Précis: A passage on the international order in flux
Subtopic: Section B · Précis
How to structure your answer
Source passage (~750 words): the candidate will receive a passage arguing that the post-1945 international order — built on UN-centred multilateralism, open trade, Bretton Woods finance and a thin but real common law of war — is being remade rather than abandoned. The passage will describe four pressures: the rise of plural centres of power, the weaponisation of economic interdependence (sanctions, export controls, chip restrictions), the climate emergency demanding global coordination, and the technology race that no single country can win or regulate alone. It will argue that India's position is distinctive — not aligned with any one bloc, large enough to matter, young enough to grow — and that its preferred outcome is a reformed multilateralism in which the rule-makers reflect today's distribution of weight. It will close with the claim that the question is not whether the old order endures but whether what replaces it carries forward the universalist commitments — peace, development, human dignity — that justified it.
Approach: précis to ~245 words. Preserve the four pressures and India's distinctive position. The closing claim about universalist commitments is the thesis.
What an examiner expects: a noun-phrase title; one paragraph; the four pressures listed in one sentence; India's position described in one sentence; the closing thesis preserved; word count in brackets.
Common pitfalls: (1) describing each of the four pressures in a separate sentence and exhausting the word budget; (2) treating India's non-alignment as the thesis; (3) replacing 'remade, not abandoned' with 'collapsing'.
Detailed model answer
553 words · target 250 words · 25 min
Sample original passage: The international order built after 1945 was a deliberate experiment in cooperative restraint. Its architects, drawn largely from the victors of the Second World War, designed the United Nations system, the Bretton Woods institutions and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade to prevent the kind of unilateral conduct that had produced two catastrophic wars. The arrangement was always imperfect — the Cold War froze parts of it for four decades, decolonisation revealed its initial parochialism, and the structural privileges of the permanent five at the Security Council embedded an inequality that the Charter itself never acknowledged. But for most of the period since 1945, the framework provided a working set of rules under which the global economy expanded, the worst forms of inter-state conflict were avoided, and the basic norms of sovereign equality were nominally observed. That framework is now under unprecedented strain. The dominant economic power and the rising one are decoupling their technology stacks. The World Trade Organization's dispute-settlement mechanism has been disabled by sustained obstruction. The Security Council has been paralysed on the largest conflicts of the present decade. Multilateral climate finance has fallen short of the figures promised, and the rules-based aspects of cyberspace, outer space and artificial intelligence have not been credibly written into treaty form. Three responses are emerging. The first is regional: blocs such as the European Union, ASEAN and African Union are building their own dense rule-systems where global ones have weakened. The second is minilateral: groupings such as the Quad, the I2U2 and the BRICS are pursuing limited cooperation among willing partners. The third is structural reform: the long-overdue expansion of the Security Council, the recapitalisation of the multilateral development banks, and the negotiation of new instruments for technologies that did not exist when the original framework was written. Whether the order survives or fractures will depend on whether these responses cohere or compete.
Model précis (≈ 240 words): The international order built after 1945 was a deliberate experiment in cooperative restraint, designed by the war's victors through the United Nations, the Bretton Woods institutions and the GATT to prevent the unilateral conduct that had produced two catastrophic wars. The framework was always imperfect — frozen by the Cold War, parochial at its inception, and structured around the permanent privileges of five powers. But for most of the period since 1945 it provided a working set of rules under which the global economy expanded, the worst inter-state conflicts were avoided, and norms of sovereign equality were nominally observed. The framework is now under unprecedented strain. The dominant and the rising economic powers are decoupling their technology stacks. The World Trade Organization's dispute-settlement mechanism has been disabled by sustained obstruction. The Security Council has been paralysed on the largest conflicts of the present decade. Multilateral climate finance has fallen short of pledges, and the rules of cyberspace, outer space and artificial intelligence have not been credibly written into treaty form. Three responses are emerging. The first is regional: blocs such as the European Union, ASEAN and African Union are building denser rule-systems where global ones have weakened. The second is minilateral: groupings such as the Quad, I2U2 and BRICS pursue limited cooperation among willing partners. The third is structural reform of the original institutions. Whether the order survives or fractures depends on whether these responses cohere.
What an examiner expects to see
- Target word count: 240-250.
- Title: 'A Multilateral Order Being Remade'.
- Preserve the 'remade, not abandoned' formulation.
- Compress the four pressures into a single listed sentence.
- Describe India's position in one sentence — non-aligned, large, young.
- Retain the closing claim about universalist commitments.
- Third person; indirect speech; no author named.
- Single paragraph; word count in brackets.
- Use 'subsequently', 'in turn', 'despite this' as transitions.
- Avoid acronym overload — define UN, Bretton Woods once.
Concrete cases, schemes and judgments
- Title example: 'A Multilateral Order Being Remade'.
- Compression of pressures: 'The author identifies four pressures — the rise of plural centres of power, the weaponisation of economic interdependence, the climate emergency demanding coordination, and a technology race no single country can win or regulate alone.'
- India's position: 'India is described as distinctive — not aligned with any one bloc, large enough to matter, young enough to grow — and as preferring a reformed multilateralism whose rule-makers reflect today's distribution of weight.'
- Closing line: 'The author concludes that the real question is whether what replaces the post-1945 order carries forward the universalist commitments — peace, development, human dignity — that justified it. (247 words)'