Need Help Narrowing my Topic

[Aditya Chawla]

I am researching about the Soviet-Afghan War(1979-1989) and to what extent it led to the collapse of the USSR. I argue that it was not the major factor for the collapse, but rather it accelerated the social and economic problems already present in the USSR and greatly delegitimized its leadership.

How can I narrow or focus my question? I feel I am being too broad in my research. If anyone is familiar with this topic, I'd greatly appreciate your advice.

[MiTcHELl99887]

Although I am not very knowledgeable in this specific topic, if you feel your topic is too broad, there is a good chance that it is. Instead of looking at the extent to which it lead to the collapse, try to limit the question by eliminating some of the variables, because it sounds like you will need to look at too much.You would need to provide information on the social and economic dilemma before and how the war increased it. As well as prove that the war weakened the leadership, but not to the extent of it falling apart, when you may find an entire essay on either one.

I hope this is helpful, but as I said, I only know what you wrote in your statement above and may be totally wrong

[Arrowhead]

Maybe focus on a particular aspect of the Soviet-Afghan war? Didn't you already make a post about this, it feels like I've answered something similar before.

Right, I checked, you did here.

Look mate, the advice doesn't change since your concern hasn't.

Think of something during the Soviet-Afghan war that possibly delegitimised or at least undermined the authority of the Politburo, or maybe even, made it controversial? Maybe the whole 'poppy seeds' fiasco or that Afghanistan was 'Soviet's Vietnam.' Just pick a theme within the war and ask yourself: 'to what extent did [this] delegitimise leadership?' or something along those lines.

We can't tell you what's the best way to narrow your topic.

Have you started doing research by the way? If you have begun to do the research then you will understand the nuances of the topic and by reading around it, you will have a fuller understanding of how you want to take the topic forward. Even if you narrow your question down to an infinitesimal perfection, I guarantee you the final research question will end up being almost-substantially different from what you started out with because the reality of the Evidence and the direction of the Analysis almost-always takes you to unexpected places.

Do the research, read around the topic, and decide what would be best to explore. It seems as though you don't realise how vast the topic is at present because you're not fully cognisant of the extent of the literature available. The point of the IA is to do a lot of research in an area of historical interest and then narrow, narrow, narrow as you go along. Not figure out the best possible research question before you even start writing. That is the nature of academic writing in any case.

Best of luck!

Arrowhead.

Edited December 2, 2012 by Arrowhead

[Aditya Chawla]

I have gotten to focus my scope a bit, with discussing the decreased legitimacy of the Red Army throughout the war (corruption, decreased morale, etc.) and how that led to greater opposition of the CPSU. However, my main problem lies in the actual wording of the RQ. Do you think you could give me some guidance in that regard?