Description
1. Core Themes (SL & HL)
Covers global socio-economic and environmental trends.
- Population change
- Population distribution & density
- Demographic transition model
- Migration patterns (forced, voluntary, international)
- Population policies (pro-natalist, anti-natalist)
- Disparities in wealth and development
- Indicators of development (GDP, GNI, HDI, gender indices)
- Inequalities in health, education, and access to services
- Theories of development (dependency theory, world systems, modernization)
- Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) / Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- Environmental quality and sustainability
- Measures of environmental quality (air, water, soil indicators)
- Impacts of population growth on environment
- Ecological footprint
- Strategies for sustainability (renewable energy, conservation, eco-tourism)
- Resource consumption
- Global patterns of energy, food, water consumption
- Renewable vs non-renewable resources
- Resource security (water scarcity, energy dependency, food supply issues)
- Waste, recycling, and circular economy
2. Optional Themes (SL chooses 2; HL chooses 3)
- Freshwater – Issues and Conflicts
- Drainage basins, flooding, and water management
- Water scarcity, quality, and supply
- Water conflicts between users and countries
- Integrated water resource management
- Oceans and Coastal Margins
- Coastal processes & landforms
- Human use of coasts (tourism, industry, ports)
- Coastal hazards (erosion, flooding, storms)
- Coastal management strategies
- Extreme Environments
- Characteristics of hot arid and cold polar regions
- Opportunities & challenges of extreme environments
- Human adaptation & resilience
- Desertification, climate change impacts
- Geophysical Hazards
- Tectonic processes (earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis)
- Hazard risk and vulnerability
- Prediction, prevention, and management strategies
- Case studies of hazard impacts
- Leisure, Sport and Tourism
- Global patterns of tourism, sport, recreation
- Growth of global tourism & mega-events (Olympics, World Cup)
- Sustainable tourism & ecotourism
- Tourism impacts on culture and environment
- Food and Health
- Global food distribution & malnutrition
- Agricultural systems and food security
- Health indicators and disease patterns
- Health care strategies and international responses
- Urban Environments
- Growth of cities & urbanization
- Urban challenges (housing, transport, pollution)
- Sustainable urban planning
- Megacities & world cities
3. HL Extension: Global Interactions
- Global flows
- Trade, aid, foreign direct investment (FDI), remittances
- Labour migration and outsourcing
- Transnational corporations (TNCs)
- Global interactions and cultural diffusion
- Global culture & hybridization
- Glocalization and resistance to globalization
- Cultural imperialism
- Global environmental change
- Climate change causes and consequences
- Global commons (oceans, atmosphere, Antarctica)
- Responses to environmental issues
- Global development and inequalities
- Global governance (UN, WTO, IMF, NGOs)
- Global trade agreements and disputes
- Power, places, and networks
