PSIR Optional Foundation (Lectures + Content + PYQs + Current Affairs)

PSIR Optional (Lectures + Content + PYQs + Current Affairs) + PSIR Optional Current Affairs for UPSC + PSIR Optional Previous Year Questions Solved - UPSC CSE PYQs (From 1979: 40+ Years PYQs Solved)

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What is PSIR Optional Foundation (Lectures + Content + PYQs + Current Affairs) by Synopsis IAS?

The PSIR or Political Science and International Relations Optional for UPSC IAS and NET JRF is designed by Riddhi Sharma, who is the content developer and main faculty for this course. Under her guidance, Garima Garg scored third highest marks in PSIR (AIR 220- 2021). Other students include Mavis Tak (AIR 386-2021) and more. 

Course includes: Video Lectures and Content. Content includes Study Material for each topic of the syllsbus, Content from Standard Optional Books Summaries, PSIR Optional Previous 40 Years Papers Solutions.

No book needed: For making content, we start with NCERTs, and refer standard text books, reference books, research papers and journals. We update the optional content with current affairs.

You can solve 24/28 questions in Paper 1, and 25/28 questions in Paper 2 in UPSC 2021 Mains from Previous Year Papers.

You can solve 52/56 questions in UPSC 2022 Mains from Previous Year Papers.

All these questions can be solved if you have followed Synopsis IAS, because Synopsis IAS make content from Previous Year Papers + Syllabus.

Strategy Videos by Riddhi Sharma: Previous Year Questions for PSIR Optional UPSC is discussed in detailed manner, in which the strategy for Answer Writing in PSIR Optional is covered.

  • You will be able to self-evaluate the answers after going through these videos.
  • You will learn to include current affairs in Paper 2; apply paper 1 concepts in Paper 2; use tables, charts, case studies etc.; and implement other important aspects of PSIR in your answers.

Our Approach: Syllabus and previous year papers are the Key! It is a well-established fact that at least 80-90% of questions are repeated directly or indirectly in UPSC Optional Papers. Considering this fact, the content is made while considering two parameters: UPSC Syllabus Plus Previous Year Question Papers.

 

Faculties

Riddhi Sharma

Course Pages

800+ Pages

Course Duration

120 hours

Validity

Mains 2025

Course Content / Syllabus

Following subjects are covered:

Syllabus of PSIR Paper - I

Political Theory and Indian Politics:

  1. Political Theory: meaning and approaches.
  2. Theories of state: Liberal, Neo-liberal, Marxist, Pluralist, Post-colonial, and Feminist.
  3. Justice: Conceptions of justice with special reference to Rawl’s theory of justice and its communitarian critiques.
  4. Equality: Social, political, and economic; the 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, and Feminism.
  9. Indian Political Thought: Dharmashastra, 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.

Indian Government and Politics

  1. Indian Government and Politics
    (a) Political Strategies of India’s Freedom Struggle: Constitutionalism to mass Satyagraha, Noncooperation, Civil Disobedience; Militant and Revolutionary Movements, Peasant and Workers 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 Executive, Legislature, and Supreme Court.
    (b) Principal Organs of the State Government: Envisaged role and actual working of the Executive, Legislature, and High Courts.
  5. Grassroots Democracy: Panchayati Raj and Municipal Government; Significance of 73rd and 74th Amendments; Grassroot movements.
  6. Statutory Institutions/Commissions: Election Commission, Comptroller and Auditor General, Finance Commission, Union Public Service Commission, National Commission for Scheduled Castes, National Commission for Scheduled Tribes, National Commission for Women; National Human Rights Commission, National Commission for Minorities, National Backward Classes Commission.
  7. Federalism: Constitutional provisions; changing nature of center-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; liberalization 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 behavior; changing socio-economic profile of Legislators.
  11. Social Movement: Civil liberties and human rights movements; women’s movements; environmentalist movements.

Syllabus of PSIR Paper - II

Comparative Politics and International Relations

Comparative Political Analysis and International Politics:

  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; Transational 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 Bretton woods to WTO; Socialist economies and the CMEA (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance); Third World demand for 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, AARC, NAFTA.
  11. Contemporary Global Concerns: Democracy, human rights, environment, gender justice terrorism, nuclear proliferation.

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” 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 US and Israel; Vision of a new world order.

 

This course is a combo of following courses

General Details

Lectures: There are pre recorded lectures by the highly qualified and experienced faculties.

Advanced lectures: These include applied part and in depth-learning for all major topics.

Study material: Course study material will be available for registered students in downloadable and printable PDF format on the student dashboard. 

Personalized student dashboard: Registered Students get a Personalized student dashboard with a login password. You can watch the lectures anywhere, anytime and any number of times.

Two-way feedback: We take students’ feedback seriously. We can remove or replace faculties if the feedback is not good.

It is a Paid Batch for UPSC CSE aspirants. However, a number of videos are uploaded at YouTube for Demo and Awareness purpose.

Course Completion Date: 1 month before exam

Validity: Validity of this course is till mains 2024.

Answer Writing Practice: There are extensive answer writing sessions exactly based on UPSC pattern. Kindly note that evaluation is not part of the Classroom course. Evaluation is available for test series students.

Model Answers: You will get model answers to the previous year questions, expected questions etc.

Expert Support: You will get Doubt clearance Sessions via mail, chat, or phone, as and when required. Offline centre Support at Delhi.

How is this course different from similar courses by other coachings?

STUDY MATERIAL
Other coachings provide too much content and the content that they provide is very unorganised and not according to the UPSC Syllabus. Other coachings overburden their students with unnecessary garbage which is hard to read even once, so just think how and when the students will revise it?

Organising the content needs 2 Things:

  1. UPSC Syllabus: This will tell you what all topics you need to keep your notes within.
  2. Previous Year Questions: This will tell you the exact topics and even exact questions many times of what will be asked in UPSC. You yourself can predict what UPSC will ask in exam with the help of previous year questions.

We have organised our Previous year Questions in such a way that it is easier to find and predict the weightage of each unit, each topic and even repetitiveness of the paper. Each unit has been organised Topic wise and it took years of research to get through this.

Mostly students do not even know which coaching to join, which books to follow for each section, which sir or ma'am will teach better and how did we fail in Optionals? Even after purchasing some coaching's material, students search for which books to follow to make notes along with coaching. Then why did the students join coaching in the first place when they could not be provided with one stop solution? Coaching is supposed to save our time, and not waste it.

But let us tell you that there are no poor students. Students just need the right approach to crack this exam. 

We advise you to not believe us blindly and look for previous year questions yourself and you will see how UPSC is repeating 90% of its questions every year. You just need to revise and practice those solutions of question papers and those topics again and again.

We proudly claim that our toppers have followed this approach and cracked the exam very easily. Some have even cracked it in first attempt.

  • If you are joining our course: we assure you that you would not need any other material for reference. Just follow this.
  • If you are not joining our course: then we advise you to download previous year questions ebook from our Free Resources Section and practice it yourself.

Please don't fall in the trap of coaching wallas claiming every year UPSC asks new things or you need to study every other thing or join random test series.

  • UPSC repeats itself.
  • You do not need to do PHD in the subject, you need to study with the right and smart approach as in the end we just need to clear our exam. So study wisely.
  • DO NOT Join random test series. Practice previous year questions asked by UPSC again and again and we guarantee you, YOU WILL CLEAR CIVIL SERVICES EXAM.

At Synopsis IAS, we provide to the point and Synoptic Content.

No other Study Material / Book needed: For making content, we start with NCERTs, and refer newspapers, standard text books, reference books, research papers and journals. We update the content with current affairs regularly. After making content for any topic, we also refer to the other major institutes notes to ensure that we don't miss any important point or topic.

Still, the content is available in approx 1/3rd pages as compared to the other institutes.

LECTURES

We do not waste unnecessary time in selling coupons for courses, marketing, and promotions. The faculties just teach, teach and teach, and do not beat around the bush. The lecture duration is short – If other institute has covered the same topic in 1 hour, we cover that just in approx. 15-20 minutes.

MEDIUM OF COURSE

We teach in easy Hinglish language. The content slides for the course are in Hinglish (One line English, One line Hindi).

The course is available in English and Hindi Mediums. The Study Material is in Three Languages: First file is in English, Second file is in Hindi, Third file is Bilingual (one line English, one line Hindi). The Lectures are delivered in Hinglish.

GUIDANCE

When it comes to guidance, noone can even come closer to Synopsis IAS. The Synopsis IAS institute is based on the vision of a person, who left services just to teach and provide genuine Guidance.

There are Strategy Videos by Krishna Sir: He has discussed the strategy to prepare for UPSC in cover in a realistic way in his most popular Guidance Series.

COST

The course is available for a very less price compared to any other online or offline coaching.

Content Developers and Faculties

Riddhi Sharma

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