Analysis . Emily Taylor, BSc Hons Economics, 2022
• Does a joint income taxation system for married couples disincentivise the female labour supply? Jodie Gollop, BA Hons Economics with German, 2022
• Conditional cooperation between the young and old and the influence of work experience, charitable giving, and social identity . Rachel Moffat, BSc Hons Economics, 2021
• An Extended Literature Review on the Contribution of Economic Institutions to the Great Divergence in the 19th Century . Jessica Richens, BSc Hons Economics, 2021
• Does difference help make a difference? Examining whether young trustees and female trustees affect charities’ financial performance. Chris Hyland, BSc Hons Economics, 2021

Postgraduate dissertations

• The impact of Covid-19 on the public and health expenditure gradient in mortality in England . Alexander Waller, MSc Economic Development & Policy Analysis, 2022
• Impact of the Child Support Grant on Nutritional Outcomes in South Africa: Is there a ‘pregnancy support’ effect? . Claire Lynam, MSc Development Economics, 2022
• An Empirical Analysis of the Volatility Spillovers between Commodity Markets, Exchange Rates, and the Sovereign CDS Spreads of Commodity Exporters . Alfie Fox-Heaton, MSc Financial Economics, 2022
• The 2005 Atlantic Hurricane Season and Labour Market Transitions . Edward Allenby, MSc Economics, 2022
• The scope of international agreements . Sophia Vaaßen, MSc International Economics, 2022

Thank you to all those students who have agreed to have their work showcased in this way.

School of Economics

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How to Write a Thesis or Dissertation Introduction

Published on 9 September 2022 by Tegan George and Shona McCombes.

The introduction is the first section of your thesis or dissertation , appearing right after the table of contents . Your introduction draws your reader in, setting the stage for your research with a clear focus, purpose, and direction.

Your introduction should include:

• Your topic, in context: what does your reader need to know to understand your thesis dissertation?
• Your focus and scope: what specific aspect of the topic will you address?
• The relevance of your research: how does your work fit into existing studies on your topic?
• Your questions and objectives: what does your research aim to find out, and how?
• An overview of your structure: what does each section contribute to the overall aim?

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Table of contents

How to start your introduction, topic and context, focus and scope, relevance and importance, questions and objectives, overview of the structure, thesis introduction example, introduction checklist, frequently asked questions about introductions.

Although your introduction kicks off your dissertation, it doesn’t have to be the first thing you write – in fact, it’s often one of the very last parts to be completed (just before your abstract ).

It’s a good idea to write a rough draft of your introduction as you begin your research, to help guide you. If you wrote a research proposal , consider using this as a template, as it contains many of the same elements. However, be sure to revise your introduction throughout the writing process, making sure it matches the content of your ensuing sections.

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Begin by introducing your research topic and giving any necessary background information. It’s important to contextualise your research and generate interest. Aim to show why your topic is timely or important. You may want to mention a relevant news item, academic debate, or practical problem.

After a brief introduction to your general area of interest, narrow your focus and define the scope of your research.

You can narrow this down in many ways, such as by:

• Geographical area
• Time period
• Demographics or communities
• Themes or aspects of the topic

It’s essential to share your motivation for doing this research, as well as how it relates to existing work on your topic. Further, you should also mention what new insights you expect it will contribute.

Start by giving a brief overview of the current state of research. You should definitely cite the most relevant literature, but remember that you will conduct a more in-depth survey of relevant sources in the literature review section, so there’s no need to go too in-depth in the introduction.

Depending on your field, the importance of your research might focus on its practical application (e.g., in policy or management) or on advancing scholarly understanding of the topic (e.g., by developing theories or adding new empirical data). In many cases, it will do both.

Ultimately, your introduction should explain how your thesis or dissertation:

• Helps solve a practical or theoretical problem
• Addresses a gap in the literature
• Builds on existing research
• Proposes a new understanding of your topic

Perhaps the most important part of your introduction is your questions and objectives, as it sets up the expectations for the rest of your thesis or dissertation. How you formulate your research questions and research objectives will depend on your discipline, topic, and focus, but you should always clearly state the central aim of your research.

If your research aims to test hypotheses , you can formulate them here. Your introduction is also a good place for a conceptual framework that suggests relationships between variables .

• Conduct surveys to collect data on students’ levels of knowledge, understanding, and positive/negative perceptions of government policy.
• Determine whether attitudes to climate policy are associated with variables such as age, gender, region, and social class.
• Conduct interviews to gain qualitative insights into students’ perspectives and actions in relation to climate policy.

To help guide your reader, end your introduction with an outline  of the structure of the thesis or dissertation to follow. Share a brief summary of each chapter, clearly showing how each contributes to your central aims. However, be careful to keep this overview concise: 1-2 sentences should be enough.

I. Introduction

Human language consists of a set of vowels and consonants which are combined to form words. During the speech production process, thoughts are converted into spoken utterances to convey a message. The appropriate words and their meanings are selected in the mental lexicon (Dell & Burger, 1997). This pre-verbal message is then grammatically coded, during which a syntactic representation of the utterance is built.

Speech, language, and voice disorders affect the vocal cords, nerves, muscles, and brain structures, which result in a distorted language reception or speech production (Sataloff & Hawkshaw, 2014). The symptoms vary from adding superfluous words and taking pauses to hoarseness of the voice, depending on the type of disorder (Dodd, 2005). However, distortions of the speech may also occur as a result of a disease that seems unrelated to speech, such as multiple sclerosis or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

This study aims to determine which acoustic parameters are suitable for the automatic detection of exacerbations in patients suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) by investigating which aspects of speech differ between COPD patients and healthy speakers and which aspects differ between COPD patients in exacerbation and stable COPD patients.

Checklist: Introduction

I have introduced my research topic in an engaging way.

I have provided necessary context to help the reader understand my topic.

I have clearly specified the focus of my research.

I have shown the relevance and importance of the dissertation topic .

I have clearly stated the problem or question that my research addresses.

I have outlined the specific objectives of the research .

I have provided an overview of the dissertation’s structure .

You've written a strong introduction for your thesis or dissertation. Use the other checklists to continue improving your dissertation.

The introduction of a research paper includes several key elements:

• A hook to catch the reader’s interest
• Relevant background on the topic
• Details of your research problem
• A thesis statement or research question
• Sometimes an outline of the paper

Don’t feel that you have to write the introduction first. The introduction is often one of the last parts of the research paper you’ll write, along with the conclusion.

This is because it can be easier to introduce your paper once you’ve already written the body ; you may not have the clearest idea of your arguments until you’ve written them, and things can change during the writing process .

Research objectives describe what you intend your research project to accomplish.

They summarise the approach and purpose of the project and help to focus your research.

Your objectives should appear in the introduction of your research paper , at the end of your problem statement .

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George, T. & McCombes, S. (2022, September 09). How to Write a Thesis or Dissertation Introduction. Scribbr. Retrieved 29 April 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/thesis-dissertation/introduction/

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Other students also liked, what is a dissertation | 5 essential questions to get started, how to write an abstract | steps & examples, how to write a thesis or dissertation conclusion.

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Research projects & dissertations

Undergraduate dissertations.

The following guide has been created for you by the  Student Learning Advisory Service . For more detailed guidance and to speak to one of our advisers, please book an  appointment  or join one of our  workshops . Alternatively, have a look at our  SkillBuilder  skills videos.   

Initial questions

Two initial questions are paramount:

• What is going to be the central focus of the study?
• What is the best method for gathering the information needed?

It is normal for researchers to start out with just a hazy idea about their ‘research question’, or for the idea to evolve as you conduct your research. It is important, however, that at the start of the process you have a clear and defined topic; too vast and the results will be vague and generalised; too narrow and you will find it difficult to find sources to evidence your research. Keep asking: what do you really want to find out?

Similarly, what is the best way of approaching the project? How will you get all the information you need to do the job properly? Do you have easy access to the sources or participants you will need to work with? Are there ethical concerns that might prevent you from working as you would like?

Getting started

You may have to submit an initial research proposal before you start the research project. This is important because:     

• Your supervisor has responsibility for checking that your proposal meets the module and/or course requirements, and it is better to find this out at the start rather than the end of the dissertation process
• Your supervisor will want to know that the project is ‘do-able’ – that is, that you can achieve what you say you want to achieve in the time and with the resources available
• The Research Proposal is part of the process of refining your ideas; it helps to press home the question: what do you really want to find out?

Departmental procedures for Research Proposals vary. ALWAYS check the module/course handbook for precise information about the forms to be filled in and where/when a proposal has to be submitted. If in doubt, ask your supervisor.    

Research planning

Dissertations typically take longer than you think. Good planning and effective time management are thus essential. Start well ahead of the deadline and begin by drawing up a schedule of the different tasks you will need to complete, and when they should be completed by.

A significant amount of time will be required for the literature search and review, particularly if you are a slow reader. If your project involves empirical (raw) data you will need to allocate sufficient time to collect this. Similarly, allow plenty of time for analysis as, even with the help of computer programmes, the collation and analysis of empirical data is a long process and has to be done carefully. Build in ‘thinking time’ to gather your own thoughts on the data, and remember to allow enough time for drafting and editing the dissertation.

As you work back from the final deadline don’t forget to include ‘emergency time’. Be prepared for illness, computer problems, family or work crises and so on. Valuable marks are often lost because students try to look for short cuts. Instead, take these eventualities into account as you draw up a schedule of your personal targets and goals.

It may look something like this:

Reading the literature

Remember the tricks of the trade: be ruthlessly targeted - what do you really need to read? Do you really need to read every word of every book, or do you only need part of a section or chapter? Look for the clues to narrow down the focus – the index or chapter introductions, for example. Use a similar approach with journal articles: use the abstract to check out whether the article will help with your specific project.

Keep clear notes of all your reading - summarising key ideas, terms, theories or arguments as you go. It is crucially important that you keep a record of all the bibliographic information and page numbers you will need for your references.

When you have collected as much background material as you can, make a list of the key points. What is directly relevant to your work, and what is merely secondary? Consider: does this support your argument or is it merely interesting? Keep the focus.

The purpose of all this reading is to show that:

• You know your subject – you understand what is already known
• You can apply this existing knowledge to your specific research project

The aim is to set up a kind of dialogue between the theories and ideas you have read and the results of your own thinking: does your data confirm or challenge the ideas put forward in the literature? What are your own ideas? Where is the evidence to support your point of view? It may help you to look at our reading strategy guide .  

Writing up the dissertation

Prepare a dissertation plan, setting out the data in the required format for your project (ALWAYS go back and re-read the instructions given at the start of the project. ALWAYS do as it says). A typical dissertation might follow a pattern something like this:

Introduction

Set the scene for the research project, show why it is important and/or interesting and indicate any problems or gaps in the current knowledge.

Set out a summary of your chosen method – and give a rationale

Why did you choose this method, and can you justify its use in this particular project? What alternative methods might have been used, and why were they not chosen?

Literature review

A brief summary of the key points made in the books and journals consulted, and a critique of this material – what is missing, do these ideas or theories work, and why/why not? What kind of overall picture starts to emerge from this literature, and what is missing? See guides on conducting a literature review .

Presentation of any empirical data

This will vary a little, depending on the quantitative or qualitative method used.

Analysis of the data

Identifying the key themes, trends or patterns.

Presentation of your findings

What do you make of this material and (if appropriate) what evidence can you produce from the empirical data to justify your point of view?

How what you’ve found out relates to the literature.

Conclusions

And check: have you actually done what you said you would do in the introduction?

Make sure your assignment is clearly structured, with good summaries at key points. There should be clear links between the sections, with everything set out in a logical order. Make sure your argument is coherent and well evidenced by your research. The higher marks are awarded to dissertations that provide an insightful or new approach to the field and that are persuasive and well presented.

Using your supervisor

University education is about developing the skills required for independent learning. This means that students are expected to take a high degree of responsibility for their own work. The role of the supervisor, therefore, is not to direct your research or help you conduct it. They are there to guide you and check that your work is on target. Your supervisor is essentially a mentor – a senior colleague who is able to offer helpful advice from their own experience and give some immediate feedback. They will advise, challenge, discuss and – if necessary – warn. But they will not do the work for you.

Normally, supervisors want to establish a kind of ‘contract’, which spells out mutual expectations as fully as possible: how often you will meet, what work the supervisor expects to be completed in advance of each session, how feedback will be arranged, and so on. Supervisors expect you to be self-disciplined and motivated enough to complete work by agreed deadlines. You should, therefore, contact them well in advance if you run into problems that will make it difficult to meet these deadlines. Supervisors expect – and have the right to expect – a fully professional approach from students. This means that you (and they) will:

• Keep appointments unless genuinely and unavoidably delayed.
• Keep in regular contact to check out how things are progressing.
• Complete agreed tasks on time.
• Check things out if you are uncertain about the correct process.
• Prepare a clear agenda for each meeting, outlining what you need to get from the session.
• Fix dates for your next supervision each time you meet.

Supervisors are extremely busy people, often engaged in demanding research of their own. So, if they sometimes appear elusive or difficult to contact please be patient and persevere; email is often a better way of raising initial queries or questions, and they can then arrange an additional meeting if necessary.    

Don’t forget: the Student Learning Advisory Service provides 1:1 tutorials, workshops and study guides on various elements of academic research – including effective reading, writing skills and working with stats and data.

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Undergraduate Dissertation Example (Including Feedback)

Image by Racool_studio on Freepik

As part of your sociology undergraduate course, you will most likely be expected to sit a dissertation module. For many, the dissertation may be a major source of worry particularly as it is probably the first time they have ever had to write one. The requirement to complete such a large piece of work can be daunting, especially given that a dissertation can be 6,000+ words. Some institutions allow for students to complete fieldwork in relation to their dissertation but many students either do not have the option to do so or prefer to forego the field research to concentrate on a purely theoretical exploration of a topic.

The following example is my own actual undergraduate dissertation. It is a number of years old now but rather than have it sit in a digital vault never to be seen again, I thought I would utilise it as an example for other people. Hopefully, it may offer some insight into how to do one. This dissertation scored 80+/100 making it a mid-first. It is copied verbatim and so includes any mistakes, errors, inaccuracies, or other issues as contained at the time of submission. It also includes the feedback I received after marking which will also give you insight into some of the comments you might receive. Needless to say, it is quite a long read at nearly 6400 words (not including appendices). It is ordered as follows:

Introduction

Methodology, bibliography.

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Locating Contemporary U.S. Sources of Venezuelan Social Divisions

“Any nation’s right to form a government and an economic system of its own choosing is inalienable. Any nation’s attempt to dictate to other nations their form of government is indefensible.” Dwight D. Eisenhower – 34 th President of the United States of America

Venezuela is a country with large swathes of outstanding natural beauty, where the people are considered as some of the most positive people globally and have a community spirit even among those in the extensive Barrios of Caracas, the largest slum in Latin America outside of Rio (Power, 2007: 123; Clifton, 2012). It is also rich in the natural resources of oil and minable elements such as Gold (Rosales, 2019; Monaldi, 2015; Stronen, 2017). Venezuela is known for its deeply nationalist mindset and places great esteem on its historical figures such as Simón Bolívar who is widely considered as the emancipator of Latin America from Spanish colonial rule (Chávez, 2009: vii). Its borders are shared with Colombia, Brazil and Guyana and its landscape is dominated by deep forest including its own share of Amazon rainforest (Salas, 2015: 2). From the democratic election of Hugo Chávez in 1998 to his death in 2013, Venezuela experienced significant social investment after Chávez nationalised Venezuelan oil and redistributed profit (Bistoletti, 2019: 68). The redistribution facilitated one of the most comprehensive education programs in the world which almost eliminated illiteracy (Bruce, 2008: 11). Additionally, free healthcare was provided to Venezuelans with the assistance of Cuba leading to a medical model which became the envy of even the most developed countries, and which simultaneously sought to expand humanitarian focused healthcare across Latin America (Brouwer, 2011: 18, 56). Furthermore, sharp rises in living standards for the poor and middle classes were evidenced (Ystanes, 2018: 42; Pantoulas & McCoy, 2019: 396). Today, Venezuela in 2020, under Nicolás Maduro, Hugo Chávez’s successor, is experiencing one of the worst humanitarian crises in history with over 4 million people having fled the country (UN News, 2019). Those who have not fled are subjected to hyper-inflation making basic goods unaffordable (Friedman, 2017; Friesen, 2018). The poverty rate now stands at 87% (Espana & Ponce, 2017), health services and medicine supplies have evaporated (Trejos, 2017; Rhodes & Valencia, 2019), supermarket shelves are empty (McGonigal & Cook, 2019; Rosati, 2018) and violent crime is uncontained (Leon, 2020: 1). It will be argued that the Venezuelan situation is not a coincidence but, rather, outcomes-in-flux deriving from US actions.

The US’ position as a dominant, semi-hegemonic power on the world economy synchronised with its bullish character derived from American exceptionalist belief and its heavy militarist inclinations facilitate the ability to be uniquely influential globally (Connor, 2020; Restad, 2014). Furthermore, the US is heavily corporatized with US corporations commanding many of the top companies globally including in the oil, health, media and arms sectors (SIPRI, 2019; Palmer, 2019; Muspratt, 2019; O’Reilly, 2016). Historically, the US has been involved in, either overtly or covertly, with or without military intervention, many regime changes globally with the aim of installing leaders favourable to US state and corporate interests (Appendix A). From the 1940’s onwards, these became more frequent and heavily focused on Latin America and the Middle East. By framing US interference in Venezuela within the loci of US geo-economics, neo-imperialism, neo-colonialism and neoliberalism as prescribed by the ‘Washington Consensus’ (Appendix B), it presents a lens through which to understand contemporary social divisions in Venezuela. Focusing on historical US behaviour globally, the aim of this paper is three-fold: to form a coherent four-point modus operandi with which the US attempts to perform neo-colonial and neo-imperialist actions to implement neoliberal globalist ideological hegemony onto other nation states; to use this modus operandi to locate the current severe economic, social and political situation in Venezuela with US origins; and to demonstrate the resulting social divisions in Venezuela. The volume of US actions globally which can be framed in this way is so significant that it is far beyond the scope of this paper thus a select number will be drawn upon to exemplify US behaviour and construct evidence for the current Venezuelan situation.

To establish a body of evidence for historical US behaviour it was necessary to review wide-ranging literature including books, journals, web pages and leaked documents to piece together where, when and how the US behaves towards other nation states. Forming a rough timeline of events, it was possible to isolate a relevant starting point for modern geo-economic and neo-colonial interference and establish US targeted countries. Further analysis was applied to determine what types of behaviour were typical and a pattern quickly emerged. From analysing these patterns, coincidence was found with nations which have formerly been, have been converted to, or have been targeted for, neoliberalism or neoliberalisation. Applying various related terms to in-text mass document searches revealed significant evidence, much beyond the scope of this paper, which could be drawn upon providing enough evidence to establish US historical behaviours. These behaviours were then considered through the lens of the current situation in Venezuela through analysing media, academic and NGO reports, making it possible to connect Venezuela’s crisis with US behaviour. As the situation still continues at time of writing, academic works and books are not readily available thus there is a reliance on news media to view current effects on social divisions. Attempts to circumvent this limitation, however, were made by considering not only mainstream corporate media, but smaller, independent and state news media for balance.

Exploring Historical U.S. Behaviour

In 1908, Britain discovered oil in Iran and subsequently took control of the industry under the name ‘Anglo-Persian Oil Company’ whilst syphoning the majority of profits (Bayandor, 2010: 12). In 1953, the US, at the behest of Britain, launched a coup d’état after the then democratically elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, nationalised Iranian oil removing what Mossadegh called the British “network of colonialism” from Iran (Blum, 2003: 63-71; Petherick, 2006: 82; Bayandor, 2010; Weiner, 2007:  81-92; Gasiorowski, 2004). Numerous techniques were employed by the CIA in the precursory stages: bribing media to print anti-Mossadegh propaganda, funding of pro and anti-Mossadegh mobs to instigate street violence, economic boycotts of Iranian oil, and bribery of military and religious leaders (Blum, 2003: 64, 67; Zepezauer, 1994: no pagination ; Snider, 2009: 274; Weiner, 2007: 86). These precursory actions assisted in destabilising Mossadegh’s leadership allowing the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, to take supreme rulership after the coup and reopen Iranian oil to US corporations (Harvey, 2010: 110). Subsequently, backed by US finance, the Shah founded SAVAK, a secretive police force which went on to become a violent repressive state apparatus and simultaneously cemented the US’ reputation for imperialist and colonialist interference in the middle east (Abrahamian, 1982: 419; Trento, 2005: 56). The tactics used in Iran became the blueprint for many future colonial manoeuvres including Syria 1956-58 and Costa Rica throughout the 1950’s (Yaqub, 2004; Blum, 2004: 82-84). The Iranian example outlines the US’ 4-point modus operandi : destabilisation, ousting of leader, installation of US aligned leader and finally colonisation. These will now be examined in more detail.

From 1970, with orders from US president Nixon to “make the economy scream”, the CIA worked to overthrow Chilean socialist president, Salvador Allende (Kornbluh, 2004: 1-2). Of primary focus was geo-economics, defined by Wigell (2016: 137) as “the geostrategic use of economic power”, for the purpose of destabilisation which, itself, can come in many guises. For Chile, geo-economically, this was limited to CIA backed strikes (Golinger, 2006: 102; Muñoz, 2008: 36), cuts to foreign aid (Eyler, 2008: 174-175) and pressuring US companies with Chilean operations to divest (Kornbluh, 2004: 18). However, drawing more widely upon US behaviour we see Cuba subjected to sanctions of trade and travel bans (LeoGrande, 2015: 940; Gabilondo, 2017: 52), Haiti the freezing of national assets (Staibano, 2005: 41), and Nicaragua the blocking of loans (Bothmann, 2015: 90). Whilst occasionally sanctions can be a positive move, on arms for example (Farrall, 2007: 110), they are often weaponised to prevent supplies entering a country and to disrupt vital imports such as medicine, food, and oil (Rendon & Price, 2019; Venezuela Under Sanctions, 2019). The media can also play a crucial role in destabilisation. Utilising smear campaigns, disinformation and accusations against leaders within the target country, the US manipulates public opinion both in the US and the target country. Often, significant mainstream news propaganda in support of, or uncritical of, US foreign policy or favouritism towards US corporations is disseminated concurrently (Cabellero, 2018: 241; Brouwer, 2011: 203, Bennett, 1990). The campaign against Guatemala’s Jacobo Arbenz in 1954 by the US in light of Arbenz’ attempt to expropriate and nationalise Guatemalan land from US corporation ‘United Fruit Company’ used such a media campaign. Tales of Guatemalan communist training camps were published whilst United Fruit Company Guatemalan policy was heavily praised despite significant human rights abuses (Schlesinger et al., 2005: 88-89; Colby, 2011). Furthermore, many media outlets are subsidised by CIA funds with media propaganda absorbing up to 29% of CIA budget and can be aimed at dissolving a leaders’ legitimacy often by promoting a rival or through disinformation campaigns disseminating US refusals to acknowledge the democratically elected leader (Blum, 2003: 104). In addition to geo-economic and media methods of destabilisation, incitement of street violence also features regularly. US backed protests in Nicaragua since 2014 paralysed the country after an injection of millions of dollars of US funding to promote ‘democracy’ (Luna et al., 2019: 177-179) as well as in Japan post-world war II where the US funded ultra-nationalist and Yakuza mobs to combat the rise of leftism (Kaplan, 2012: 44).

For Chile, the aim of destabilisation was to oust Allende before he could implement a socialist system which would lead to nationalisation of US investments (Qureshi, 2009: xii). This was successfully achieved in 1973 when Allende was overthrown in a coup d’état (Girardi & Bowles, 2018: 16). Coup d’état’s are the most common form of forcibly ousting a leader from power whether by the US directly such as Grenada in 1983 or, as is more often the case, a US backed assault such as Nicaragua and Vietnam 1969-70 (Manning, 2011: 727; Hybel & Flecke, 2014: 17-54; Blum, 2003: 290-304). Either way, the premise is to install a leader favourable to US state and corporate interests (Harvey, 2007: 151). General Pinochet’s installation as military dictator in Chile after the coup against Allende signified the end of Latin America’s longest democracy and began a new era of dictatorship not only in Chile but across Latin America (Dinges, 2004: 2-3). Argentina’s Isabel Martínez de Perón was ousted in favour of US backed Jorge Rafael Videla (Lutz, 2008: 148); Guatemala’s Jacobo Arbenz for Carlos Castillo Armas, the first of a line of US backed Guatemalan dictators (Baldwin, 2008: 49); and Brazil’s João Goulart for Humberto de Alencar Castelo Branco (Hecht, 2010: 113). This tactic however commonly ends with violent and repressive outcomes. The backing of Pinochet led to 3000 known deaths, torture and displacing over one million people (Horvitz, 2006: 78; Lazzara, 2011; Dinges, 2004); Armas and subsequent Guatemalan dictators led to hundreds of thousands of deaths in civilian massacres, genocide of Maya, concentration camps, bombing of civilians and civil war (Brett, 2016: 4; Doyle & Kornbluh, n.d.; Cullather, 1994; Schlesinger et al., 2005); Videla employed forced disappearances, torture and murder of 30,000 (Strier, 2014: 361-362; Arditti, 2002: 19; Horvitz, 2006: 22); and Branco opened up the Amazon rainforest to corporate investment and became the first in a line of ever more repressive Brazilian military rulers (Rosenbaum & Tyler, 1971: 422). Asides from the common penchant for murder and death, there exists a connection between each US backed leader and each ousted leader: the ousted leader is usually a leftist and democratically elected as is the case with Arbenz (Murphey, 2017: 32), Mossadegh (Armstrong, 2003: 77) and Goulart (Toussaint, 1999: 121); and each US backed leader is usually rightist and engages in political cleansing of leftists whether through death such as Pinochet and Videla (Kornbluh 2004: 164; Horvitz, 2006: 22) or dismantling of leftist policies as with Branco  (Dulles, 2007: 66). Perhaps to encapsulate the issue, John Foster Dulles, former US Secretary of State, once stated that Latin American dictators were “the only people we can depend on” (Westad, 2007: 148). Such a statement implies awareness of the level of unacceptability of US colonialist manoeuvres. However, the severity of the US opposition to leftist politics is of such significance that the US claimed in 1966 that in the event of a leftist election victory in Uruguay, a military invasion would be required ( ibid : 151). Thus, US behaviour is clear: violence is near-mandatory, and it forms the opportunity for neo-colonisation in the structural ashes of the overturned nation.

It is in the milieu of violence where the neo-colonial enrooting of the neoliberal model takes place. Nichols (2014: 454) defines neo-colonialism as the “means by which sovereignty extends outward and is then reterritorialized through continual internal reorganization…through containment, capture and divisive social organization”. Additionally, neoliberalism is a political corporatist ideology based upon free market economics, privatisation, deregulation, retrenchment of public welfare and services and dominance of capital over everyday lives (Brown, 2015: 28) whilst simultaneously “a form of governmentality…that can be identified as interventionist…deploying state-apparatuses…to govern society” (Madra & Adaman, 2018: 113). It is the ideology of the global capitalist class, structurally pre-planned and diametrically opposed to leftist ideals (Miller, 2010: 23). The military Juntas , a state apparatus in themselves, of Operation Condor, a US backed state terror operation precipitated through Pinochet and utilising numerous Latin American leaders, carried with them the limitless repressive violence of the neoliberal restructuring apparatus both economically and socially beginning with Chile and extending outwards (Watt, 2012: 116-117; Taylor, 2006: 1). Through mass killings and containment through imprisonment of leftists across Latin America, the US deployed neoliberalism via a neo-imperialist crusade. Neo-imperialism has been defined as “the objectless disposition on the part of a state to unlimited forcible expansion” (Schumpeter, 1919: 6) with the aim of “steal[ing] the wealth generated by the people…generated by the labour power of the worker” (Maddy, 2009: 2). Through the forcible spread of violence, countries of Latin America began to adopt the neoliberal ideology. Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Venezuela and Peru, for example, all underwent neoliberal restructuring (Huber & Solt, 2004: 153).  Restructuring is often shielded by the façade of a need for ‘democratisation’ within the target country due to its chaotic social and economic landscape (Watt, 2012: 117). In actuality, it is the reconfiguring of the social order both nationally and globally to align with neoliberal global capitalism (Robinson, 1997: 208). The idea of ‘democratisation’ is rendered invalid when drawing upon Chile, Iran, Guatemala and Uruguay as these were already democratic prior to US interference (Qureshi, 2009: 75; Petherick, 2006: 16; Valdes-Ugalde, 2014: 27; Shoman, 2010: 47). Before we turn our gaze towards today’s Venezuela, we can deeper analyse how neoliberalism infiltrated Venezuela historically through examining the application of the definitions of neo-colonialism and neo-imperialism using a specific and pivotal example: oil.

Venezuela has one of the largest oil reserves in the world which have consistently been at the forefront of social and political divisions and are Venezuela’s leading source of national income (Wilpert, 2007: 88; Salas, 2015: 73; Peet, 2009: 193). In 1958, the three major Venezuelan political parties formed a power sharing pact called ‘Punto Fijo’ which essentially created a political corporatist alliance to prevent any other candidate from being elected (Marsh, 2016: 52). During this time oil booms and oil busts came and went and in 1979 the economy began to decline for the next two decades causing poverty to increase from 17% in 1980 to 65% in 1996 (Wilpert, 2007: 13). In 1989 Venezuela implemented a neoliberal restructuring following the election of Carlos Andrés Pérez which became known as El Gran Viraje after Pérez requested ‘structural adjustment’ loans from the IMF to tackle the economic decline (Moreno & Shelton, 2014: 283; Brading, 2012: 47). The IMF is itself a US backed neoliberal finance institution whose loans are conditional based upon the prescription of the Washington Consensus (Babb & Kentikelenis, 2018: 18; Marangos, 2008: 227). It is neo-imperialist insofar as the loan conditions force the opening of, and deregulation of, markets allowing in US multinational corporations who, in turn, extract the wealth of both people and nation (D’Arista, 2002: 22; Dutta, 2015: 11-12, Beder, 2009; Chalfin, 2010: 168). Simultaneously, neoliberalism is the colonising ideology as it carries with it US corporatism and requires internal reconfiguration of both state and society to its structural rules (Hibben, 2016: 18). Much of the oil industry was infiltrated by US multinational oil corporations sympathetic to neoliberal corporate ideology with oil wealth mostly harboured by Venezuelan elite hiding behind the neoliberal rhetoric of the ‘trickle-down effect’, a theory which assumes that wealth creation at the top will eventually make its way down to the poorest (Ewell, 1984: 193; Peet, 2009: 192; Bistoletti, 2019: 79). As part of this reconfiguration, neoliberalism commands a two-tier social structure which necessarily supports the moral relativist notion that poverty is inevitable (Dorey, 2011: 5; Lazzarato, 2017: 39). By the overthrow of the neoliberal stranglehold in Venezuela when Hugo Chávez was elected in 1998, fiscally, the Elite 10% took 37% of national income compared to 0.9% for the poorest 10% (Peet, 2009: 192) demonstrating the corruption of ‘trickle-down’ theories. Looking still deeper into the Venezuelan oil industry, we can frame it not only within the notion of an ideological state apparatus as suggested in Madra & Adaman’s (2018: 113) definition of neoliberalism, but as a starting point for locating US sources of the current situation in Venezuela.

Using the Modus Operandi to Locate the Current Severe Economic, Social and Political Situation in Venezuela

The US modus operandi in Venezuela is wide ranging and complex and, as such, is beyond the purview of this work thus must be constrained to select examples. Following the establishing of the four-point modus operandi incorporating: destabilisation, ousting of leader, installation of US backed leader and neo-colonisation by neoliberal restructuring, we can utilise this to begin analysing today’s Venezuelan situation by considering Althusser’s (1971) notion of ideological state apparatuses (ISA’s) in the historicity of Venezuelan oil through to targeted destabilisation today. Althusser (1971: 145) conceptualises ISA’s as a vehicle for ideological dissemination. Dissemination occurs through religion, education, media and politics which transmit the values and attitudes expected by capitalism (Cole, 2008: 83; Wright & Roberts, 2013). Althusser (1971: 145) also conceptualises the ‘repressive state apparatus’ (RSA) which incorporates violence and control through military, prisons and policing in order to maintain capitalist power (Cole, 2008: 83; Althusser, 1971: 144-145). ISA’s still contain an element of repression although this is often covert, and RSA’s still maintain the ideological strand that controls them. The pre-Chávez Venezuelan oil industry under corporatist control was functioning as an ISA by serving the interests of the elite and simultaneously inflicting its secondary RSA function by reinforcing poverty through vastly unequal income distribution. Confusion arises however in how the neoliberal domination of a non-neoliberal state-owned asset fits into Althusser’s ISA. It can be argued that, as the oil industry was controlled by foreign corporatist ideology, it was, in fact, acting as a foreign state ISA vessel ; specifically, the US. Chávez’ predecessor, Pérez, implemented neoliberal policies from the IMF allowing the oil industry to be opened to foreign companies essentially creating said vessel (Moreno & Shelton, 2014: 283). This led to major social divisions in employment, wages and rising prices and caused significant riots which in turn invoked the RSA through military attacks on protestors ultimately taking up to 3000 lives (Stronen, 2017: 38). Althusser (1971: 142) stated “the proletariat must seize state power in order to destroy the existing bourgeois state apparatus” and this is essentially what Chávez did. In successfully being elected despite a prior failed coup (Bruce, 2008: 2), Chávez, as a proletariat, seized state power and set about taking control of the ISA not only from the Venezuelan state, but from multinational corporatists (McGowan, 2011: 56-60). Although this process started in 1999, it continued until his death in 2013 demonstrating the difficulties in the process of removing neo-colonial ideology.

The importance of oil in this situation cannot be overstated and it acts as a pivotal and powerful tool in the US arsenal of destabilisation techniques. Oil is particularly vulnerable to global ‘market fluctuations’ (Rentschler, 2013). However, the ‘nature’ of oil markets is highly dubious. US shale oil over-flooded the market in 2014 in coordination with purposefully cheap Saudi oil which drove down global oil prices (Maupin, 2016). Venezuela, now presided over by Nicolás Maduro after the death of Chávez in 2013, faced a severe and continuing impact resulting from significantly declining national income ( ibid ). The US continues to exacerbate the situation by applying sanctions on importing Venezuelan oil which is significant as Venezuela is one of the US’ major sources of oil (Weisbrot & Sachs, 2019; US Department of State, 2016). Sanctioning however is not restricted to US imports as the US also issues threats to sanction other countries purchasing Venezuelan oil (Saefong, 2019; Paine & Zhdannikov, 2019). Additionally, the US has actively prevented Venezuela receiving help from OPEC the oil cartel in which Venezuela was a founding partner (Sharma, 2019; Fornes, 2018: 101). Furthermore, China, Venezuela’s major buyer, has withdrawn in fear of US sanctions essentially cutting off most oil exports (Wain, 2019).

Destabilisation does not end with oil, however. The US is the only country globally to impose sanctions on other countries where narcotics production occurs (Hufbauer, 2007: 15). Trump personally selected both Venezuela and Bolivia in 2017 to be nominated under sec. 706(1) of the FRAA as countries which have substantially failed to meet obligations under international counter-narcotics agreements (BINLEA, 2018: 5). Colombia, designated as having a much higher narcotics problem than Bolivia and Venezuela, was exempted on the grounds that they are “security partners of the United States” ( ibid : 7) demonstrating that selection is not based on severity of a narcotics problem but rather as a tactical manoeuvre. This geo-economic manoeuvre has two faces: firstly it allows the US to undermine and commandeer obligated financial aid destined for Venezuela under Sec. 490(e) of the FAA 1961 facilitating the prevention of financial aid to Venezuela; and secondly, bilateral financial assistance programs in the ‘national interest’ of the US are still permittable under FRAA sec. 706(3)(a). The Red Cross has specifically called out this underfunding of aid to Venezuela as a purposeful “tool to destabilize the country” (Vaz, 2019a) and it is this destabilisation which is intended to pressurise Venezuela into accepting bilateral assistance which usually has strict conditionality aligned with the neoliberal Washington consensus (Corrales, 2011: 108; Appendix B). Bilateral assistance usually comes from US aligned, neoliberal agencies such as the World Bank, IMF and other IFI’s (Blakeley, 2009: 53; Appel & Orenstein, 2018: 95; Birch, 2017: 20). Further significant leverage has been applied through Trump’s freezing of Venezuelan assets in the US as well as other countries such as Japan who are under pressure to comply with US demands,  essentially cutting off another line of national income (Spetalnick & Rampton, 2019; Associated Press, 2019). Sanctions, as well as cyber-attacks, have been linked to Venezuela’s electricity blackouts due to lack of fuel and imported parts to keep it functioning (Dominguez, 2019; Vaz, 2019b). This alone caused a loss of 6.4% GDP in 2019 (Weisbrot & Sachs, 2019: 14). Perhaps most significant are large-scale food shortages due to a drop of around 80% in imports ( ibid : 4) combined with substantial reductions of medical supplies (Page, 2019: 1255). Geo-economic chicanery is further exemplified through economic sanctions which are utilised in parallel to offers of aid and with sanctions targeted towards Venezuelan oil (Patel, 2019: 8). Expressed bluntly, the sanctions are weaponised to force the acceptance of aid, thus accept the neo-imperial, neo-colonial, and neoliberal conditions attached. To refuse this aid, as Maduro has, is constructed by the neoliberal corporate media as a dictatorship starving the people in what is essentially a gaslighting campaign (Daniel & Lenihan, 2019; O’Grady, 2019). Whilst economic destabilisation is clear, it also exists concurrently with the remaining three points of the modus operandi in flux.

At the time of writing, Venezuela resides in a milieu through which intersects all four-points of the US modus operandi simultaneously. Within the complexities of geo-economic destabilisation, Maduro is confronted by attempts to oust and replace him with US backed opponent, Juan Guaidó (BBC News, 2019; Gaouette & Hansler, 2019). This is simultaneously occurring alongside the attempts at neo-colonisation hidden within the aforementioned humanitarian aid; both functioning in tandem with the media who misrepresent blocking of humanitarian aid in order to discredit or malign Maduro. It is possible to isolate a connection between US aid to Venezuela, US sanctions and media false narratives of Maduro. By taking medicine as an example, US sanctions cut off Venezuela’s access to international payment systems which subsequently cut off access to medicine imports and hospital equipment (Weisbrot & Sachs, 2019: 4). This inevitably led to medicine shortages (Patel, 2019: 9). Furthermore, Venezuelan assets frozen in the sanctions represented the value of six years-worth of medicine supplies for the nation (Nebehay, 2019). The US, with the support of Guaidó, attempted to force ‘humanitarian aid’, including medicine, across the Colombia-Venezuela border and were subsequently blocked by the Venezuelan National Guard (Venezuelanalysis, 2019). The media frame this event as the act of a dictatorship (Polanco et al., 2019), criminal (Gibbs & Dixon, 2019), a way of Maduro controlling the population (Meredith, 2019), or just outright deny that economic sanctions have contributed to the situation (Trombetta, 2018). Additionally, the media also seem forgetful about previous US neo-colonial, neo-imperialist ‘humanitarian aid’ incarnations which funnelled arms to Contras in 1980’s Nicaragua which were subsequently employed in murdering literacy assistants to the poor to start with, then continued with the death of 20,000 more people (Gomez, 2003: 137-139); or the $2.6 billion dollars of direct and indirect ‘aid’ to El Salvador between 1980 and 1989 facilitating the US backed rightists of the Salvadoran state in slaughtering the rural poor ( ibid : 112-113). It would be reasonable to expect that Maduro would be aware of these events. In actuality, Venezuela has been requesting aid and has been receiving it from the Red Cross (Dobson, 2019; ICRC, 2019) as well as medicine shipments from Russia (Nebehay, 2019) and further humanitarian aid from CERF, ECHO, WHO and UNICEF (WOLA, 2019). This, however, is ignored by the western corporate media in favour of constructing the aforedetailed false narrative with the intent of delegitimising Maduro in favour of legitimising Guaidó who claims presidential authority over Venezuela with US backing (Cohen & Blumenthal, 2019). The outcomes of these methods remain to be seen as they persist at time of writing. Within this milieu however, the wider public are experiencing significant resulting social divisions.

Part Three:

Demonstrating resulting social divisions in venezuela.

The culmination of the US modus operandi in Venezuela has been pronounced. In 2019, the number having fled Venezuela was around 4.7 million and expected to rise to 6.5 million in 2020 (UN News, 2019). Those who cannot, or will not, leave, face spiralling social divisions. So severe is the situation that Zakrison & Muntaner (2019: 2586) claim that the US is currently committing a genocide as defined under the UNCPPCG Article II to which the US is a signatory and is thus breaking their own agreements. Food prices are astronomical in comparison to wages due to corporate entities facilitating a market for US dollars causing hyperinflation of the Venezuelan Bolívar and in despite of government price controls to attempt to stabilise food prices (Graham-Harrison et al., 2019). Severe lack of food security has led many people to lose significant amounts of weight which, through the continuum of the crisis, has led to the reappearance of malnutrition (Doocy et al., 2019a; Sequera, 2018). Already by 2016, 32.5% ate less than two meals a day. In 2017 this had risen to 63.2% and in 2018 78.6% (Denova, 2018: 198). The media commonly report that supermarket shelves are empty (McGonigal & Cook, 2019; Rosati, 2018). There also exists a counter-narrative that some supermarket shelves are full (McEvoy, 2019; RT, 2019). It seems however, that those who have access to US Dollar currency can buy groceries, and those who do not find themselves unable to do so (Pons & Armas, 2018). At time of writing, the minimum wage for Venezuela was 40,000 Bolívars per month (Pereira, 2019). Buying one kilogram of apples costs around 40,000 Bolívars; 4 toilet rolls was 30,000 and basic cold medicine around 72,000, nearly two months wages (Expatistan, 2020). Rich Venezuelans are known for their connections to Miami, Florida which Macleod (2019: 7) refers to as ‘the unofficial capital of Latin America’ where the elite often travel for shopping trips or maintain property thus giving them access to the US currency market (Salas, 2015: 3, 107). What makes this particularly interesting is that the US FAA downgraded Venezuela’s air safety rating, essentially a sanction banning flights to and from the US, which raises the question on how the Venezuelan elite are making trips to Miami (Ash, 2019). The impact of this is that those who can afford such luxury are complicit with US sanctions insofar as aiding hyperinflation by importing US dollars. This essentially causes a major social chasm between the rich and the remaining 87% in poverty (Espana & Ponce, 2017). Additionally, this has empowered US currency itself in becoming a tool of colonialism. Aside from food retailers, there are many globalist brands such as Zara, Reebok and Adidas trading inside Venezuela and these only accept payment in US dollars (Long, 2019) thus the Neoliberal corporate world has its influence within Venezuela’s retail and excludes those without access to the correct currency.

Many more divisions are pronounced including mental health associated with migration (Schwartz et al., 2018), post-emigration adaptation (Salas-Wright et al., 2020), adolescent alcoholism (Vaughn et al., 2020) and shortened life expectancy (Garcia & Aburto, 2019). However, with a poverty rate at 87% (Espana & Ponce, 2017), effects on health are significant. Alongside the aforementioned malnutrition due to food shortages, other serious health implications have arisen and shall be collated to demonstrate the wide social division in Venezuela. Sanctions have contributed to an 85% shortage of medicines (Trejos, 2017; Rhodes & Valencia, 2019). This has directly affected child immunisation availability and coincides not only with sharp rises in infant mortality and maternal mortality, but significant rises in mumps, measles, tuberculosis and diphtheria which are traditionally prevented through child and adolescent immunisation (Beyrer & Page, 2019: 286; Garcia et al., 2019; Friedrich, 2019: 1041, Rodriguez et al., 2019: 5). Medicine shortages have also significantly affected diabetes and HIV patients including delayed diagnosis and clinical shortages (Weisbrot & Sachs, 2019: 4; Doocy et al., 2019: 86; Page et al., 2019: 1257). Malaria cases have gone from around 70,000 in 2013 to 400,000 in 2018 (PAHO, 2018) and numerous other vector-borne diseases have seen significant increases (Grillet et al., 2019). Weisbrot & Sachs (2019: 21) estimate that such sanctions have contributed to 40,000 additional deaths in 2017-2018 alone which the VSC (2019: 3-4) argues fits the definition of ‘collective punishment’ under both the Geneva and Hague International Conventions which the US was again signatory to. However, these conventions are regulatory frameworks applied in times of war, in the traditional sense, and may not stretch to geo-economic ‘wars’ or ideological ‘wars’ (Fruchterman, 1983: 304). This does not make the VSC wrong as sanctions in general are considered a form of collective punishment as they target a civilian population for the actions of governments over which the population has little or no control (Horvitz, 2006: 380). As such, there seems little in the way of protection for the population except in the form of aid from NGO’s. However, NGO’s themselves play perhaps an unexpected role.

Whilst the effects on social division within the population at large are demonstrable, there is a deeper, and possibly more concerning issue: that of political division, that is, political division between those who are supposed to assist the population in times of crisis: NGO’s. What makes this particularly problematic for Venezuelan society is that, rather than simply help and assist a people and country in need, a subversive element is ‘piggybacking’ covertly under the guise of NGO’s. The International Crisis Group (ICG) (2018: i), which claims to be independent, explicitly states that sanctions are aimed at achieving “negotiated transition” and are “the best path out of the crisis” thus supporting sanctioning and an ideological transition. However, on closer examination of ICG, it is backed by corporate donors including BP (or, as formally known as, Anglo-Persian Oil Company ) and has a corporate advisory council made up of neoliberal globalist corporations including Shell, Chevron and HSBC ( ibid , 27). Amnesty International has repeatedly, albeit almost imperceptibly, aligned itself with Trumps numerous suggestions of military intervention in Venezuela whilst ignoring US sanctions in favour of apportioning blame on Maduro for food shortages (Amnesty.org, 2019; Emersberger, 2019). Amnesty ( ibid ) suggested the use of ‘universal jurisdiction’ under which the ‘responsibility to protect’ can be invoked. Such protection can involve the use of military intervention which Schabas (2012: 205-206) argues is becoming ingrained within NGO discourse. These are two examples of a wider set including HRW, known for its anti-Venezuelan biased reporting (Human Rights Watch, 2008; COHA, 2008), and IBAHRI who are partners with the neoliberal OECD (Bouhali, 2015). Even taking the academic research into account shows that there is a deep political partisanship within the research and significant and uninvestigated assumptions being made regarding causation of the Venezuelan situation. For example, Beyrer & Page (2019: 287), Rendon & Price (2019: 3-4) and Alhadeff (2018) all highlight Maduro as the root problem. This is not to suggest that Maduro is infallible however, yet each author specifically finger-points whilst clearly ignoring key information regarding neoliberal and neo-colonial ideology. For example, Alhadeff (2018) does not acknowledge US sanctions within their report, subsequently blaming economic mismanagement on Maduro’s part and a crackdown on political opposition as if the aforementioned neoliberal political cleansing of leftists was not a thing. Perhaps economic mismanagement is doublespeak for ‘not in line with the Washington consensus’ thus implying a call to the IMF is needed for economic restructuring. Ultimately, the NGO’s and various academic actors seem fixated on reigniting and reinforcing neoliberal dominance as solution, a solution which has already demonstrably failed before (Santarcangelo, 2019: 1-2), as opposed to providing a human-centred temporary safety net to help the populace whilst the Venezuelan government focus on retaining Venezuelan sovereignty and a return to social stability.

The first goal of this paper was to establish a four-point modus operandi with which the US attempts to perform neo-colonial and neo-imperialist actions to implement neoliberal globalist ideological hegemony onto other nation states. By drawing upon the actions of previous US interference in Iran, Guatemala, Chile, Cuba, Syria, Nicaragua, Grenada, Vietnam, Brazil, Argentina and Haiti, this modus operandi has taken shape. Through the utilisation of geo-economic manoeuvres, it has been demonstrated that destabilisation of the nation state acts as a starting point. Through employing the use of economic sanctions aimed at disrupting Venezuela’s national income as well as sanctions aimed at disrupting trade in critical goods such as food and medicine for the people, the US not only destabilises the economy but also the leadership. Evidence presented shows additional leverage is applied through media propaganda financed though covert means and funded mobs. Secondly, once a country is destabilised, the US seeks to oust the leader. Evidence has shown that there is clear political and ideological purpose in this on two points: to remove a leader oppositional to US ideology and to facilitate a political cleansing of left-wing politics. Removal is often achieved through employing coup d’états when pressure alone is not enough. Thirdly, installation of a leader favourable to US interests occurs and is currently being attempted in Venezuela through the aforementioned methods and the delegitimising of Maduro whilst recognising Juan Guaidó as rightful leader. This is the current milieu within which Venezuela currently resides. If Maduro is overthrown, the third point will be complete: installation of US aligned leader. Subsequently, it is extremely likely that that the fourth point will begin: colonisation and the neoliberalisation of Venezuela through the forcing open of markets, particularly the oil and mining industries, and a return to the authoritarian, two tiered-society experienced in the pre-Chávez era of neoliberalism. In the meantime, the failure and corruption of mainstream NGO’s in assisting people through non-partisan humanitarian means are essentially abandoning the people of Venezuela to starvation and severe health inequalities whilst the US continues its neo-colonisation and geo-economic warfare.

Ultimately, US actions have contributed to the breaking down of Venezuela as a nation state. The Economist (2018) denotes Venezuela’s gradual slide into authoritarian rule since 2014, around the time of the US / Saudi oil price slump, but this perhaps belies the fact that, under such a united effort aimed at neo-colonisation of Venezuela, Maduro has been forced to defend it through more authoritative means. The US has clearly used its unique and powerful position on the world stage to spread its own brand of dominance around the world and particularly in Latin America. Through often covert methods incorporating the clandestine CIA, left-wing leaders in opposition to US hegemony have been purposefully ousted in favour of US aligned, often brutal dictators who have subsequently incorporated repressive regimes in turn leading to uncountable loss of human lives. Considering the US’ own home-grown social problems, for example, US healthcare as the leading cause of personal bankruptcy and education unaffordable for many (Austin, 2014: 2; Kornblum, 2012: 406; Senak, 2016; Poutre et al., 2017), 38 million people in poverty and drug addiction and killing at epidemic proportions (Semega et al., 2019; Ritchie & Roser, 2019), it demands further academic enquiry into what the fundamental purpose of violently spreading such an ideology actually is when one’s own backyard crumbles under it. As Cuba, Russia and China, all opponents of the US, support the Maduro government; whilst Mexico and Uruguay sought to be intermediaries between Venezuela and the US and while Norway tentatively acts as mediator, the US openly continues to disregard preventative diplomacy seeking only the solution they desire: overthrow of Maduro, leading to significantly heightened tensions between global superpowers (Ramcharan, 2020: 99-100), mass migration and a once positive Venezuelan people facing starvation and death.

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Taylor, M. (2006). From Pinochet To The “Third Way”: Neoliberalism and Social Transformation In Chile . London Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press.

Toussaint, E. (1999). Your Money Or Your Life!: The Tyranny Of Global Finance . London Sterling, Va: Pluto Press.

Trejos, A. (2017). Amid Venezuela Political Crisis, Shortages of Medicine Soar. Retrieved 27 January 2020, From https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/06/22/venezuela-medical-shortages-doctors-health-care/103039928/

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Vaughn, M., Salas-Wright, C., Goings, T., Oh, S., Marsiglia, F., & Cohen, M. Et Al. (2020). Disconcerting Levels of Alcohol Use Among Venezuelan Immigrant Adolescents In The United States. Addictive Behaviors , 104 , 106269.

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Vaz, R. (2019b). Venezuela: New Widespread Power Outage as Gov’t Denounces Alleged Attacks. Retrieved 13 January 2020, from https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14404

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Weiner, T. (2007). Legacy of Ashes: The History Of The CIA . New York: Doubleday.

Weisbrot, M. & Sachs, J. (2019). Economic Sanctions as Collective Punishment. The Case of Venezuela. CEPR .

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Westad, O. (2007). The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and The Making Of Our Times . Cambridge New York: Cambridge University Press.

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Yaqub, S. (2004). Containing Arab Nationalism : The Eisenhower Doctrine And The Middle East . Chapel Hill: University Of North Carolina Press.

Ystanes, M. (2018). The Social Life of Economic Inequalities In Contemporary Latin America: Decades Of Change . Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

Zakrison, T. L. & Muntaner, C. (2019). US Sanctions in Venezuela: Help, Hindrance, Or Violation Of Human Rights? The Lancet , 393 (10191), 2586–2587. Elsevier.

Zepezauer, M. (1994). The CIA’s Greatest Hits . Tucson, Ariz. Emeryville, CA: Odonian Press Distribution to The Book Trade Through Publishers Group West

Appendix A:

Selection of nations subject to historical u.s. interference.

Whilst the list of countries which the US has subjected to colonial and imperialist interference stretches back to the 19 th century, the scope of the countries referenced in this work begins with Iran in 1953. A small selection and light description of each is mentioned here along with some suggested readings.

As outlined in the paper, Iran was targeted by the US after British requests to overthrow the democratically elected Mohammad Mossadegh to take control of Iranian oil. Under the guise of anti-communism, the CIA and Britain orchestrated a successful coup d’état to prevent the nationalisation of the Anglo Iranian Oil Company which later went on to become BP (British Petroleum). The project was codenamed TPAJAX.

Abrahamian, 2013; Kinzer, 2008; Gasiorowski, 2004; McMurdo, 2012.

Guatemala: 1954

Under the rule of Jacobo Arbenz, Guatemala sought to expropriate land from the powerful US corporation the United Fruit Company. The company was known for its near enslavement of Guatemalan peasants and its vast ownership of Guatemalan land. The United Fruit Company was the largest land holder in Guatemala at the time. Under the codename operation PBSUCCESS, the democratically elected Arbenz was overthrown in a violent US backed Coup d’état by Carlos Castillo Armas who went on to become the head of a brutal Guatemalan dictatorship ultimately killing thousands of civilians.

Chapman, 2007; Schlesinger et al., 2005; Colby, 2011.

Cuba: 1959 – Present

After seizing power in 1959, Fidel Castro set about a redistribution of Cuban wealth to the peasantry in addition to the expropriation of US corporate assets. Soon after, a wide ranging and complex web of US interference including sanctions and terrorism took place to try to overthrow or assassinate Castro. Cuba, aligned with Russia, became the centre stage for the Cuban-missile crisis, a standoff between the US and Russian over strategic weapons placement. The CIA partook in biological warfare, assassinations, including that of Che Guevara, and terrorism. US interference continues to this day.

Kornbluh, 1998; Dapena, 2004; Latell, 2012.

Chile: 1973

After almost winning an election in 1958, the US set up a major CIA operation to prevent Salvador Allende from becoming President at the next election. It succeeded through mass propaganda campaigns. This continued until 1970 when Allende, despite US interference, won the election. The US set about utilising a destabilisation program which led to an economic freefall. The US then assisted General Pinochet in a Coup d’état which lead to Allende’s ‘suicide’. Subsequently, Chile fell into violent military rule leading to the US backed state terror campaign Operation Condor which spread across Latin America.

François, 2018; Kornbluh, 2004; Qureshi, 2009.

Nicaragua: 1978-1990

Nicaragua was ruled by a family dynasty installed by previous US interference. Support by a US national guard indulging in murder, rape, contraband and drugs, helped maintain the dynasty. After this regime was overthrown by the Sandinista’s seeking to reconstruct an impoverished society created by the dynasty, President Jimmy Carter flooded Nicaragua with ‘aid’ directed at funding the ‘Contras’ and destabilising most of Nicaragua’s major industries. The Contras subsequently ran a campaign of barbarism against the Nicaraguan population including severe human rights atrocities encouraged by the provision of a CIA technical manual instructing them on how to run such a violent campaign. Eventually, after years of war, the US backed opposition political party UNO, in a bought election, saw the Sandinista’s lose power.

Perla, 2016; Garvin, 1992; Brown, 2001; Dickey, 1985.

Haiti: 1986-1994

After decades of violent oppression, Haiti’s violent ruling family, the Duvalier’s (AKA Papa Doc and Baby Doc), were forced from Haiti. In their place, a new election was to be held with a high likelihood that a priest, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a liberation theologist who helped teach the poor about ideas of resistance against authoritarian oppression, would win. The US along with the CIA launched a campaign to prevent him coming to power. Aristide triumphed even in the face of rigged elections against him. However, after a few months in power, and after providing hope to the Haitian people of a new beginning free of tyranny, a coup violently overthrew Aristide and a new military regime began a new era of human rights abuses. While there is no apparent evidence to suggest US interference in this coup, the military regime was CIA trained in brutality. The US, this time, rather than interfere, simply left the country to fall into violence on its own accord. 

Aristide & Wargny, 1993; Podur, 2012; Sprague, 2012.

Appendix B:

The washington consensus.

The Washington consensus is a set of 10 policy instruments with which the US believe can realistically be ‘implemented’ in other nations. These are:

• Fiscal restraint: as imposed by IMF conditionality to maintain low deficit (often through austerity)
• Public expenditure reduction : this is unnecessary as tax revenues can be increased but spending reductions are always preferred by the right wing
• Tax reform: widening the tax base and incorporating marginal tax rates
• Interest rates: should be determined by the market and be positive to prevent capital flight
• Exchange rates: to make exchange rates as competitive as possible
• Trade policy liberalisation: anti-protectionist measures, removal of restrictions
• Foreign direct investment: facilitating an inward influx of foreign investment. The US is anti-economic nationalism for other nations but not for itself.
• Privatisation: transfer of state assets into private corporate hands
• Deregulation: removal of restrictions to facilitate increased competition
• Property rights: strong property rights fundamental to the operating of the capitalist system

(Williamson, 1990; Marangos, 2008: 230-231).

Reviewer 01

The dissertation relies on an impressive body of literature. Its analysis of USA’s political interference in Venezuela, Latin America, and beyond is thus very detailed and has remarkable historical depth. The dissertation makes use of pertinent theoretical frameworks, although some of these would have deserved a more subtle use. For instance, more recent theories of neo-imperialism could have been introduced. Also, while the understanding of Venezuelan oil as ISA is interesting, Brian should have further defended this analysis, making it clearer how oil serves an ideological function. The historical reconstruction has the issue of not dealing with geopolitical context – for instance, the transformations occurred after the Cold War should have been taken into examination. Another problem of contextualisation has to do with the analysis of Venezuela, and this is, to me, the main problem with the work. There is little discussion of local politics, social organisation, and conflicts. Of course, while it is absolutely legitimate to consider the US strategy as the prime factor of social disgruntling, no social scientist would think societal conflicts purely derive from external influence. Some more attention to the local political dialectics should have thus been presented, linking it to discussion on the local elites joining the side of USA (which appears in the text). In the same vein, while no analysis of the Venezuelan crisis can ignore the geopolitical stakes it has, and US influence, the author should have at least discussed some endogenous theories of the crisis, such as the ones about the failure of many resource-based states in diversifying their economy. In this sense, the dissertation reads, at times, more like a pamphlet than like an academic analysis. Finally, the analysis of NGOs role in constructing consensus against Maduro should have been more consistently carried out.  

The dissertation lacks abstract and ethics form.  

Reviewer 02

Overall this is a piece of work which demonstrates strong research skills and a high level of competence in terms of academic writing and presentation.  It offers a rich case study of politico- structural origins of social divisions, providing an original synthesis of available research to identify a ‘4-point modus operandi’ which attributes current social divisions to US policy.  The value of this analysis is attested with a number of examples before applying this to the case of Venezuela. The dissertation is an accelerated immersion into substantive detail and analysis that deserves much credit.  It is a case study illuminative of political sociological concerns and as a piece of historical sociology.  It draws on Althusser’s notions of RSA and ISA to make sense of politically motivated structural adjustment.  The dissertation would have been further strengthened by further development of its framing as a political sociological and historical sociological analysis.  For example, the following deserve greater introduction to set the dissertation up: structural versus individual explanations for poverty and inequality; locating the case study vis-à-vis political sociology and economic sociology as sub-disciplines; critiques of methodological nationalism as insufficient to explain national issues and including in this a discussion of Government/ governance/ governmentalities in relation to the politics of economic globalisation; the notion of ‘structural adjustment’ as top-down policy and bottom-up experience. Within the word count restrictions, it would have been impossible to address all these elements and succeed in the depth of case study presented.  A suggestion, were the piece to be developed/ adapted for publication, would be to clearly locate a selective representation of the case study to particular theoretical debates and disciplinary foci.   

Maintaining Intellectual Honesty in Sociology

The lord of the rings: the one ring as metaphor for consumerism, brian waldock.

Brian is a current PhD student in sociology. His thesis focuses on a range of concepts including platonism, bureaucracy, and abstract space. When not destroying his mind with theories, he indulges in the occasional video game, anime, chinese takeaway, or maybe even a very rare pint.

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Undergraduate Thesis Examples

This page contains examples of Undergraduate Theses from students who have graduated with research distinction in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

All undergraduate theses completed at The Ohio State University are stored at the  Knowledge Bank at OSU Libraries  and can be accessed via their  Search Interface .

2021 Graduates

Abigail aronica.

Building a New Galactic Synthesis Model to Aid in the Detection of Exoplanets Thesis Advisor: Dr. Scott Gaudi, Department of Astronomy

Devin Bennett

Comparison of the Chemical Evolution of Simulated Milky-Way Type Galaxies Thesis Advisor: Dr. Jennifer Johnson, Department of Astronomy

Collin Christy

Classifying Stellar Variability in the V and g bands with the All-Sky Automated Survey for SuperNovae Thesis Advisor: Dr. Krzysztof Stanek, Department of Astronomy

Evan Fitzmaurice

Migration and Stability of Multi-Planet Circumbinary Systems Project Advisor: Dr. David Martin, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Scott Gaudi, Department of Astronomy

Jessica Kulp

Recreating the "Origins of the Elements" Planetarium Show and Curriculum Module Project Advisor: Dr. Wayne Schlingman, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Richard Pogge, Department of Astronomy

Analyzing Unusual Stars in Kepler Project Advisor: Dr. Mathieu Vrard, Center for Cosmology and Astro Particle Physics Thesis Advisor: Dr. Marc Pinsonneault, Department of Astronomy

Maria Pudoka

Inspecting Stellar Angular Momentum Evolution and Ages using High-Resolution Spectroscopy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Michael Rothman

Biosignature Detection in Exoplanetary Atmospheres Using Monte Carlo Simulations Thesis Advisor: Dr. Anil Pradhan and Dr. Sultana Nahar, Department of Astronomy

Robert Von Holle

Active Galactic Nuclei and the Correlated Properties of Neighboring Galaxies Thesis Advisor: Dr. Barbara Ryden, Department of Astronomy

2020 Graduates

Serena cronin.

The Local Environments of Low-Redshift Supernovae Project Advisor Dr. Dyas Utomo, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Adam Leroy, Department of Astronomy

Dhvanil Desai

Galaxy Alignment with Surrounding Large-Scale Structure Thesis Advisor: Dr. Barbara Ryden, Department of Astronomy

Conor Hayes

Spectroscopic Confirmation of Four Ultra Diffuse Galaxy Candidates Project Advisor: Dr. Johnny Greco, Center for Cosmology and Astro Particle Physics Thesis Advisor: Dr. Paul Martini, Department of Astronomy

Jared Kolecki

Measuring Elemental Abundances in Metal-Poor Stars Thesis Advisors: Dr. Ji Wang and Dr. Jennifer Johnson, Department of Astronomy

Sophie Lebowitz

The Dragonfly Galaxy III. An Imposter Radio Galaxy in the High Redshift Universe   Project Advisor: Dr. Bjorn Emonts, The National Radio Astronomy Observatory Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Jeniveve Pearson

An Analysis of the Historically Observed Period Change of UV Piscium, RT Andromedae, and XY Ursae Majoris Using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo Approach Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Gabriela Torrini

Studying angularly extended gamma-ray sources with VERITAS Project Advisor: David Kieda, University of Utah Thesis Advisor: Dr. Laura Lopez, Department of Astronomy

Jack Warfield

An Intermediate-Age α-Rich Galactic Population Beyond the Solar Neighborhood Thesis Advisors: Dr. Marc Pinsonneault and Dr. Jennifer Johnson, Department of Astronomy

2019 Graduates

Dominic flournoy.

Intrinsic Shape Alignment of Early versus Late Type Galaxies Thesis Advisor: Dr. Barbara Ryden, Department of Astronomy

Ness Mayker

HI Balmer Jump Temperatures for Extragalactic HII Regions in the CHAOS Galaxies Project Advisor: Dr. Danielle Berg, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Richard Pogge, Department of Astronomy

2018 Graduates

Macy huston.

Making Microlensing Predictions With a New Population Synthesis Galactic Model Project Advisor: Dr. Matthew Penny, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Scott Gaudi, Department of Astronomy

Michael Macuga

The Fraction of Active Galactic Nuclei in the USS 1558-003 Protocluster at z = 2.53 Thesis Advisor: Dr. Paul Martini, Department of Astronomy

2012-2017 Graduates

Lawrence capuder.

Contribution of Solar Mass Loss to the Solution the Faint Young Sun Paradox for Physically Motivated Mass Loss Prescriptions Thesis Advisors: Dr. Marc Pinsonneault & Dr. Scott Gaudi, Department of Astronomy

James Derrick

The Green Valley: Separating Galaxy Populations in Color-Magnitude Space Thesis Advisor: Dr. Barbara Ryden, Department of Astronomy

Andrew Gallagher

Searching for Dark Galaxies Via Their Distorted Companions in the SDSS Thesis Advisor: Dr. Barbara Ryden, Department of Astronomy

Zachary Hartman

Looking for the dM in sdB+dM Systems Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Denise Hung

Metallicities and Temperatures for Two Metal-Rich and Two Metal-Poor Galaxies Project Advisor: Dr. Kevin Croxall, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Richard Pogge, Department of Astronomy

Circumbinary Planets via Microlensing Thesis Advisor: Dr. Scott Gaudi, Department of Astronomy

Mallory Molina

Inter-Percentile Velocity Width: An Alternative Parametrization of the Velocity Field of the Broad-Line Region Thesis Advisor: Dr. Bradley Peterson, Department of Astronomy

Elizabeth Otto

Chemical Abundances of CH Stars in Omega Centauri Thesis Advisor: Dr. Jennifer Johnson

Rachel Patton (Cannata)

Exploring Sources of Contamination in Kepler Surveys for Stellar Rotation Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Joseph Shulze

Characterization of LP133-373: A Double-line, Eclipsing dMe Binary Thesis Advisor: Dr. Donald Terndrup, Department of Astronomy

Andrew Taylor

A Possible Evolutionary Channel for the Recently Discovered Class of Millisecond Pulsars in Long, Eccentric Orbits Thesis Advisor: Dr. Todd Thompson, Department of Astronomy

Erika Wagoner

Testing Stellar Models for M Dwarfs Project Advisor: Dr. Sarah Schmidt, Department of Astronomy Thesis Advisor: Dr. Jennifer Johnson, Department of Astronomy

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