International Relations vs Business

College Majors Humanities Majors
1

I am applying to college this summer, yet I don’t know if I should major in international relations or not. As a recruited athlete, I have the ability to get into the highest business schools in the country. However, I am also interested in IR. I don’t know if I would like IR because I have very little understanding of where a IR degree can take you, or if it will take me to an occupation that I would enjoy.

Where can an IR degree take you, what is an IR degree like, and how do you know if you will enjoy where it takes you? What are the biggest differences between international business (programs like the Huntsman program at upenn) and IR?

2

International business and International relations are two very different things. Business focuses on major countries like Germany, China and India where you will have most trade with. They don’t delve into the politics of the country. Relations is much more specialized since you have to have a concentration such as Middle Eastern. If you did relations you would not just look at the business side but all of the sides of the Middle East including it’s history, threats, trade, politics, human rights, environmental policies and etc. Hope this helped a little bit.