MAPS OF HISTORY · IB HISTORY · PAPER 2 · POPULAR MOVEMENTS
IB HISTORY · PAPER 2 · THEMATIC STUDY
Paper 2: Popular Movements
Popular Movements is one of the four Paper 2 Thematic Studies of the new IB History course, first examined in May 2028, and it draws its examples from 1750 onwards. The theme is about movements that mobilised large numbers of ordinary people: why they arose, how they forced change, how states and opponents pushed back, and what they achieved. It is organised around four questions, and a strong essay uses examples from more than one region, so under each question below the chapters are grouped by region.
Open any chapter listed here in its atlas and its IB notes offer evidence to quote, primary sources and a practice question with a model essay plan. Between them they cover seventeen chapters in three atlases, set in Europe, the Americas, Asia and Oceania, and Africa and the Middle East.
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1. Why did popular movements emerge?
6 CHAPTERS WITH IB NOTES · 2 REGIONS
The Americas
- The Revolution Crosses the AtlanticTWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 2 · 1789–1791
- The Problem That Has No NamePROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 1 · 1945–1963
Who gained rights under the National Assembly’s decree of 15 May 1791? Only men of colour born to a free father and a free mother: a few hundred people. Even that grant was cancelled on 24 September 1791.— Two Roads to Independence, chapter 2: The Revolution Crosses the Atlantic
Africa and the Middle East
- The White HighlandsTWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 7 · 1895–1939
- War, Land and the OathTWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 8 · 1939–1952
- Ben Ali: Stability and SilencePROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 8 · 1987–2010
- Twenty-Eight DaysPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 9 · DECEMBER 2010 – JANUARY 2011
The Uganda Railway cost about £5.5 million, far more than the estimates presented to Parliament. Built from 1896 to 1901 by 31,983 workers recruited in British India, it needed to pay for itself; officials invited settlers to the highlands with that purpose in mind.— Two Roads to Independence, chapter 7: The White Highlands
2. How did they create change?
5 CHAPTERS WITH IB NOTES · 4 REGIONS
Europe
- The Union UnravelsREMAKING THE STATE · CHAPTER 9 · 1989–1991
In autumn 1989, communist governments fell across Eastern Europe while Gorbachev declined to send troops; on 9 November the Berlin Wall opened. People inside the Soviet Union saw Moscow hold back abroad and could ask whether it would also refrain from using force against them.— Remaking the State, chapter 9: The Union Unravels
The Americas
- Organising for EqualityPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 2 · 1963–1970
- The Personal Is PoliticalPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 3 · 1968–1975
In its first year, the EEOC received about a third of its complaints from people alleging sex discrimination. Officials nevertheless treated the clause as a “fluke”; NOW was founded on 30 June 1966 to press for action.— Protest and Change, chapter 2: Organising for Equality
Asia and Oceania
- Building the Meiji StateREMAKING THE STATE · CHAPTER 5 · 1877–1894
From 1881 the finance minister Matsukata Masayoshi reduced the money supply, raised taxes and founded the Bank of Japan. By 1884 rice prices had roughly halved in some regions. Indebted silk farmers rose at Chichibu that November, revealing who bore the cost of sound money.— Remaking the State, chapter 5: Building the Meiji State
Africa and the Middle East
- Building a DemocracyPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 10 · 2011–2014
Tunisians went to the polls on 23 October 2011 to elect a Constituent Assembly; about 4.3 million voted. Ennahda took 89 of the 217 seats and formed a governing coalition with two secular parties.— Protest and Change, chapter 10: Building a Democracy
3. How were they challenged?
2 CHAPTERS WITH IB NOTES · 2 REGIONS
The Americas
- The ERA and the BacklashPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 5 · 1972–1982
On 15 March 1973, Nebraska voted to rescind its ratification. Tennessee, Idaho, Kentucky, and South Dakota later did the same. Whether a state could take that step raised a constitutional question the courts never settled.— Protest and Change, chapter 5: The ERA and the Backlash
Africa and the Middle East
- Terrorism and FragilityPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 11 · 2012–2015
A UN working group reported in July 2015 that up to 1,500 Tunisians were fighting in Libya and about 4,000 in Syria. The figures were widely reported as a total of about 5,500.— Protest and Change, chapter 11: Terrorism and Fragility
4. What was their impact?
5 CHAPTERS WITH IB NOTES · 3 REGIONS
The Americas
- Who Was Left Out?PROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 4 · 1970–1981
- A Global MovementPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 6 · 1975–1985
The Relf sisters were twelve and fourteen when they were sterilized at a federally funded clinic in Montgomery, Alabama, in June 1973. The ensuing lawsuit cited estimates that 100,000 to 150,000 such sterilizations took place each year.— Protest and Change, chapter 4: Who Was Left Out?
Africa and the Middle East
- The Road to UhuruTWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 10 · 1960–1963
- Building a DemocracyPROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 10 · 2011–2014
KADU was founded under Ronald Ngala on 25 June 1960. It sought majimbo: regions whose powers over land would be protected. The second Lancaster House conference put that arrangement into the constitution in 1962.— Two Roads to Independence, chapter 10: The Road to Uhuru
More than one region
- Two Movements ComparedPROTEST AND CHANGE · EPILOGUE · 1945–2015
The gains did not reach everyone. The National Welfare Rights Organization collapsed in 1975. In Tunisia’s Centre-West, poverty stood at 32 per cent in 2010, and the revolution did not close that gap.— Protest and Change, chapter 12: Two Movements Compared
Practice questions and essay plans
What would your answer be? Make a plan for each question, then compare it with the outline. The outline gives a thesis and a claim for each paragraph. The first plan comes from a free chapter and is shown in full. For evidence, a counter-argument and a judgement, see the full plans in the chapters’ IB notes in each atlas.
PAPER 2 · TWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 2
How far did the ideas of the French Revolution cause the rising of August 1791?
French revolutionary ideas helped open the way to the rising by dividing the free population and weakening authority in the colony. But the enslaved planned the rising through networks of their own and brought their own aims to it. The French Revolution supplied a trigger and a language to use; the agency of the enslaved was the driving force.
The Revolution divided those who ruled the colony.
EVIDENCEPlanters formed colonial assemblies, the boldest at Saint-Marc in 1790. Free men of colour pressed for rights, and Ogé took up arms in October 1790. Paris granted rights in May 1791 and withdrew them in September.
LINKThese conflicts among the free weakened the forces that kept the enslaved in check.
The enslaved used their own networks to organize the rising.
EVIDENCEDrivers met on 14 August 1791. According to tradition, Boukman led a ceremony at Bois Caïman that bound the leaders together; the rising began across many estates at once on 22–23 August.
LINKCoordinating action on that scale depended on structures planters ignored, including estate drivers and religious gatherings.
The insurgents drew on aims and ideas beyond those of France.
EVIDENCEThe leaders flew royalist flags and claimed that the king had granted free days. Thornton argues that many Kongolese veterans thought in terms of just kingship. In December 1791 the leaders sought freedom for only a few hundred officers.
LINKThe rising had more than one source of ideas. Universal emancipation emerged later, as the war developed.
Historians in the tradition of C. L. R. James give French revolutionary ideas a more direct role. Sailors, servants and news, they emphasize, carried the language of rights to the enslaved, and the rising followed 1789 by only two years. The insurgents’ later appeals to the rights of man in negotiations support this reading.
The French Revolution was a necessary trigger: it divided the free population and supplied a language of rights. The main cause, however, lay in the organization, experience and aims of the enslaved. They used French ideas, but the rising was not defined by those ideas alone.
Read the chapter behind this plan: The Revolution Crosses the Atlantic.
PAPER 2 · REMAKING THE STATE · CHAPTER 5
How far was the Freedom and People’s Rights movement responsible for the introduction of the Meiji constitution in 1889?
The movement was largely responsible for the constitution’s timing: its petitions helped force the government’s promise of 1881. The content owed more to the oligarchs, the small circle who ran the government. They wanted institutions Western powers would accept for treaty revision, and they kept power with the emperor’s advisers.
Popular pressure made a constitution difficult to avoid.
The oligarchs also had a diplomatic reason to introduce a constitution.
The oligarchs contained the movement while directing the constitution’s design.
The evidence for each point, the counter-argument and the judgement are in the IB notes of chapter 5 in the atlas. Read the chapter first: Building the Meiji State.
PAPER 2 · PROTEST AND CHANGE · CHAPTER 1
To what extent was the emergence of second-wave feminism in the United States caused by changes in women’s economic position after 1945?
Economic change was the deepest cause of second-wave feminism. As more married women entered paid work, unequal pay became a grievance they encountered in daily life. Economic change made the movement possible; writers and officials named and measured the grievance, while ideas and institutions helped turn it into a movement.
Women’s growing participation in paid work exposed them to unequal rewards.
Women’s unequal legal standing gave reformers a political target.
Ideas and institutions helped give private discontent an organized form.
The evidence for each point, the counter-argument and the judgement are in the IB notes of chapter 1 in the atlas. Read the chapter first: The Problem That Has No Name.
PAPER 2 · TWO ROADS TO INDEPENDENCE · CHAPTER 10
“Kenya’s independence was granted by Britain, not won by Kenyans.” Discuss.
Britain did control the timing and setting of decolonization, but that is only part of the story. Kenyans created pressures under which Britain decided to leave, and their parties helped determine the settlement, from Kenyatta’s release to majimbo. The statement gives too little weight to their actions.
Britain controlled the process.
Kenyans made staying too costly.
Kenyan parties shaped the terms.
The evidence for each point, the counter-argument and the judgement are in the IB notes of chapter 10 in the atlas. Read the chapter first: The Road to Uhuru.
Key concepts
These are the concepts the IB notes of the seventeen chapters above name most often for this theme, with chapters to read for each.
- Causation · 9 CHAPTERS
Why something happened: the long-term conditions, the triggers and the choices behind it, and which of them mattered most. For example: The Revolution Crosses the Atlantic, The White Highlands, War, Land and the Oath, The Road to Uhuru. - Change · 7 CHAPTERS
What was different afterwards, how quickly it changed, and for whom. For example: War, Land and the Oath, The Road to Uhuru, Building the Meiji State, Organising for Equality. - Perspectives · 7 CHAPTERS
How people at the time, and historians since, have seen the same events differently, and why. For example: The Revolution Crosses the Atlantic, Building the Meiji State, Organising for Equality, Who Was Left Out?. - Significance · 6 CHAPTERS
Why an event, person or idea matters, judged by its effects and by how it has been remembered. For example: The Revolution Crosses the Atlantic, The Union Unravels, The Problem That Has No Name, Who Was Left Out?. - Consequence · 4 CHAPTERS
What followed from an event or decision, intended and unintended, in the short and the long term. For example: The White Highlands, The Personal Is Political, Building a Democracy, Terrorism and Fragility. - Continuity · 2 CHAPTERS
What stayed the same through an apparent upheaval, and why it survived. For example: Ben Ali: Stability and Silence, Terrorism and Fragility.
More atlases for this theme
These atlases are filed under Popular Movements. An “IB notes” mark means that every chapter has those notes. The other atlases cover the theme in their chapters; each has an IB History page with study notes and essay questions.
Second-wave feminism and the Tunisian revolution
A slave revolution and a colony’s Emergency, side by side
How Japan and Russia changed their systems
From the American Revolution to the barricades of 1848
From the rising of 1857 to Nehru’s republic
Fifty new nations in fifty years
How each began and what it left
The atlases without IB notes still answer the first and last questions of any theme: each opening chapter argues why its story began, and each closing chapter what it left behind. Here are those arguments in headline form, with the chapters that make them in full.
The Age of Revolutions
1775 – 1848 · 12 CHAPTERS
How it began. The World of 1775: Paying for an empire · Readers and the language of rights · An empire sustained by slavery · The people beyond the line
What it left. 1848: The Springtime of Peoples: Changes that endured · Unification by other means · Exiles carry the arguments abroad · The age in the balance
Indian Independence & Partition
1857 – 1964 · 15 CHAPTERS
How it began. The Rebellion and the Crown: Dalhousie’s annexations and the Doctrine of Lapse · Awadh: an annexation that reached the barracks · An army that no longer trusted its masters · The cartridge: a rumour as trigger
What it left. Building the Republic: A democracy that held · The unfinished revolution of caste and gender · A planned economy and its limits · Borders still in dispute
The Decolonization of Africa
1945 – 1994 · 12 CHAPTERS
How it began. How Thin the Empire Really Was: Rule by a handful, through intermediaries · An economy built for extraction, not development · The war as solvent · Pan-Africanism finds its leaders
What it left. What Independence Achieved, and Could Not: Rwanda, April–July 1994 · Democracy and the 1990s · Follow a country
On the old course (2027 exams)
Students sitting the old course in 2027 will find the closest match in these world history topics, which our IB notes also tag:
- World history topic 8: Independence movements (1800–2000) · 5 CHAPTERS
Two Roads to Independence - Prescribed subject 4: Rights and protest · 2 CHAPTERS
Protest and Change
The old-course page lists every chapter by topic.
Revision tools
Test yourself on the atlases with IB notes for this theme. Each atlas ends with a map quiz that asks you to find places and moments on the map itself; the quick quiz and the printable study guide are free pages on this site.
- Protest and Change
MAP QUIZ · QUICK QUIZ · PRINTABLE STUDY GUIDE - Two Roads to Independence: Haiti and Kenya
MAP QUIZ · QUICK QUIZ · PRINTABLE STUDY GUIDE - Remaking the State: Meiji Japan and Post-Soviet Russia
MAP QUIZ · QUICK QUIZ · PRINTABLE STUDY GUIDE
Maps of History is independent and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the International Baccalaureate Organization. IB course names describe alignment only; paper, theme and section names follow the new course outline and may change when the final guide is published.
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