Concepts and Paper 2 exam skills

Cause and consequence, continuity and change, perspectives, and significance — the exam picks two of these four for the concept mini-essay.

Looking at why an event happened (causes) and what resulted from it (consequences) — and asking whether those consequences were inevitable.

Long-term: a century of Jim Crow segregation laws after slavery ended in 1865. Short-term: the 1955 murder of Emmett Till and Rosa Parks's arrest, which sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

Change: British rule ended and India became a self-governing republic. Continuity: deep poverty, and Hindu-Muslim tensions (which caused Partition) persisted for decades.

Activists like the ANC saw it as a just liberation struggle; the apartheid government called it a communist-inspired security threat; some Western governments in the Cold War prioritised stability over ending apartheid.

Its impact at the time, how many people it affected, how long its effects lasted, and/or what it reveals about the wider period — not just how dramatic or famous it was.

Both are 'small' single events judged significant because they triggered mass mobilisation: Parks's arrest sparked the year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott; the March 1917 Petrograd women workers' strike (International Women's Day) helped trigger the February Revolution.

A moment where the pace or direction of change speeds up sharply — e.g. the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre in South Africa hardening the ANC's shift toward armed resistance.

Africa & the Middle East / Americas / Asia & Oceania / Europe examples include: UK suffragettes (Europe, 1918/1928 votes won), or Aboriginal rights campaigns in Australia (Asia & Oceania, 1967 referendum).

Using at least two examples from at least two different IB regions to support a 'To what extent...' judgement, comparing similarities and differences, not just describing each in turn.

Success depended on contingent factors — media coverage of violence like Bloody Sunday (1965), Cold War pressure on the US image abroad, and Lyndon Johnson's political will to pass the Civil Rights Act (1964) and Voting Rights Act (1965).

Later historians can use archives and hindsight unavailable to activists at the time — e.g. reassessing how much Gandhi's non-violent campaign alone caused independence, versus Britain's post-WWII financial exhaustion.

Section A: a concept mini-essay [6]. Section B(a): explain one example [4]. Section B(b): a 'To what extent...' essay [15].

Cause and consequence, continuity and change, perspectives, significance. The exam picks two per paper — prepare all four.

At least 2 examples from at least 2 different IB regions, compared explicitly.

Africa and the Middle East, the Americas, Asia and Oceania, Europe.

It cannot reach the top markband, which requires comparison across at least two regions, however detailed the single-region account is.

US civil rights (Americas): caused by segregation laws and racial inequality, leading to the Civil Rights Act (1964). Indian independence (Asia): caused by colonial rule and economic exploitation, leading to independence and partition (1947).

What the movement transformed (new laws, new status) against what stayed the same (old attitudes, inequalities that persisted).

How different groups viewed the same movement differently: activists, opponents, governments, or later historians — used as an analytical lens, not a source-skills exercise.

One clearly identified, specific example (named movement, place, date) with a developed explanation — not a list of facts.

Africa and the Middle East; caused political change — end of apartheid and the 1994 democratic elections.

Asia and Oceania; an idea/issue movement (environmental), leading to federal protection of the Franklin River (1983).

State clearly 'to what extent' the statement is true (not just 'yes and no'), and substantiate that judgement with comparative evidence from both regions used.