A Level World History: International History, 1870-1939 (Cambridge 9489)

This guide covers the International Option: International History, 1870–1939, an AS Level route through Papers 1 and 2 for Cambridge International AS & A Level History 9489. This 2027-2029 series syllabus replaces the previous one, which the board states was valid for the 2026 series only — the option is redated from 1870–1945 and drops its former fourth topic, China and Japan.

Where this fits in 9489

At AS Level, candidates study one of three options — European (Modern Europe, 1774–1924), American (The History of the USA, 1820–1941), or International — each with three named topics, assessed via Paper 1 (Historical Sources) and Paper 2 (Outline Study). A school teaches one option, not all three, so the International Option is a genuine alternative route through 9489, not additional content alongside the other two.

The rotation is a fixed, published table, not an unpredictable one: each topic serves as the Paper 1 topic once every three years, and Paper 1 and Paper 2 always examine disjoint topics in a given year.

Year	Paper 1 topic	Paper 2 topics
2027	Imperialism and the emergence of world powers, c.1870–1918	International relations, 1919–29; International history, 1929–39
2028	International relations, 1919–29	Imperialism and the emergence of world powers; International history, 1929–39
2029	International history, 1929–39	Imperialism and the emergence of world powers; International relations, 1919–29

Syllabus coverage

CAMBRIDGE AS & A LEVEL HISTORY 9489 — INTERNATIONAL OPTION: INTERNATIONAL HISTORY, 1870–1939

• Section 7: Imperialism and the Emergence of World Powers, c.1870–1918 — the causes and impact of “New Imperialism,” and the emergence of Japan and the USA as world powers alongside the established European empires
• Section 8: International Relations, 1919–29: Conflict and Cooperation — the peace settlements, international tension in the early 1920s, the recovery of the mid-to-late 1920s, and the League’s record over the decade
• Section 9: International History, 1929–39: The Rise of Extremism and the Road to War — the impact of the Great Depression, the rise of extremism, why the League failed to keep the peace, appeasement, and the outbreak of war in 1939

This option no longer includes a China and Japan topic — that content was part of the previous (2026-series) syllabus and has been dropped from the 2027-2029 series.

Section 7: Imperialism and the emergence of world powers, c.1870–1918

This topic opens with the causes of “New Imperialism”: the economic and political motives behind late-nineteenth-century imperial expansion, and the domestic support for it (or opposition to it) in Britain, France and Germany specifically. It then traces the impact of that expansion on international relations – disputes with China (including the Boxer Rebellion), Anglo-German tension over South Africa, and the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 as an attempt to manage rivalry between imperial powers. The topic’s second half turns to two new world powers emerging outside the established European empires: Japan, through rapid modernisation, victory in wars against China (1894–95) and Russia (1905), a treaty with Britain (1902), and its role in the First World War; and the USA, through the closing of its frontier, economic growth driving a need for overseas trade, the Spanish–American War (1898), and its eventual entry into the First World War.

Section 8: International relations, 1919–29: conflict and cooperation

This topic follows a roughly chronological arc across the decade. It opens with dissatisfaction over the 1919–20 peace settlements (Versailles, Trianon, Neuilly, Saint Germain, Sèvres), reparations, and the contrasting reactions of victors and defeated powers – Germany’s “Diktat” being the clearest example. International tension remained high from 1920–23 (the Ruhr Crisis, the Corfu Incident, German hyperinflation) despite treaties such as the Washington and Genoa Conferences, the Rapallo Pact and the Treaty of Lausanne. From 1924–29, relations improved through economic recovery and a further sequence of agreements – the Dawes Plan, the Locarno Treaties, the Kellogg–Briand Pact and the Young Plan. The topic closes by assessing the League of Nations itself across the decade: its aims, membership and structure, its use of collective security in disputes such as the Aaland Islands, Vilna and Upper Silesia, its weaknesses, and the role of its Agencies.

Section 9: International history, 1929–39: the rise of extremism and the road to war

Where Section 8 tracks relative stabilisation, Section 9 tracks its collapse. The rise of extremism is explained through the impact of the Great Depression on political ideologies, the rise of dictatorships, foreign responses to the Spanish Civil War, and Hitler’s sequence of expansionist moves (rearmament, remilitarisation of the Rhineland in 1936, the Anschluss and Sudetenland crisis in 1938, and the seizures of Czechoslovakia and Poland in 1939). The League’s failure to keep the peace is examined through the failure of disarmament and its weak responses to the Manchuria and Abyssinia crises. Appeasement is examined as a specific British and French policy choice, shaped by economic and military considerations and changing relations with the USSR, running through the Rhineland, the Anschluss and the Munich Crisis over Czechoslovakia. The topic closes on the outbreak of war in 1939: British rearmament, the guarantee to Poland, the reasons for the Nazi–Soviet Pact, and the invasion of Poland itself.

How to approach it

Within Sections 8 and 9, the run of named treaties and conferences (Washington, Genoa, Rapallo, Locarno, Kellogg–Briand, Munich) is easy to blur together; anchor each one to the specific “key question” it answers (why tension remained high, why relations improved, why appeasement was pursued) rather than memorising a bare list of dates. Since Paper 1 (Historical Sources) and Paper 2 (Outline Study) draw on the same three topics, and the fixed table above rotates which topic is set on each paper, build secure knowledge of all three rather than concentrating revision on whichever seems most likely to appear in a given year.

Official syllabus

Cambridge International AS & A Level History (9489) syllabus for 2027-2029 — official syllabus PDF, sections 7-9 (“Subject content – International Option: International history, 1870–1939”).