The guide says change involves understanding and evaluating people's perceptions of it. That is the whole micro: “was this a good change?” has no answer until you say who you are asking.
One ordinary change, scored from four different positions.
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The four questions that explain most disagreements
- Who gains and who loses? Usually different people, and the gainers are usually more visible.
- Who was asked? Most people affected by a change are not consulted about it.
- When are you asking? The gain is immediate and measurable; the cost is often slow and hard to count.
- Compared with what? Against the old way, or against what could have been built instead?
The last one is the sharpest: Most evaluations compare a change with what existed before. Comparing it with what could have been built instead is harder, fairer, and almost always more interesting.
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Real-world examples you can name
Platform work and employment status — UK Supreme Court ruling on Uber drivers February 2021; EU platform work directive adopted 2024
Work is allocated by an app rather than a manager. The UK Supreme Court held that Uber drivers are workers entitled to minimum wage and holiday pay, and the EU has since legislated a presumption of employment where a platform controls the work.
Who it affected: Couriers and drivers, and companies whose model assumed self-employment.
Short-term letting platforms and city housing — Barcelona fines from 2016; ban on tourist flats announced for 2028
Platforms let residential flats be rented to visitors nightly. Cities argue this removed homes from the long-term market and pushed rents up; Barcelona has fined platforms for unlicensed listings and announced it will end tourist flat licences entirely.
Who it affected: Residents priced out of central districts, hosts earning from spare rooms, and visitors.
School closures and remote learning — 2020–2022
At the peak, UNESCO counted over 1.5 billion learners out of school. Where teaching moved online it kept going for households with a device and a connection and stopped for those without, turning the digital divide into a measurable gap in learning.
Who it affected: School-age children, most sharply those in low-income and rural households.
None of these has an agreed answer: That is why they are useful. A case everyone agrees about gives you nothing to argue with, and part c questions are marked on the argument.
How this is tested — this is the concept behind almost every part c question in the paper, whatever content topic it is dressed in. It comes up two ways:
Paper 1 — structured question
- Part c: to what extent has a change benefited a group
- Part b: explain why two groups see a change differently
Paper 2 — source-based question
- Q3: contrast two sources with different views of one change
- Q4: synthesise sources on whether a change was worth it
The trap: a verdict with no position: “It has good and bad points” is not an evaluation. Name the group, name the measure, then judge.
Explain one reason why two groups may evaluate the same technological change very differently.
Model answer plan
See the mark-by-mark plan — for / against / judgement, with marking guidance — in study mode.
To what extent do digital platforms improve the lives of the people who work through them?
Model answer plan
See the mark-by-mark plan — for / against / judgement, with marking guidance — in study mode.