Thursday, October 31, 2019

Enhanced whistle blower protections Research Paper

Enhanced whistle blower protections - Research Paper Example whistleblower is risky, the essay discusses various ways to protect them from elements that want to harm them to prevent them from sharing the information they possess. Whistleblowers fall into two categories. They include internal and external whistleblowers. Internal whistleblowers are the individuals who report discrepancies and misconducts of colleagues or their superiors to the management. Several reasons would motivate an employee to become a whistleblower. They include corruption, nepotism and sexual harassment. External whistleblowers are the individuals who disclose misconducts within the company to outside entities. They include lawyers, the media, police or watchdog agencies like anticorruption organizations. External whistleblowers are usually motivated by moral or selfish reasons. Opinions concerning whistleblowers differ from different people. To some, whistle blowing is as an act of selflessness while others accuse them of pursuing fame, fortune, greed and personal glory. This persecution of whistleblowers mostly comes from the affected or implicated individuals who want to discredit them to absolve themselves of the accusations. Individuals who want to prevent the disclosure of information often target whistleblowers. It becomes a dangerous situation with whistleblowers fearing for their lives as they get pursued. Countless whistleblowers have been killed while others have been forced into exile because they exposed the corruption in an organization. These actions led to the creation of witness protection agencies, which offer protection to whistleblowers when and until they finish presenting their proof of the misconducts to the relevant authorities. For example, the United States has several institutions that protect whistleblowers. They include the National Whistleblowers Center that protects whistleblowers from discrimination from the organization or their fellow employees. This act protects whistleblowers` identities from disclosure. It

Monday, October 28, 2019

Trade Issues Between US And China Essay Example for Free

Trade Issues Between US And China Essay This essay will research the relationship between the United States and China in regards to trading policies.   A brief description of the United States’ foreign policy will be given and following this an examination of the US-China trade relation will be analyzed with historical background ranging from 1979 to present.   In the development of this essay.   The context of the research will center around the four p’s in trading; power, principles, prosperity and peace and how in each area China has maintained such variables in trading.    The other issues that will be delivered as integral to the relationship of US-China trade will be the US-Soviet relations in regards to the China Card, Tiananmen Square, human rights, and labor standards. China’s Trade   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The aspect of China’s trade that will discussed in this dissertation will be GATT and WTO policy and procedure.   A brief history of China’s trade since its conception will also follow in the paper’s scope.  Ã‚   In fact China and its role with the WTO is one in which there exists strain. China became a member of the WTO in December of 2001.   China had been an original member of GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) but has since declined any efforts towards globalization.   However, since its inclusion with the WTO in 2001 China is under specific WTO regulations.   These regulations are highlighted as nondiscrimination in trading policies, market opening, transparency and predictability, undistorted trade, and preferential treatment towards developing countries.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The history of large industrial trade in China will also be examined as its rise to power became renowned on a global scale in the early 1970’s.   The develop of China’s trade was also expedited thanks to its involvement with Taiwan Province of China in the IMF as well as the World Bank which further emphasizes China’s transformation from a centrally organized economy to a more market-oriented economy, as such China, â€Å"abolished trade plans, decentralized trade, slashed tariffs, unified the dual exchange rates in 1994, and removed exchange controls on current account transactions in 1996† (Adhikari Yang 2002). The reform that become a wide part of China’s modern technological development was foreign involvement.   Thus, China’s trade was aggrandized thanks to foreign aid, and exporting of China’s natural resources and materials.   In accordance with this statement, a glance at China’s foreign trade is reported to have gone from $10 billion in the late 1970’s to $278 billion in the year 2000; this development will be a large part of the research:   there will be a compare and contrast section in the dissertation involving various years of wealth in foreign trade with China’s mainland, and the advancement of China as a trading power. The numbers for the year 2000 made China the sixth largest trading nation on a global scale, â€Å"The trade-to-GDP ration increased from 10 percent at the beginning of reforms to about 40 percent in the late 1990’s.   China’s total inflows of foreign direct investment (FDI) reached $47 billion in 2000, second in size only to those received by the United States† (Adhikari Yang 2002).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   A large part of the dissertation will deal with China’s open trading policy, which began in the 1970’s.   It is thanks to this open trading policy that China was able to develop at an astounding rate.   Another large section of the paper will highlight the importance of trade meetings between Mao Zedong and US president Richard Nixon.   Thus, the dissertation will break down the stages of China’s development beginning with these open trade policy meetings in the 1970’s. In a progressive, and categorical fashion, the dissertation will proceed with China’s trade, and after the initial meetings in the mid 1970’s, China began to develop as a more dominant trade partner in 1979 with Deng Xiaoping’s visit to the US.   This is when China began to truly embrace foreign trade; this boosted China’s own domestic economy and allowed the country to compete on a global scale in the areas of foreign capital and technology (Eckholm and Sanger 1999).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Since trade was the key in developing China, and helping it advance in technology, a great deal of research is needed in China’s involvement with the WTO (World Trade Organization).   The rising tension between other trading powers and China through China’s membership with the WTO will also be a detrimental factor in the tension between China and the US.   When China is initially brought into the WTO there was discussion of how this would alter the economic conflict between the U.S. and China into a global level. Thus, the United States Congress was wary of the substantial evidence that trade with China may prove to be dangerous.   This is supported by the fact that the economic conditions in America may decline over the next decade thereby bringing forth a stronger dependence on labor in China and MFN, â€Å"A substantial use of force to suppress dissent in Hong Kong would be one such trigger.   It appears that Chinese officials are cognizant of this fact and are likely to eat away at the liberties of Hong Kong’s people, if they choose to do so, in small bites, so as not to draw foreign attention† (Naughton 1998; 66).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Since China’s development as a trading power in the 1970’s there have been many high tension subjects which have altered the face of world trade.   The efforts to curtail negative assessment with other countries will be developed in this dissertation, especially between China and the US as trading powers, rivals, and conglomerates.   A close-up of American companies and their trade policy with Chinese investors, and markets will be dissected, especially the growing relationship between Chinese trade and the Boeing corporation.   In the effort of fair trade and a growing economy America has tried to curtain negative assessments made of the Chinese governments especially in light of Tibet.   One such American company that strongly promotes U.S.-China trade is the Boeing company that is looking toward China for their next marketable plane. Other groups include the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations who try to persuade the American people that human rights in China is equitable and their sustaining efforts combine with restrained behavior in China twine together to enhance a more morally correct China that is appropriate for trade (Naughton 1998; 66). The expansion of China as a super power in trade depends on the response and accessibility to the open market it is allowed.   A brief look at slave labor, cheap labor, labor laws of countries compared to China will be a large part of the research being done in this dissertation.   The cheap market that China makes affordable to foreign investors is often times tainted with sweat shops, so a brief look at the Chinese government’s involvement in trying to dissuade the use of cheap labor will be focused upon in the dissertation.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   These restrained sentiments felt by the U.S. Congress exist in part due to the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis which allows for the overly cautious approach Congress is setting forth with China because of China’s presumed power and its conscious ability to inflict harm on specific U.S. interests.   However, by being cautious Congress ensures that the future trading negations between these two countries should be defined as a stable relationship (Naughton 1998; 67). China and GATT   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   China as a member in GATT will be examined as both a positive and a negative factor.   A brief history of China and GATT will be examined as well as China’s need for trade, and an open door policy.   The Chinese domestic politics of WTO accession have changed dramatically.   In the beginning China mobilized with alacrity and cohesion to once again become a member of GATT.   The consensus of such industries as petrochemicals, and pharmaceuticals could agree upon the need for their nation to be involved with GATT, this proves China’s desirability towards a more open doors policy with trade.   Part of the reason for China’s renewed interest in GATT may be attributed to †¦it appear that GATT membership would defuse recurrent trade frictions over U.S. MFN status, but it was obvious that Chinas prestige and importance in the world demanded full GATT membership. Moreover, it was clear that GATT membership could be an important force driving the economic reform process forward. For all these reasons, national interest was elevated above sectoral interest groups. The flood of publications in China on the challenge of GATT membership clearly demonstrates the anxiety felt by many sectoral interests but also reflects what they clearly felt was the inevitability of membership and the serious nature of the import competition GATT membership would bring (Naughton 1998; 177). Inside of Chinese nationalism however there seems to be rising policies that are contrary between the U.S. and China; China feels pressured by the U.S. and that they make demands that cannot be fulfilled without jeopardizing China’s own economy.  Ã‚  Ã‚   Such demands that have been focused on and are met by the Chinese include their unifying of the currency, their reduced tariffs, as well as their cut on nontariff barriers, and equally important is their demonopolization of the foreign trade system (Naughton 1998; 177).  Ã‚   Each of these demands will be given a section in the dissertation, and thorough research will be delivered in regards to them.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   There is a very large importance in China’s development as a trading country and its acceptance into the American market.   Market strategies, and the trade issues between China and the US play a necessary part in the global trade.   China, in conjunction with U.S. trade policy has subsequently, since being incorporated into GATT, has opened their country to trade.   In 1997 they, â€Å"†¦launched into a major program of state enterprise divestment and restructuring that can be seen as a response to U.S. demands that the government cease subsidizing state-owned enterprises† (Naughton 1998; 177).   Again, this information points to the give and take relationship between China and the US, and how one’s trade policy is contingent upon the other’s trade policy which can be detrimental to the growth of each other’s market.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In their interest in trade China has a strong interest in augmenting their enforcement capability, improving their customs service as well as paying attention to their unifying revenue collection capability (Naughton 1998; 178).  Ã‚  Ã‚   The U.S. seemingly has correlating objectives in regards to China’s trade.   The United States Trade Representatives have a clear objective when it   comes to China; there is a focus on the imbalance of trade, and the exorbitant amount of trade exporting China has accomplished.   This is a major issue for the United States who no longer dominants trade because of the majority exports that are labeled as labor intensive consumer goods that the Chinese have flooded into the foreign market.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   It seems then that China’s trade is hinging upon the decisions of U.S. businesses.   The U.S. businesses are in favor of trade with China because in their own systems of operations they have subsidiaries in China.   These businesses recognized as Naughton states, Perceiving the importance of Chinas economy in future years, numerous American businesses support a policy of intensified engagement with China. U.S. businesses are an important lobby not only because of their interests but also because of their perceptions of China. Given the magnitude of U.S. investment, many businessmen have now spent time in China. They see that China is a dynamic, rapidly evolving, and increasingly prosperous society. Their positive impressions partially offset the negative impressions of China created by problems relating to human rights, nuclear proliferation, and arms sales. (Naughton 1998; 179). Thus, the transformation of China into a trading conglomerate was rapid.   Naughton’s research will be a guideline by which this dissertation will come to fruition.   The in depth analysis which Naughton portrays in his book will aid in developing the tension and necessary engagement China and the US have on a market scale.   With Naughton’s work, a look at market scale, the evolvement of trade between the US and China, and the economic growth for both countries will be projected in future years. China’s Trade History 1979-Present   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   A detailed inclusion of China’s trade history on a global scale will be included in the dissertation in order to compare and contrast China’s development as a country and a trading power.   A major factor in this power scheme is the People’s Republic of China.   China first envisioned an open economy in 1979 with the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Since this inception, China has increased its exports to an annual average of 16.1 percent.   The country as a whole is classified as the tenth largest exporter in the world.   In correlation with these facts, China’s exports have also grown at a statistic of 15 percent per year.   Furthermore, China’s annual growth rates in trade grew to an increase of three times the world’s rates in the years 1978 and 1990.   It was in 1993 that it was reported that foreign trade in China made up 38 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product.   Thus, China has expanded in trade since 1979.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In 1978 China had not interest or involvement in foreign investment, yet by 1993, China has acquired the interest of nearly $60 billion foreign investors (Shirk 1994; 1).   China began a reform strategy in 1979 that sought to enable foreign trade investments as a priority to the progress of the PRC.   From early 1960 to the 1970’s China based its economy on the concept of self-reliance, and approached their way of life strictly in egalitarian methods.   This approach quickly showed its proneness to failure however and China recognized this and soon began to implement a different model.   This new model was based on economic marketization and internationalization under authoritarian rule (Shirk 1994; 7).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚     China based its economic prowess after the Communism in the Soviet Union.   This style of command present in China enabled the country to produce high rates of industrialization which from the years 1949-1980 were estimated at 10 percent annually.   Despite these numbers the truth was that in order to remain self sufficient China had to sacrifice manpower by way of continually increasing capital and labor into the industry in order to maintain such high growth (Shirk 1994; 10).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In 1979 this all changed. Through power (one of the four p’s) Hua Guofeng allowed a small section of market activity in the idea of allowing state-owned firms to sell their own quota output, â€Å"on their own at market prices and new nonstate firms were allowed to form. The higher prices of the market were a powerful incentive for managers to enter the plan and then to press for smaller plan quotas and more market opportunities† (Shirk 1994; 28).   In this fashion Hua Guofeng allowed the economy to outmode the Communist plan.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   From 1980-1981 reformists attempted to promote a balanced economy by parlaying resources to light industry and to agriculture.   Thus, heavy industry suffered an alarming deficit and consequently in 1982 representatives allowed heavy industry’s share to be restored (Shirk 1994; 29).   Thus, heavy industry in China has always received favored treatment, while counter to this light industry is funded by the self, â€Å"China’s dramatic increases in exports and domestic growth may derive primarily from labor-intensive light industry and agriculture, but central government capital investment does not reflect this change and still favors heavy industry† (Shirk 1994; 29).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   On the topic of open policy it was not until 1984 that China extended its trading freedoms to the provinces of SEZ’s to Hainan Island and about fourteen other coastal cities.   The new open cities were allowed to offer tax incentives for foreign investment.   This open concept was furthered in 1984 with the inclusion of other deltas such as the Pearl, Yangtze, and Min Rivers (Shirk 1994; 39).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The year 1988 saw secretary Zhao Ziyang further widen open policy to include the entire coastal zone which had a population of 200 million.   Zhao stated that an unbalanced growth was harming China’s economy in that the inland regions were not being exposed as the coastal regions to different cultures as well as wealth which meant that China was not advancing at the same speed in technology, â€Å"therefore the coastal areas should be allowed to move ahead by using their better labor, communications and infrastructure, and scientific and technological capacity to attract foreign business and expand exports† (Shirk 1994; 40).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Despite these ideas and Zhoa’s promotion of them, he was fired in 1989, and replaced by Premier Li Peng.   Although Li Peng was a conservative he implemented a strategy of building his own personal support base.   In lieu of Zhao’s failure to incorporate Shanghai in his plans, Li Peng decided to grant that area more economic development and autonomy for foreign trade which yielded more revenues.   He gave the inland provinces full foreign exchange.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In June of 1992, Beijing, â€Å"†¦authorized twenty-one additional cities, located along the Yangtze River and in the Northeast, to offer special incentives to foreign investors† (Shirk 1994; 41).   This action in turn advanced inland provinces to endorse and participate in international business with the full approval of the local government.   There were created special development zones which allowed foreign investors to be offered certain terms in regards to trade, The development zone policy was extremely popular among local leaders, who saw it not only as a way to gain access to international business but also as a means of gaining benefit and privilege.22 During the first nine months of 1992, almost 2,000 development zones were set up, a large proportion of them in inland areas. As a result, the inland provinces raised their 1992 share of foreign capital attracted to China from 7 percent to 10 percent.23 By early 1993 the press was reporting that nobody knows exactly how many such zones, which attract investment with a variety of tax breaks and other favorable policies, have been launched in China. (Shirk 1994; 41). These concepts spread throughout the developmental zones and thus were responsible for certain negative consequences.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   These consequences included economic overheating, a severe shortage of funds, as well as energy, transport and certain raw materials (Shirk 1994; 55).   Shortly after this China had a type of national intervention in which the State Council in 1993 reinstituted a ‘central approval’ for each newly formed developmental zone (Shirk 1994; 55).   In accordance with the CCP general secretary Jiang Zemin demanded inspections on all zones which began a mass shut down of each zone which did not establish infrastructure and other foreign conditions.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   By the 1990’s China had established selective authoritarian rule in their open zones.   About 90 percent of foreign investment in these zones was involved in the coastal states and 40 percent is reported to belong to Guangdong.   This left the inland provinces seeking their own investors.   These investors were found with Russian, Japan and South Korea.   These investors sought out the Northeast and Shandong Province.   It may then be stated that the concept of an open policy has greatly enhanced the coastal regions of China while leaving the inland provinces lacking in investors, and market trading which attributes to the imbalance in China. China’s Trade Relations   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   China, although seemingly embattled into foreign trade has quickly grown with their new found economy.   China is in international demand and that demand is only increasing.   This is due mostly from power.   In policy and the envisioning of China’s different leaders and leaders in foreign trade, the Chinese economy has shucked off their dominant Communist ways and have since 1979 been approaching foreign trade with prosperity.   China compromised in joining GATT but this lead investors to believe that China’s intent was solely for their own prosperity as well as others and this initialized trade between countries.   Thus, it may be stated that in part, China has grown with their open policy and in a way realized peace through trade because of the restrictions of the United States and of GATT on their trading policy and thus China has grown in terms of economy.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The other issue that arose from China’s power in their economy was the dual rate system, As for international institutions, although the International Monetary Fund advocated convertibility, it would accept some degree of exchange controls. Joining GATT did not require full convertibility, although dual rates for trading activities, often viewed as export subsidies, were an obstacle to membership. The United States, already running a trade deficit of approximately $20 billion with China, complained out of one side of its mouth†¦ In response to international and domestic demands for a reform of the foreign exchange regime, Chinese leaders gradually devalued their currency and created an officially sanctioned swap market for foreign exchange. Devaluation began in 1981 with the adoption of a special internal settlement rate of 2.8 yuan to $1 U.S. for foreign trade transactions. (Shirk 1994; 57-58).   It is thus stated that Chinese goods were underpriced due to their state subsidiaries.   Although the exchange rate made Chinese good profitable, imports were not easily winning the economic battle in China as they were comparably overpriced.   As a result of this during 1981-1984, dual rates existed and were ‘substantial’ (Shirk 1994; 58).   The growth of exports as well seemed to be vanishing as the 2.8 yuan rate was weak.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The dual rate was a spot of heavy criticism among other international trading nations.   The International Monetary Fund stated that dual rates were in clear violation of IMF’s standards.   As a result the United States who had been a large financial supporter of China filed several complaints stating that the internal rate was â€Å"a form of export subsidy† (Shirk 1994; 59).   The State Council responded to these issues in 1985 by getting rid of the dual rate exchange in favor of the internal system (as mentioned prior) of a 2.8 yuan.   The government subsequently devalued the renminbi five times â€Å"13 percent in 1986, 21.2 percent in 1989, and 9.57 percent in 1990† (Shirk 1994; 59). China Card   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The issues of dual exchange rate are clearly seen in the China Card.   The Chinese economy has been witness to exorbitant expansion within the time frame of 1970- present.   This has allowed for the retardation of recession seen across Asia.   China is growing exponentially.   The Chinese bank has added problems to the Chinese economy by continually lending money to governmental projects that abound in profitless margins.   In support of this China had in 2004 reportedly lent out nearly 40 percent of its gross domestic product with reports being silent as to whether or not there were any signs that this money was returned with interest.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   China also has a fixed exchange rate with the US dollar which lends investors to believe that China is overdue for an economic crisis.   The only thing that seems to be holding China together is their strict capital controls which lock domestic savers into these bankrupting banks across China. Tiananmen Square protests of 1989   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The Tiananmen Square Massacre occurred June 4th 1989.   This was a protest in response to the government of the People’s Republic of China which students and other activists were party.   The PRC government initiated riot gear and as such many of the peaceful protestors were left dead; the number murdered during the protest ranges anywhere from 200 to 3,000 Chinese students as well as Red Cross.   The protest was devised in view of held beliefs that the Communist Party of China was corrupt.   The protest also shared the views of workers who stated that economic reform was leading the country towards inflation which was leading to unemployment and the immense amount of poor in the PRC (Wikipedia 2006).   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The protestors did not disperse when asked to by the government and as such the government’s counteraction was to declare martial law.   Martial law allowed for tanks to infiltrate Tiananmen Square and essentially wreak havoc.   Foreign press was banned from the event (Wikipedia 2006).   This event lead to the questioning of the labor laws in China and the fairness and consciousness China was paying towards human rights.   If China wanted to sustain the sequestering of this massacre then this was a statement of omission in which China was essentially proving the protestor’s beliefs that trade as connected with labor was inhumane. Conclusion   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In conclusion this paper has expounded on the U.S-China trade relations in due course of China’s GATT acceptance and their WTO acknowledgements in order to provide a stronger economy.   The other half of the paper represented dual rate as well as the China Card in which Chinese currency and their propensity of cheap goods allow for the country to become strong but according to IMF China was in violation foreign policy.   This leads to further evidence of China having unfair labor laws with the massacre that occurred at Tiananmen Square in 1989.   Thus, China’s trade is a dichotomy that is both good and bad; prosperous for the PRC yet lacking in support of the common laborer.   The relationship between the U.S and China as described in this paper is teetering and yet, because of the WTO and foreign investments such as Boeing, trade with China is inevitable. Work Cited Adhikari, Ramesh Yongzheng Yang.   What Will WTO Membership Mean for China   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   And It’s Trading Partners?   Finance and Development.   Vol. 39, No. 3.   September Asher, David L.   How to Approach the China-North Korea Relationship. October 10, 2006,  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Rpt. Delivered to the Heritage Org. Brians, Paul et al.   Reading About the World Vol. 2.   1998.   (Online).   Available:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/marx.html Davidson, Tim.   Taking Back Congress.   Rolling Stone, October 19, 2006. Eckholm, Erik, and David E. Sanger.   U.S. Reaches an Accord to Open China Economy as   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Worldwide Market.   New York Times.   16 November 1999. Elliot, Micheal.   The Wrong Side of the Barricades.   Time Canada.   Vol. 158, Issue 3, p19.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   September, 2001. Freedman, Maurice.   â€Å"Chinese lineage and society.†Ã‚   London, Athlone P.; New York,  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Humanities P., 1966. Foster, Jacques Gernet. Translated by J.R. Foster. A History of Chinese Civilization. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge. 1982. Fung, K.C.   The China-United States Bilateral Trade Balance: How Big is it Really?   Pacific   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Economic Review.   Vol. 3, No. 1.   (1998).   pp33-47. Fung, K.C.   New Estimates of the United States-China Bilateral Trade Balances.   Journal of  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   the Japanese andIinternational Economics.   Vol. 15, (2001). pp102-130. Holloway, John.   Capital Moves.   Capital and Class, No. 57.   pp.137-144, Autumn, 1995. Hudis, Peter.   Marx in the Mirror of Globalisation.   CYREV: A Journal of Cybernetics   Revolution, Sustainable Socialism, and Radical Democracy.   Issue 7, Spring 2001. Kapp, Robert A.   Testimony of Robert A. Kapp President, US-China Business Council Trade   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Subcommittee, Committee on Ways and Means U.S. House of Representatives.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The United States-China Business Council.   1998.   (Online).   Available:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://www.uschina.org/public/testimony/testimony5.html. Lieber, Robert J. : The Eagle Adrift: American Foreign Policy at the End of the Century.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Glenview, Ill. Scott, Foresman, 1998. Mill, John Stuart.   On Liberty.   Modern Library; New Ed edition (2002). Mingst, Karen A. Essential Readings in World Politics. New York, NY. WW Norton Company, 2004. Montagnon, Peter. The Heart of the Dragon: Mediating. Drometia Investments Ltd., 1984. Naughton, Barry et al.   After the Cold War: Domestic Factors and U.S-China Relations.     Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   M.E. Sharpe, 1998. Online Library of Liberty.   Karl Marx: Capital and Critique of Political Economy. 2005.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   (Online).   Available:   http://oll.libertyfund.org/Home3/Set.php?recordID=0445. Rikowski, Glenn.   Transfiguration:   Globalisation, the World Trade Organization and   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The National Faces of the GATS.   www.libr.org/isc/articles/14-Glenn_Rikowski.html Sewell, Thomas. Karl Marx and the Freedom of the Individual. Ethics. Vol. 73. No. 2. 1963. P. 119-125. Shirk, Susan L.   How China Opened Its Door:   The Political Success of the PRC’s Foreign  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Trade And Investment Reforms.   Brookings Institution, 1994. The Mongolian Empire: The Yuan. Washington State University. Online source. Date Accessed: February 11, 2006. URL: http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/CHEMPIRE/YUAN.HTM Walt, Stephen M. International Relations: One World, Many Theories.   Washington: Spring  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   1998, Iss. 110 Wikipedia.   Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.   2006.   (Online).   Available:   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989 Wolf, Martin.   Is Globalisation in Danger?   World Economy.   Vol. 26, Issue 4, p.393-411, April,  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   2003.

Saturday, October 26, 2019

The Relationship Between Nature and Architecture

The Relationship Between Nature and Architecture What has landscape architecture and industrialized society to learn from indigenous cultures and their symbiotic relationships with nature? ‘Despite nature’s many earlier warnings, the pollution and destruction of the natural environment has gone on, intensively and extensively, without awakening a sufficient reaction; it is only during the last century that any systematic effort has been made to determine what constitutes a balanced and self-renewing environment, containing all the ingredient’s necessary for man’s biological prosperity, social cooperation and spiritual stimulation.’ (Ian McHarg, Design With Nature) At the dawn of the twenty-first century it becomes clearer and clearer daily to scientists, environmentalists, and landscape architects alike, what massive climatic and ecological devastation has been caused by one-hundred-and-fifty years of human industrial activity. Mankind can no longer avert its eyes from environmental catastrophe by pretending that the science behind such doom-full asseverations is unsound, that the results are ambiguous, that the evidence is dubious. As these delusions are blown away by ever more certain evidence, there appear in their place the horrific spectre of rivers and oceans sated with pollution and filth, rainforests ravaged by deforestation, deserts extending at unnatural speeds, and   the atmosphere a toxic and noxious fog filled by the vast emissions of our industrial societies. In less than two centuries, man’s industrial and technological acceleration has brought him to the brink of environmental collapse. It is now evident to all but the most blinkered or obstinate governments that comprehensive action is needed urgently to prevent our follies from going past the environmental ‘tipping-point’ that we have neared and whereafter we risk permanent and irreparable devastation. There have been   myriad suggestions from environmentalists as to which solutions must be implemented to reverse this damage of the past two centuries; there have likewise been many summits, conferences and treaties convened to discuss these issues – the most recent major one being the Kyoto Agreement ratified by all countries except the United States. This essay however examines what landscape architects and conservationists may learn from the relationship with nature and the environment known by indigenous peoples for tens of thousands of years. It looks, in particular, at what may be understood from the ‘ways of life’ of the Bushmen of the Kalahari in Botswana and Namibia in particular, and also the aborigine peoples of Australia, the indigenous Indians of the Brazilian rainforest and the nomads of the Mongolian steppes. These peoples have lived in many instances, in a near perfectly harmonious and undisturbed relationship with nature for thousands of years in the case of the Kalahari Bushmen for over ten thousand years! The philosophies and mythologies of these peoples reveal how they understand and rejoice in the benevolence and fecundity of nature and the profound generosity of the gifts that she has continually bestowed upon them. Universally amongst these peoples there is an intense respect and gratefulness for nature and for what, in McHarg’s phrase, is the ‘glorious bounty’ that she provides. It seems almost too simple and too obvious to say that modern man, who has wreaked enormous damage in fifteen decades, might have a great deal to learn from peoples who lived without any such damage for more than one thousand decades!   In this essay’s analysis the term ‘symbiotic’ will be a key criteria of investigation; the notion of two organisms (man and nature) feeding from each other and using each other for mutual benefit. After a section of historical reflection where it glances at the seminal and pioneering ideas of Ian McHarg and J.B. Jackson, this essay goes on to explore how the knowledge of indigenous cultures about the environment might be fused with modern technology to create an ideal, sustainable and environmentally-friendly form of landscape design and city-planning. Moreover, the essay studies the notion of ‘collective consciousness’ amongst society as to the planet we inhabit and our collective responsibilities towards it. Throughout these last sections references are made to modern examples of the themes under discussion, as well as contemporary designers such as James Corner, Mark Treib and Sebastian Marot.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   It is vital for students of landscape architecture to know something of the genesis of the theory and practice of landscape architecture; this historical orientation informs the student as to how landscape architecture can be a medium through which the understanding of nature by indigenous peoples may be fused with the technological advances of our own societies to form and develop environmentally friendly and sustainable sites for the future. Within this history, perhaps no one’s ideas are more seminal than those of the father of the discipline: Ian McHarg.  Ã‚  Ã‚   Before the 1970’s mankind did not possess a comprehensive or total understanding of his relationship with nature and his environment; his knowledge was splinted and fragmented and so unification of environmental theories and ideas was a very rare event. Moreover, no detailed and systematic philosophy of environmental design had yet been conceived. The creation of this philosophy fell, above all, to Ian McHarg. Lewis Mumford’s eloquently tells us of the significance of McHarg’s, the ‘inspired ecologist’, for environmental studies and landscape architecture. Mumford says:   ‘. . . his is a mind that not only looks at all nature and human activity from the external vantage point of ecology, but likewise sees the world from within, and a participant and as an actor, bringing to the cold dry colourless world of science the special contribution that differentiates the higher mammals, above all human beings, from all other animate things: vivid colo ur and passion, insatiable curiosity, and a genius for creativity’. McHarg’s work was vital because he showed that man must conceive of his environment as a totality and respond to that totality with a dedication and awakened consciousness yet unparalleled in human history. McHarg opened man’s eyes to the destructive capabilities and tendencies of man with respect to his environment; he showed ‘. . . the way in which modern technology, through its hasty and unthinking application of scientific knowledge or technical facility, has been defacing the environment and lowering its habitability.’ McHarg nurtured a nascent consciousness amongst environmentalists and academics as to the threat of pesticides, herbicides, green-house gases etc; and his epoch-making book Design With Nature established the fundamental principles of a philosophy of landscape architecture and city-design that is harmonious with nature and seeks to benefit from nature’s gen erous fruits without consuming them exhaustively. McHarg’s philosophy had and has a practical aspect and a tremendous efficacy upon environmental renewal if people are willing to implement its advice. This knowledge must ‘. . . be applied to actual environments, to caring for natural areas, like swamps, lakes and rivers, to choosing sites for further urban settlements, to re-establishing human norms and life-furthering in metropolitan conurbations’. McHarg imbued landscape design and city-planning with a distinctive and previously all-together lacking moral and ethical dimension, and swung round the aesthetic sensibilities of these disciplines to exalt and revere the principle of harmonious inter-action and inter-dependence with the environment. In Mumford’s words, again: ‘McHarg’s emphasis is not on either design or nature herself, but upon the preposition with, which implies human cooperation and biological partnership’. By this philo sophy a design is not imposed upon nature and does not therefore run the risk of being unsuccessful due to its incompatibility with the environment; but instead a design emerges out of the natural features of the landscape. By this approach, the meeting of design upon environment will be a natural and harmonious fit. To use a medical metaphor: the landscape will not reject the organ that is transplanted within it: the two are intimately joined. Perhaps, at bottom, there emerges out of the work and philosophy of McHarg, Jackson, Rachel Carson and all who have come after them, the conviction, that if done in the correct way and with the correct attitude, man can even ‘improve or ‘perfect’ nature by adding the element of himself to it.   For more than ten thousand years the Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert, a vast 500,000 kilometre square area of southern Africa, have lived a lifestyle that has changed nearly nothing for this entire period. The Kalahari Desert appears to the softened Western observer as a barren, inhospitable and intolerably difficult place to survive – yet alone live continually! But the Bushmen have not only lived here amongst the dunes, plains and brush for countless millennia, but they have prospered also. At the heart of this ancient way of living is the harmonious and balanced relationship that the tribes of the Kalahari share with the environment that supports them. This is a ‘symbiotic’ relationship where man takes what he needs from nature, but only enough, so that nature in return profits by being treated respectfully. A useful analogy is the one Courtlander makes between the shark and the little fish that clean it: the shark is cleaned by these fish as they remove its parasites and in return the fish are fed by the parasites of the shark. The relationship between the Bushmen and nature is similar: the Bushmen feed from nature’s bounty and then nature benefits also to the extent that she is treated respectfully. This relationship is symbolised in the abodes and dwelling places of the Bushmen: their huts are made of materials taken from the immediate environment: grass, wood, animal skin, earth. These products are all used with maximum efficiency so that nothing is wasted and nothing in nature is harmed; these features are elaborated in the sacred places of worship of the Bushmen (mounds, mountains, watering-holes) where these materials are used more extensively. Klaus has shown in his three-volume work The Sacred Rituals and Magical Practices of the Bushmen of the Kalahari the Bushmen’s celebration of nature by way of numerous religious rituals and magical practices. Other cultures that share an such an intimate and delicate relatio nship, and such a direct reflection of this the style of their dwelling places, include the aborigine peoples of Australia who live a very similar lifestyle to the bushmen and venerate Ayres rock as the acme of nature’s munificence – as has been well documented by Kama’eleiwiha in Native Land and Foreign Desires; also, the myriad indigenous tribes of the Amazon basin in South America as recorded by Davies in his Indigenous Tribes of Brazil; and the nomadic peoples of the Mongolian steppes. What then has the modern landscape architect to learn from the symbiotic relationship of indigenous peoples with nature? Landscape architects of 2005, often working on sites at the derelict fringes of society, on industrial waste-grounds, the edges of motorways, close to airports and so on are often forced to work with sites that are sated with pollution, toxins, scrap materials and waste products. The rejuvenation of sites as these by landscape architects must be in accordance with principles of sustainability and environmental balance. The Bushmen of the Kalahari, the aborigines of Australia and so on have, above all, a certain ‘control’ about the way they occupy and use their environment. The Bushmen will only kill as many animals as suffice to satisfy their hunger; by not hunting to excess the Bushmen ensure the stability of the livestock populations and the other species that depend upon them. The aborigines of Australia and the nomads of Mongolia are intimately awa re of the maximum amount that they can take from nature without forcing deprivation upon her; there is a ‘collective consciousness amongst these peoples as to their responsibility towards nature and as to what the relationship is between nature and society. For an aborigine or South American Indian to do damage to or pollute his environment is tantamount to an act of self-harm and self-destruction; and as such acts of mass pollution are undocumented amongst such peoples. Landscape architects must adopt a similar collective consciousness and try to emit this through their designs so that their audiences and users come to take up a similar consciousness. Landscape architects must also learn something of the ‘control’ exhibited by indigenous peoples towards the environments, and do this by building their landscape creations with the same centrality of control. This has been shown particularly by the work of Martha Schwartz in the United State and the Schouwburgplein in Rotterdam.   Instead of vast landfill sites that forever plant more toxins and pollutants in the soil, designs must embrace the technologies of recycling, bioengineering and so on. Notable examples of attempts as such design include the, the Evergreen Estate in Chicago, USA, the BMW building in Berlin, and, less well-known but perhaps most persuasively of all, in the Plaza de Paz in Bogota, Colombia. In each of these designs the materials used for construction are environmentally friendly and were produced in an environmentally friendly manner; the energy used by these places is clean and comes from renewable sources. Every aspect of these designs is intended to foster harmony and equilibrium between man and his environment, and to promote amongst users of these sites a deeper environmental consciousness that they might then extend to their families and colleagues and thus, eventually, force the governments who represent them to take up similar attitudes also. It is almost need less to say, that future opportunities for such design are endless.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   In the final analysis, landscape architects of the twenty-first find that they have an immense amount to learn about their discipline from the ways of life and symbiotic relationship with nature that have been known and practised by indigenous and nomadic peoples for several millennia. A landscape architect might indeed conclude that buried within this intimate and intricate relationship with nature are the ideal principles with which to compensate the rapacious appetite for and consumption of the environment by modern industrial society. At the heart of the indigenous and nomadic attitude to nature are the concepts of ‘balance’ and ‘equilibrium’: it is by these principles that mankind may continue to enjoy the bountiful fruits of nature without exhausting her ability to produce them. It is this exhaustive, relentless and apparently inexorable ‘taking from nature’ by our economies and cultures without returning anything to nature that has distur bed the delicate balance cherished by indigenous and nomadic peoples. Nonetheless, it is impossible for our age to dispense with the sophisticated technologies and industries that we have developed and to return to a state of indigenous lifestyle; what is needed is to create an architectural philosophy of design that fuses the simplicity and balance of the indigenous relationship with nature, with the technological advances of our own age. The duty and responsibility of the twenty-first century landscape architect is to produce designs and structures that bring these two philosophies together. It is therefore essential that landscape architects work intimately with scientists, ecologists, botanists, businessmen and others so as to bring the greatest amount of environmental consideration and reflection to the development of a particular site or project. By convening all of the particular parties interested in a site in this way, a dialogue may be opened between them and therefore the greatest hope arises that action will be implemented to guarantee the environmental health of a site. It must always be in his mind that as the world races towards the environmental ‘tipping-point’ of no return, that this responsibility upon the landscape architect is a heavy one. The realization of such ambitious landscape architecture has begun with the works of James Corner, Sebastian Marot and Mark Treib. BIBLIOGRAPHY Academic Books, Journals Articles Bachelard, Gaston (1994) The Poetics of Space; Beacon Press, Boston. Casey, Edward (1993) Getting back into place towards a new understanding ofthe place world; Indiana University Press Courtlander, H. (1996). A Treasure of African Folklore. Marlowe Company, New York. Ed: Corney, James (1999) Recovering Landscape; Princetown Davies, P. (1971). The Indigenous Tribes of Brazil. Farenheit Press, Preston.   Heidegger, Martin (1977) Building/Dwelling/Thinking; New York, ed: Krell   Heizer, Michael (1999) Effigy Tumuli; New York, Harry N. Abrams Heizer, Michael (1997) Cities Natural Process; London New York, Routledge. Jackson. J.B. (1994) A Sense of Place, a Sense of Time; Yale. Kame’eleiwiha, L. (1992). Native Land and Foreign Desires. Frontham Books, Sydney London. Klaus, Walter. (1951). The Sacred Rituals and Magical Practices of the Bushmen of the Kalahari. Ford Books, Edinburgh. Ford Books. Mathur, Anuradha, da Cunha, Dilip (2001) Mississippi Floods: Designing aShifting Landscape; Yale Univ. Press McHarg, Ian L. (1971) Design with Nature; Doubleday/ Natural History Press Mumford,L. ‘Introduction’ in McHarg, M.L. (1971). Design With Nature. Doubleday, Natural History Press. Roy, Arundhati (1999) The Cost of Living; Flamingo Smithson, Robert (1996) The Collected Writings; California Press Ed: Swaffield, Simon (2002) Theory in Landscape Architecture A Reader; Univ. of Penn Press Weilacher, Udo (1996) Between Landscape, Architecture Land Art; Birkhaà ¼ser

Thursday, October 24, 2019

The Pit and the Pendulum essay -- essays research papers

The Dungeon of Madness In this story, Edgar Allan Poe (such as in many of his works) uses the setting to create a dark image inside our minds. He makes this specially through darkness, therefore the character makes a connection with death. â€Å"The physical setting oppresses him in the visions of his graveyard† (1). â€Å"The setting plays an important role in how the narrator discovers the many ways he may die† (2). It is a dungeon full of torturing traps, and the character, as any normal human, feels terror inside his prison and fears his death in any of the cruel ways arranged for him. Still, he has to decide between death and the relief which it brings or life with the interminable agony of being tortured as a lab mouse. The best terror stories create suspense through the setting. Most of the times, the character does not know completely where he is or what enemy or problem he is facing. In â€Å"The Pit and the Pendulum†, the underground prison is dark; as a result, the character compares the place with hell or even his tomb. That is why at the beginning, during his dream-like state, he does not want to open his eyes and we do not know where he is either. The darkness makes the character struggle with the idea of trusting his senses or not. Also, he is afraid to discover more mean ways in which he may die. Poe creates a disgusting atmosphere for the setting. He starts describing the prison as a "damp and hard place." There is no light and the character is not able to s...

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Have the Aspirations of the Un’s Founders as Laid Out

The United Nations was established at the San Francisco Conference on October 24 1945. The world had just witnessed the failure of the League of Nations to fulfill its purpose, the prevention of a Second World War. Consequently the countries that had opposed Germany and Japan looked to succeed where they had previously failed in promoting a â€Å"just and peaceful global community† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 314). The objectives, principles and structure of the organization they hoped would achieve this were recorded in the United Nations Charter. Upon entering the UN, members were required to consent to the set of conditions laid out in this treaty. At the outset there were 51 members. By 2006 this number had grown to include 192 member states, almost encompassing the entire world. Yet whilst the organization has grown in size, the question remains as to whether those aspirations originally laid out in the Charter have actually been met. I will argue that the United Nations has had some success in its capacity as a humanitarian organization, as well as being a useful tool helping to solve international economic, social and cultural problems. However I believe that the UN remains somewhat impotent with regards to issues of international peace and security. The UN Charter is composed of a preamble, followed by numerous articles grouped by topic into a total of 19 chapters. The preamble offers an overview of the hopeful aspirations upon which the UN was founded. The vision that is described consists of four crucial goals. These are then reiterated in the first chapter in a more formal context. The fist target of the UN is â€Å"To maintain international peace and security† (UN Charter). I will argue that the UN is, and indeed always will be incapable achieving this. The second goal laid out in the Charter is â€Å"To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples† (UN Charter). This effectively promotes the concept of state sovereignty, the idea that every state has the right to govern itself without alien intervention. I will argue that this too is unattainable in accordance with UN principles. My case for the failure of the first aim is based upon the principle behind the second aim, and visa versa. The case that I put forewords is that the ideal of simultaneously maintaining peace while promoting sovereignty is unattainable. The other aspirations of the UN include â€Å"solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character† as well as â€Å"promoting and encouraging respect for human rights† (UN Charter). I will argue that the UN has indeed had some success in achieving these two objectives. In order to assess whether the United Nations aim to promote international peace and security has been successful, it is first important to have some understanding of the UN Security Council and the way it functions. Originally it consisted of 11 states. In 1965 this number rose to 15. Of these states, five maintain a permanent membership whilst the ten others are elected on a biennial basis. For decisions made by the Security Council to be passed, a majority of 9 of the 15 member states must vote in favor of them. Furthermore this majority must include every one of the permanent member states, effectively granting them veto power over all decisions regarding security. The permanent members consist of â€Å"the USA, Britain, France, Russia (previously the Soviet Union), and China† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 , p. 15), those states considered to be the great powers at the time the UN was formed. In accordance with the Charter, in the incidence of a perceived threat to international peace the Security Council first attempts to find a nonviolent means to settle the issue. This is described in Chapter VI and may involve settlement or mediation. Other non-violent methods may include â€Å"complete or partial interruption of economic relations and of rail, sea, air, postal, telegraphic, radio, and other means of communication, and the severance of diplomatic relations† (UN Charter: article 41). Where violence is unavoidable the UN may sanction a peacekeeping mission with the objective of affecting a ceasefire or separating rival forces. The principles of UN with regards to international peace and security have now been described. It was the hope in 1945 that the Security Council could be used as a tool to â€Å"save succeeding generations from the scourge of war† (UN Charter: Preamble). However I would argue that just like the League of Nations before it, the fundamental principles behind UN’s security policies are flawed, rendering their aspiration for international peace impossible. It is my belief that the aforementioned policies of the Security Council are incompatible with the principle of state sovereignty, which is also endorsed as an aim of the UN in Article 2 (7) of the Charter, stating that â€Å"Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state†. F. H. Hinsley presents the idea of these two ideals clashing in his book ‘Sovereignty’ (1966). The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 â€Å"legitimized and standardized† (Watson; 1992) the practice of state sovereignty amongst major European powers, requiring them to recognize and respect the territorial integrity of other states. This is widely considered as being the formal introduction of state sovereignty into international relations. Sovereignty essentially refers to â€Å"the supreme authority in a political community† (basiclaw. net; 2004) and implies that states have the right to govern themselves, recognizing no higher authority. However even before such ideas were given proper recognition, states had always recognized their right â€Å"to go to war for any reason whatever, on any pretext at all, if it judged war to be in its interests or necessary for its security† (Hindsley; 1966:p230). It follows that this right is encompassed within those of a sovereign state, which recognize no higher authority and so are free to do that which is in their best interests. Hinsley points out that â€Å"after the end of the nineteenth century states clung tenaciously to this right, believing it to be fundamental to their sovereignty† (1966 p. 30). Yet at the same time, following the devastation of the Second World War, states were undoubtedly disinclined to enter another global conflict. In an attempt to maintain peace the United Nations was formed. Hinsley wrote that the League of Nations Covenant was ‘riddled with compromises which reflect the clash between their conviction that it had become imperativ e to restrict their right to go to war and their conviction that it remained impolitic or impossible to do so† (1966). I would argue that the same could be said for the United Nations Charter, which simultaneously prohibits war whilst insisting on state sovereignty. At the time when the UN was founded, this clash of interests represented in the Charter may not have been of great consequence. Nations were sick of war and were happy to respect sovereignty if it meant they could avert further conflict. This reflected the â€Å"traditional belief that diplomats should ignore the internal affairs of states in order to preserve international stability† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 20). However over time shifts in the international environment would change this. During the cold war, member states were tentative when it came to any sort of interference within other sovereign states. This was demonstrated in Jean Kirkpatrick’s (1979) essay written in the defending the preservation of brutal dictatorships in Latin America as a means of fighting communism without having to get directly involved (Forsy the 1988: 259-60). Furthermore â€Å"the process of decolonization had privileged statehood over justice†, the UN having â€Å"elevated the right to statehood above any tests of viability, such as the existence of a nation, adequate economic performance†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 314). However with the end of the cold war came a shift in the attention of the international community towards â€Å"individual political and civil rights, as well as the right to basic provisions like food, water, health care, and accommodation† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 314). Charles Beitz exemplified this, being amongst the first to argue against unconditional statehood, claiming that subsequent to independence there must be greater consideration of circumstances of the individual (Beitz 1979). It was argued that these circumstances of the individual were not merely a humanitarian concern, but could potentially be â€Å"a threat to international peace and security. Evidence of a threat to international peace and security could be the appearance of significant numbers of refugees, or the judgment that other states might intervene militarily† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008). This developing association of morality with national interest in the UN agenda is what I believe brings to light the clash between the aspirations of the UN, one being to promoting international peace, the other being the preservation of the â€Å"self-determination of peoples† (UN Charter, article 1). In order to uphold the rights of individuals where they are being neglected, intervention is necessary. Here it seems the UN is caught in a catch 22. On the one hand they can neglect to take interventionist action in order to protect sovereignty. This can be seen in the reluctance of the UN intervene n Darfur which in 2009 had resulted in the death of â€Å"up to 200,000 people and left 2. 7 million homeless† (Tisdall, 2009). Alternatively they have the option of a â€Å"relaxation of the non-intervention principle† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 323). However this approach is equally problematic in attempting to ensure international peace, creating a â€Å"slippery slope† whereby states will take military action without the approval of the UN (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 314). This is recognized by Hinsley, who points out that â€Å"States easily exploit such loopholes. If they cannot plead self-defense for using force- a difficulty which they rarely encounter – they can use it without declaring war or justify it by claiming that they are acting in a good cause as the Security Council would act if the Security Council were not stalled. † (Hindsley, 1966 p. 233). The 2003 invasion of Iraq can be seen to illustrate this point. Before entering Iraq, America looked to gain UN approval. Whilst there has been great speculation over its motivations for doing so, the justification given to the UN was Iraq’s supposed possession of weapons of mass destruction. The alleged presence of these meant the US could claim they were acting to protect the interests of their people. Later the violation of human rights was also given as a justification. However the UN security council did not come to a decision in the winter of 2003 and â€Å"France and Russia threatened to veto a second Security Council resolution authorizing force† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008 p. 323). Regardless of this response a US-led coalition waged war in Iraq in March 2003. The Iraq War case study demonstrates the impotence of the UN to prevent major powers from pursuing their own agendas, even when these agendas threaten international security. In an interview with the BBC, the United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan has said, â€Å"from our point of view and from the Charter point of view [the war] was illegal† (2004). On the other hand a statement from the â€Å"Bush administration’s National Security Strategy of September 2002† (Taylor; Curtis, 2008) claimed that the US â€Å"will be prepared to act apart when our interests and unique responsibilities require† (NSS, 2002: 31). This perfectly illustrates how a state exercising its sovereignty, acting in its own special interests which in this scenario include going to war, is at odds with the principles set out in the UN. I would argue that this failure in not a result of UN administration or procedure. It seems instead that the UN is based upon a flawed principle that attempts to encompass two opposing ideals. A system that acknowledges the fact that states internal affairs are of international consequence and therefore can potentially merit intervention, cannot at the same time achieve its aim to maintain international state sovereignty. We see America is unable to exercise its right as a sovereign state to wage war on Iraq under the terms of the Charter, and so must act outside it. Ultimately I would conclude that the ideals at the heart of the UN have rendered it powerless to prevent international conflict impossible. Likewise the ability to justify interventionist policies through the terms of the charter means that the UN can never fully achieve its aspiration to allow the â€Å"self-determination of peoples†. I have already touched somewhat upon another ambition set out in the UN Charter, the aim to promote & protect human rights. However as yet I have only addressed human rights issues with a view to them potentially being a threat to international peace and security. I shall now go on to look at them in greater detail, explaining why I believe the UN has to some extent been successful, despite the fact that human rights abuse is still rife in the world today. A major problem faced by the UN in their efforts to spread human rights is a lack of trust between states that results in a breakdown of international cooperation. The inclusion of human rights earlier in the essay when focusing on issues regarding security and sovereignty highlights an important point. Since the rise in humanitarian intervention after the end of the cold war, there have been â€Å"doubts about the extent to which ‘humanitarian intervention’ is a separate legal or conceptual category† (Welsh, 2006, p. 81). Between 1991-2000 there were 9 cases of humanitarian interventions in Northern Iraq, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Somalia, Rwanda, Haiti, Albania, Sierra Leone, Kosovo and East Timor (Welsh, 2006). However in all but two cases the UN Security Council or independently acting states did not cite â€Å"humanitarian considerations alone as a basis for intervention† (Welsh 2006, p. 81).

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Zeitgeist spirit

Zeitgeist spirit The digital age has brought several conveniences and inconveniencies to the modern life. The sweeping changes that have been brought about by the digital age have affected almost all aspects of life. The ease of access to information has also enabled people to question their choices in life and contemplate how their careers will be affected by the digital age.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Zeitgeist spirit specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More This happens to two salesmen whose careers become irrelevant due to the digital age. These two men are the subject of the movie â€Å"The Internship† which premiered in 2013. The movies portrays several shocks that have been brought about by the digital age including diminishing careers, changing work environments, changes in employer-employee relations, among other shocks. The dynamics of the business world are also shifting from a profit oriented business culture towards a more people oriented corporate culture. Over the last ten years, several movies have addressed various angles of these changes in the employer-employee relations through several movies such as â€Å"The Horrible Bosses† and â€Å"The Heist†. These movies depict the souring relationships between employers and employees. The recent revolution in the corporate world involves bridging this gap and making employees feel more like part of the corporate world and less like ‘tools’ to be used by corporate world. This revolution has brought about workplace day-care programs, extended paternity leaves, recreational facilities in the workplace, additional employee freedom, and giving employees access to free stuff. â€Å"The Internship† is able to capture the Zeitgeist spirit of the changes occasioned by the digital age and the quest to bridge the employee-employer gap in today’s corporate environment. â€Å"The Internship† is a movie about two men, Billy and Nick who find themselves jobless after their line of business becomes obsolete. This is after their employer goes out of business due to the diminishing demand for watches. Billy then applies for the internship positions at the giant tech company, Google.Advertising Looking for essay on art and design? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The two friends are consequently accepted for the summer internship in spite of their advanced ages. At Google, Nick and Billy find themselves as the odd interns when they are pitted against the other ivy-league schooled interns. The terms of the internship specify that interns â€Å"form teams that compete against each other and the members of the winning team get jobs at Google† (The Internship). Billy and Nick team up with three other odd-placed interns and their group is led by an equally odd character, Stuart. The movie depicts among other things the work envi ronment at Google, the interrelationships between top-level employees and lower-level employees, and the type of employees that are found at Google. Google is a company with a global outlook and it represents the most advanced level of digital culture. Right from the time Billy and Nick arrive at Google headquarters, they are bombarded with shocking levels of advanced digital technology. For instance, at the company’s entrance the two interns encounter a car that is ‘driving itself’ (The Internship). This advancement in digital technology is a reality in the modern world. The leading players in digital technology are always trying to outdo each other by fronting what is thought to be the most advanced level of digital technology (Kosfeld and Siemens 25). The remotely driven car is an example of displays of advanced digital technology. Due to the changing nature of the digital technology, today’s society is always on the lookout for the ‘newestâ€℠¢ form of technology. This need has prompted tech companies to dedicate a vast amount of their resources to finding the next big thing in technology. This movie represents the spirit of the fast changing digital age in a number of ways. In another instance, the interns’ teams are given the challenge of coming up with a phone app that is most likely to appeal to the public. Therefore, the winning app must represent the newest levels of digital technology. Corporations are going to great lengths to ensure that their employees are representative of the diversity of the modern world. Globalization has made it possible for anyone to work anywhere in the planet irrespective of the accompanying differences in cultures.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Zeitgeist spirit specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The corporations are also working hard to bridge the cultural gap between different ethnicities around the world. For example, today there are various technological applications that are aimed at bridging this cultural gap. â€Å"The Internship† represents the spirit of diversity through the movie’s cast. The interns in Billy and Nick’s group consist of Neha who is of Indian descent, Yo-Yo who is Chinese, among other diverse groups and mentalities. For example Neha, Stuart, Graham, and Yo-Yo all exhibit several deficiencies in their social behaviors. The spirit of diversity in the modern world is not restricted to racial diversity. However, diversity today calls for the inclusion of people who exhibit differing social behaviors. For example, the popular American comedy â€Å"The Big Bang Theory† portrays diversity among people of different intellectual abilities. â€Å"The Internship† seeks to capture the same spirit by portraying interns of different age groups, races, social orientations, and intellectual abilities (The Internship). The issues of misunderstandin gs among diverse groups are not synonymous with the digital age. For instance, the race issue does not come up in â€Å"The Internship† but other forms of diversity such as age and intellectual diversity are referred to in the movie. This spirit of the changing nature in diversity is well captured in the movie. From the 1900s, the relationship between employees and employers has been strained. First, there were the repressive working conditions during the industrial revolution (Bernstein 67). Then there were the employee inequality issues in the 1950s. More recently, the disparities between top-level and low-level employees that were highlighted during the recession have been the subject of rebuke within the modern society. This movie is able is able to capture the spirit of the changing nature of corporate culture. For example, the issue of employee rank is not emphasized in the movie. It is not until the end of the movie when the identity of the silent employee commonly kno wn as â€Å"Headphones† is revealed. ‘Headphones’ holds the esteemed position of the head of Google search. Previously, he could only be found around the premises blending with the rest of employees including interns.Advertising Looking for essay on art and design? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More Moreover, most employees in the movie are given titles in accordance with the departments they work for as opposed to having titles that reflect on their rank. The movie is able to capture the spirit of change in the employer-employee relations. â€Å"The Internship† is a movie that details the work environment in one of the most respected corporations in the world. The movie is able to depict how the digital age is changing people’s lives as well as the corporate environment. The movie represents the Zeitgeist spirit in matters of the digital age and the corporate environment. In future, the movie will be used to investigate the digital age at its prime. Bernstein, Irving. Turbulent Years: A History of the American Worker 1933-1941, New York, NY: Haymarket Books, 2010. Print. Kosfeld, Michael and Ferdinand Siemens. Competition, Cooperation, and Corporate Culture. The RAND Journal of Economics 42.1 (2011): 23-43. Print. The Internship. Dir. Shawn Levy. Perf. Vince Vau ghn and Owen Wilson. Wild West Picture Show Productions, 2013. Film.

Monday, October 21, 2019

Meltdown essays

Meltdown essays On Saturday, April 26, 1986 at 1:23 am, the worst nuclear power plant disaster in history occurred at the Chernobyl Unit 4 reactor in the Ukraine, former Union of Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR). The Chernobyl accident was the product of a severely flawed reactor design, one that could never have been licensed in the United States of America, and the plant operators made solemn mistakes. The operators violated procedures that guaranteed safe operation of the plant. The accident destroyed the reactor, killed 32 people, and contaminated large areas of Belarus, Ukraine and the Russian Federation. The Chernobyl disaster was the only time in the history of commercial nuclear electricity generation that radiation-related fatalities occurred. The largest nuclear disaster could have easily been prevented, if the Former Soviet Union would not have undermined the warnings and cautions they were given. The Former Soviet Unions choice to use the RBMK was an outcome of bi-beneficial reasoning. The RBMK provides the USSR economic resourcefulness and military advantages. At the time, Ukraine had poor economic development and the militarys needs of potential nuclear warfare during the Cold War logically brought the RBMK as a solution to the problem. The Union saw the advantages of the RBMK, as warfare tactics and economic prosperity and overlooked consequences. The qualifying explanation that the RBMK, Reactor Bolshoi Moschnosti Kanalynyi (roughly translated as reactor cooled by water and modified by graphite), supplies an unlimited access to the chronic raw materials that Ukraine is saturated in and also provides needs for military enhancement is true. However, the risks of this plan for the nuclear plant far outweigh the selfish advantages the Union was seeking. The nuclear power plant works readily with some contamination. On the other hand, military circumstantial requiremen ts were only for the abundance and easy access to...

Sunday, October 20, 2019

7 Reasons to Become an Occupational Therapy Assistant

7 Reasons to Become an Occupational Therapy Assistant You might be familiar with what an occupational therapist does, but you might not be aware of what an occupational therapy assistant does- or even that such a position exists. But this crucial role does exist and open positions are actually on the rise across the country. It’s one of the most in-demand jobs out there in the health care field. If you still need convincing, here are a few of the many great reasons to become a certified occupational therapy assistant (COTA).1. Increasing Quality of LifeMost people don’t value their ability to do the normal day-to-day functions; they just do them. Occupational therapy assistants help patients who have been injured, disabled, or otherwise lost function through age or disease. And when their patients are able to perform even the most basic functions- which contribute so much to quality of life- it is a major victory. Their contributions are enormous in people’s lives and help them rebuild confidence and meaning in thei r lives.2. Working with the Whole PersonPlenty of health care professionals don’t have the kind of quality time to deal with their patients as people. COTAs, on the other hand, have a special patient-provider relationship that deepens and develops over time. They get to watch their patients do something today that they couldn’t do yesterday, and keep helping them to better their daily lives.3. Working with AnyoneCOTAs are not restricted to working only with one age group. They’re able to work with pediatrics, geriatrics, and everything in between. For sheer diversity of clients, this job cannot be beat.4. Responsibility and OversightA lot of jobs give you tons of responsibility, but very little oversight. COTAs work closely with OTs, which means they almost always have help, while still directing much of their own one-on-one work with their patients.5. Creative PotentialAn OTA never finds their job dull. It requires a great deal of creative thinking and guarante es that no two days will be the same. There are even a wide range of toys and smartphone apps to help both patient and provider.6. High DemandOTAs are in high demand. Nearly 80% of OTAs find a job within six months of graduating from a program. You can usually find work with just an associate’s degree, and salaries are on the rise.7. Low StressNot only is there great job security in this field, with COTA roles growing faster than the national average, the day-to-day work remains rather low-stress in comparison with other health care jobs. And is overwhelmingly rewarding.

Saturday, October 19, 2019

Engineering project management Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Engineering project management - Assignment Example A large number of employees would increase the rate at which the work will be done and increasing chances of completing the project on time (Panneerselvam & Senthilkumar 2009). The contractor may also employ other technologies and equipment instead of using manpower. The use of machines instead of humans to do certain tasks is normally advantageous since the tasks can be done at high rates there by increasing the chances of completing the project on time (Nagarajan 2007). The contractor may also divide the project into small and more manageable units, and each unit should have a goal to achieve. As for the case of the company, the organization should give additional funding to contract so as to fund the additional works as well as fund additional manpower and/or any new equipment acquired for the task. Another solution that might help the company meet its aims is that the organization may consider subcontracting sections of the order while it is still waiting for the new equipment to be installed. (Word count: 248) Question 2: Safety and Health ramifications and Time scale a) Time scale ramifications Due to safety concerns associated with asbestos, the scope of the project is likely to be changed (removal of the existing duct and its contents). The changing of the scope would mean that other constrains such as time and cost will be adjusted accordingly (Kanda 2011). This means that the project deliverable (installing a new machine’s base) will not be produced on time. The consequence of not completing this project on time is dire to the company since the organization might lose an important order, and due to the cost investment made on the new equipment the organization might be forced to close down. This means that delaying the installation of the base of the new machine is not an option for the organization. b) Safety and Health ramifications Employees are amongst the most important elements for organizations; therefore, there health should be made pri ority (CCH 2009). In addition, safety of environments in which employees work must conform to occupational safety and health standards (Lingard & Rowlinson 2005). Compromising the health of workers by making them work alongside these asbestos ducts would affect health, and consequently their productivity will also be affected (CCH 2009). The organization may also risk being closed down for not following occupational safety standards and regulation. (Word count: 202) Question 3: Consequences of the organization following strict time scales regardless of the presence asbestos a) Consequences If the organization decides to meet the strict time scale without regarding the presence asbestos, the consequences may be dire to the organization. First, as earlier mentioned the employees of the organization may be exposed asbestos to limits more than those specified by occupational health and safety authorities of the region in the organization is operating. The result of this is that the empl oyees may contract heart and lung related ailments, which may in turn affect their productivity (CCH 2009). This means that the organization may fail to meet its current production levels as well as the sales target. Another consequence of following the strict deadline without regarding the presence of asbestos is that the organization may be closed down by the safety and health occupation authority in the area in which it is operating for violating the recommended threshold values of the asbestos.

Friday, October 18, 2019

Should Companies Allow Employees to Exercise on Work Time Coursework

Should Companies Allow Employees to Exercise on Work Time - Coursework Example Furthermore in a recent research, for workers who were more active physically, job burnout was less likely to develop into depression. In this research, the greatest benefits were attained by people who exercised hours weekly. High levels of energy, as well as daily health, are just among the benefits that originate from exercise. Weight loss is an unbelievable outcome that has happened from exercise for some individuals. Increasing physical activity has been proved to burn more calories, which assists in breaking a weight loss plateau (Scott, 2008). Physical activity has not just proved to reduce obdurate body fat, but also to lower blood pressure levels, cholesterol, as well as reduce the risks of diabetes and cancer (Hellmich, 2008). This enables an individual to live healthier and longer just with some exercise. According to Hellmich (2007), exercising can as well suppress appetite suppressant since it leaves an individual feeling less hungry. Some overweight individuals have been seen to have issues with cardiac problems in later life. Habitual exercise has proved to protect against illnesses linked with persistent low-grade systemic inflammation (Peterson & Pederson, 2005). Being overweight does not automatically mean one may not be in shape. It is in some individuals’ body nature to carry extra weight as indicated in most studies. One research showed that the exercise benefit was enjoyed despite the body mass and that being thinner does not always mean being fitter (Australian, 2007). One can have a look at a manual labor job of several athletes from boxing to football see overweight individuals that are in incredible shape. A number of types of exercise have proved not to assist in ridding away body fat. Moreover, exercise has even been associated to lower the level of stress as well as fire up a range of brain chemicals that might leave an individual feeling happier as well as more relaxed as compared to before she or he

Market Research Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Market Research - Assignment Example This report is designed to have an insight about an organization that is about to conduct some market research into consumer buying habits for the products and services that this company has for sale. Henry John Heinz, the founder of this company said that he learned from his parents’ idea of business which was, â€Å"Deal with the seller so justly that he will want to sell to you again.† He believed in fair play in the business and this quality of him had made him a successful businessman. Heinz is a $10.7 billion global company. The products of Heinz enjoy #1 or #2 market share in more than 50 countries. Every year the company sells 650 million bottles of its iconic Ketchup. Heinz's top 15 power brands are counted as more than two-thirds of its annual sales. There are about 35000 people that are employed by Heinz in almost 50 countries around the globe. Heinz is a responsible corporate citizen dedicated to safe practices, environmental stewardship and giving back to t he society (Heinz Company, Pittsburgh, 2012). 2.0 Research Options What is the correct option for doing research either through external consultancy agency for the market research or the option of doing the research in the company itself. 2.1.0 External Consultants Many organizations take the assistance of external consultants in identifying, recommending and implementing change. There have been companies which have been successful while there are some which have failed after having consultancy from external consultants. First, there needs to be cooperation with the consultant from the entire top management and not merely the CEO or a few directors/managers. Next, there cannot be any information that is out of action from the external consultants. The solution to transformation is that complete information about the organization and its strengths and most prominently, its flaws must be visible. The other feature that makes organizations rely on external consultants is since these co nsultants have knowledge in dealing with companies in similar industries and hence can relate their expertise and experience to advise specific changes. 2.1.1 Advantage of External Consultants 1. External Agencies have research skills that are industry specific. These niche considerations are such that the organization can customize different external agencies to specific internal needs as a means of maximizing their marketing strategy (Joshi 2005). 2. External Contractors have access to target sectors; hence they have underlying knowledge of best practices. Accompanied within this spectrum of understanding are recognitions that industries niches aren’t only accompanied by a specific skill set, but also industry contacts and statistical research that can advance their marketing goals (Joshi 2005). 3. External Agency contractors bring objective viewpoints. The nature of institutional culture has been theorized to have a significant and profound impact on decision-making and co mpany practices. While such uniformity of perspective has noted strategic advantages, oftentimes the external viewpoints that are accompanied with outside agencies can add these fresh and much needed insights (Joshi 2005). 4. They are much quicker as compared to internal research. These agencies have developed streamlining techniques that allow

Challenges of VET Programs in Schools Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Challenges of VET Programs in Schools - Essay Example It also offers different forms of trainings that help students fit into the job market easily. This paper will describe the vocational and training program in detail and highlight challenges that the program is facing. One may wonder how Australia arrived at a situation whereby a vocational and training program became an available option in the education system. History reveals that TAFE has been a leader in offering technical training for more than hundred years. However, tracing what it has evolved into from the 1970’s is more crucial than the entire history. Australia found 1970’s to be full of economical challenges. Its export values dropped and the country plunged into inflation and unemployment. Since the world was embracing technology so fast, people became jobless in Australia. The Sydney mechanical college had been offering technical skills that enabled people make a living before the hard times. When the economy destabilized, strategies changed. The Australian National Training Authority came into place and introduced vocational and education training in schools (VET). Students could learn different vocations alongside the curriculum and even train on workplaces. The program’s main objective was to provide the students with skills that could enable them find jobs or learn trades that could enable them make a living (Rauner, Maclean & Boreham, 2008). Vocational education and training is part of what TAFE does. Currently, TAFE has a broad range of courses. TAFE targets people of all age groups. It offers trainings to students who are completing their year12 enabling them to land jobs. Courses for such students instill them with skills that are necessary for the workplace. In addition, TAFE offers part-time courses to people who land jobs before they complete school. Other working class people need extra qualifications to get promotions and TAFE offers such. TAFE is unique and is the preferred choice because it offers nationally and internationally recognized courses at a broad range. On the hand, similar courses are available in schools approved and supported by TAFE for students who are yet to complete their year 12. It is one of the ways of ensuring a high retention rate to curb levels of dropouts. Schools offering such courses prepare students for the workplace and offer them life skills. These schools link up the students with workplace exposures. By the time of completion, students have some experience that can help them get jobs. In addition, these schools are a choice for students who cannot put up with the curriculum in the other schools. Instead of dropping out of school, they opt for TVET schools. Schools that run VET program have had their success stories over the years. They have positively influenced the society. However, such schools face several challenges. One of the challenges has its roots on the nature of the courses offered. Critics argue that students take subjects of a broad range making it difficult for them to determine their certification level. According to these schools, students complete their courses. However, keeping a track of all the courses students take becomes quite complex and this is the basis of the challenge (Maclachlan, 1994). As TAFE supports schools in offering TVET, it includes a program that requires a student to get a job and work a day weekly for several months. Students have to manage their time wisely and manage the two

Thursday, October 17, 2019

Non-Employment ADR Research Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Non-Employment ADR Research - Essay Example eam is made up of trained, qualified and impartial fact finding individuals, who employ their expertise in offering dispute resolution services in the company (Cheeseman, 2010). This program allows for diverse evaluation of the issue at hand. Meetings are held between the conflict parties and the open door program specialists while investigations on the same issue are done confidentially. Information gathered is then analyzed in line with the rule of law and company requirements, after which a decision is arrived at. This ADR strategy has helped Intel corporation in a number of ways. First, the program provides employees with recommendations on conflict resolution. It provides the management with a basis upon which future conflicts can be avoided, alongside offering a resolution ground for the current disputes. Workable solutions have therefore been realized through this program. The most important aspect of this program is that employee participation in all activities undertaken by the program is not penalized, and therefore employees can express their concerns without fear of being sacked. This factor has facilitated the success of Intel Corporation in its ADR. Most of this company’s disputes emerge from liability claims. The company previously used to traditionally litigate claims. This means that it engaged the courts in litigating its claims. Court procedure for resolving disputes seemed favorable for the company, but the cost of the process in terms of both time and money raised concerns. The company realized that in most cases the claims were settled before trials took place and of course not before preparation time for the case (Jennings, 2006). In this regard, the company adopted mediation strategy for its ADR. This strategy allowed the company to significantly cut on the cost of making claims as well spare time for other activities within the company that generally improved the company’s welfare in business. Risks associated with the jury trials

Gender and Equality Thesis Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Gender and Equality - Thesis Example Gender, equality and inequality all over the world vary immensely, and in various continents, the manner in which women are treated varies as a result of differences in culture. For instance, women residing in the Middle East are in most cases belittled by their spouses as well as the society because of traditional ideologies (Kelly & Breslin, 2010). On the other hand, the women in the western societies go through a different form of inequality whereby they can only access particular forms of employment, ways of living, wages as well as qualities that are similar to those enjoyed by men. Regardless of the fact that these inequalities are not supposed be inequalities as they are considered as gender aspects from a natural biological point of view in a practical manner, utilitarianism can be perceived as a form of discrimination regarding the biological difference that are evident. For instance, in the west, people of the female gender are not usually regarded as being good candidates for being employed at construction sites and other places that may be hazardous or might need the use of physical strength. In spite of the decades dedicated to feminist advances, countless inequalities against women have not been dealt with and are still in existence. The most notable is the number of women who are in corporate leadership as well as those in political leadership, which is comparatively low. Additionally, women are still entitled to low wages with this aspect being associated with fewer years of experience on the similar jobs to those being done by men as a result of pregnancy and raising children. There are also very limited opportunities for women in professional sports and numerous other areas that need some level of physical strength, as well as in the cases where there is an aspect of isolation or danger. Society also makes the women feel less safe than the men and they

Wednesday, October 16, 2019

Challenges of VET Programs in Schools Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Challenges of VET Programs in Schools - Essay Example It also offers different forms of trainings that help students fit into the job market easily. This paper will describe the vocational and training program in detail and highlight challenges that the program is facing. One may wonder how Australia arrived at a situation whereby a vocational and training program became an available option in the education system. History reveals that TAFE has been a leader in offering technical training for more than hundred years. However, tracing what it has evolved into from the 1970’s is more crucial than the entire history. Australia found 1970’s to be full of economical challenges. Its export values dropped and the country plunged into inflation and unemployment. Since the world was embracing technology so fast, people became jobless in Australia. The Sydney mechanical college had been offering technical skills that enabled people make a living before the hard times. When the economy destabilized, strategies changed. The Australian National Training Authority came into place and introduced vocational and education training in schools (VET). Students could learn different vocations alongside the curriculum and even train on workplaces. The program’s main objective was to provide the students with skills that could enable them find jobs or learn trades that could enable them make a living (Rauner, Maclean & Boreham, 2008). Vocational education and training is part of what TAFE does. Currently, TAFE has a broad range of courses. TAFE targets people of all age groups. It offers trainings to students who are completing their year12 enabling them to land jobs. Courses for such students instill them with skills that are necessary for the workplace. In addition, TAFE offers part-time courses to people who land jobs before they complete school. Other working class people need extra qualifications to get promotions and TAFE offers such. TAFE is unique and is the preferred choice because it offers nationally and internationally recognized courses at a broad range. On the hand, similar courses are available in schools approved and supported by TAFE for students who are yet to complete their year 12. It is one of the ways of ensuring a high retention rate to curb levels of dropouts. Schools offering such courses prepare students for the workplace and offer them life skills. These schools link up the students with workplace exposures. By the time of completion, students have some experience that can help them get jobs. In addition, these schools are a choice for students who cannot put up with the curriculum in the other schools. Instead of dropping out of school, they opt for TVET schools. Schools that run VET program have had their success stories over the years. They have positively influenced the society. However, such schools face several challenges. One of the challenges has its roots on the nature of the courses offered. Critics argue that students take subjects of a broad range making it difficult for them to determine their certification level. According to these schools, students complete their courses. However, keeping a track of all the courses students take becomes quite complex and this is the basis of the challenge (Maclachlan, 1994). As TAFE supports schools in offering TVET, it includes a program that requires a student to get a job and work a day weekly for several months. Students have to manage their time wisely and manage the two