The faculty is home to broadly understood political science and regional studies, with particular focus on cultural aspects. This duality of scholars' interests enables interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary studies related to global regions to be conducted and deepens the analysis of political issues through reflection on social, economic and cultural problems.

• Political Theories, Systems and Thought. It includes analyses of modern political systems, theory, philosophy and sociology of politics, the history of political thought including methodological issues, as well as contemporary debates on liberalism, republicanism, democracy, and human rights. An important project conducted with the Centre for Political Thought in Kraków is a published series entitled Biblioteka Klasyki Polskiej Myśli Politycznej (The Library of Classical Polish Political Thought), which includes sixty volumes of scripts of selected Polish intellectuals written between the 16th and 20th century.
• Public Order, Security and Communication. It includes the analysis of cause and effect of the collapse of public order and social structures and the related infringement of human rights, humanitarian catastrophes, mass migrations, and threats to international security. These studies are enriched with analyses of the shaping and changing of international order. They include research on civil society, public sphere organisation and management, communication and media, the shaping of global security, the institutionalisation of internal security policy, particularly in the European Union, changes in modern diplomatic and consular law, political and legal aspects of European citizenship, conflict theory, strategic aspects of politics in foreign countries and world regions, military politics, problems of Mediterranean countries, and the history of contemporary South Central Europe.
• Countries, Nations and Civilisations. In this field, issues related to the crisis of the nation-state and the phenomenon of nationalism, non-democratic mechanisms of change of the country's political system, as well as the cultural roots of integrating Europe and integration processes occurring at various levels – from economic to political and legal – are analysed. Moreover, studies are conducted on the history and perspective of the development of individual cultures and civilisations, prospects for the globalisation of international relations, social movements, migration, social mobility, and multiculturalism.

Research findings of the faculty staff are recognised by public institutions (e.g. Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and frequently used by the media.

Studies on research projects conducted at the faculty are published in monographs and in Politeja. Pismo Wydziału Studiów Międzynarodowych i Politycznych UJ (Politeia: Journal of International and Political Studies of the Jagiellonian University), as well as in two highly evaluated journals appearing at the faculty: Ad Americam (published by the Institute of American Studies and Polish Diaspora) and Problemy Współczesnego Prawa Międzynarodowego, Europejskiego i Porównawczego (Problems of Modern International, European and Comparative Law – the Institute of European Studies). They can also be found in published series edited by academics from the faculty, e.g. Varia Culturalia; Rosyjska Literatura Emigracyjna (Russian Emigration Literature); Prace Amerykanistyczne UJ (American Works of the Jagiellonian University); Rosja: Wczoraj, dziś, jutro. Polityka – kultura – religia (Russia: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow; Politics-Culture-Religion); Societas, Politika; as well as series of course books on the social sciences entitled Materiały Robocze Forum Europejskiego Natolin (Working Materials of European Forum Natolin) by the Polish Scientific Publisher PWN.

The faculty was placed in the prestigious Excellence Group in rankings conducted by the Centrum für Hochschulentwicklung (CHE) in the discipline of political science, taking the highest place among Central and Eastern Europe centres (Die Zeit). In 2013, the faculty was recognised as the best education centre in Poland in the field of knowledge of world regions.

Knowledge of international issues is popularised by the faculty through, for example, lectures given as part of the Jagiellonian Diplomatic Encounters by ambassadors from foreign countries accredited in Poland and Polish diplomats accredited in other countries, as well as through Jagiellonian Lectures delivered in London.