History

Course summary

Authoritarian states in the 20th century, analysing the rise, consolidation and development of authoritarian states as well as opposition to them. It will concentrate on the governments of Stalin in Russia, Hitler in Germany and Mao in China. The Move to Global War, investigating the nature of wars in the twentieth century, focusing in particular on the First and Second World Wars, the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, the Chinese Civil War 1927-37 and 1946-49, the Falklands/Malvinas war of 1982 and the Gulf War of 1991. Higher Level students will additionally study European history in the 19th and 20th centuries. They will look in more detail than the Standard Level course at a range of topics from Imperial Russia under Alexander II, to the rebuilding of the European continent after devastation of the 2nd World War. European diplomacy and the First World War 1870-1923 will involve a more thorough analysis of the long-term causes of the breakdown of pre-1914 diplomacy and the wider consequences of that breakdown after the First World War.