🏛️ OPTIONAL — POLITICAL SCIENCE & INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS (PSIR)

Papers: VI & VII · 250 marks each · 500 total Best for: non-technical backgrounds; anyone genuinely interested in politics, governance and world affairs. GS overlap: VERY HIGH — covers almost all of GS-II (polity, governance, IR), much of Essay, and most interview policy questions. Effectively you prepare two things at once.

⚠️ Verify the exact syllabus against the current UPSC notification at upsc.gov.in before you begin.

PAPER I

Section A — Political Theory and Indian Politics

1. Political Theory: meaning and approaches.
2. Theories of the State: Liberal, Neo-liberal, Marxist, Pluralist, Post-colonial and Feminist.
3. Justice: conceptions of justice with special reference to Rawls' theory of justice and its communitarian critiques.
4. Equality: social, political and economic; relationship between equality and freedom; affirmative action.
5. Rights: meaning and theories; different kinds of rights; concept of human rights.
6. Democracy: classical and contemporary theories; different models of democracy — representative, participatory and deliberative.
7. Concept of Power: hegemony, ideology and legitimacy.
8. Political Ideologies: Liberalism, Socialism, Marxism, Fascism, Gandhism.
9. Indian Political Thought: Dharamshastra, Arthashastra and Buddhist traditions; Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, Sri Aurobindo, M.K. Gandhi, B.R. Ambedkar, M.N. Roy.
10. Western Political Thought: Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, John S. Mill, Marx, Gramsci, Hannah Arendt.

Section B — Indian Government and Politics

1. Indian Nationalism: (a) Political Strategies of India's Freedom Struggle — constitutionalism to mass Satyagraha, Non-Cooperation, Civil Disobedience; militant and revolutionary movements; peasant and worker movements. (b) Perspectives on Indian National Movement — liberal, socialist and Marxist; radical humanist and Dalit.
2. Making of the Indian Constitution: legacies of the British rule; different social and political perspectives.
3. Salient Features of the Indian Constitution: the Preamble, Fundamental Rights and Duties, Directive Principles; Parliamentary System and Amendment Procedures; Judicial Review and Basic Structure doctrine.
4. (a) Principal Organs of the Union Government: envisaged role and actual working of the President, Prime Minister, Parliament and Supreme Court. (b) Principal Organs of the State Government: Governor, Chief Minister, State Legislature, High Court.
5. Grassroots Democracy: Panchayati Raj and Municipal Government; significance of the 73rd and 74th Amendments; Grassroots movements.
6. Statutory Institutions/Commissions: Election Commission, CAG, Finance Commission, UPSC, National Commission for SCs/STs, National Commission for Women, NHRC, National Commission for Minorities, National Backward Classes Commission.
7. Federalism: constitutional provisions; changing nature of Centre-State relations; integrationist tendencies and regional aspirations; inter-state disputes.
8. Planning and Economic Development: Nehruvian and Gandhian perspectives; role of planning and public sector; Green Revolution, land reforms and agrarian relations; liberalisation and economic reforms.
9. Caste, Religion and Ethnicity in Indian Politics.
10. Party System: national and regional political parties, ideological and social bases of parties; patterns of coalition politics; pressure groups, trends in electoral behaviour; changing socio-economic profile of legislators.
11. Social Movements: civil liberties and human rights movements; women's movements; environmentalist movements.

PAPER II

Section A — Comparative Politics and International Relations

1. Comparative Politics: nature and major approaches; political economy and political sociology perspectives; limitations of the comparative method.
2. State in Comparative Perspective: characteristics and changing nature of the State in capitalist and socialist economies, and advanced industrial and developing societies.
3. Politics of Representation and Participation: political parties, pressure groups and social movements in advanced industrial and developing societies.
4. Globalisation: responses from developed and developing societies.
5. Approaches to the Study of International Relations: Idealist, Realist, Marxist, Functionalist and Systems theory.
6. Key Concepts in International Relations: national interest, security and power; balance of power and deterrence; transnational actors and collective security; world capitalist economy and globalisation.
7. Changing International Political Order: (a) rise of superpowers, strategic and ideological Bipolarity, arms race and Cold War, nuclear threat; (b) non-aligned movement — aims and achievements; (c) collapse of the Soviet Union, unipolarity and American hegemony, relevance of non-alignment in the contemporary world.
8. Evolution of the International Economic System: from Brettonwoods to WTO; socialist economies and CMEA; Third World demand for a New International Economic Order; globalisation of the world economy.
9. United Nations: envisaged role and actual record; specialized UN agencies — aims and functioning; the need for UN reforms.
10. Regionalisation of World Politics: EU, ASEAN, APEC, SAARC, NAFTA.
11. Contemporary Global Concerns: democracy, human rights, environment, gender justice, terrorism, nuclear proliferation.

Section B — India and the World

1. Indian Foreign Policy: determinants of foreign policy; the institutions of policy-making; continuity and change.
2. India's Contribution to the Non-Alignment Movement: different phases; current role.
3. India and South Asia: (a) Regional Co-operation — SAARC, past performance and future prospects; (b) South Asia as a Free Trade Area; (c) India's "Look East"/"Act East" policy; (d) impediments to regional co-operation — river water disputes, illegal cross-border migration, ethnic conflicts and insurgencies, border disputes.
4. India and the Global South: relations with Africa and Latin America; leadership role in the demand for NIEO and WTO negotiations.
5. India and the Global Centres of Power: USA, EU, Japan, China and Russia.
6. India and the UN System: role in UN Peace-keeping; demand for Permanent Seat in the Security Council.
7. India and the Nuclear Question: changing perceptions and policy.
8. Recent Developments in Indian Foreign Policy: India's position on the recent crises in Afghanistan, Iraq and West Asia; growing relations with the US and Israel; vision of a new world order.

BOOKLIST

STRATEGY

• Paper I Section A is the scoring section — thinker-based questions are predictable and repeat. Master 10 Western + 5 Indian thinkers thoroughly.
• Quote scholars by name in every answer — this is the single biggest differentiator in PSIR.
• Paper II is current-affairs heavy. Maintain a running file on India's bilateral relations, updated monthly.
• Solve 15 years of PYQs — PSIR repeats themes heavily.
• Build a thinker-quote bank and a scholar-opinion bank (e.g., on federalism: Granville Austin, Morris-Jones, K.C. Wheare).
• Draw flowcharts for theories; examiners reward visual organisation.

Pros: huge GS-II overlap, abundant material, intuitive for most candidates. Cons: very popular (answers must stand out), Paper II needs constant current-affairs updating, long syllabus.