How DP Global Politics Is Assessed: Revision Notes

Condensed for quick recall of how the course is assessed. For the full subject overview, use the IB DP Global Politics subject overview.

How Global Politics fits into the wider Diploma

Global Politics sits within the individuals-and-societies subject group alongside options such as History, Economics and Geography, and shares that group’s general assessment philosophy of combining external written papers with an internally assessed, individually graded component. What sets it apart within that group is the explicit requirement for direct, real-world engagement with a political issue rather than desk-based research alone – a design choice that reflects the subject’s aim of connecting political theory directly to lived political reality, not just to documented case studies.

SL vs HL weightings

Component	SL	HL
Paper 1 (four structured questions, four core units)	30%	20%
Paper 2 (extended-response, core units)	45%	40%
Paper 3 (HL only: two contemporary case studies)	—	20%
Engagement activity	25%	20%

The four core units (every student, every level)

Power, sovereignty and international relations · human rights · development · peace and conflict.

The engagement activity

• Students investigate a political issue of genuine personal interest through direct engagement, not desk research alone.
• Complemented with theoretical perspectives from research.
• Submitted as a written report — common to both SL and HL.

The engagement activity in more depth

The engagement activity is graded against criteria covering: the quality and relevance of the direct engagement itself (interviews, observation, participation, or another form of first-hand involvement with the chosen political issue); the integration of theoretical perspectives drawn from wider reading and course concepts; critical analysis connecting the engagement experience to broader political theory; and reflection on the process, including its limitations. A common weakness is an engagement activity that stays descriptive – recounting what was done and observed – without enough critical connection back to core political concepts (power, legitimacy, sovereignty, and so on) covered elsewhere in the course; the strongest reports treat the direct engagement as evidence to be analysed through a political-science lens, not simply reported.

Command terms across the papers

Both Paper 1 and Paper 2 draw on the standard individuals-and-societies command-term glossary: define, identify and describe at the lower end; explain, compare and examine in the middle; evaluate, discuss and to what extent at the top, where a reasoned judgement weighing multiple perspectives, actors or pieces of evidence is required. Because Global Politics is explicitly built around contested political concepts and competing perspectives, “evaluate” and “discuss” responses in this subject are expected to engage with more than one viewpoint or theoretical framework before reaching a conclusion – a one-sided answer, however well argued, typically loses marks against these top-tier command terms.

Why the four core units recur across every paper

Because Power, sovereignty and international relations; Human rights; Development; and Peace and conflict are compulsory core units examined at every level, Papers 1 and 2 are built to draw questions from across all four rather than allowing a student to specialise in only one or two – a revision plan that concentrates disproportionately on a favourite unit while under-preparing another risks a significant gap on exam day. Because HL students additionally sit Paper 3 on two contemporary case studies chosen from the syllabus’s engagement options, HL revision should treat the four core units and the case-study content as complementary rather than substitutable – strong core-unit understanding underpins strong case-study analysis, since the case studies are examined through the same core concepts.

How this compares to a related individuals-and-societies subject

Like other individuals-and-societies DP subjects, Global Politics combines external written examination with an internally assessed, individually graded component – but its engagement activity is distinctive in requiring genuine first-hand engagement with a real political issue, rather than a desk-research essay or a fieldwork-based investigation as in some sibling subjects. This hands-on requirement reflects the course’s own stated aim of connecting political theory to lived political reality, and is worth planning for well in advance, since arranging a genuine engagement opportunity (an interview, an observation, participation in a campaign or organisation) often takes longer to organise than a purely library-based research task.

Exam traps

• Preparing Paper 1 and Paper 2 around only one or two of the four core units, when all four are examinable.
• Treating the engagement activity as a research essay, missing the required direct-engagement component.
• HL students underestimating Paper 3’s case-study demands, since it’s a distinct paper from Papers 1-2.

Self-test

1. Name the four core units common to every DP Global Politics student.
2. What distinguishes the engagement activity from a standard research essay?
3. What is Paper 3, and who sits it?
4. What are Paper 1 and Paper 2 weighted at, at SL?
5. Name one criterion the engagement activity is graded against, beyond the quality of the direct engagement itself.
6. Why do “evaluate” and “discuss” answers in this subject need to engage with more than one viewpoint?

Answers: 1. Power, sovereignty and international relations; human rights; development; peace and conflict. 2. It requires direct engagement with a real political issue, not desk research alone, complemented afterward with theoretical perspectives. 3. A paper examining two contemporary global political challenges through case studies, sat only by HL students. 4. Paper 1: 30%, Paper 2: 45%. 5. Any of: integration of theoretical perspectives, critical analysis connecting the engagement to broader theory, or reflection on the process and its limitations. 6. Because Global Politics is built around contested concepts and competing perspectives, so a one-sided answer at the top command-term tier typically loses marks against those criteria.

Official syllabus

International Baccalaureate Organization, Diploma Programme Subject Brief – Individuals and Societies: Global Politics, first assessment 2026, published 2023 – the same source cited by the full syllabus guide and the subject overview.