The DILHPS fosters interdisciplinary teaching and research activities in a set of areas sharing or sympathetic with an international perspective. The aim is deepening the knowledge of relations between legal orders, between legal regime and political systems, also considering their historical respective evolution and geographic, political and economic issues.
In this framework, the interaction among different disciplines is favoured. They refer to the most important contemporary legal and political systems, to legal regimes favouring coexistence and cooperation among States, to the question of identity of non-European civilisations, to the theoretical and historical analysis of the evolution of the systems and forms of States and government and to the interdisciplinary analysis of the international political scenario.
As a result of its international and interdisciplinary vocation, in the teaching activities the DILHPS is the main responsible for the bachelor programme in International Sciences and European Institutions (Scienze internazionali e istituzioni europee) and for the master degrees in International Relations (Relazioni internazionali), Political and Government Sciences (Scienze politiche e di governo); with other departments it shares the responsibility for the bachelor’s degrees in International Politics, Law and Economics, in  Political Science (Scienze Politiche), in Public Sector and Healthcare Management (Management pubblico e della sanità) and in Linguistic and Cultural Mediation (Mediazione linguistic e cultural). It is also partner in a number of postgraduate programmes (Ph.D., advanced masters and courses). It has concluded agreements for scientific or teaching collaboration with, among others, Catholic University of Uruguay, University of Santa Caterina (Brasil), Rey Juan Carlos University of Madrid, Autonoma of Barcelona (Spain), University of Montpellier I (France), University of Szczecin (Poland), Machiavelli Center for Cold War Studies - CIMA (Florence).
In the same perspective of openness to international relations, the Department promotes and encourages the mobility and exchanges of students and professors within the ERASMUS programme.
DILHPS endorses the principles included in the Code of Ethics of the Milan University.