Hi people!
Hope that all of you are doing fine. This is my first article on the CBSE class 12 political science examination. In this article, I’ll be dealing with the questions pertaining to world politics in the paper. In subsequent articles, I’ll elaborate on the other aspects of the examination. So here you go!
Firstly, please realise that all the chapters included in the contemporary world politics book are crucial. Once again, I’ll advise you to learn things in points. Try to imagine the questions that can be asked from each subsection and frame your own answers in points. Say, if you’re answering a question on US structural hegemony, the points could go on like this- 1)Meaning of structural hegemony; 2)Manifestation in provision of SLOC’s and public goods; 3) Significance of Bretton Woods; 4)Provision of Internet; 5)Origin of MBA degree, and so forth.
Pro-level advice to ambitious students- Honestly saying, it’s difficult to make sense of the Cold War and disintegration of USSR without knowing about the history of the First and Second World Wars. Our textbook merely mentions the ideological rift and the race to attain that superpower status, as reasons for origin of Cold War. It doesn’t really trace the origins of that ideological rift, because after all, it’s a political science text. In case you have time left, I’ll recommend you to refer to books like “Age of Extremes” (by Eric Hobsbawm) and “Twentieth Century World” (by Rothney and Findley). Note- Not at all required for board examinations. They are exclusively meant for people who are interested in further reading.
Images are crucial, not only because they can be directly tested upon, but also because they’ll help you to expand your answers. E.g.: while writing about US hard power, it’s critical to mention about US command structure. This has been meticulously portrayed in an image. Similarly, Information about U.N. peacekeeping missions, flags of EU and ASEAN etc. is provided in images.
Plus boxes are a big contention among students. In theory, they are not meant to be directly tested upon. But in practice, there have been questions from plus boxes in the past. To be on the safer side, I’ll recommend you to prepare all of them. Some of them are especially important. The ones that provide information on founding fathers of NAM, the General Sec of USSR, the Secretary Generals of U.N. and the Cold War timeline should be prepared by all students.
Keeping yourself updated with everything is critical for this paper. Many facts given in the book (e.g. the current U.N. Secretary General) are not updated. It’ll be better if you give the correct information. Also, it’s important to mention about the current happenings when you’re answering any question. For example, if you’re writing about Indo-China relations, it’s important to write about the Doklam issue, the emerging rift between the two countries due to ongoing Maldivian crisis, etc. Likewise, while writing about Indo-ASEAN relations, you could write about how the Prime Minister invited the dignitaries from all the 10 countries to witness the Republic Day parade. In the same vein, you must keep yourself updated with the current status of issues concerning SAARC, EU, UN etc.
You could expect a lot of open-ended questions in this paper. In such questions (mostly 6-markers), you’ll be required to express your own opinions at length. That’s why it’s good to have a perspective on all the issues concerning the world. Sometimes there would be counterfactual questions. In the past, CBSE has asked questions like, “How would the present world have been, had the Cold War not happened? “or “How would the present world have looked like, had the disintegration of USSR not happened?”, etc. These are purely subjective questions. Thus in the second question you could write that there would have been fewer countries in the world, superpower rivalry would have still plagued the world, US hegemony would have been a far cry, etc.
This is pretty much it for this article. Stay tuned for more!
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