IB History HL key terms

The compulsory Paper 1 topic chosen by the school from the IB History guide, studied through a set of primary and secondary sources that students analyse for origin, purpose, value and limitation.

Origin, purpose, value and limitation: the four-part framework used to evaluate a historical source, considering who made it, why, what it reveals, and what it cannot show.

The background information about a source, such as its author, date, place of creation, intended audience and context, which shapes how far its content can be trusted.

Material created during or close to the period under study, such as letters, speeches, photographs, treaties or diaries, offering direct contemporary evidence of events.

An account produced after the events by someone interpreting earlier evidence, such as a textbook, biography or academic article, valuable for synthesis but dependent on primary material.

A slant or partiality in a source arising from the creator's interests, beliefs or audience, which does not automatically make the source useless but must be identified and explained.

Deliberately persuasive material, often state-produced, designed to shape public opinion or behaviour, usually by simplifying issues and appealing to emotion rather than evidence.

The suppression or control of information, images or expression by an authority, which limits what contemporaries could publish and alerts historians to gaps in the surviving record.

Checking one source's claims against independent evidence from another source to test reliability, noting whether accounts agree, conflict or simply repeat a shared origin.

The extent to which a source can be trusted as evidence, judged from its provenance, internal consistency, corroboration and the purpose for which it was produced.

How useful a source is for answering a specific enquiry, a judgement that depends on the question asked rather than on whether the source is generally trustworthy.

A Paper 1 task requiring candidates to compare sources, assess their value and limitations, or synthesise them into an argument, always grounded in the supplied documents.

A form of rule seeking total control over public and private life through a single party, ideology, terror, mass mobilisation and modern communications, exemplified by Nazi Germany and Stalin's USSR.

A system where power is concentrated in a leader or elite with limited political pluralism and weak accountability, but which may not attempt the total social control associated with totalitarianism.

Sustained official glorification of a leader through propaganda, portraits and rituals, intended to generate devotion and legitimise authority beyond ordinary political support.

The forced consolidation of private farmland into state or collective farms, carried out in the USSR from 1929, intended to extract grain and control the peasantry, and causing famine and mass resistance.

A state programme setting production targets for industry and agriculture over five years, central to Soviet economic policy from 1928 and used to justify rapid, often coercive, industrialisation.

An economic system in which the state owns key resources and sets output, prices and investment through central planning rather than market exchange.

The Soviet campaigns of the late 1930s involving mass arrests, show trials, executions and labour-camp imprisonment, used by Stalin to eliminate rivals and intimidate society.

The policy of conceding limited demands to an aggressive power to avoid war, associated with British and French responses to Hitler before 1939 and debated as either prudent or disastrous.

The idea that states should jointly resist aggression, embodied in the League of Nations and later the United Nations, but weakened by great-power non-membership and limited enforcement.

The interwar international organisation founded in 1920 to settle disputes and prevent war, hampered by the absence of the USA and by reliance on voluntary economic and military sanctions.

The September 1938 settlement in which Britain, France and Italy allowed Germany to annex the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia, widely cited as the high point of appeasement.

The prolonged global rivalry between the USA and USSR and their allies after 1945, conducted through ideology, alliances, arms races, proxy wars and propaganda rather than direct superpower war.

US strategy of preventing the spread of communism beyond existing borders through economic aid, alliances and military commitment, articulated by George Kennan and applied in Europe and Asia.

The 1947 US pledge to support free peoples resisting subjugation, first applied to Greece and Turkey, marking a decisive turn towards global containment of communism.

The US programme of economic aid to western Europe from 1948, designed to rebuild prosperity, stabilise politics and reduce the appeal of communism.

A conflict in which major powers support opposing local forces rather than fighting each other directly, as in Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan during the Cold War.

A period of relaxed tension between rival powers, especially the USA and USSR in the 1970s, marked by arms-control talks and increased dialogue without ending underlying competition.

The process by which colonies gained political independence from European empires, accelerating after 1945 through nationalist movements, weakened imperial finances and international pressure.

A policy of avoiding formal alliance with either Cold War bloc, promoted by states such as India, Egypt and Yugoslavia to preserve independence and gain leverage from both sides.

A political force emphasising the identity and interests of a nation, capable of unifying states, driving independence movements, or justifying aggression and ethnic exclusion.

The study of how history has been written, including changing interpretations, schools of thought and debates among historians about causes and significance.

A particular historian's or school's explanation of events, shaped by evidence available and contemporary concerns, which candidates must compare rather than treat as fixed fact.

The re-examination of established historical accounts in light of new evidence or arguments, producing interpretations that challenge earlier orthodox views.

The analysis of why events happened, distinguishing long-term structural conditions, medium-term developments and short-term triggers, and weighing their relative importance.

The role of chance, choice and accident in shaping events, an idea used to challenge explanations that treat outcomes as inevitable products of deep structural forces.

A judgement about why an event, person or development matters, assessed by criteria such as scale of impact, duration, depth and relevance to later developments.

The internally assessed HL research project, requiring a focused question, evaluation of sources, investigation and reflection on the methods used.

A narrow, answerable question framing the historical investigation, specifying place, period and issue closely enough to be researched within the word limit.

The investigation section in which candidates assess selected sources for origin, purpose, value and limitation and explain how these shaped the evidence used.

The final investigation section where candidates discuss what the research revealed about the methods and challenges of the historian's work, not simply restating findings.

The approach a historian takes to selecting, interpreting and organising evidence, including the choices and limits that shape the conclusions reached.