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Personal statement for PPE and law?

(edited 12 years ago)

Very difficult to do. You could get away with it if your other choices were Pol & Phil, Pol & Economics, straight Economics, etc, as they recognise that you may have applied for the combination of PPE elsewhere, but Law being quite different will make covering all bases extremely difficult, especially seeing as for PPE you're already having to discuss your interests in three subjects.

Once you've written a draft PS you think you're happy with, you could post it here to be reviewed by the PS Help team, but I would advise you to think carefully about your subject choices before you start trying to write your statement.

Reply 2

Junaid16

I don't think that is remotely realistic. If you're applying for Law at the top tier universities, you'll be expected to show evidence of wider reading and evidence of your passion for the subject. I find it out hard, to see how than could be incorporated into a PPE personal statement, when the two degrees aren't particularly linked. Why don't you just apply for Law at all 5 universities, what is the attraction of PPE?

(edited 12 years ago)

Reply 3

Mr_Velcro

Wow talk about a difficult question!! I guess there are a few different ways you could go about it:

- talk about the link between ethics/moral systems (this covers philosophy) and the law that governs society.
Aristotle: "Man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all".
Also think about Hobbes and the state of nature (google for more information :smile:

)
Say how arbitrary laws are yet how important they are to keep the fabric of society together (or something along those lines)
But remember Aristotle: "Even when laws have been written down, they ought not always to remain unaltered"
Talk about the trade-off between individual liberty and security (security is brought to you by a solid legal system).

Be careful not to come across as some authoritarian fascist nutcase by being too pro the legal system. Alternatively, by throwing in too many quotes like these: "Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny" (Edmund Burke) you could come across like an equally nutty anarchist.

If you think about it, phrases like 'society's laws' and 'democratic rules' etc could maybe appy to both a politics course and a legal course, depending on who is reading it.

- You could also maybe throw in something about derterminism vs free will - could link that back to reoffending

- You could also make a connection between international law + human rights. This is personally how I would do it because a law department would just assume you wanted to be a Human rights lawyer and pretty much anything on this subject could be tied into PPE. You could perhaps reference situations like guantanamo bay etc which some people say constitutes illegal detention. You could talk about to what extent we should have the legal rights to interfere in other countries affairs. Separate the concepts of legal rights and human rights and think about how blurred the two concepts are. Imagine to yourself that you want to work for the UN - this way you could briefly mention something about how we live in a globalised world with strongly interconnected economies and how world finances affect the decisions that institutions like the UN make (just to cover off the Economics). I think academics will like that because they're into that kind of thing because they're left wing and like thinking about poor people and war.

You could have a really ambitious final statement like "As Ghandi, my all-time favourite lawyer tells us, "We must be the change we want to see in the world" and with this in mind I believe myself to be fully motivated to use this degree to give me the education and skills necessary to move forward in life and do great things blah blah blah... "

You could end up with quite a good and quirky personal statement you know.

A potentially relevant J.S. Mill quote for you
"Protection, therefore, against the tyranny of the magistrate is not enough; there needs protection also against the tyranny of the prevailing opinion and feeling, against the tendency of society to impose, by other means than civil penalties, its own ideas and practices as rules of conduct on those who dissent from them; to fetter the development and, if possible, prevent the formation of any individuality not in harmony with its ways, and compel all characters to fashion themselves upon the model of its own. There is a limit to the legitimate interference of collective opinion with individual independence; and to find that limit, and maintain it against encroachment, is as indispensable to a good condition of human affairs as protection against political despotism". — On Liberty, The Library of Liberal Arts edition, p.7.

Reply 4

Mr_Velcro

Although actually thinking about it, i don't think you should do PPE. It's a really fantastic degree and can be very demanding and from the sounds of it you aren't really inspired by it - if you were you'd be applying to do PPE at York, Durham, Warwich etc (York's PPE course is outstanding). I just came up with all that stuff up there off the top of my head because PPE runs through my blood like a beautiful AIDSs. I could write a zillion different PPE personal statements (I won't, that would be stupid) and if you aren't motivated by the degree then to be honest just stick to law.

You can be a corporate lawyer and make loads of money.

Reply 5

punctuation

Original post by Mr_Velcro

Haha, do write a zillion PPE personal statements! :wink:

Kidding.

Anyway, to the OP:

As everyone has said, you don't seem especially keen on the subject PPE. I think you just want to go to Oxford for a well-known program. Why don't you do law at Oxford, then? That, or pick a subject that's more closely related to law.

Reply 6

Minerva

Original post by simonoafc

Well my sister read PPE at St Peter's College and my Grandfather and Great-grandfather both read PPE at Balliol College - this has always been an inspiration, if not sometimes also a pressure.

My ultimate goal is a career in human rights law specifically, so both degrees would be suitable in that sense (although obviously with PPE i would have to do a conversion).

I have already read widely around the law, politics and economics, and over the summer I intend to do some wider reading on philosophy.

My main reason for only wishing to apply to Oxford for PPE is that many people (at the Bar, in a pressure group I did some work for, and at my school) have all said that unless studied at Oxford, PPE is not the most useful of degrees, and that it would most likely not be worth the extra time worth studying for it. I am genuinely passionate about politics, economics and public policy, with Politics and Economics being my strongest subjects at school as shown by my AS module grades so far, and I do enjoy reading in the areas and debating on them.

If I were simply studying for the sole reason of academic titillation, then yes I would also apply to PPE at Durham, York, Warwick and Manchester. However, I have to be realistic and also think of my career and my future finances

Then you have your answer.

Don't even think about applying for law - you'll be wasting your time and everyone else's. If you end up hating the degree you're doing, you will not do well enough in it to do the other things you have in mind.

As for your career prospects being undermined by reading PPE at Durham or any of the other unis you mention, words fail me. If you have potential, you will achieve it whichever uni you graduate from. If you don't, a degree from Oxford will not make any difference, even assuming they take you on in the first place.

You might also like to read How to Avoid Getting 5 Rejections

(edited 12 years ago)