Compare and contrast the treatment of opposition by two rulers, each from a different region.

The question requires that candidates give an account of the similarities and differences between two rulers in terms of their treatment of opposition, referring to both rulers throughout. The two rulers must be from different regions but they may or may not have been contemporaries. Candidates may refer to a variety of methods rulers may have used to deal with opposition and these may include imprisonment and/or execution of opponents, military action, the introduction of laws restricting privileges and/or freedoms, banishment into exile or the seizure of land owned by opponents. In some cases, candidates may suggest that rulers carried out pre-emptive strikes to stymie nascent opposition and/or to make examples of those who might seek to oppose the ruler. Both similarities and differences must be clearly indicated but there does not need to be an equal focus on each.