He mentions this thing about fractured multilateralism which I felt like would be an excellent point to include in answers which is quotable. Also he mentions about India's nuclear policy. I don't think it's something that we can quote him on, but it's still a good general view that we can include in our answers.
In today's editorials in the Hindu there was a line I really liked. "Theory of interests is superseding ideology in foreign policy." I felt like this statement also goes along very well with the "world of convergences" as described by our EAM.Has this been not mostly the case with India? Interests over ideology?
Well interests has been at the core of foreign policy throughout history for sure, but in the few decades after the establishment of the UN ideology played a significant role (liberalism and democracy). For example, NAM was a policy created as both an ideology and in the self-interest of developing nations. In the current scenario, NAM has lost its relevance. Not because it's ideology is flawed but because nations like India find no real benefit from it i.e. interests. So I would argue that while interests were always a core part of foreign policy, the role of ideology has decreased which causes the relative importance of interests to increase in foreign policy formulation. So the statement that the theory of interests is superseding ideology doesn't mean interests were not present before, but only that it is gaining more importance than ideology. Though I think the realist school of international relations would argue that ideology has never played a role in international relations and that it was only interest or the drive for power that shaped international politics.
Well interests has been at the core of foreign policy throughout history for sure, but in the few decades after the establishment of the UN ideology played a significant role (liberalism and democracy). For example, NAM was a policy created as both an ideology and in the self-interest of developing nations. In the current scenario, NAM has lost its relevance. Not because it's ideology is flawed but because nations like India find no real benefit from it i.e. interests. So I would argue that while interests were always a core part of foreign policy, the role of ideology has decreased which causes the relative importance of interests to increase in foreign policy formulation. So the statement that the theory of interests is superseding ideology doesn't mean interests were not present before, but only that it is gaining more importance than ideology. Though I think the realist school of international relations would argue that ideology has never played a role in international relations and that it was only interest or the drive for power that shaped international politics.
That’s a good explanation.
Is there any example of a decision being made by a country choosing ideology and sacrificing a significant interest? Most examples have both in the same direction.
This would be a realist view, but one could say that ideology has always been a nice way to package and back up decisions that were made based on practical interests, like the European identity ideal for the EEC/EU, or NAM. As the world order stabilises with respect to one country’s dominance (US), or as a nation’s confidence and consequence in the world rise (India) the ideological cover might simply become unnecessary to sell a stand taken, both at home and globally. Might enables assertion of right. Besides, an ideology compatible with present day issues, that are far more complex, is naturally harder to devise. Perhaps what seems like pragmatism today, with enough academic writing and debate about it, might even be representable as ideology tomorrow!
Yupp exactly. Ideology will never survive unless it overlaps with interests.
Hello guys!. Preparing for 2022. As I have started just 2 months back. Thinking of PSIR as an optional. As I am working so the dynamic part and overlap with GS may help and I am interested in thinkers. Is PSIR good for a working professional? And What about coaching? Shubra Ranjan tablet course will do? Or Piyush Choubey? Guide please.
I personally think if you are someone that can decently understand concepts when you read about them and just spend some time thinking things through coaching is not necessary. Like if you can comprehend what is being written in books like OP Gauba and Andrew Heywood, coaching is not a must. I personally read the basic books and used SR notes for value addition. This works for Section A of both papers. For IR, I just read a lot of articles and books on it because I have a lot of interest in the subject. For Section B of Paper I, I don't really know. It's, by far, my weakest part of PSIR.
https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/is-political-correctness-a-force-for-good
This doesn't really have anything to do with the exam, but I thought it was an interesting topic.
@MarcusA So 2 pages for 10 marks, 3 pages for 15 marks and 4 pages for 20 marks?
From where and how are you covering Section B of Paper I? I never covered it in a comprehensive manner and I personally find it the most difficult part of PSIR.Selective topics could be done from BL Fadia(sm, pg)
Freedom movement, perspective from Sekhar Bandopadhyay or Bipin chandra
Selective constitution topics from Bidyut Chakraborty or there is also another good book Oxford Handbook on Indian politics i guess
^^all these are good but very tough to complete in limited time
Thank you man. I'm only appearing in 2021 so I have some time. I guess I'll go through these sources selectively.
For 2B, I personally also used Dhananjay Singh Yadav's notes. He has a lot of quotes for each of the basic topics. I think they would be helpful in an introduction or conclusion. His notes can be found here: Optional | English, Agastya (home.blog). Also for Paper 2 in general, I would highly recommend the MEA website. Especially the speeches section and Distinguished Lectures.Thank you. He does have some good quotes.
But in MEA section, the lectures and speeches are from 2019 , are you referring to those?
Yeah the lectures are only till the end of 2019, but the speeches are frequently updated.
Had decided that would be spending June and July on optional . Make proper notes for all parts ( haven't done it yet) and join sr test series for answer writing practice . Also , give time for essay and write one every fortnight. (Coverage of 750 marks)
Now I'm confused after seeing AWFG 2.0 program of Forum . That would help in covering and note making of GS 2,3,4 . I would also be writing essay a fortnight. (Coverage of 1000 marks)
@AzadHindFauz @whatonly @sstarrr @dragon_rider and others , would be very helpful if you can provide some insights and give advice .
For info :
2 attempts
2019 : Pre didn't clear
2020: Pre cleared ; mains didn't clear
I think it depends on how good/bad you think you did on each paper. From what I've read and seen, I think the most important papers to focus on are the Optional, Ethics and Essay papers. I feel like if I can score extremely high in these (which means having to put in that much work for those papers) and average marks at the very least in GS 1, 2 and 3 then I should be fine. My reasoning is that it's difficult to outscore others on GS 1, 2, and 3 whereas I feel it's relatively easier to outscore the competition in ethics, essay and optional. Since you've written mains once, I'm assuming you have at least a basic framework of notes for the GS papers and if you don't have a complete set of notes for optional, I would suggest you focus on optional over GS.
DISCLAIMER: I have NOT cleared prelims till now so take everything I say, not with just a pinch of salt, but with a whole bucketful.
Also@whatonly and@AzadHindFauz , could you guys share a list of topics on which you prepared for the essay if you have such a list?
@Rewl1 I used to look at answer copies of Megha Arora and Trupti Dhodmise. Both had very different styles and got good marks (300+). I used to look at Megha Arora's copies, pick out questions from them to write, and compare with her answers to figure out exactly how to improve. I would suggest sticking to one or two people after looking at a few who have gotten good marks, depending on whose style you like, and then trying to see what you can take from them.
Didn't really listen to any talks. I read articles by Megha Arora, Ananya Das, and Dhananjay Singh.
https://medium.com/firestarter
https://unravellingcse.wordpress.com/2015/07/30/political-science-preparation-by-ananya-das-air-16/
That's a great idea to take questions toppers have answered and comparing our answers with theirs. I had not thought of doing that.
How to make crisp notes for psir.. I had made earlier and later ended up writing the whole thing which again has become bulky.. it's like everything seems important to me. Should I segregate things like - quotes of thinkers in one place, keywords in another, critics in one..
Please suggest 🙏
I would suggest mind maps with just the keywords, quotes and critics views etc. This is my mind map on Plato.
I plan on making these even shorter after maybe like two or three revisions. Also, these are missing a few other points like Plato and fascism, Karl Popper's criticism etc. and some quotes on Plato which I haven't updated to these yet (my laziness has nothing to do with this at all :P)
@dragon_rider The mind maps look very neat.Is there an app /software for this?
This is Mindmup. It's a free online software. I switched to Miro though because you can integrate it into Notion which just makes it easier since all my notes are in Notion.
paywall !!he has also written that becoming vishwaguru is pointless if the people of the country goes hungry, sick, and poor. definitely it might satisfy the ego , but the goal should be welfare and transformation of lives of ordinary people. Further he argues that historically only those rising powers have grown into major powers who have managed to control their urge to flaunt power and built their power silently. He gives example of peloponesian war b/w sparta and athens, Wilhelm germany, japan in 1930's. By being assertive prematurely on global stage , a state attracts wrath of the status quoist powers. Even china followed a policy ofI read somewhere regarding his book. He has written India is not ‘vishwa guru’ yet because world is much more realistic. A country's success is based on material power, hard power, economy, military strength, and ability to handle domestic affairs properly. Do you agree ?
By the way, Menons are in IFS for 3 generations now. Extraordinary !
hide your ambitions and disguise your claws, and only after global financial crisis became assertive and ambitious on global stage. But on the other hand there also arguments against this hiding strength argument. China was assertive right from the day zero, it went on to have a border war with india, a conflict with soviet in 60s, tiannanmen square , involvement in vietnam, korea et al
This reminded me of the funniest article headline that I've read recently
https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/07/28/oh-god-not-the-peloponnesian-war-again/
Clear your cache memory and try again.
SR TS lost credibility in my eyes. I had joined the TS that they launched like a while back for 2021 Mains and I didn't like it. In the 1st exam the topics covered were Plato, Aristotle and Machiavelli and yet one of the question was about the Indus Water Treaty. I mean there was only a total of 8 questions so it wouldn't have been that hard to just double or triple check the questions are from the proper topic at the least. It just made me feel like they're not being diligent in their efforts. I could be completely wrong and they are indeed very diligent and this was just a random mistake.
Also, I wanna point out that I didn't think their questions and model answers were bad at all. In fact, I think they're good to help us figure out a structure/framework for our answers and how to kind of connect a relatively vague question to something concrete in the syllabus.
Does anyone know of a good book that covers Eastern Philosophy? I'm looking for something similar to Story of Philosophy by Will Durant (as mentioned by@Villanelle) or A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell.
Unlike lending from China—and even from IMF and World Bank—Indian lines of credit are demand-driven, consultative, transparent, andnonconditional- Harsh pant
As a rule goods and services forminimum 75%value of contracts covered under Exim loans must be sourced from India - finance ministry
Exim loans are given to companies and corporations dealing with imports and exports right? I think Harsh Pant was talking about loans given to foreign governments but to be really sure I would have to look at the article in which he says this to understand the context.
Has anyone answered "Examine the changing pattern of electoral behaviour in India" (2011, 30 marks)?
I would start by saying how the study of electoral behavior is a result of the growth of the behavioral and post-behavioral approaches in political science and how it's important to understand the political atmosphere of a country.
Then I would mention Milan Vaishnav who pointed out the difficulty of studying EB in India due its size and diversity. Substantiate it with Kenneth Arrow's 'impossibility theorem.'
Then I would mention the trend in EB like how individuals vote more based on the party or the PM or CM candidate as in a presidential system than on the MP and MLA candidate. I would point out how people vote differently at national and state level and how the public differentiates between national issues and local issues (supported by the post-poll survey conducted by Lokniti). Also could mention 'federalization' of electoral politics where national elections are also heavily shaped by state-level factors.
I would also point out how people seem to be voting for criminals or those with criminal cases pending against them leading to criminalization of politics (maybe quote Milan Vaishnav again since it's a 30 mark question).
You could also add that voter turnout seems to be increasing as seen in the 2019 LS elections.
This is all I have in my notes, but we should definitely add the role of caste and religion in voting behavior and how it's changed, if it has changed. If anyone has these points, please post it here.
@dragon_rider @sstarrr I did a bit of reading up on it. Vaishnav does claim that there is a voter preference for criminals who can "get things done" in the context of weakening rule of law. However, there is also a counter-view by Abhijit Banerjee et al (2014)-
"Contrary to the voter preference hypothesis, voters presented with vignettes that randomly vary the attributes of competing legislative candidates for local, state, and national office become much less likely to express a preference for candidates who are alleged to be criminal or corrupt. Moreover, voters’ education status, ethnicity, and political knowledge are unrelated to their distaste for criminal and venal candidates. The results imply that the electoral performance of candidates who face serious allegations likely reflects factors other than voters’ preferences for patronage, such as limited information about candidate characteristics or the absence of credible alternative candidates with clean records."
This is great. I hadn't known Abhijit Bannerjee had given such a countering viewpoint.
