Education management Thesis Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 35000 words

Education management - Thesis Example This mobility is something special as it is confined to a single country. It has some similarities with international mobility because Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region administered under separate set of different from the mainland China. Administrative and education pattern in Hong Kong differs much from that obtaining in mainland China, and also with other parts of the world. Education in Hong Kong is the stepping stone for further education at the international levels also. The segment of education in Hong Kong is affected with student flow from mainland China and also from international quarters, with globalization and neo-liberalism. Discussion is also made in this article about the forces that have impacted and continue to impact the education system in Hong Kong. What are the characteristics that attract the students to pursue their studies in Hong Kong and encourage parents from mainland China to get their children admitted to schools in Hong Kong right from the ki ndergarten levels? Want are their special problems and how the administration is grappling to control the situation? The paper concludes by indicating the significance of management of education of students of mainland China and Hong Kong. Two diametrically opposed political philosophies are working with a purpose to hammer out a common educational policy but it is futile to expect that Hong Kong will give up the upper hand in the field of education. The authorities at mainland China will not mind it, because Hong Kong is an integral part of the People’s Republic of China. Hong Kong has been a Special Administrative Regions (SAR)of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) since their sovereign reversion to PRC from the United Kingdom within the structure of â€Å"one country, two systems† in 1997. On the education administration of any country the political system has the direct bearing. At the official ideological level, the mainland China

New York Police Department Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

New York Police Department - Assignment Example Particularly in policing and law enforcement, the effectiveness of the personnel involved in the law enforcing process is a major factor of concern. The New York Police Department (NYPD) is such a law enforcing organization that has a wonderful history of promoting social security and communal harmony among the New Yorkers. Since New York is the largest city in the world, the expectations and challenges in the daily life of the people are largely subject to legal implications from the social vulnerabilities. The following points can give a detailed picture of the origin, development and the prominence of the NYPD in the legal and community perspectives. 1. The History of the New York Police Department The New York Police Department (NYPD) is one of the world’s most efficient crime investigation and law enforcement bodies with a very large spectrum of operation in the US. A particularly British model of patrolling and law enforcement was prevalent during the first two centuries since the institution of Schout-fiscal as the law officers in the Dutch domains of America. From the evidences of literature, the inception of the organized form of the city police department took place in 1844. As the first large scale operation of the NYPD under the leadership of Matsell, the Chief of Police, a force of around eight hundred personnel started patrolling in the city in 1845. As Berry (2000, p. 4) points out, the NYPD was set up with the focus of peaceful social life in the five boroughs of the demography of the city, and under the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, the organization was liberated from the political influences to stand as an independent body of law enforcement. Now the NYPD is the largest policing agency in the US with the power and efficiency to use ultra modern weapons and sophisticated technology to trace criminals and in most cases, prevent crimes in advance. 1. A. Mission of the NYPD The NYPD is all fit to care for the public safety and the prosp erity of the community by adhering to its organizational missions and objectives. As the largest legal system in the country, the expectations of the department are very high and have to be maintained with high integrity among the personnel. The mission of the NYPD is a conglomeration of the missions of many departments interlinked in the organizational structure. The functional missions of these departments jointly work for the effect of reduced crimes and sustainable social and personal security for individuals, organizations and properties in the city of New York (mission statement, NYPD). The mission of the Property Clerk Division is to procure and produce the properties as evidence required by the judiciary and return or dispose them after due trial of the case. The support service bureau is the backbone for the monitoring of crimes and locations in a high-tech way with the access of internet and GIS and GPS systems. Another unit of the NYPD governs the counterterrorist operati ons in the city which the primary operational group against terrorist attacks and plots within or outside the city. The Crime Prevention Section has its motive to provide deterrent measures to reduce crimes in the city with the involvement of general public. The Crime Preven

Causes And Effects Of Land Pollution Environmental Sciences Essay

Causes And Effects Of Land Pollution Environmental Sciences Essay The object of this project is to gain a more a holistic and deep understanding of the Legal and Regulatory framework governing Land Pollution in India By looking into the origin of Environment we understand how the society till date has shaped and what is the Causes and Effects of Land Pollution and what contribution the Law has given . Another very important object of this project is to understand what the need of Environmental Law in the society was. The method of research adopted is doctrinal in nature. I have referred sources on the net as well as a few books on Environmental Law available in the university library besides adding my personal views and knowledge of the topic. Land pollution is the contamination of the Earths land surface through misuse of the soil by poor agricultural practices, mineral exploitation, industrial waste dumping, and indiscriminate disposal of urban wastes. It includes visible waste and litter as well as pollution of the soil itself. Soil pollution is caused by chemicals in herbicides and pesticides for agricultural activities as well as littering of waste materials in public places such as streets, parks and roads. The accumulation of waste is a threat to the health of people in residential areas and waste decays also encourages household pests and turns urban areas into unsightly, dirty and unhealthy places to live in. These problems result in the loss of 6 million hectares of land each year. It also results in the loss of 24 billion tons of topsoil each year and a loss of at least 15 million acres of prime agricultural land to overuse and mismanagement every year. Some measures of land pollution are through the education of people through campaigns, recycling to reduce wastes. Laws have also been passed by governments to deal with land pollution. When we hear a person describe a place as dirty, what usually comes to our minds is the bad condition of the place. The place, which could be your bedroom, is imagined to have clothes scattered on the floor and books unarranged on the shelf. However, I define the word dirty in a more specific manner. Dirty in my definition, means that there are rubbish or litter on the floor. This makes the atmosphere of that certain place unpleasant not only to the eye, but also to the mind. Land pollution is therefore the dirtying of the land. It comes about due to inconsiderate dumping of waste, littering and ineffective waste disposal methods. Mixing of harmful substances with soil is called land pollution. When the natural soil gets mixed with the harmful and toxic elements due to various means, it pollutes the soil and alters its original physical and chemical characteristics. Animals waste too pollutes land. The effect of such soil pollution is quite harmful and dangerous on human life as well as on plants and animals. Soil pollution slowly and steadily causes environment and air pollution as well by vaporization of various harmful chemicals from the contaminated land. Polluted land results into further pollution of plants and ground water resources which ultimately leads to polluting entire web of food chain in the ecosystem. Chapter 1 Causes and Effects of Land Pollution People across the globe have been facing a number of health problems caused due to the pollution of land, water and air. Talking about land pollution, it has some of the most devastating effects on both nature and living beings. Land pollution is characterized by the contamination of Earths surface, where humans and other creatures live. One of the major causes of land pollution is human activities. Given below is complete information about the main causes and harmful effects of land pollution.    1.1 Causes of Land Pollution The disposal of non-biodegradable wastes, including containers, bottles and cans made of plastic, used cars and electronic goods, leads to the pollution of land. The process of mining leads to the formation of piles of coal and slag. When these wastes are not disposed through proper channel, they are accumulated and contaminate the land. Industrial wastes are major contributors of land pollution. Dumping of toxic materials such as chemicals and paints makes the areas surrounding the industries, look very filthy. Improper treatment of sewage leads to the accumulation of solids, such as biomass sludge. These solid wastes overflow through the sewage, making the entire area look dirty.  [1]   Population India is the second most populous country in the world with more than 1 billion people.  This large population is also an environmental challenge for the world. Soil Erosion This is the biggest problem. Wind also aids in expanding the ever-increasing desert conditions of the Rajasthan desert.   Similarly, many ports are now covered in sand for the same reasons. Deforestation Although the British started deforestation in India, the pressures to modernize since the partition of 1947 have only increased the rates of deforestation.   The mercurial growth of cities and the rapid construction of factories to help feed the thirst for economic growth have come at the cost of Indias woodlands.   These policies not only harmed the trees but the indigenous peoples that had long thrived among the trees throughout India.   2. Effects of Land Pollution   Tonnes and tonnes of domestic wastes are dumped every day. Since people do not follow proper methods for the disposal of such wastes, it leaves the places look dirty and makes them unhealthy. Land pollution indirectly affects the respiratory system of human beings. Breathing in polluted dust or particle can result in a number of health problems related to the respiratory system.  [2]   Skin problems are often diagnosed due to land pollution. It is said that the improper disposal of household wastes leads to allergic reactions on the skin. Land pollution has been found as one of the leading causes for birth defects. Pregnant women living in unhealthy and dirty environment can incur breathing problems and a number of diseases, which may affect the health of the baby as well. Land pollution has serious effect on wildlife. Flora, which provides food and shelter to wildlife, are destroyed. Land pollution often disrupts the balance of Nature, causing human fatalities. Chapter 2 Legal framework governing Land Pollution in India 2.1 Policy under the Five-Year Plan. Indias development plans balance economic development and environmental concerns. The planning process is guided by the principles of sustainable development. There has been an evolutionary process for mainstreaming environmental protection in Indias planning process. The first formal recognition of the need for integrated environmental planning was made when the Union Government constituted the National Committee on Environmental Planning and Coordination (NCEPC) in 1972. The concern for environmental harm came to the fore especially during the Sixth Five-Year Plan (1980-85), which contained a separate provision for environmental degradation. Steps were also taken for water, air, noise, and land pollution.  [3]   2.2 Constitution of India a) The States responsibility with regard to environmental protection has been laid down under Article 48-A of our Constitution, which reads as follows: The State shall endeavour to protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wildlife of the country. b) Environmental protection is a fundamental duty of every citizen of this country under Article 51-A(g) of our Constitution which reads as follows: It shall be the duty of every citizen of India to protect and improve the natural environment including forests, lakes, rivers and wildlife and to have compassion for living creatures. c) Article 21 of the Constitution is a fundamental right which reads as follows: No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law. d) Article 48-A of the Constitution comes under Directive Principles of State Policy and Article 51 A(g) of the Constitution comes under Fundamental Duties. e) The States responsibility with regard to raising the level of nutrition and the standard of living and to improve public health has been laid down under Article 47 of the Constitution which reads as follows: The State shall regard the raising of the level of nutrition and the standard of living of its people and the improvement of public health as among its primary duties and, in particular, the State shall endeavor to bring about prohibition of the consumption except for medicinal purposes of intoxicating drinks and of drugs which are injurious to health. h) The 42nd amendment to the Constitution was brought about in the year 1974 makes it the responsibility of the State Government to protect and improve the environment and to safeguard the forests and wildlife of the country. The latter, under Fundamental Duties, makes it the fundamental duty of every citizen to protect and improve the natural environment including forests, lakes, rivers and wildlife and to have compassion for living creatures. 2.3 The Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 The Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 was introduced as an umbrella legislation that provides a holistic framework for the protection and improvement to the environment. In terms of responsibilities, the Act and the associated Rules requires for obtaining environmental clearances for specific types of new / expansion projects (addressed under Environmental Impact Assessment Notification, 1994) and for submission of an environmental statement to the State Pollution Control Board annually. 2.4 Hazardous Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules, 1989,as amended in 2000 Waste refers to a material that has no utility for a person. Although natural waste can be disposed off and recycled or composted, it is the toxic, non-degradable waste of plastic and electronic goods that is becoming a mounting problem for India and other developing nations. Besides the contribution of households, garbage is also generated by industries, agriculture and mining.  [4]   The Hazardous Waste Rules applied to Management and Handling of 18 categories of wast like: Cyanide wastes Metal finishing wastes Waste containing water soluble chemicals compounds of lead, copper, zinc, chromium, barium, and antimony Mercury, arsenic, thallium, and cadmium and antimony Non-halogenated hydro carbons including solvents Halogenated hydro carbons including solvents Wastes from paints, pigments, glue, varnish and printing ink Wastes from dyes and dye-intermediates containing inorganic chemical compounds Wastes from dyes and dye-intermediates containing organic chemical compounds Waste oil and oil emulsions Tarry wastes from refining and tar residue from distillation or pyro lytic treatment Sludge arising from treatment of waste water containing heavy metals, toxic organic, oils, emulsion and spent chemical and incineration ash Phenols Asbestos Wastes from manufacturing of pesticides and herbicides and residues from pesticides and herbicides formulations units Acid wastes Off specification and discarded products Discarded container liners of hazardous and toxic chemicals and wastes.  [5]   The Problem of Disposal of Hazardous Waste and its Dangers The sharp increase in waste generation is not matched by facilities for disposal of hazardous waste. In India, waste is either burnt or just buried at a place. The sharp increase in the quantum of generated waste and the inadequate space for its disposal has led to improper methods of disposal. Consequently, problems like contamination of ground water and increased air pollution have emerged as serious threats to general health and life. The municipal workers are most affected people by the occupational danger (hazard) of waste handling; they suffer from illness like eye problems respiratory problems, gastro and skin problems.  [6]   While the improper disposal of solid waste can result in environmental and health problems, the growing quantum of electronic waste poses a massive risk to our ecological system.   Electronic equipment waste ranging from personal computers, optical disc players and mobile phones contains toxic materials like lead, cadmium, mercury, flame retardants and leaching plastics. If this waste is left untreated in landfills or dumps (as is the case in India), it will result in irreparable loss to the life in the soil, water and the atmosphere, thus adversely impacting human health and ecology. People working in areas close to these landfill areas or areas where electronic waste is stored are in danger of severe health problems like damage to the kidneys, swelling of the brain, interference with regulatory hormones, skin problems, cancer and neurological and respiratory disorders. Indian Laws relating to Disposal of Hazardous Waste In India, the Environment Protection Act, 1986, authorizes the central government to take all measures deemed necessary or expedient to protect the quality of environment and prevent any type of pollution. Hence, the Government of India has framed the Hazardous Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 1989 and Hazardous Waste (Storage Export and Import) Rules, 1989 to regulate the disposal of hazardous waste in India.  [7]  These rules make it mandatory for any organization to seek the permission of the local state pollution control board for grant of authorization for carrying hazardous substances in the form of collection, reception, treatment, transport, storage and disposal of such wastes. In recent judgement of Rajasthan High court in the Suo Motu action taken against the administration of Jaipur city, Justice D. V. Singh held that right to life includes the right to food, clothing, shelter, right to reasonable accommodation to live in, right to descent environment and also right to live in clean city. Even in the case of Municipal Council, Ratlam V. Vardichand  [8]  , the case which was the beginning point of environment jurisprudence in India in which justice Krishna Iyer attributed the pollution free environment and public health with that of Human right aspect. Judgment and decisions of the judiciary have proved that pollution free environment and clean city is facet of Right to life. The Basel Convention Which was signed by India on 22 September, 1992, sought to regulate the garbage imperialism or toxic terrorism, as it was called, indulged in by the Organisation for the Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries towards Non-OECD Countries. The Basel Convention envisaged that in the beginning of year 1998, there will be complete ban on exports of hazardous waste but it could not materialize for obvious reasons. Besides so many important clauses in the Basel Convention, the most important one is that the country which is importing hazardous waste should have facilities to dispose of the waste in an environmentally sound manner. Final Legal Take Away Tip The government of India has proposed a new set of rules called the E-waste (Management and Handling) Rules 2010. This provides for making the producer of electrical and electronic equipment responsible for the collection and appropriate disposal of e-waste generated at the end of the product life.  [9]  Besides banning the import of used electrical and electronic equipment for charity in the country, these new rules also aim to regulate not only the producers, but also the recyclers and intermediaries. 2.5   Law Relating to Bio-Medical Waste Management The hospital wastes attracted the attention of the Supreme Court as early as in 1994 when a writ petition was filed under Article 32 of the Constitution against the concerned authorities to provide clean and health environment. Issue of improper hospital waste management was the crux of the case in B.L. Wadhera v. Union of India  [10]   The court gave series of directions. The most important among them are: 1. All hospitals with 50 beds and above should install incinerators or any of effective alternative method under their own administrative control. 2. The incinerator or alternative methods should be fitted with necessary pollution control mechanism, approved and confirming to the standards laid down by the Central Pollution control Board. 3. The Central Pollution control Board and the State Pollution Control Boards should regularity send its inspection teams in different areas to ascertain that the collection, transportation and disposal garbage/wastes is carried out satisfactorily. Under the Indian Penal Code, 1860 a polluter of the environment can also be punished if he does an act which causes any common injury, danger of annoyance to the public or to the people in general then the act may be treated as public as defined under Section 268 and the offender may be treated punished under Section 290 or 291 of the Code, There are also penal provision under a situation which either causes, or destroys, or diminishes the value or utility of any property, of affects the property injuriously as provided under the Section 426, 230, 231, and 432 of the Indian Penal Code. This otherwise means that if any person who generates, collects, receives, stores, transport, treated, disposes or handles bio-medical wastes in any form sh all be treated as a contravener of the above penal provisions.  [11]   There should be concerted efforts of government for spreading the awareness among the people about the importance of cleanliness and protection of environment through the communication media as well as organizing awareness camps at local levels.  [12]   Bio Medical (Management and Handling) Rules, 1998 The Bio-medical Rules came into existence in 1998 through a notification in exercise of the powers conferred by Sections 6, 8 and 25 of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986. Bio-medical Rules is the first of its kind of national law in whole South- East Asian Region in relation to bio-medical waste management. The definition of Bio-medical waste is very comprehensive and extensive one. National legislation is the basis for improving health care waste practices in any country. There should be a clear designation of responsibilities before the law is enacted. Unfortunately, Indian law fails to come up to the standard prescribed by the World Health Organization. The Committee on Solid Management  [13]  recommends that bio-medical waste should be refrained from throwing on the streets or open places as well as into municipal dust bins or the domestic waste collection sites. This means majority of the institutions still managed to throw the bio-medical waste municipal bins near to their premises. So it can be said that utter failure of the law in implementing it. The Rules is very wide and includes the occupier who generates bio-medical waste. The Rules which speak about setting up of incinerator or any other alternative mechanism in a hospital. Let us presume that the all the hospitals have set up the incinerator. Has the Pollution Control Board equipped with enough infrastructures to check and each and every incinerator of a hospital in relation its operation and emission standards?  [14]   Just by imposing deadline regarding setting up of incinerator even after it has been discarded by western countries or any other methods. The incinerator should be used at it optimum level otherwise the waste may not be treated properly. In a hospital environment, technologies like incineration fail because untrained janitor staff runs them. Most of the surveys incinerators run at temperatures lower than those specified in the rules. Due to poor operation and maintenance, these incinerators do not destroy the waste, need a lot of fuel to run, and are often out of order. If every hospital has an incinerator; definitely it cannot be used its optimum level as the amount infectious waste is less. This leads improper treatment of bio-medical waste. The result is obvious causing danger to human health and the environment Generally waste is disposed through incineration by heating minimum 1000 o C. Due to failure of continue supply of electricity the heat will not raise up to prescribed level. The result is not completion of disposal of waste according to the rules. 2.6 The Municipal Solid Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules, 2000 This defined municipal solid waste as commercial and residential wastes generated in a municipal or notified areas in either solid or semi-solid form excluding industrial hazardous wastes but includes treated bio-medical wastes. According to Purden Anderson, refuse and solid waste are about the same thing, Garbage is food waste, Trash and Rubbish are roughly equivalent terms; they contain little or no garbage. Trash frequently refers to grass and shrubbery clippings, papers, glass, cans and other household wastes.  [15]  Rubbis is also likely to include demolition materials like brick, broken concrete, and discarded roofing and lumber. It has further been clarified that solid waste includes discarded and abandoned appliances tank autos, mine and manufacture waste, agricultural, lumbering, hospital, research laboratories and industries. Some industrial wastes are toxic or hazardous. It is important to ascertain the nature of waste whether it is biodegradable or combustible in handling and disposal of solid waste. Combustion and landfill method of disposal further gives rise to problems like air, water and land pollution, affecting adversely the health of the man, and flora and fauna. Apart from household, office waste, the waste from industries within the city precincts have become a threatening problem now-a-days. Waste from industries using chemicals and synthetics, biomedical waste are hazardous or dangerous waste too. The Indian Penal Code and Solid Waste Management The Indian Penal Code of 1860 has dealt with solid waste management under Chapter XIV of offences affecting the public health, safety, convenience, decency and morals. Since, solid waste gives rise to various type of diseases and is dangerous to public health, it has been treated as public nuisance and has been made punishable. But there is no direct section in the Code which deals with the problem of solid waste. Provisions under the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 Section 133 of the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973 deals with removal of nuisance and empowers the Sub-Divisional Magistrate or any executive Magistrate, on receiving report/information, to make order to remove the public nuisance and desist from carrying any trade, business which is causing public nuisance. The Court have made use of Section 133 of the Code widely to deal with the problem of solid waste management. In the famous case of Municipal Corporation, Ratlam v. Shri Vardhichand  [16]  Justice Krishna Iyer declared that à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦the guns of Section 133 go into action wherever there is public nuisance. The public power of the Magistrate under the Code is a public duty to the members of the public who are victims of the nuisance. If the order is defied or ignored, Section 188, I.P.C. comes into penal play. It was further, observed that imperative tone of S.  133, Cr.P.C. read with the punitive temper of S.  188 I.P.C. makes the prohibitory act a mandatory duty. The Court also pointed out that Article 47 of the Indian Constitute makes it a paramount principle of governance that steps are taken for the improvement of public health as amongst its primary duties. Right to sanitation, decent and dignified life The courts on various occasions have declared in unequivocal terms that maintenance of health, preservation of sanitation falls within the purview of Article 21 of the Constitution as it adversely affects the life of the citizen and it amounts to slow poisoning and reducing the life of the citizen because of the hazards created, if not checked. The court have also declared that it is a primary, mandatory and obligatory duty of the municipal corporations/ councils to remove rubbish, filth, night soil or any noxious or offensive matter.  [17]  The Pollution Boards and its officers have a basic duty under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 to stop unauthorised movement and/or disposal of the waste. They are also empowered to take action against erring industries and persons. In Virendar Gaur v. State of Haryana and in many other cases, the Supreme Court has time and again declared that right to life under Article 21 encompasses right to live with human dignity, quality of life, and decent environment. Thus, pollution free environment and proper sanitary condition in cities and towns, without which life cannot be enjoyed, is a integral facet of right to life. A Landmark Case The Supreme Court of India in Dr. B.L. Wadehra v. Union of India  [18]  , emphatically pronouncement that the resident of Delhi have a statutory right to live in a clean city. Therefore, Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) and New Delhi Municipal Council (NMCD) are under a statutory obligation to scavenge and clean the city and it is mandatory for these authorities to collect and dispose of the garbage/waste generated from various sources in the city. It was further observed that non-availability o funds inadequacy or inefficiency of the staff, insufficiency of machinery etc. cannot be pleaded as ground for non-performance of their statutory obligations. 2.7 The new Plastic Waste (Management and Handling) Rules 2011 New rules in India have banned the use of plastic sachets for storing and selling food and tobacco products, and both recycled and compostable bags used for carrying foodstuffs have also been banned. The new Plastic Waste (Management and Handling) Rules 2011 have not entirely banned recycled plastic bags, but in addition to their restrictions on carrying food items, they must conform to a number of other rules laid down by the Bureau of Indian Standards, one of which states: The plastic carrying bags shall either be white or only with those pigments and colourants which are in conformity with the bar prescribed by the Bureau of Indian Standards. Bags should also be no less than 40 microns in thickness, double the thickness required under previous rules. Officials hope the new rules will achieve thickness uniformity throughout the country.  [19]   Chapter 3 Suggestions In such cases one has to adopt `cradle to grave solutions from generation to final disposal of the wastes. This is particularly essential with the waste including toxic and hazardous wastes. To contain and control the problem, there must be `awareness program to reduce solid waste, to reuse the things if possible and to recycle the wastes like paper waste. Thus, it deals attitudinal change amongst the people before we venture to strengthen the existing laws and implement them effectively and efficiently Reprocess the wastes to recover energy and material. Separate hazardous waste from other source material for efficient handling. Incinerate or otherwise convert hazardous wastes to non-hazardous wastes. To encourage recycling of material, some motivation be given. Efficient laws alone cannot solve the problem, unless we have efficient mechanism to implement, will of the government to implement and attitudinal change among the masses is needed Multiplicity of laws and multitudinous authorities cannot overcome such problem unless people are made aware of the adverse effects of this problem and they abide by laws with an aim to safeguard the present and future generation. Municipal corporation is a local authority within the meaning of `State under Article 12 of the Constitution and it is Statutory duty to collect, store, transport, process and dispose of the municipal soiled wastes and see the health hygiene of the public is maintained. Report anyone who actively dumps waste to the appropriate authorities. Reduce, re-use and recycle. Glass Bottles or jars can be reused or taken to a bottle bank for recycling. Metals: Used aluminum and steel cans can be collected as scrap and smelted for re-use. Avoid batteries. They contain a range of metals but are difficult to recycle. Plastics: Many drink bottles are made from a plastic called PET, which can be re-used. Vegetable Waste: A bucket with a lid makes a good container for vegetable waste that can be regularly added to the compost heap for use in the garden. Efforts at individual levels should be promoted. People should form the habit of storing waste at source in their own houses and deposit such waste into the municipal system only.  [20]   Conclusion   The apathetic Governmental attitude towards the disposal of waste is a problem that has led to difficulties in implementation of The Municipal Solid Waste (Management Handling) Rules, 2000 as it has led to ignorance towards uncollected domestic waste. The waste processing and disposal facility has to be set up by the Municipal Authority on their ow

Alan Bennetts Talking Heads Essay -- Alan Bennett Talking Heads Essay

Alan Bennett's "Talking Heads" "Talking heads" by Alan Bennett is a collection of monologues in which the audience are showed into the life of a character and given an insight into the character's personality and situation.peoples lives are portrayed in comic ways leaving the audience feeling sympathy and guilt for the character in laughing at their misfortune. Monologues are a long speech made by one person. This style of script is really effective and has a powerful effect on the audience. These monologues were written for television broadcasting, programmes presented in this way are put under the genre of tragi-comedy. This style of script has a dramatic effect upon the audience because from one statement , several emotions arise, for example Irene writing to someone informing them that their wife is a prostitute it is comic that she would care to write a letter about something that does not concern her of this sort of information but in another way it displays pathos because she is has enough time to spare to have such an interest in finding out information such as this. The talking heads monologues often give an exaggerated story largely influenced by the environment and era in which the characters live in. For example Doris' jaded views of nursing homes which are perhaps stereotypically nursing homes from the era in which she brought up in. This cynical view also emphasises the lack of respect in the ironic way that an elderly person has been influenced by negative views of the older generation. Within this essay I am going to analyse the talking heads scripts and bring about my point of views as well as also using my background knowledge on the era and several other topics which seem to o... ...eotype people which displays irony as they fit into 3 groups of people which are well known to be stereotyped: porn stars, o.a.p's and interfering busy-bodies. "When I saw his vest it had electrician written all over it." Lesley says on meeting a man with a tattoo. I think these stereotypical associations are made due to their ignorance towards different cultures, classes and race. As a conclusion to this essay I feel that Alan Bennett has created these monologues effectively through the use of pathos which is present through all the monologues. He enforces feeling brought about by the pathos with metaphors as well as clichà © phrases.The television episodes are simple but effective in setting an atmosphere appropriate to the monologue. He brings the characters to a level which we can all relate to in some way which makes the impact of tragedy far deeper.

Good and Bad Memory in Academic Study

I. Abstract Improving memory has always been a critical issue of most concern for every person in general, particularly for students in academic learning. Accordingly, our research aims to examine some possible explanations for both students’ good and bad memory in academic study. Another approach of this study is to look for the solutions to students’ poor memory performance. To collect the data, a questionnaire was developed and delivered to 60 English students in the context of Hanoi University.The findings suggest that although most of students have general knowedge about memory skills, not many of them efficiently employ what they have absorded. In conjunction with ineffective study methods, laziness, low concentration and overlearning are the main factors lowering students’ memory. Consequently, a good memory skill is not enough, more important than that is the practice of training the brain every day to reach the best of memory ability. II. IntroductionApp arently, people are now overwhelmingly bombarded by a huge amount of information which changes and multiplies every day. Hence, it is of great necessity for each individual to have a good memory so as to perceive and deal with such large knowledge. However, it is a fact that many people, including students have trouble memorizing. According to Tony (2008), as much as 95 percent of people suffer from major problems related to memory. He claims the reason explained for this is that people have little access to methods or skills to â€Å"best utilize their inherent capacities† (p. 2). In our research, we mainly focus on a group of freshmen and sophomores of Hanoi University to find out why students sometimes feel helpless with their memory and in what ways they can boost their retentive memory in academic study. III. Materials and methods For the data collection purpose, a questionnaire serves as the most practical and effective tool due to its convenience and speediness, especi ally when the survey conducted involves people on a large scale. Our questionnaire consists of two parts, namely reasons and solutions, representing five questions on the whole.Specifically, the first part is to identify the number of English students of Hanoi University (English Hanuers) having access to memory skills at school as well as how they evaluate their memory ability. The reasons constituting to participants’ poor memory are in particular examined. The second part is designed in attempt to specify memory’s kind most students possess. Besides, some memory skills are suggested to see the most applicable in academic study. Prior to the real delivery, we had a trial version conducted in our class. The result shows that some informants were confused about the question order.Accordingly, an alternative was developed as respond to subjects’ problems. 60 questionnaires were randomly administered to 60 students on a voluntary basis in April, 2012. Both English freshmen and sophomores participated in the survey, among whom, female numbers as the major ones. It took us one week to implement the survey and one more day to sort out appropriate sheets. Of 60 questionnaires delivered, 8 were invalid as not being completed, therefore; 52 left met standards for final tabulation. Data analysis was undertaken as the next step.In the first part, the respondents’ answer is divided into two groups, depending on their option in the 2nd question. If students label themselves as owning a good memory, they will proceed to answer question on reasons and factors involved. In contrast, those who believe to possess a poor memory will be asked to respond to a list of possible causes. The second part contains two smaller sections. The first section is composed of four questions including twelve options, which could be divided into three groups. Described in each group are some basis symptoms, in consequence featuring visual memory, auditory memory and k inesthetic memory.The next section presents some suggestive memory skills for students to choose which one they mostly employ. Based on respondents’ choice, we synthesized and analyzed which memory aids are useful academically. IV. Results and Discussion 1. The reasons contributing towards students’ poor memory In order to make the data analysis clearer and easier to understand, we divided the respondents’ answer into two groups, namely group A and group B. Group A contains students whose answer is ‘yes’ to the question whether they were taught about memory skills at school. And others who ticked ‘no’ for the question mentioned above belong to group B. . The statistics of English Hanuers who have been taught about memory skills at school Table 1:The access of English Hanuers to memory skills at school |Access to memory skills at school |Number of respondents (†¦/52) |Percentage (%) | |Group A |37 |71 | |Group B |15 |29 |Table 1 sh ows the access of English students of Hanoi University to memory skills at school. As presented in the table 1, as much as 71% of respondents have learned about memory skills at school. What can be traced from the table is that a large number of subjects, in the investigation’s scope, more or less have some knowledge base related to memory. Understandably, it is the obvious fact that people are increasingly aware of the importance of memory in an individual’s success (William, 2009). Students, especially those studying foreign language are not the exception.It is of great fundament for English learners to develop the degree of memory to increase their language acquisition. The more they understand how their memory works and how to work with it, the more they enjoy the power of memory in their learning. Nevertheless, the matter should be taken into consideration is the effectiveness of those memory skills to students’ performance. The claim that students who have access to lesson related to memory skills have a better memory than those who do not will be investigated in the next part. . 2 The comparison between the percentage of respondents who have a good memory and those who do not [pic] Figure 2: The percentage of good and bad memory of taught and untaught memory-skill students Figure 2 compares the proportion held by participants who evaluate themselves as having good memory and those suffering from poor memory between two groups. The result appears to be different from our expectation. Among students in group B, the percentage of those possessing a good memory is much higher than that of in group A.Specifically, nearly 70% of students in group B is determined to own good memory which opposes to that in group A with only 46%. This fact can be partly explained by the ineffectiveness in students’ learning styles and memory methods which lead them to encounter difficulties in memorizing. Language learners may suffer more from memory inability since they have to deal with a large number of vocabularies and structures in everyday learning. From what is presented in the chart, it can be probably concluded that English Hanuers still somehow face difficulties making use of what they conceive at school.Obviously, although educators put priority in optimizing students to effectively master their study, students seem to find it difficult to take the knowledge into practical application. 1. 3a Reasons contributing to good memory [pic] Figure 3a: Reasons for good memory. It is clearly shown in the pie chart 3a that among students having good memory, the number of those who see it as the result of long-run practice makes up to 65%, outnumbering those who are naturally inherited with 35%. It is possibly inferred from the data that the mnemonic competence can be boosted and strengthened by day-by-day practice with the suitable memorizing methods.Of the same viewpoint, Higbee (2001) states that practice plays as a key facto r to memory improvement. It is a fact that the number of people who are born with excellent innate memory is very small, and majority of people gradually reach the state of having good memory by practice. In Kazt’s findings (2006), most people employ about 10% of their memory ability. He also emphasizes that there is no bad innate brain, but it is because of people’s underestimation of what their memory can do which causes their memory’s limitation.Many students, generally, are of the opinion that their memory is out of control, which results in the less success of memory practice. 1. 3b Reasons contributing to students’ poor memory 1. Low concentration 2. Overlearning 3. Laziness 4. Knowledge disuse 5. Low understanding 6. Negative learning attitude [pic] (The total number is over 100% because the respondents tick more than one option) Figure 3b: Reasons for bad memory Bar chart 3b displays some common reasons contributing towards students’ bad me mory. Generally, English Hanuers suffer from poor memory with combination of reasons.Of the six factors provided, laziness ranks as the most popular one to be blamed on (64%). Following next are overlearning and low concentration which share the same number of 56%. Coincidently, we got the same incidence of 32% for low understanding together with negative learning attitude as the key elements to students’ memory inability. Meanwhile, knowledge disuse is mentioned as the most unpopular factor resulting in respondents’ poor memory performances. It comes as no surprise to us that laziness is revealed as the main reason leading to students’ poor memory.The congruent result is presented in Higbee’s work (2001) when he claims that laziness plays an important role in people’s deficient and ineffective memory. Manifestly, memorizing and memory use for study are a complex and complicated process which requires a great deal of effort and determination. And a bout 95% of information will be forgotten if learners do not retrieve it in a proper way (Adam, 2009). Therefore, laziness appears to be a huge barrier preventing students from boosting up their memory.Also, being distracted and having too much knowledge to learn are the common reasons as students usually complain that they are out of breath because of the huge amount of knowledge and information absorbed. Some students find it hard to focus on study and remember things since they have to cope with a great deal of interference such as part-time job, finance, love affair, and so on. It varies from person to person in the reasons and factors accounting for their experiencing memory difficulties and there may be a combination between the outside and the inside causes.However, what it is down to is that it is students themselves who are the most responsible to their memory inability. 2. Solutions 1. Memory types of English students of Hanoi University [pic] Figure 4: Memory types of Eng lish students of Hanoi University Figure 4 describes the memory types of English Hanuers. As generally demonstrated from the findings, participants belong to various types of memory. Not only do they possess single type of memory but also those of combination. Nevertheless, more students belong to single types than mixed types.Of six categories provided, visual memory is the most preferred one as 31% of students are classified in this category. People owning visual memory type have tendency to memorize by creating mental images, looking at pictures and diagrams. Auditory memory refers to people who memorize information better through melodies, beats and rhythms. They prefer to hear instructions or lectures rather than watch or write, and better take in information presented orally (Cusimano, 2001). As shown in the chart, 23% of respondents belong to type of auditory memory.Meanwhile, 15% of the subjects show that they are likely to be in the group of kinaesthetic memory. Those prefe r trying or experiencing things to memorize and they tend to enjoy activities more during class time. [pic] Figure 5: Memory skills used to better memory Figure 5 presents some memory skills students use to better their memory. Connecting old and new information is the most popular methods to be employed by English Hanuers (42. 3%). Meanwhile, 30. 8% of respondents feel that using mindmaps helps them most in studying and remembering things.Taking notes while studying seems less effective as just only 26. 9% of students choose it as their favorite method to memorize. Undeniably, new information can be easily memorized if it is organized based on the connection with the background knowledge. The better you understand the subject, the longer and more vividly you remember it. Using mindmaps is considered as an effective skill in improving memory because it boosts the react of both sides of the brain (Tony, 2008). Users not only create a mental image but also depict a real map on the pap er, which help the brain ave time to transfer the information into long-term memory. Taking notes while studying also is very important since students cannot remember all the contents during the class. It is a muscle activity, and the fact is that our muscles have significantly better memories than our heads (Kesselman- Turkel, Peterson, 1982). When writing something down, you will remember more efficienly than just only read or listen. Moreover, the lecturer or professional may give a lot of precious and interesting information from their knowledge and experience, which are not written in any books.Hence, it is vital for a student to take notes for reviewing after class time. However, because of laziness, some students still have the wrong awareness of note-taking skill. IV. Conclusion In brief, this small-scale paper investigates reasons and solutions to poor memory among English students of Hanoi University. Firstly, laziness, low concentration and over-learning are the most comm on factors contributing towards students’ memory inability. With regards to these problems, some memory skills are recommended. Different students choose their own method which helps them remember most effectively.They highly appreciate the connection between background knowledge and new information as well as the role of reviewing in memory’s improvement. However, because of the small scale of the research conducted, the limitations are unavoidable. We failed to testify the correlation between students’ memory types and their most favorite memory skill. Hence, in further research, this should be taken into consideration as an important key point. It is our attempt in giving some brief review about memory and the ways to boost students’ memory.We hope that the research helps students identify their memory’s type and define the most effective skills and study methods. REFERENCES Adam, K. (2002). I'm a gifted, so are you. England, Times Media Pte Ltd . Cusimano, A. (2001). Learning disability, there’s a cure. Pennsylvania, Achieve Publications. Harry, L. (2000). How to develop a power memory. New York, NY: Free Press. Higbee, K. L. (2001). Your memory: how it works and how to improve it. New York, NY: Maloew and Company Katz, E. (2006). Secrets of a super memory. New York, NY: Free Press.Kesselman-Turkel, J. & Peterson, F. (1982) Note-taking made easy, Lincolnwood, IL: Contemporary books. Tony, B. (2002). Mind maps book. USA, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated. Tony, B. (2008). Use your head. London, BBC Pubns. William, W. A. (2009). Memory: How to develop, train and use it. UK, The Elizabeth T- wne. APPENDIX QUESTIONNAIRE We are Hoang Thi Hoa and Dam Thi My Hanh, from class 11a10. Our research aims to investigate the reasons contributing to the students’ poor memory and also find out some effective ways to hasten their memory.We would be grateful for your honesty in answering these questions. Thank you so much for y our cooperation. I. REASONS 1. Were you taught anything about your memory skills at school? ? Yes ? No 2. Do you think that you have a good memory? ? Yes ? No ( If yes, skip question 4, if no, skip question 3) 3. What could be the reasons explained for your good memory? ? Naturally, I have a good memory ? It is the result of my practice Other(s):†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. ( please specify) 4. What factor(s), in your opinion, contributes to your poor memory? You unable to concentrate when you study ? You have to learn too much knowledge at a time ? You are lazy ? You disuse what you have learned ? You do not understand clearly what you learned ? You try to remember only when you are forced to ? You have negative attitude when having something to study and remember II. SOLUTIONS A. TO BEST REMEMBER INFORMATION,†¦ (circle only one for each question) 1. When lea rning new words, I often try to†¦ a. Visualize the word b. Say the word aloud c. Write the word 2. When needing concentration to study, I usually†¦ a. Look at something carefully . Listen to music c. Find a quiet place 3. When reading, I†¦ a. Like descriptive scenes b. Enjoy conversations and try to hear the characters c. Prefer actions and do not like reading much 4. When learning something new, I†¦ a. Like to see diagrams or pictures b. Prefer to hear instructions or like to talk about it with someone else c. Prefer to jump right in and try it B. TO BETTER MY MEMORY, I†¦ ? using mind maps ? connecting old and new information ? taking note while study Other(s):†¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦Ã¢â‚¬ ¦. (please specify) THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR COOPERATION!

Widespread use of renewable energy

The first oil daze in 1973 raised worldwide concern about dwindling energy supplies. High oil monetary value was a mark of depletion worldwide energy beginnings. Since 1960s no large oil resources have been discovered in the universe. It suggested that universe oil production will make its extremum within one or two decennaries ( Lauber, 2005 ) . The rise in oil monetary values besides affected the developing states ‘ development programs, which demand big sums of energy for their early procedure of industrialisation. For developed states, the fluctuation in oil monetary values caused economic and societal jobs such as unemployment, trade shortages and higher rising prices due to their great dependence on oil import ( Seitz, 2008 ) . Since the industrialised revolution the ingestion of universe energy has been uninterrupted. With the modern-day universe population growing, energy demand is lifting at a rapid rate, particularly in many developing states with a deficiency of reso urces on their ain land. It is predicted that between 1997 and 2020 energy demand will increase 60 per centum, 120 per centum growing will happen in developing states, particularly in Asia ( Hill, 2004 ) . If this tendency continued, the environmental jobs would necessarily deteriorate even farther. As a considerable proportion of the universe energy, fossil fuels account for the premier beginnings of C dioxide emanations, which are chief subscribers to the planetary heating. Acid rain concentrated by acerb gases from fossil fuels, amendss ecosystems and corrodes human edifices. It is going a terrible job in Asia with the turning ingestion of fossil fuels as the procedure of industrialisation accelerates ( Seitz, 2008 ) . The quickly spread outing usage of gasoline-powered vehicles could do terrible urban smog and spit little particulates, which are the greatest menace to people ‘s wellness ( Jaccard, 2005 ) . Sanderson and Islam ( 2007 ) maintain that the way of economic development necessarily caused environmental jobs related to the overly usage of environmental resources and clime can besides impact some sectors of the economic system such as H2O resources, agribusiness, conv eyance and touristry, which are vulnerable to climate alteration. In general there are three major solutions for the turning energy demand and world-wide environmental jobs, each of which has its attractive forces. First fossil fuels can be used more cleanly and expeditiously, which could lend to a decrease in energy strength and cut down the emanations of nursery gases. Energy preservation can take consequence in short term and straight execute on present energy system without great passage. The economic system in the United States increased 30 per centum while the oil ingestion declined 20 per centum between 1977 and 1985 because the state used energy much more expeditiously ( Seitz, 2008 ) . Second, atomic power emits no air pollution which could greatly turn to the environmental jobs. France shifted to atomic as its major power of electricity in response to the energy crisis, and by 2005 it reached one of the universe highest rates by supplying 80 per centum of its electricity from atomic beginning ( ibid ) . Third renewable energy involves uni nterrupted energy beginnings and produces small pollution to the environment. There is immense potency in this new energy beginnings to run into much of the turning energy demand and bit by bit replace fossil fuels with equal support ( Middleton, 2003 ) . For every bit long as the planetary economic system continues to development and operate on the footing of limited energy supplies, the great demand for energy services in the hereafter would do terrible energy crisis. Increasing energy efficiency can assist to countervail the rise in energy demand, but it is improbable to turn to all the extra demands ( ibid ) . Furthermore, the environmental taint caused by fossil fuels will go on to necessitate options. Lauber ( 2005 ) maintains that while the present cost of salvaging one ton of C by increasing energy efficiency is well lower than by utilizing renewable energy to avoid emanations, renewable power will play a function in the long tally, energy efficiency can merely work out short term job. Besides the safety and atomic waste jobs, a important growing in atomic power usage would increase trust on imported U. Dependence on energy imports would still be a first job for states with a deficiency of resources. In add-on, the atomic begi nnings besides face energy crisis as it is shown that the known militias of U will merely last for 60 old ages by present counts. ( Traube, 2004, cited Lauber, 2005 ) . Therefore, renewable energy seems to be a better option based on its two outstanding advantages: infinite beginnings and small pollution. Renewable energy may be defined as energy generated from natural resources in the environment such as sunshine, air current, tides and geothermic heat, which are continuously replenished. Harmonizing to the definition renewable energy will ne'er run out. For this ground, renewable energy could be an ideal solution to the energy deficit job. Additionally, renewable energy does non bring forth pollution straight, which will relieve the serious planetary environmental impairment. Renewable energy is really already in widespread usage: approximately 20 per centum of universe ‘s electricity production comes from hydroelectric dikes ; in many developing states biomass provides the lone power for cookery and warming ; India and China both have primary air current power electricity programs, with 2,000 megawatt marks ; Some Middle Eastern states are seeking to research the H production powered by solar energy as a long-run option to dependence on exporting oil ; The large-scale federal authorities in the United States received increasing R & A ; D support for renewable energy after the 1974 oil daze ( Elliott, 1997 ) . The widespread usage of renewable energy in many states clearly shows that the publicity of renewable energy engineerings provides great advantages for both rich and hapless states. In industrialised states, solar or weave energy necessitate extremely skilled and knowledge-intensive employers, which will be an drift to a new occupation hunting inclination. Using biomass with more efficient engineerings for cookery and warming in developing states where the biomass is normally used inefficiently and prodigally can convey big benefits such as a decrease in deforestation. Examples are the widespread usage of improved wood and wood coal cooking ranges in Kenya every bit good as the production of ethyl alcohol from sugar cane in Brazil ( Aˆmann, Laumanns and Uh, 2006 ) . However, â€Å" one renewable beginning may bring forth small or no pollution, but have other inauspicious environmental and societal consequence † ( Hill, 2004, p.325 ) . Hydroelectric dikes generate low nursery gas emanations but affect both up- and down-stream ecosystems and coerce many people who live along the river into taking from their places. Solar power does non bring forth direct pollution. During the procedure of fabrication and transporting solar panels, energy storage and keeping machines, nevertheless, pollution will be generated. Renewable energy has to confront three challenges in its practical application. First, the beginnings of energy are non uninterrupted. For illustration solar power can non be accumulated at dark and lupus erythematosus is generated on cloudy or showery yearss with small sunshine ( Hill, 2004 ) . The job with air current power is that the air current may non be blowing when and where it is needed. Therefore the large-scale storage of solar and weave energy is necessary and needs both proficient and fiscal support. Second, renewable energy has comparatively low energy denseness. Take the instance of solar energy, to run into the big energy demand, big countries of land are required to be covered with solar panels. Harmonizing to the US Electric Power Research Institute, to run into 25 per centum of America ‘s electricity demand about 6000 square stat mis of solar farms, an country peers to the Connecticut State, are needed ( Hill, 2004 ) . Biomass energy will confront the same ch allenge. Large land countries used for biomass energy demand to stay forested. This could do land-use struggles because the important growing of the universe ‘s population will necessitate increasing nutrient production and more land dedicated to agribusiness. There is a tradeoff between the two methods of land usage ( Jaccard, 2005 ) . The 3rd challenge involves inconvenient location of power workss. Large-scale solar power workss need to be located in countries with plentiful and long-time sunshine. The best air current power need the energy sites with reliable and strong air currents. These locations are normally far from energy ingestion centres. Transporting the power to clients requires substructures and complicated power line organisation. Peoples normally do non desire power lines near their places or schools and a deficiency of transporting substructures are all obstructions to the existent feasibleness. There are besides political and finicky barriers to the acceptance of renewable energy system. Many authoritiess prefer conventional fossil fuels to renewable energy â€Å" due to tradition, acquaintance, and the size, economic strength, and political clout of the conventional energy industries † ( Geller, 2002, p. 43 ) . In developing states loans for building renewable energy undertakings have been rejected by the World Bank and many-sided development Bankss due to their little undertaking graduated table, strangeness with the engineerings and higher investing hazard ( Martinot, 2001, cited in Geller, 2002 ) . In decision, despite those barriers and disadvantages, the widespread usage of renewable energy meets the demands of sustainable development in a long term. Whether in footings of increasing energy efficiency, switching to atomic power or developing renewable energy beginnings, the future effects can non be evitable. Even though renewable power engineerings were in most instances non to the full competitory commercially and the switch to renewable energy system will take a long period, their costs had the possible to fall quickly, and by 2020 should be able to surpass fossil fuels ( Lauber, 2005 ) . Nuclear power was evaluated as being more expensive than renewable energy and as keeping small opportunity of cost decreases in the hereafter. At the present phase different beginnings should be used together and the development of renewable energy should be given more accent.MentionsAˆmann, Dirk, Laumanns, Ulrich and Uh, Dieter ( 2006 ) Renewable Energy: a planetary reappraisal of en gineerings, policies and markets London: Sterling, VA: Earthscan.Elliott, D. ( 1997 ) Energy, Society and Environment: Technology for a Sustainable Future. New York: Routledge.Geller, Howard ( 2002 ) Energy Revolution: Policies for a Sustainable Future. Washington, DC, USA: Island Press.Hill, Marquita K. ( 2004 ) Understanding Environmental Pollution ( 2nd ed. ) . Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Jaccard, Mark Kenneth ( 2005 ) . Sustainable fossil fuels: the unusual suspect in the pursuit for clean and digesting energy Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Jamie Sanderson and Sardar M.N. Islam ( 2007 ) Climate alteration and economic development: SEA regional modeling and analysis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Lauber, V. ( Ed. ) ( 2005 ) Switch overing to Renewable Power: A model for the twenty-first Century. London, GBR: Earthscan Publications.Middleton, Nick ( 2003 ) The planetary casino: an debut to environmental issues ( 3rd ed. ) London: Arnold.Seitz, J L ( 2008 ) Global Issues ( 3rd ed. ) . Blackwell: Malden MA ( USA ) .

How to conduct a case study Essays

How to conduct a case study Essays How to conduct a case study Essay How to conduct a case study Essay How to conduct a case study Loop Patriarchy Purpose of a case study The purpose of a case study is to provide a more thorough analysis of a situation or case (often the story of an individual) which will reveal interesting information to the reader. Often they are used in social development to describe a persons life. Case studies often accompany reports, to give flesh to written reports. Know why you are conducting this interview. To what end will you ask questions? Ethical considerations The person to be interviewed must be respected. She must understand why you ant to speak to her and what use you will put what she says. You must explain who you are, who you work for, why you want to speak to her. Respect her dignity. Case studies must avoid exploitation. Similarly, they must avoid sensationalism. You must also avoid reporting any claim that is far-fetched, or which could cause conflict between her and her family and community. Be aware that poverty is often associated with disenfranchisement. Do not abuse her powerlessness for your own ends. Make sure you use an interpreter if you do not speak her language. If you do, you must ensure the interpreter is trained, and does not put words into the respondents mouth, or censor her or encourage her to say things she otherwise would not have. Will you take photographs? Will you ask permission? What will you do if permission is refused? How will you deal with the power imbalance between you and her? What will you do with the photographs? Will you give her a copy? How will this be arranged? Location busy with child care or other household duties. If it is done elsewhere, ensure her inform so that she may feel composed and not intimidated. Steps to Writing the Case Study 1. Know the subject or project. Be sure you know where she fits in. If she is a beneficiary, be sure you know of what. 2. Know her name. Be courteous and good mannered. Dress as if you respect her. 3. Arrive on time. Ask permission before taking photos 4. Explain how the study will be done. 5. Avoid the gathering of crowds. Well intended curiosity on the part of neighbors may be upsetting or embarrassing, and may cause her not to speak or not to reveal ere true feelings. . Decide if you will use anonymity. Discuss this with her. If you do agree, keep your promise. 7. Take notes. Check them with her when you are finished. Where you are quoting, use quotation marks. Avoid unnecessary descriptions of poverty that might humiliate she was dressed in rags, etc. Writing the report 1. Use a snappy attracting title if you can think of one. Catch the readers attention. Consider your audience carefully. 2. Try to keep your report to one page. This means that each word must count. 3. Your analysis should locate the womans words and circumstances within the wider situation. Her story should therefore be illustrative. Your report can therefore draw on project reports, or the findings of research. If you do use reports or research they should be quoted and referenced. 4. Depending on the context, consider using the problem solution benefit flow, explaining how our work addresses the problem and what benefits accrue from our intervention. Dont exaggerate. Dont underestimate the knowledge of the reader.

Free Essays on Deforestation In Brazils Amozon Rainforest

Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest The Amazon rainforest is an ecosystem that holds an extremely diverse array of plants and animals. It is located in the northern and central portion of South America, mainly in Brazil. It took thousands of years for it to become the way it is, and it stood peacefully up until last century. People began cutting it down for the economical advancement of their country, many people are still unaware of the impact this will cause. Some of the reasons deforestation occurs are population growth and logging. These reasons benefit Brazil’s economy, unfortunately they are in turn devastating the earth’s environment. We must stop deforestation; the rainforest is home to millions of creatures and it acts like a filter for the entire planet. The biggest issue concerning deforestation in Brazil and the Amazon is an economic one. When an economically struggling country has a choice between logging a forest to sell timber for high profits and leaving the forest intact without monetary compensation, the nation usually chooses the profitable alternative. This is because immediate economic gains are more important than future environmental costs (Miller, 1987, 59). Brazilians believe that it is in their best interest to cut into the forest to provide economic support for Brazil. However, rapid deforestation is rarely in the economic interest of the country concerned. When environmentalists show their concern over the loss of the rainforest, Brazilians get annoyed. They believe the arguments for preserving the forests are a â€Å"rich man’s luxury.† They are mainly concerned with the country’s need to improve its people’s living standards and accommodate the growing population. The combination of bad policies, population growth, and poverty makes the rainforest issue a difficult problem to solve. Poor people use mainly wood as fuel, and no one really seems to care about the government re... Free Essays on Deforestation In Brazil's Amozon Rainforest Free Essays on Deforestation In Brazil's Amozon Rainforest Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon Rainforest The Amazon rainforest is an ecosystem that holds an extremely diverse array of plants and animals. It is located in the northern and central portion of South America, mainly in Brazil. It took thousands of years for it to become the way it is, and it stood peacefully up until last century. People began cutting it down for the economical advancement of their country, many people are still unaware of the impact this will cause. Some of the reasons deforestation occurs are population growth and logging. These reasons benefit Brazil’s economy, unfortunately they are in turn devastating the earth’s environment. We must stop deforestation; the rainforest is home to millions of creatures and it acts like a filter for the entire planet. The biggest issue concerning deforestation in Brazil and the Amazon is an economic one. When an economically struggling country has a choice between logging a forest to sell timber for high profits and leaving the forest intact without monetary compensation, the nation usually chooses the profitable alternative. This is because immediate economic gains are more important than future environmental costs (Miller, 1987, 59). Brazilians believe that it is in their best interest to cut into the forest to provide economic support for Brazil. However, rapid deforestation is rarely in the economic interest of the country concerned. When environmentalists show their concern over the loss of the rainforest, Brazilians get annoyed. They believe the arguments for preserving the forests are a â€Å"rich man’s luxury.† They are mainly concerned with the country’s need to improve its people’s living standards and accommodate the growing population. The combination of bad policies, population growth, and poverty makes the rainforest issue a difficult problem to solve. Poor people use mainly wood as fuel, and no one really seems to care about the government re...

Using the French Expression À la rentrée

Using the French Expression la rentrà ©e la rentrà ©e!  [a la ra(n) tray] is a French expression used to mean, See you in September! or See you this fall! When translated literally, the phrase means, at the return. This is an common idiomatic phrase of normal register. How to Use the Phrase In August, major sectors of France slow down or close up shop completely. School is out, the government is more or less AWOL, and many restaurants and other businesses are closed as well. Therefore, many French people are on vacation for all or part of the month, which means that la rentrà ©e, in September, is more than just students and teachers going back to school; its also everyone else returning home and going back to work, returning to normalcy. la rentrà ©e! is a valediction, similar to bonnes vacances!  (have a nice vacation), a way of saying good-bye and an acknowledgement that youll see the other person when you both re-enter the real world after your prolonged vacation.You can also use la rentrà ©e as a reference to that point in time, to explain when something will happen, as in Je vais acheter une nouvelle voiture la rentrà ©e- Im going to buy a new car in early September / when school starts back up / after I get back from vacation. A related expression,  les affaires de la rentrà ©e,  means back-to-school deals/sales.

Affirmative Action Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Affirmative Action - Term Paper Example The following will explore job discrimination with an eye to how this form of discrimination affects certain groups of people in the labor market and how society has attempted to protect these people from discrimination. Taking a controversial approach to minority set aside programs, this essay will then persuasively argue that since these programs promote discrimination themselves, they are inherently defeatist and promote the same type of behavior that they try to eradicate. We now begin with an overview of the reasons for minority set aside programs – also called â€Å"Affirmative Action† in the United States – and this will follow with a concise rebuttal of the needs for such programs. Discrimination in the workforce affects people from all walks of life. Accordingly, the employment opportunities of half of our population are hindered by latent and overt sexism in the offices of America. It is well known that women in America earn substantially less than their male counterparts. The Equal Pay Act (EPA) of 1963 was established more than four decades ago to protect men and women who perform the same tasks from wage-based discrimination. Sexism is an unfortunate aspect of our modern society but the EPA seeks to combat it through positive legislation aimed at correcting the pay discrepancy between men and women in the labor force. Older workers also face a variety of impediments to their active inclusion in the labor force and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) of 1967 protects individuals who are 40 years of age or older from discrimination at work. Finally, people with disabilities face a plethora of hurdles in society and the Americans with Disabilitie s Act (ADA) of 1990 was established to ensure the full inclusion of people with disabilities in American society. Covering a wide variety of instances of discrimination, the ADA is one of the most recent pieces of legislation mentioned above which aims to tackle problems

Comparison & Contrast Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Comparison & Contrast - Essay Example While Sietel directly and openly opposes the banks decision adhere to advocacy groups, Yeoman is more affirming as he recognizes the role of banks in the pursuit of sustainable development. Yeomans begin his discussion by recalling how activist groups were able to make JP Morgan Chase, the second largest bank in the US, adhere to environmental and social policies. The article bring to light how financial institutions, which were not the typically targets of environmentalists, contribute to the degradation of the environment as they fund the projects of â€Å"air polluters† and â€Å"illegal loggers.† The author also describes how banks have incorporated corporate social responsibility in their strategies. In the case of Citigroup, â€Å"the bank committed to banning investment in firms that logged primary tropical forests, and it pledged to invest in renewable-energy projects† (Yeoman 2). The institution of the Equatorial Principle further formalizes the banks’ adherence for a more sustainable operation. However, Yeomans also recognized that banks and other companies often fail to deliver their lofty promises. Though business organization vo wed to adhere on environmentally and socially sound policies, companies often fail to apply these policies on their every project. In contrast, Sietel voices out a strong criticism against the move of the banks to cooperate with environmentalist. It should be noted that the article express its approval on â€Å"corporate concern for environment.† However, he stresses that joining activist groups on their thrusts may post complicacies for business organizations as most of their goals are not in line with their environmental partners. In conclusion, the two articles give light to the current issue of incorporating environmentally responsible policies for banks. Yeoman analyzes the issue by exposing both positive and negative aspects of

A Career In Marketing Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

A Career In Marketing - Case Study Example After reviewing the great diversity of careers that are available to the individual interested in a career in marketing, I was particularly drawn to a career in public relations. Public relations and market outreach is a field that interests me because it goes beyond merely marketing a product and directly incorporates elements of social interaction and company representation. In such a way, the individual who works within such a career is ultimately responsible for seeking to challenge public opinion and represent the firm/organization in the time of difficulties and in times of success. Ultimately, it is the challenge of such a position that is attractive due to the fact that many individuals employed in public relations type marketing jobs have had the distinct ability to fundamentally alter the means by which the public views the firm and the ultimate product or service offerings they represent. Such is not the norm however but it is a possibility for the individual that works in such a field. With respect to the particular type of skills and knowledge that is required for such a job, the website that was analyzed to inform his report stated that a degree in good standing from a four-year university or college was ultimately a requirement. Although there was no experience requirement for beginning within such a career, ultimately representing the firm to the public would be something that would most certainly require much experience as well as supreme command of verbal and written skills.

The Impact of Global Recession on Small Businesses Dissertation

The Impact of Global Recession on Small Businesses - Dissertation Example Prior research done by John Kitching mentioned that small businesses are treated as highly susceptible to external shocks, such as recessions, with firm performance declining in line with GDP. Small firms possess limited resources, customers and product lines across which to spread their risk – all of which restrict a firm’s capacity to withstand competitive pressures in adverse macroeconomic condition. They are also much more likely to cease trading than larger enterprises. Falling GDP at the macro level causes performance decline at the micro level and, in severe cases, business closure. Many economists have now been predicting the world global recession since the 1930s. Such grim warnings discovery spending by households and businesses, depressing output even more. America, Britain, the Euro area and Japan are almost certainly already in recession according to the popular rule of thumb of two successive quarters of falling GDP. In an updated World Economic Outlook, published on Nov 6th 2009, the IMF predicted the world GDP would fall to 2.2% in 2009, based on purchasing power parity weights, from 5% in 2007 and 3.7% in 2008. GDP is a measure of the total value of production of goods and services by all resident producing units in an economy during an accounting period, which is usually one year or one quarter. While recessions involve falls in GDP, they are namely characterized by rising unemployment. Fear of a long recession stems not just from the distressing developed country figures.

Literature Review Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Literature Review - Assignment Example Although change is a never ending process, many organizations are faced with the challenge of developing a management style that will enable them to cope with the changes. This leads to us asking so many questions such as whether there is one best way of making changes in an organization to improve its production. And to answer such a question, we can say that there is no one best way of making changes in an organization that can lead to its sustainability. This is evident from the complexity of an organization. Many people of an organization are affected with this change and so we must consider them. Most scholars argue that there are various ways of making changes in any organization and also other area. There is one argument that change effort must focus on cultural change for sustainability. By first understanding, the nature of an organization and its cultures, change can be easily implemented. This is because nature of cultures tends to be rooted deeply in an organization and is not easy to discern them. Organizations here are considered as social system as the performance of the organization is considered to be made up by the way people, and structures interact. The article on this also says that by simply improving management systems or changing technologies are not the way to go about because culture of organization will not change. By transforming the norms and values related to the socioeconomic welfare and environment, successful change towards sustainability will be achieved. Managers and employees should change their perspective and begin to value new things an example is that of caring for the environment, the community and the employees. True change according to this argument is responsible for producing changed values and norms that result in choices about organizational aspects that are different from the previous status quo. It discourages the change of

Critical and evaluative intellectual biography of Jean-Noel Kapferer 3 Essay - 1

Critical and evaluative intellectual biography of Jean-Noel Kapferer 3 articles - Essay Example Although many managers feel that investment in luxury business is one of best ways to remain profitable, they fail to understand the nature of the products and the best way to approach the market to optimize organization profits. Through a series of research based articles, Kapferer eliminates the vagueness that hinders understanding of luxury brands and provides an approach to invest in luxury business by analysing the client behaviour and their purchasing patterns. Through creation of brand awareness, Kapferer has managed to influence the contemporary business strategies. A close analysis of Kapferer’s contribution the design of the luxury brands will show his great influence in the business market. The main area of focus of Kapferer has been in modern business, especially in the branding of luxury brands. He has dedicated a number of his works to the luxury market that for long has become vague, putting the managers at the risk of failure in this market. His strong background in business is linked to his great experience and knowledge in the field of business. Kapferer is MBA holder from HEC Paris and PhD in North-western University in USA. Currently, he serves as a professor as HEC Business school, one of the schools that have won the first position among Europe business school. Overtime, Kapferer has developed the skill of indepth and critical analysis of brands with the aim of providing product design strategies that can be applied in the practical business environment. He has produced a number of books in different languages that have become brand icons in the business environment. His experience as a business consultant in the international business environment has contri buted to his influence in the business environment (Kapferer, 1996). Having identified the vagueness that exists in the understanding of luxury products, Kapferer seeks to provide disambiguation through an in-depth analysis of the factors

Literature Review Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Literature Review - Assignment Example Although change is a never ending process, many organizations are faced with the challenge of developing a management style that will enable them to cope with the changes. This leads to us asking so many questions such as whether there is one best way of making changes in an organization to improve its production. And to answer such a question, we can say that there is no one best way of making changes in an organization that can lead to its sustainability. This is evident from the complexity of an organization. Many people of an organization are affected with this change and so we must consider them. Most scholars argue that there are various ways of making changes in any organization and also other area. There is one argument that change effort must focus on cultural change for sustainability. By first understanding, the nature of an organization and its cultures, change can be easily implemented. This is because nature of cultures tends to be rooted deeply in an organization and is not easy to discern them. Organizations here are considered as social system as the performance of the organization is considered to be made up by the way people, and structures interact. The article on this also says that by simply improving management systems or changing technologies are not the way to go about because culture of organization will not change. By transforming the norms and values related to the socioeconomic welfare and environment, successful change towards sustainability will be achieved. Managers and employees should change their perspective and begin to value new things an example is that of caring for the environment, the community and the employees. True change according to this argument is responsible for producing changed values and norms that result in choices about organizational aspects that are different from the previous status quo. It discourages the change of

The boardroom episode of the apprentice Essay Example for Free

The boardroom episode of the apprentice Essay I saw The Apprentice once, many years ago. I didnt like it. I felt it was everything that was wrong with modern culture and the media in general. I vowed never to watch it again, and assumed everyone else would feel similarly. They did not. Jump to the present day, and The Apprentice is still as popular as ever, going by the fact that my Twitter feed mentions nothing else whenever it is on. I try to follow intelligent, liberal, clear-thinking people. So why do they all get sucked in to The Apprentice? Ive not heard anyone say they actually like it, if anything they seem to actively dislike it, but still they tune in every week without fail. What strange psychological system is in place that makes so many people want to watch the antics of a number of strangers they claim to find repugnant? Is everyone a secret masochist? Does Alan Sugar have some sort of mind-control power? Is the BBC employing weapons-grade There must be some interesting psychological phenomena in play. This needs investigating. So, as someone experienced in numerous areas of psychology who is largely ignorant about the current format and cast of The Apprentice, I felt I was in a perfect position to offer an objective psychological assessment of it. Here are the notes I made from viewing the latest episode. 2 min: OK, were barely out of the recap and already Lord Sugar emphatically says he believes actions speak louder than words. But many of the physical actions humans can perform produce little or no audible output. A metaphor, or does he suffer from synaesthesia? 3 min: Im thinking Lord Sugar may be using psychological methods to control the contestants and produce the most stimulating television. He seems the sort. Also, he strikes me as a cross between an ageing human and a belligerent Brillo pad. Just saying. 5 min: Lord Sugar calls the contestants at 5.20 am. Bit early, a possible attempt at sleep deprivation, leading to an unstable mental state? Also, all the contestants seem to live together in one house. Im assuming this is  something arranged by the show and not a massive coincidence? 8 min: Theyre visiting a farm, as you do. Details aside, Lord Sugar seems to persist in addressing the contestants from a raised level, so its a set-up where groups of supposedly ruthless people stand assembled in uniform while a man with absolute power over them looks down and barks orders. 9 min: Lord Alan Sugar wants them to set up and run a farm shop, something completely unfamiliar to people who work in the economic/corporate field. Excessive environmental change can cause symptoms to worsen in delirium. Most of the contestants dont seem old enough for that to be a major concern, but then given the aforementioned sleep deprivation 11 min: Maybe this friction between so many empty vessels is an attempt to generate large amounts of static electricity? Lord Sugar may want this to power some device hes working on. This doesnt sound like the most practical technology, but then again he is the head of Amstrad. 13 min: I dont think that guy Alex knows his eyebrows look like that. They must have drawn them on him as he slept for a cruel joke. 17 min: One of the women is on a farm and says the silage smells really nice. Maybe her insula or putamen is wrongly wired up? 19 min: Eyebrow guy showing obvious signs of dyscalculia. Im sure thats not an issue for people who want to work with large sums of money. 21 min: Theres a great deal of footage here of close-ups of vegetables and vaguely glamorous women. Its like being backstage at the filming of a Marks and Spencers advert. 23 min: The phrases Just use logic and Engage brain have just been used with no sense of irony or self-awareness. Can the Dunning-Kruger effect ever be fatal? If so, we might not make it to a full series. 25 min: Announcer keeps saying milkshake and now all the boys are in a yard. Nobody has mentioned the obvious joke yet. 28 min: I appear to be watching a lot of dislikeable people buy fruit, at prime time on BBC1. This may be an ingenious form of propaganda by the junk food industry. 29 min: I am struggling to tell these people apart, for all that they dont really resemble each other. The programme may have caused some form of prosopagnosia. Either that or my visual processing system has just grouped them together as some diffuse mass of absolute-tittery. I believe the gestalt theory of visual perception allows for this. 30 min: Theyve got to sell ridiculously expensive slabs of buffalo meat or theyll lose the contest, and yet nobody has said the steaks are too high. Its like Im doing all their thinking for them. 32 min: Heavily made-up woman just asked a passing pedestrian are you interested in some milk? Freud would have had a field day with this show. 35 min: I dont think anyone would be willing to buy produce from a man in the street with the sort of eyebrows used to denote a cartoon character as evil. How is it possible for a human to occupy the uncanny valley? 36 min: This show is instilling in me an intense loathing of these people and the capitalist system that produces and even rewards such individuals. This may be some clever use of associative learning by the BBC, subtly supporting its more socialist funding model. Good effort, if so. 37 min: Its no good; Im going to need some booze to get all the way through this. Back in a second. 37 min: OK, here we go again. I couldnt find any proper alcohol, so am sucking on an antibacterial kitchen wipe. Itll do. 39 min: I just realised that Lord Sugar sounds like the main bad guy in a cartoon that promotes dental hygiene. This could be worth a fortune. If only there was some way to present my business ideas to Alan Sugar

Parent Firms of Joint Ventures

Parent Firms of Joint Ventures Are joint-ventures and their parent firms more closely related in terms of skill-relatedness than in terms of value-chain? Abstract The distance between joint-ventures and their parent firms is a fairly new topic of research in the field of diversification. In the process of determining the actual parent firm of a joint-venture out of all alternative industries, it turned our that both vertical- and skill-relatedness proved to be significant. The results indicate further that skill-relatedness is more predictive in this process than vertical relatedness and that joint-ventures are more likely to have parents that have skill overlap to their primary activity than industries that do not. These results hold for the entire sample and a subsample of manufacturing firms. Another finding is that joint-ventures and their parents tend to be more closely related in skills than their parents active in the joint-venture. Suggesting that joint-venture are a mechanism to reduce cognitive distance and increase the absorptive capacity of the new knowledge being transferred. 1. Introduction Diversification and relatedness between firms has been widely researched and finds their theoretical foundation in Coase (1937); Penrose (1959) and others. Coase (1937) can be regarded as one of the first to address the transaction costs theory, while Penrose (1959) addressed the resource based view of the firm. Both theories form the basis of many empirical research to understand more about diversification behavior of firms. These theories therefore form a basis for further research in diversification and especially in the distance between joint-ventures and their parents for this paper. Output produced by one industry often form the basis of production in other industries. It makes economic sense to integrate these activities into already existing activities to improve efficiency, make the company less dependable on their primary activity and expand the company, in order to achieve growth. Fan and Lang (2000) found this already before in their research about diversification. Firms tend to have secondary segments that are related in terms of in-output. This vertical integration of activities is most likely to occur when facing high market transaction costs. Neffke and Henning (2010) also investigated diversification behavior of firms using in-output relatedness. Their research however introduced a new measure of skill-relatedness, which turned out to be dominant in predicting diversification behavior of firms. Conform the resource based view, regarding human capital as the prime asset of the firm, their research firstly compared observed job switchers against the predicted job switchers between certain industries. Individuals gain, certain specific skills during their working life and can only redeploy this knowledge (â€Å"know-how†) in other industries which posses some degree of knowledge overlap. If this is not the case, switching will only hurt the individual, since he or she will be not valued for all acquired skills during his working life. This measure of skill-relatedness between industries proved to outperform in-output relatedness and supported the resource based view in diversification activities of firms. While diversification behavior and relatedness is widely researched, this is not the case for the relationship between joint-ventures and their parents. A joint-venture is a separate legal entity (Harrigan, 1988) and has at least two parents, who are in joint-control and reliable for their equity share in the joint-venture. This paper will discuss, why a joint-venture might be preferred over alternatives and how this might influence the distance between joint-ventures and their parent firms. This will provide new insights in the relationship between joint-ventures and their parent firms. In order to investigate the relationship between joint-ventures and their parent firms and testing for dominant mode in this relationship, this paper used a sample of 237 German joint-ventures between 2005-2011 and constructed an average vertical relatedness according to Fan and Lang (2000) for German industries between 2005-2007. It than included the skill-relatedness of Neffke and Henning (2010) based on Swedish labor switchers between 2004-2007. These data allowed us to make an overview of all joint-ventures and all industries in which it can have their parents. We then tagged the actual parent firms of the joint-ventures with a one and all other industries with a zero, allowing us to run a logit regression with the actual parent firms as our dependent variables. The findings indicate, that the resource based view is the dominant mode in explaining distance between joint-ventures and their parent firms. This provides more insight in the importance of close relatedness in terms of skills over other forms of relatedness. In the following chapter, we start with a theoretical framework about diversification and argue that the resource based view can be regarded as the most important in diversification moves. We will then discuss the alternative diversification possibilities and the limitations of diversification. This will be followed by a discussion of the most important strategic motives on joint-ventures choice. These strategic motives and the theoretical framework will be summarized at the end of chapter 2 and we will explain how this all will relate on the distance between joint-ventures and their parents. In chapter 3 we will discuss empirical evidence on diversification and joint-ventures and their implications on our research. Then we will follow with a data discussion and our method of research in chapter 4 and 5. The results and out findings will be presented in chapter 6 and the final chapter will discuss our outcomes, provides some more insight in the distance between both parents active in the joint-venture, limitations, policy implications and future research. 2. Theory on diversification: an introduction This paper investigates the distance between joint-ventures and their parents. Before we can have a look at this relation, we start with a theoretical framework about diversification and the implications of this framework for our research. Thereafter, we will explain more about diversification motives and the problems and limitations firms might face when diversifying. We then summarize all this and discuss how this all relate to our expected findings on joint-ventures and the relatedness with their parents. 2.1 Theoretical framework behind diversification strategies A theoretical framework behind diversification strategies will be discussed in the coming chapter. This theoretical framework provides more insights in the diversification motives of firms. After these motives have been discussed, we can discuss their influence on the distance between joint-ventures and their parents at the end of chapter 2. 2.1.1. Transaction cost theory The transaction cost view is a theory of Coase (1937) and Williamson (1975, 1985) and addresses the view that economizing is the core problem of economic organizations. The core of these problems in organizational context lay in the assumptions of incomplete information and self interest seeking firms / people. Incomplete information in contracts implies that it is impossible for individuals and firms to predict each future event, therefore all contracts are incomplete and exposed to uncertainty of future situation not foreseen by firms and individuals. If these future states / conditions change, the incentives for the individuals and firms involved might also change. In other words, there is room for self-interest of individuals. In the transaction cost theory, these assumptions of bounded rationality and self-interest seeking are paired and as a result there is room for fraud or guile of economic agents. Economic agents are driven by self-interest and the transaction costs theory a llows these agents to deceive, disguise and confuse in order to maximize their self interest. Opportunistic behavior and moral hazard are thus included in the theory of transaction costs. These assumptions are the basis for the theory of transaction cost and have some consequences, especially when it comes to contract modes and thus joint-ventures. Due to bounded rationality and opportunistic behavior of economic agents, all contracts are incomplete (Williamson, 2006). This means, economic agents have an incentive to behave to their own optimal ex post outcome if situations change which cannot be contracted. The second assumption is contract as promise (Williamson, 2006). This assumes that economic agents will fulfill contracts as promised. However, this will not be obtained if these agents are given opportunistic opportunities. â€Å"The transaction costs analysis entails an examination of the comparative costs of planning, adapting, and monitoring task completion under alternative governance structures† (Williamson, 2006, p. 58). The transaction will become the basic unit of analysis and minimizing transaction cost will result in the most efficient governance structure. Transactions differ in three ways from each other; (1) frequency at which transactions recur; (2) level of uncertainty to which they are subjected; (3) level of asset specificity involved. Since asset specificity is of crucial importance, we elaborate some more about the characteristics of asset specificity. â€Å"Asset specificity has reference to the degree to which an asset can be redeployed to alternative uses and by alternative users without sacrifice of productive value† (Williamson, 2006, p. 59). This asset specificity becomes of importance in the context of incomplete contracts, while asset specificity can take different forms; (1) physical asset specificity; (2) site specificity; (3) dedicated asset specificity and (4) human asset specificity. The complexity of a transaction is therefore highly dependent on the asset specificity (k) of the asset and investments in that asset. A supplier can for example use a general purpose technology with low asset specificity (k=0) or it might invest in a specialized technology with high asset specificity (k=1). High asset specificity is likely to involve high bilateral dependency between the parties in the transaction. Since the parties involved in the contract become vulnerable of each other, switching is difficult and costly option due to the mutual dependency and the investments done in specific assets. The buyers cannot easily turn to an alternative supplier and the current supplier is highly dependable on the demand of its current buyer. Therefore the higher the asset specificity, the more likely it become that higher contract costs have to be faced. Both parties have more incentives to devise safeguards to protect the investment in the transaction if asset specificity is high. How ever, if there is low asset specificity (k=0) and we thus have a general purpose asset, contract are easily monitored and market transactions will be preferred. Back to the diversification decision, minimizing transaction costs is regarded of crucial importance for the choice in governance mode. This implies that firms choose between a wholly owned subsidiary, a simple market transaction or a hybrid made, as a joint-venture for example. This trade-off between a joint-venture and other governance modes has been widely researched. Hennart (1991) for example found that; Japanese firms start joint-ventures with U.S. counterparts to combine intermediate inputs when they are subjected to high market transactions costs. This paper uses a relatedness in terms of in-output and can therefore measure the distance in terms of the use of intermediate products between industries. The influence on joint-ventures and partner distance will be discussed at the end of chapter 2. At this point of the paper, it is however important to understand that high relatedness in the use of intermediate products is likely to be caused due to high transaction costs. This w ould imply that if diversification has a high level of relatedness in value-chain and are thus closely relatedness in terms of vertical relatedness, this is most likely caused by high transaction costs and supports the transaction costs view of diversification.. 2.1.2. Knowledge and resource based view In the resource based view, knowledge (â€Å"know-how†) is regarded as the most important production factor within the firm. The origin of the resource based view goes back to the work of Penrose (1959), who inspired the discussion of the resource based view of the firm and the importance of resources to achieve firm growth. Penrose stated that: â€Å"the firm is a collection of productive resources (human and non-human) under administrative coordination and authoritative communication that produces goods and services for sale in the market for a profit† (Penrose, 1959, p. xvii).† â€Å"The administrative coordination and authorities communication define the boundaries of the firm† (Penrose, 1959, p. xvii). The firm specific human resources are regarded as the most important of all resources within the firm. Without these human knowledge, there can be no operating firm. As a result, the firm cannot make decisions, long-term planning, run operations and it c an certainly not make any expansions. From this point of view Penrose (1959) indentified two major causes of firm growth. First of all, causes external to the firm and secondly those causes that are internal to the firm. â€Å"External causes for firm growth, as capital constraints, cannot be fully understood without an examination of the nature of the firm itself† (Penrose, 1959, p. 532). We may therefore conclude that firm growth is endogenous to the firm; this is a result of two reasons mentioned by Penrose (1959). In order to execute plans and strategic action, human capital is required. After completion of the project/action, managerial resources will be released with increased knowledge. These resources gained experience and knowledge during the time of the expansion and can be redeployed at alternative use after the time of the expansion. The redeployed individuals with an increased knowledge and skills might improve efficiency and organization of the firm, but might also be able to development new or speci alized services. Depending on the expansion, individuals involved might also gain ‘unique knowledge of their experience; this is particularly true for certain forms of tacit knowledge, which are more difficult to transmit. The theory of firm growth of Penrose (1959) has been regarded as one of the earliest contributions to the resources based view of the firm, stressing the importance of knowledge as the key production factor within a firm. The drive of firms for growth, is a drive for new knowledge that is not accessible to the firm before their diversification. However, the motives and goals of each diversification differ and so do the resources possessed by each firm in a diversification. These differences and similarities in knowledge are of crucial importance in the resource based view, where acquiring new knowledge is the ultimate goal for achieving growth. Acquiring knowledge comes with certain problems; the â€Å"fundamental paradox† of knowledge and the difficulty arising from transferring tacit knowledge are two of those problems. In the fundamental paradox of information it is extreme difficult to determine the value of the knowledge for the buyer of the knowledge, which causes high c ontract costs. Since it is impossible for the buyer of knowledge to estimate ex ante the characteristics of what is being bought. On the other hand, if the seller of the knowledge provides this information, he will be revealing important information and transferring his â€Å"know-how† free of charge (Arrow, 1959). If the targeted knowledge, is a certain â€Å"know-how† which cannot be patented and protected against spillovers to competitive firms and other industries it become far more difficult. Certain types of knowledge cannot be put on paper and granted a patent. Firms experiences in manufacturing, distribution, and country-specific knowledge, knowledge of markets, customers and especially high educated employees cannot be patented but are of crucial importance of a firms success in the resource based view. â€Å"This type of knowledge that cannot embody specifications, designs and drawings, but instead is embedded in the individual is called ‘tacit knowledge†. (Polanyi, 1959; Hennart, 1988, p. 366). These individual characteristics of experience and social nature make transfer, coordination and spread of knowledge between firms, extreme complex and difficult (Lam, 2006). The transfer and spread of this tacit knowledge is one of the difficulties when facing diversificat ion decisions. The transfer and spread of this tacit knowledge can be done in different alliance forms, which will be discussed later in this paper. However, for now, it is important to know that diversification is undertaking to gain new knowledge, which must be for same part related to the knowledge of the firm. This is the case since the new resources must be redeployed at alternative use after a project, which might be a joint-venture for example. As for distance in diversification, higher skill-relatedness and thus diversification activities that are more closely related in skills stresses the importance of the resource based view. 2.1.3. Portfolio management theory A third and final theory behind diversification motives is the portfolio theory of Markowitz (1952). Diversification decisions of firms are important decisions taken by firms management in order to maximize the expected returns of their portfolio of investments. These investors are the shareholders of the firm and have a claim on the residual value of the company assets, when debt has been paid. In order to maximize this expected return of the firm outstanding shares, the law of large numbers will ensure that the actual yield of the portfolio will be almost the same as the expected yield. In any case, holding a diversified portfolio would be preferred over all non-diversified portfolios (Markowitz, 1952). Increasing variance in your portfolio would mean an increase in the number of projects, since each project would be successful / unsuccessful at a certain probability, which is referred to as risk. Holding a large variety, in other words, betting on more than one horse, increases yo ur probability on having a winning project. The portfolio management theory suggests that diversification tends to take place in activities that are unrelated to the primary activity of the firm. If this is the case, diversification activities (such as a joint-venture) would be unrelated to the primary activity of the firm. There would be a large distance between the firm and its diversification activities, while transaction costs and the resource based view are stressing the importance diversification in more closely related activities, although for different motives. 2.2 Different diversification alternatives In all theories discussed, the main driver for diversification is in order to achieve growth. Either, by minimizing transaction costs in the transaction costs economy or by diversification of risk, which increases the probability of a winning innovation. In all these theories is explained how they might influence the distance between diversification activities. Is there however any limit to firm growth in their challenge to innovate and to expand? According to Penrose (1959) there is no limit on the size of a firm, however the growth of the firm has some limits it can reach. In the Hercules Powder Company case study Penrose claimed: â€Å"Growth is governed by a creative and dynamic interaction between a firms productive resources and its market opportunities. Available resources limit expansion; unused resources (including technological and entrepreneurial) stimulate and largely determine the direction of expansion. While product demand may exert a predominant short-term influence, over the long term any distinction between ‘supply and ‘demand determinants of growth becomes arbitrary† (Penrose, 1959, p.1) How does this reflect to diversification strategies? Penrose (1959) distinguished between different areas of diversification. The firm can be divided into different productive activities, that consist of machines, processes, skills and materials, all closely and complementary associated in the production process, which Penrose (1959) calls the production/technology base. The firm now faces the decision to diversify into a new market using the existing technology base. It might prefer entering an existing market using a new technology base, which is referred to as horizontal/complementary expansion. The last scenario would be to enter a new market using a new technology base. As described above, the ability of a firm to expand and grow is limited by its internal resources, from which human resources is regarded as the most important. Diversification increases the creative and dynamic interaction of a firm and its resources. All these forms of diversification have implications on the expected distance between the diversification activities and thus joint-ventures and our research. Entering a new market using a new technology would probably have a larger distance in terms of skills from its primary activity than entering a new market with an existing technology. In this latest case, the technology and specific knowledge can be partially redeployed at alternative use, while this is not the case in the first alternative. The main implication from Penrose (1959) famous work is that firms diversify in order to achieve growth. According to Penrose (1959) the resource based view of the firm is the dominant view in order to achieve this growth by diversification. This would suggest that the distance between diversification activities would be more closely related in terms of skills and less closely in vertical relatedness, used as a measure for the transaction costs theory. If diversification is undertaken in order to diversify risk, conform the portfolio management theory diversification activities would not be related at all. 2.3 Limits on diversification and diversification distance? There are different diversification forms as discussed in the previous chapter. It is important to understand that firm growth is limited by its human capital (Penrose, 1959). A firm should therefore carefully choose its diversification activities. A clear understanding of these limits and where these limits depend on is extremely important to understand the distance between firms diversification activities. Since this implicitly answers the question, to what extent firms diversify and is there a limit on the distance between partners and their diversification activity? Cohen and Levinthal (1990) discuss the ‘absorptive capacity of a firm, which indicates: â€Å"the ability of a firm to recognize the value of new, external information, assimilate it, and apply it to commercial ends, which is critical to its innovative capacity† (Cohen and Levinthal (1990), p. 128). This absorptive capacity puts limits on the commercialization of new knowledge and boundaries on diversification. Cohen and Levinthal (1990) assume that a firms absorptive capacity and the individual absorptive capacities of its employers are largely a function of the firms level of prior related knowledge. Earlier research suggest that absorptive capacity might be a byproduct of a firms RD investments and others suggest that firms can also invest directly in absorptive capacity while investing in specialized educ ation/training. The key to absorptive capacity is that organizations needs prior related knowledge to assimilate and use new knowledge for exploitation. This is very important for the resource based view in our paper, since this implies that diversification activities of firms should be related in terms of skills. Since, the higher the prior knowledge in ones memory, the higher their ability to acquire new knowledge and the ability to recall and use that knowledge. What is often the case in organizations and especially expected in joint-ventures is the transfer of learning skills across bodies of knowledge that are organized and expressed in similar ways. Mowery et al. (1996) indicated that joint-ventures are the most efficient alliance form for transferring tacit knowledge, which could certainly human specific skills. As a consequence, experience or performance on one learning task may influence and improve performance on some subsequent learning task (Ellis, 1965). Cohen and Levin thal (1990) make two important assumptions about knowledge, important for diversification strategies. â€Å"Firstly, knowledge is cumulative and secondly, learning performance is greatest when the object of learning is related to what is already known† (Cohen and Levinthal, 1990, p. 131). This implicit that learning is more difficult in novel domains, in other words radical exploration of new ideas, products, technologies and standards. Diversification might offer an advantage, since with diversification comes a wider knowledge base and as a results an increasing probability that the new knowledge is already / partially known to the organization. The absorptive capacity of an organization however, does not only exist off the aggregated absorptive capacity of its individuals, but also on the ability to exploit this knowledge. Cohen and Levinthal (1990) mention there is a trade-off between high levels of absorptive capacity of an organization and the ability to exploit this. They describe this as a trade-off between inward-looking (specialization) versus outward-looking (diversify) trade-off, where excessive dominance by one or the other will be suboptimal. Exploitation can best been seen as specialization of old familiar ideas and certainties in organizational learning, while exploration can best be described as the invention of new technologies, standards, products or ideas in an organization. Cohen and Levinthal (1990) discuss also the importance for innovation of close relationship with both buyers and suppliers, suggesting a vertical relatedness would be beneficial for innovation performance. In the trade-off described, Co hen and Levinthal (1990) suggest that to the keep an effective, creative utilization of new knowledge a portion of prior knowledge should be closely related with a the firm new knowledge, and another part should be fairly diverse, although still related. If this is the case, firm diversification activities should be closely related in terms of skills supporting the resource based view of the firm. Why is it important to have both creative utilization and a portion of prior knowledge is best described by March (1991), who distinguishes between exploration and exploitation. Returns of exploration are systematically less certain than those of exploitation (March, 1991), this might influence the choice for diversification for the long term however, exploration has long run positive return although this outcome is certainly not always the case in the short run. Exploration activities therefore capture much more risk taking, uncertainty, variation, flexibility, discovery and innovation than exploitation. Exploitation is more focused on production, choice, efficiency, marketing, costs and benefits (March, 1991). The importance of exploration is best described in a model of mutual learning in an closed organization and its personnel in it (March, 1991). The organization is regarded as a storage of knowledge (consisting of procedures, norms, rules and tacit assets) and the organization, accumulate knowledge over time by learning from their personnel. â€Å"Individuals (personnel) however, are socializing the organizational beliefs, which are diffused to individuals through various forms of instruction, indoctrination, and exemplification† (March, 1991, p. 74). This mutual learning approach between organizations and individuals has implications for the choice between exploitation and exploration in organizations and has therefore consequences for the short-run and long-run incentives. In this model of mutual learning organizational code is affected by the beliefs of their personnel, the other way around, the individuals are influenced by the organizational code / norm. Important to know is, that individuals can not influence each other, the influence each other through the organizational code. What will happen in this closed model? In this organization, each adjustment in beliefs is served to eliminate the difference between the organizational code and the individual beliefs. If the individuals over time become more knowledgeable about the code, they become also more homogeneous with respect to knowledge and in the end will find an equilibrium. In this equilibrium the individuals beliefs share the same organizational code. It is therefore important to keep a portion of new knowledge in order to increase the organizational code. March (1991) also describes a second model, evaluating the role of personnel turnover in the organization and turbulence environment are considered. The length of service of an individual in an organization has a positive effect on the knowledge of the individual and therefore also a positive effect on the average knowledge of the individuals. A recruit therefore has a negative effect on the average knowledge of the individuals. The role of turnover on the organization knowledge is more complicated and is a problem of learning rates versus turnover rates. As described in model of mutual learning the strength of the recruit is, the diversity in knowledge, since the recruit posses on average less knowledge than the individual it replaces. Long serving individuals, on average know more, but their knowledge is already reflected in the organizational code over time and therefore they are less likely to contribute to the organizations knowledge base. Now consider environmental turbulence t o the organization, this can be the case of processes involving lags in adjustment rates. Consider an organization without personnel turnover, in this organization the beliefs reflected by the individual and these beliefs do not change, although the environment is changing. After some time the organizational code is systematically degraded through changes in reality and a much lower equilibrium is reached. Organizations with a moderate personnel turnover however, are resistant to these environmental shocks and adjust to the new knowledge of the recruits (diversified knowledge). March (1991) extent this model of competitive ecology in a model to compete for scarce resources and opportunities. Assuming the performance of a firm is a measure of the average value (x) and some measure of variability (v), which are normally distributed. An increase in both will increase the probability to gain competitive advantages over competitors. In this part there consist a trade-off between an increase in the mean and the variance. Which supports earlier literature, that diversification is undertaken to gain excess to new knowledge to some extent, but is expected to be related to prior knowledge of the firm. March (1991) conclude that exploration firms compete far more on variance than exploitation firms. 2.4 Implications and differences between the theories discussed The main difference between the management portfolio theory and the resource based view and the transaction costs view is that the management portfolio expect that diversification tends to take place in unrelated industries, while this is not the case for the other two theories, although at different level of relatedness. The resource based view stresses the importance of knowledge gain and the benefits of this new knowledge in diversification. Transaction costs theory however focuses more on the cost side of the transaction.Leaving the transaction costs as basic unit of analysis to determine an appropriate alliance form, which will minimizes the transaction costs of the firm. According to Wang (2007), a firm shoul