The PhD is one of the central objectives of our academic activity and the ultimate raison d’etre for our presence in Latin American universities. It is the embodiment of our goal of providing high-quality education. Our PhD programme focuses primarily on university teaching staff, as a basic step in improving the quality of higher-level education in the host universities. One of the most important criteria in our choice of a partner university is the centre’s interest in affording faculty an opportunity to build on their Master’s degrees through doctoral research.

The PhD activities for all Master’s degrees are combined in a single programme, entitled ‘Globalisation under examination: interdisciplinary challenges and responses’. Combining all the activities under a single management unit not only facilitates our administrative work, it also enables us to adapt our operations to the specific needs and circumstances of our Latin American students.

The programme has a single leader, responsible for coordinating all activities and liaising with both the UPV/EHU and the partner universities in this area. The heads of the Master’s degree programmes also sit on the Doctoral Academic Commission. This ensures that the commission has direct access to any problems that may arise in the different programmes and enables it to apply the fairest and most efficient solutions. This approach has proved very successful and over 160 PhD theses have been read since the programme was launched.