How to do the AQA ‘How far do you agree’ question.

Some essays are monologues (speeches), others are a dialogue (discussion).  This question is the latter. 

Introduction

Imagine you are talking with your friend about football teams.  He is a great supporter of a particular team, and he declares loudly that they are the greatest team on earth. 

“How do you reckon that?” you ask, and he gives you a long harangue about the trophies they have won, the stars who played for them, their marvellous managers and past glories.  “Best team in the world,” he says. 

“They certainly are a great team,” you acknowledge, “but best team in the world?”  You mention teams such as Juventus, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich – surely they have a strong claim to be labelled the world’s greatest?  And you go on to mention some facts about his team he had neglected to share – their current bad run of form, that scandal last year, the conflict between fans and owners. 

You talk it through, and eventually agree that his team are ‘one of the best’ in most respects, but no one can deny that they are the most famous. 

The ‘How far do you agree’ question.

The ‘How far do you agree’ question is exactly the same.  You are presented with a claim – usually that something was the MAIN cause or result of a situation. 

You start by briefly giving some basic factual info – a quick summary, because it won’t earn you more than a mark – and then like your enthusiastic friend, you set about arguing as convincingly as you can that the premise of the question is correct (eg that it WAS the main cause).  This first section of your essay is like a mini ‘explain how’ essay in its own right, and you end with a mini-conclusion: “So we can see that it was hugely-important.”

But, you ask – just like you argued with your footballing friend – was it the MOST important? 

This is a critical moment in your essay, and it is vital that you flag to the reader that you are now going to look at the other side of the issue – or else your essay will just look like you are disagreeing with yourself.  So you write something like: “On the other hand… “ and you present to the reader:

(a) other factors which were also very important (and why)

(b) uncomfortable facts and ideas which suggest that the proposed factor wasn’t as important as the previous section suggested. 

And then you finish with: "Therefore..." and a concluding section which weighs the ‘arguments-FOR’ versus the ‘arguments-AGAINST’ … and hopefully comes up with a judgement less lame than “so they were all important”. 

‘The main reason why the League of Nations failed to prevent WWII was because of how it was organised.’ How far do you agree with this statement? 

If you study it, you will see how I have used that frame in this essay:

• Paras 1-2 are a short factual account of the (poor) organisation. 
• A second section looks at the arguments which support the idea that poor organisation might have been a reason the LoN failed.  Notice how it starts: “It has been argued that the organisation of the League contributed hugely to its failure:” and ends “So we can see how it might be argued that the organisational limitations of the League seriously hampered its effectiveness, and contributed to its failure.” – key sentences that keep your reader informed about where your argument is going. 
• And now we come to the vital moment in the essay – the hinge where it stops looking at one side, and starts looking at the other.  Can you see how I flagged this up to the reader?  I have used a rhetorical question: “But was the League’s organisation the MAIN reason it failed?”  But you could just as well use “On the other hand…” or even perhaps just a huge “HOWEVER…”.  But remember: it is no use unless the reader notices it. 
• After this, the third section proceeds to contradict the original idea.  You will be able to see how it explains how OTHER factors led to the failure of the LoN (Article 16, Treaty of Versailles, USA not a member, Great Depression, Anti-Comintern Pact, its failure), and how it then suggests that the League's organisation as might not have been as weak as suggested. 
• Finally, the essay is able to round up the evidence and declare that – faced by all those other factors – the League's organisation was "almost an irrelevance".  THEREFORE, it concludes, the LoN's organsiation was NOT the main reason it failed. 

Adapting the essay to every question.

The thing about this essay is that, once you have written it, you can easily adapt it to fit ANY ‘how far do you agree’ question on how the failure of the LoN – you have all the ideas you need; all you need to do is to rearrange them. 

Consider the following essay frame.  It is the essay frame for ‘poor organisation’.  But what if the essay had blamed the absence of the USA?  Drag ‘the USA not being a member’ into the title and see how the essay frame uses the same elements to answer the new question.  Then do the same for the other factors:

Going Deeper

The following link will help you widen your knowledge:

Good advice from Save My Exams - although based on a ToV question, this has some good general advice

YouTube

Advice from Mr Green and History & Politics - not this question, but a similar approach and useful ideas.