Practice IB Global Politics Topic Identity with authentic exam-style questions for both SL and HL students. This question bank focuses on the exact syllabus content for Identity and mirrors Paper 1, 2, 3 style where relevant.
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Stimulus
Text extract (adapted): "For decades Hong Kong's residents held an identity distinct from the mainland, shaped by rule of law, a free press and the 'one country, two systems' promise. After the mass protests of 2019, Beijing imposed a National Security Law in June 2020 that criminalised secession, subversion and 'collusion with foreign forces'. Officials said the law restored order and a proper sense of national belonging. Within two years, opposition newspapers had closed, activists had been jailed or had fled, and civil-society groups had disbanded. Surveys had already shown that fewer young people identified as 'Chinese'. Critics argue that a shared identity cannot be legislated into existence; imposing one by force tends to harden the very difference it seeks to erase."
Using the stimulus, identify three things it suggests about Beijing's approach to identity in Hong Kong.
Analyse one political issue raised by attempting to impose a national identity through law.
Recommend a course of action that a central government could take to build shared national belonging in a region with a distinct identity without resorting to coercion, and consider its limitations.
Evaluate the extent to which imposing a single national identity through coercive law deepens rather than resolves an identity crisis.
Stimulus
Adapted from Belonging Without Papers: Citizenship and the Politics of Recognition by Nadia Okafor (2022), published in the Review of Comparative Nationhood.
Membership of a political community can be granted along two very different logics. Under 'ethnic nationalism', belonging is inherited: the nation is imagined as a community of shared ancestry, language and religion, and the state reserves full citizenship for those who fit that lineage. Groups outside the imagined bloodline are treated as permanent outsiders, however long they have lived within the territory.
By contrast, 'civic nationalism' defines the nation through shared institutions and a common commitment to the rules of the political community. Membership is open, in principle, to anyone who resides, participates and consents, regardless of origin. Yet even civic states quietly police belonging through language tests, loyalty oaths and documentation requirements, so that legal recognition and lived belonging rarely align perfectly.
Using at least two examples from the stimulus, contrast 'ethnic nationalism' with 'civic nationalism' as described in the text.
With explicit reference to a global political challenge from one of your researched case studies, explain how a state has used citizenship or nationality law to exclude a particular identity group.
Based on your answer to part (b), recommend a reform that would strengthen the political recognition of the excluded group.
Evaluate the extent to which the denial of legal recognition, rather than economic grievance, is the primary driver of identity-based conflict. Base your response on one researched case study and integrate links to at least two HL extension topic areas.
Stimulus
Text extract (adapted): "In August 2021 France passed a law to 'reinforce respect for the principles of the Republic', widely known as the anti-separatism law. It expanded the state's power to monitor mosques, associations and home schooling, framing a strict reading of secularism as a shield against radicalisation. Supporters argued the state was protecting shared national values after the murders at Charlie Hebdo, the Bataclan and, in 2020, of the teacher Samuel Paty. Critics replied that treating an entire religious minority as a security problem tells young French Muslims that their faith and their citizenship cannot coexist, and that suspicion, not belief, is what pushes a few towards the very extremism the law claims to prevent."
Using the stimulus, identify three things it suggests about how France has responded to the presence of a religious minority.
Analyse one political issue raised by the securitisation of a religious identity.
Recommend a course of action that a government could take to protect public safety without alienating a religious minority, and consider its limitations.
Evaluate the extent to which securitising a minority religious identity does more to create insecurity than to prevent it.
Stimulus
Adapted from Language, Loyalty and the State by Delal Aydin (2022), published in Minority Politics Review.
Groups that share a distinct language and history but lack a state of their own tend to press one of two demands. 'Cultural autonomy' asks the state to protect the group's difference within existing borders: mother-tongue education, media in the community's language, and freedom to practise its traditions. It accepts the sovereignty of the central state and seeks recognition and space inside it.
'Political sovereignty' is a more fundamental claim to govern: control over territory, security and law, whether through deep federal self-rule or an independent state. Central governments frequently grant limited cultural rights while treating any move toward political sovereignty as a threat to national unity, criminalising the parties and militias that pursue it.
Using at least two examples from the stimulus, distinguish between 'cultural autonomy' and 'political sovereignty'.
With explicit reference to a global political challenge from one of your researched case studies, explain how a stateless national group has sought either cultural rights or political autonomy.
Based on your answer to part (b), recommend a political arrangement that could accommodate the group's demands while preserving state unity.
Evaluate the extent to which granting cultural rights to a national minority reduces, rather than intensifies, demands for full political sovereignty. Base your response on one researched case study and integrate links to at least two HL extension topic areas.
Stimulus
Adapted from Who Counts as a Citizen? Documentation and the New Nationalism by Priya Ramaswamy (2023), published in the Journal of Rights and Membership.
Modern states increasingly decide belonging through paperwork. Under an 'inclusive citizenship' model, membership rests on birth or long residence within the territory, and the burden of proof sits with the state: a person is presumed to belong unless shown otherwise. Documentation exists to serve the resident.
An 'exclusive citizenship' model reverses this logic. Here belonging must be actively proven by the individual through registers, ancestry records and official lists, and those who cannot produce the required documents can be stripped of status. When such registers are combined with fast-track pathways for some religious or ethnic groups but not others, documentation becomes a filter that sorts long-settled populations into citizens and suspected foreigners.
Using at least two examples from the stimulus, contrast 'inclusive citizenship' with 'exclusive citizenship'.
With explicit reference to a global political challenge from one of your researched case studies, explain how a documentation or registration policy has affected the political status of a minority group.
Based on your answer to part (b), recommend a safeguard that would protect vulnerable groups from wrongful loss of citizenship.
Evaluate the extent to which majoritarian nationalism poses a greater threat to minority rights than external interference. Base your response on one researched case study and integrate links to at least two HL extension topic areas.