Ethics in Business are an Optional Extra Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Ethics in Business are an Optional Extra - Essay Example ing even in corrupt practices they justified by reasoning along the lines of cultural relativism and the need for practical thinking, they believed that they were acting ethically even if their actions had unethical effects, such as promoting slave labour conditions. Increasing pressures from stakeholders are changing the behaviour of businesses, making those who manage them more aware of the need to follow higher standards of business ethics. Five different forces were identified as the sources of these pressures that are slowly but surely convincing businesses that the practice of social responsibility has become necessary. A key factor in this change of attitude is the experience that practising business ethics can help the firm achieve its purpose of earning profits whilst meeting the needs of its stakeholders. Another factor is that as more firms engaged in unethical business practices, whatever advantages they may have derived from doing so have become counterproductive, leading to serious threats to business survival. The paper concludes with the argument that ethics in business is in the process of being transformed from an â€Å"optional extra† to a â€Å"must-respond issue† that is necessary for the firm’s sustainability and competitiveness. This paper is a discussion of ethical practice in business. Starting with a description of business ethics and its important role in society, the discussion proceeds to the key issues related to the practice of ethics by business organisations. Examples are cited why business ethics is a controversial issue and the sources of the controversy, and how these are resolved in practice. The critical discussion that follows addresses the central question as to whether ethics is important and serves the purpose of a business, or whether it is merely an optional extra that a business could do without. The European Forum for Quality Management (EFQM, 1999) describes business ethics as a set of codes, values, and

Policy and Strategy for Business Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 6500 words

Policy and Strategy for Business - Essay Example From this paper it is clear that Fiorina’s strategy of ‘my way or highway’ has also left the top leadership starkly deficient in senior executive positions. Surely she had fired a lot of people in key positions during her tenure. Robert P. Wayman, the interim-CEO, is not exactly in a position to make business critical decisions and time may be running out for HP. The company lacks the technological edge to compete with its US rivals like the Dell and the IBM, and the Chinese giant Lenovo, in the PC market. The software unit of HP is a non-performer that makes a measly contribution of $122 million to the company’s kitty. The initiative of HP to emerge as a significant player in the software business by acquisition of companies has also backfired. The fact the HP lost money in software, despite the bright results of the industry in general, is a vivid pointer to its slip shod handling of acquisitions. But the most serious threat that HP faces is to its Printe r market from its competitors like Dell. Though the profits of $ 22 from printing division in 2003 was the saving grace of the company, Dell has speeded eating into its pie of low end division of Inkjet printer. Despite the bleak picture, it is only the Printing division that is the proverbial silver lining of the cloud for HP. This paper outlines that tactically the company is moving in the right direction by strengthening it and spending more into its R & D. However, the company needs to make bold decisions to rebuild its investor confidence. The stocks of the company had plunged 8% in the market, which is enough to wake the Board up. And it is the Board alone that can save HP from its obvious dismantling. A few radical decisions, besides the more obvious one of the appointment of a full time chief, need to be made without any more wastage of time. HP needs to shed extra-baggage by disinvesting more the less profitable PC and software divisions and concentrate on printing. This way it will no longer have to defend itself on many fronts.

Psychology Theories for Celebrity Worship and Fandoms

Psychology Theories for Celebrity Worship and Fandoms ATHYNEA BURCHALL Outline and Evaluate what psychological research has shown about celebrity worship and intense fandom. What do you think are the real world implications? The topic of celebrity worship and intense fandom was once a media interest but this new phenomena is now a focus of psychological investigation and has been researched into by social; psychologist. This assignment is going to look into why people form parasocial relationships with celebrities sometimes with people they have never met. Intense fandom can be described as â€Å"Fandomis a term used to refer to a  subculture  composed of  fans  characterized by a feeling of sympathy and camaraderie with others who share a common interest. Fans typically are interested in even minor details of the object(s) of their fandom and spend a significant portion of their time and energy involved with their interest, often as a part of a  social network  with particular practices† wikipedia  [1] Celebrity worship is the idolisation of a celebrity or a group of celebrities, and therefore goes hand in hand with fandom, as groups of individuals come together in their worship of a specific celebrities or idols. Most of the time this fascination with their idols is a harmless activity hobby or past time however sometimes it can develop into an obsessive disorder coined as Celebrity Worship Syndrome (CWS). The term CWS first appeared in an article â€Å"Do you worship celebrities?† by James Chapman 2003 in the Daily Mail. â€Å"Celebrity worship syndromeis an obsessive-addictive disorder in which a person becomes overly involved with the details of a celebritys personal life. Psychologists have indicated that though many people obsess over glamorous  film,  television,  sport  and  pop  stars, the only common factor between them is that they are all figures in the public eye. The term Celebrity Worship Syndrome is in fact a misnomer.† Wikipedia [2] Gibson in her study goes on further to explain â€Å"Much research has been conducted about who engages in celebrity worship and what drives the compulsion. Celebrity worship for purely entertainment purposes likely reflects an extraverted personality and is most likely a healthy past time for most people. This type of celebrity worship involves harmless behaviours such as reading and learning about a celebrity. Intense personal attitudes towards celebrities, however, reflect traits of neuroticism. The most extreme descriptions of celebrity worship exhibit borderline pathological behaviour and traits of psychoticism. This type of celebrity worship may involve empathy with a celebritys failures and successes, obsessions with the details of a celebritys life, and over-identification with the celebrity. Gibson (2009)[3] Psychological research done in this area by Mc Cutcheon, Lange and Houran developed a scale on which to assess the level of obsessive behaviour a fan was exhibiting known as the Celebrity Attitude Scale. Mc Cutcheon from this study suggested that people who scored lower on the scale were â€Å"involved individualistic behaviour such as watching, listening to, reading and learning about celebrities whilst the higher levels of worship are characterized by empathy, over-identification, and obsession with the celebrity. Mc Cutcheon (2002)[4] In another study by Mc Cutcheon, he developed the absorption-addiction model to try and explain cases of celebrity worship. The study found a lack of personal identity and life fulfilment in a person’s life contributed to psychological absorption into a celebrity’s life, and could then develop into more extreme and obsessive behaviour, to try and sustain this identity that they have formed in relation to someone else. Later research done in the UK done by Maltby (2003) used a larger sample of participants for his study; found that there were 3 dimensions or levels to celebrity worship. Entertainment social, Intense personal and Borderline pathological. â€Å"Entertainment social refers to a normal degree of interest in the life of a favourite celebrity. It is manifested by, for example, a desire to discuss the celebrity with friends, and agreement that learning about the celebrity through magazines or newspapers represents â€Å"having a good time.† â€Å"Intense personal† celebrity worship involves the feeling of a strong personal â€Å"connection† with a celebrity. It is manifested by, for example, a feeling that the celebrity is a faultless soul mate, about whom the individual has frequent thoughts. Finally, â€Å"borderline pathological† worship is arguably the most detrimental form. It is manifested through a variety of bizarre beliefs such as a shared secret code through which the individual can communicate with the celebrity, a belief that the celebrity would come to help the individual in times of distress. North and Sheridan (2007)[5]. There have been various reasons attached to why celebrity worship happens, mass media has been blamed as celebrity stories are bombarded constantly by the media, via TV, magazines, and the internet, and even reputable newspaper high lighting celebrity gossip as front line news. â€Å"When we are incessantly being exposed to figures through any medium, par asocial interaction can be fostered, which is the building of an imaginary relationship between audience and the figure (Keas, 2008).[6] DNA has also been cited as a reason behind celebrity worship. â€Å"Fischoff, who has academically studied the cult of celebrity, says the very need to find an idol and follow him is programmed into our DNA.†Whats in our DNA, as a social animal, is the interest in looking at alpha males and females; the ones who are important in the pack, says Mischief. We are sociologically pre-programmed to follow the leader, he says, and notes that we are biochemical sitting ducks for the Hollywood star system; even the stars themselves get caught up in the mystique.† ABC news [7]. Also with one in three relationships now starting via the web may be social fragmentation can be contributing factor as well, â€Å" In today’s individualistic world, perhaps fantasy relationships with celebrities are easier to form than the real one Harrison,† (2006).[8] Statistics done by Ramanires in 2011 found that 1/3 of the worlds population is afflicted with some form of celebrity worship and this number is growing. What are the implications of these phenomena in everyday life? Fans who are addicted or obsessed with their idol will spend most of their time, energy, and money on following their celebrity, whether on-line, via magazines, papers or in person to find out new information, meet them, or find out what they are doing, in order to have a sense of knowing their celebrity and following their lives to be apart of the celebrity life themselves. This is detrimental to their own lives because a substitute for their own lives and is not real. It is instead of concentrating on productive activities and forming real relationship dint heir own lives. Fans are also willing to spend a lot of income on fan memorabilia, CD’s, downloads, and other promotional material. Aronowitz agrees, but also says entertainment media is at least partly to bl ame for creating the monster known as the celebrity super fan. The whole Hollywood spin machine works together to create images that are impossible for any of us to live up to. They purposefully set us up to admire and even covet something we can never have†¦. when we are completely vulnerable, they sell us the image even harder from headlines that titillate us with celebrity secrets, to the books, diets, cosmetics, foods, jewellery, and clothes that promise well be closer to the ones we adore. Aronowitz.[9] . However Houran argues â€Å"that people who worship celebrity at low level tend to be happier, more outgoing and more amiable as it is a form of social bonding, stress reduction, escapism and entertainment (Harrison, 2006)[10]. In addition, social mutual support and strong companionship can be found belonging to a Fandom group. Where fans can meet new friends with same interest through conventions, the fans club meeting or Internet, feel a sense of acceptance, support a nd belonging they don’t feel anywhere else in their lives, where they have a common interest and have something in common straight away so can communicate and form relationships easily. Like most things theres a dimensional approach here; there are some people who are fascinated by celebrities’ lives, but also involved in meaningful activities and relationships in their own lives, and for these people star watching is usually a harmless diversion, says Hollander This idolisation of celebrities and wanting to be like them as role models can have both positive and negative implications. Due to the exposure of the media a celebrity’s life is completely on display, showing the negative behaviours as well as the positive ones, such as smoking, taking drugs and drinking. Prior to Marilyn Monroe, a stars life was hidden from the public. But now, instead of a glossy ideal, we see celebritys ugly messes, including their drug and alcohol abuse, which, for many who admire these people, translates into a very dangerous message, says Aronowitz.[11] A survey done by Downing () â€Å"shows that many teenage girls confessed to changing their own opinions because of the influence of a celebrity, some even admitted to smoking after viewing smoking in movies; the same may be true for drug and alcohol use. Roughly half agree that their own peers drink or smoke cigarettes because they see their idols doing it. The survey revealed that most adolescent com pletely wants to look or going as far as plastic surgery and act like famous people. Moreover, nearly 60 percent of teens said they wanted to pierce a body part or get a tattoo because a celebrity has. And 77 percent believe that when a star loses weight, they would also do the same and loss weight. Downing ()[12]. A lot of picture found in magazines and on the internet of celebrities have been air brushed and the celebrity have had tanning, make up and hair done by professional artists. Fans try and imitate their idols, even though they do not look like this naturally in real life, and the fans will go to extreme lengths to copy them. There have been links to celebrity worship and anorexia and cosmetic surgery in teenage girls. This might explain why eating disorders are prevalent amongst teenagers to date. For some people, they are willing to undergo plastic surgery in virtue of imitating their favourite celebrity’s outlook. They believe they can have a better life like the celebrity if they look like the celebrity (Hareyan, 2006).[13] However it can be argued that then celebrities can be positive role models as well and therefore celebrity worship can have positive implications. For example living a healthy lifestyle, highlighting a cause and decreasing a stigma attached to issues suc h as Brooke Shields bringing post natal depression into the spot light. Many celebrities have used their popularity and fame to motivate people or to change their behaviour to be more positive. A Taiwanese celebrity, Chen Jian Zhou launched â€Å"a project named ‘Love Life’ to promote the important values of loving life. To date, there have been more than a hundred artistes join this project to promote ‘I Love Life’† (Wang, 2010)[14]. Giles also argued â€Å"the adoration of celebrities as role models or idols has been prevalent for many years and it can be argued that it is normal and a part of identity development within childhood and even adolescence† (Giles et al 2004)[15]. However there have also been psychological implications of celebrity worship. It starts to be mentally harmful to someone when a person starts to substitute idolising their celebrity for real life and real relationship, as they can lose focus on their own lives and became obsessed with a fantasy world escaping their reality. In North study in 2007 he found that celebrity worship can be associated with depression, social dysfunction, anxiety, stress, negative and reports of illness. Maltby also stated that celebrity worshippers have a lower psychological well-being than non-worshippers. â€Å"Though low levels of celebrity worship (entertainment-social) are not associated with any clinical measures, medium levels of celebrity worship (intense-personal) are related to fantasy proneness (approximately 10% of the shared variance), while high levels of celebrity worship (borderline-pathological) share a greater association with fantasy proneness (around 14% of the shared variance) and  dissociation  (around 3% of the shared variance, though the effect size of this is small and most probably due to the large sample size) These finding suggests that as celebrity worship becomes more intense, and the individual perceives having a relationship with the celebrity, the more the individual is prone to fantasies.† Wikipedia [16] Some fans are so obsessed that it becomes dangerous to themselves and the celebrity. For example â€Å"a dozen of Michael Jackson’s fans committed suicide after his death. One of them barely survived, yet he killed himself anyway as he wanted to be with Michael† Thompson, ( 2009)†[17]. However Aronowitz argues A lot of these people who fall deeply into celebrity worship are just abnormal pathology waiting to happen. The fact that it comes out in the form of idolization of a particular celebrity is less important than recognizing the pathology was there all along. And if it was not focused on a celebrity it would be foc used on something else, but it would still be there.[18] Aronowitz Conclusion Celebrity Worship and intense Fandom although has recently been researched by Psychologist I feel more investigations are needed into the implications of this growing phenomena as the research is based on small sample sizes, and mostly done in the UK and US. As statistics state this has become a worldwide phenomenon, which is only going to increase. Also mental health issues for the more extreme cases needs examining as the implications for these can negative and even dangerous. I feel mild forms of celebrity worship and intense fandom is harmless and can even be beneficial. As long as it doesn’t take over your life and a person is still participating in their own lives and reality. http://psychology.about.com/b/2009/09/01/the-psychology-behind-celebrity-worship.htm Abanes Richard. â€Å"Celebrity Worship.† Religions of the stars: What hollywood believes and how it affects you. n.eds. Minneapolis: Bethany House. 2009. Print. Alexander, Jeffrey C. The Celebrity-Icon. Cultural Sociology 4.3 (2010): 323-336. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 29 Oct. 2013. Downing, Alexandrea. Calista Flockheart And Britney Spears: Celebrity Culture And Its Role In Shaping Adolescent Identity. Conference Papers American Sociological Association (2004): 1-12. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 30 Oct. 2013. Hollander, Paul. Michael Jackson,tghe The Celebrity Cult, And Popular Culture. Society 47.2 (2010): 147-152.SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 29 Oct. 2013. North, Adrian C., and Lorraine P. Sheridan. Death, Attractiveness, Moral Conduct, And Attitudes To Public Figures. Omega: Journal Of Death Dying 60.4 (2009): 351-363. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 29 Oct. 2013. Parkins, Wendy. Oprah Winfreys Change Your Life TV And The Spiritual Everyday. Continuum: Journal Of Medi a Cultural Studies 15.2 (n.d.): 145-157. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 31 Oct. 2013. http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Healthday/story?id=7941766page=2 Giles, D. C. (2004). Parasocial interaction: a review of the literature and a model for future research.Media Psychology. Maltby, J., Day, L., McCutcheon, L. E., Gillett, R., Houran, J., Ashe, D. D. (2004). Personality and coping: A context for examining celebrity worship and mental health. British Journal of Psychology, 95, 411428. Maltby, J., Giles, DC., Barber, L. McCutcheon, L.E. (2005). Intense-personal celebrity worship and body image: Evidence of a link among female adolescents.British Journal of Health Psychology, 10(1), 17-32. McCutcheon et al (2002). Are parasocial relationship styles reflected in love styles? Current Research in SocialPsychology, 7, 8293 North, A. C., Hargreaves, D. J. (2007). Problem music and self-harming. Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior ,36, 582590. Sheridan et al (2006). Celebrity Worship, addiction and criminality. Psychology, crime and law. 13 (6) 559-571. Giles, D. C. (2004). Parasocial interaction: a review of the literature and a model for future research.Media Psychology. http://psychologicalgirl.wordpress.com/2013/01/02/the-psychology-behind-celebrity-worship/ References: Maltby, J., Giles, DC., Barber, L. McCutcheon, L.E. (2005). Intense-personal celebrity worship and body image: Evidence of a link among female adolescents.British Journal of Health Psychology, 10(1), 17-32. North, A.C., Sheridan, L. Maltby, J. Gillett, R. (2007). Attributional style, self-esteem, and celebrity worship.Media Psychology, 9(2), 291-308. http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2008/11/23/the-psychology-of-celebrity-worship/ Jump up^Do you worship the celebs? | Mail Online. Dailymail.co.uk. Retrieved 2012-07-11. Jump up^Do you have Celebrity Worship Syndrome? | Mail Online. Dailymail.co.uk. Retrieved 2012-07-11. Jump up^The Psychology Behind Celebrity Worship. Celebrities.knoji.com. 2010-07-24. Retrieved 2012-07-11. involved individualistic behavior such as watching, listening to, reading and learning about celebrities whilst the higher levels of worship are characterized by empathy, over-identification, and obsession with the celebrity. Jump up^McCutcheon, L. E., Lange, R., Houran, J. (2002). Conceptualization and measurement of celebrity worship. British Journal of Psychology, 93, 67-87. Jump up^Maltby, J., Houran, J., Lange, R., Ashe, D., McCutcheon, L.E. (2002). Thou Shalt Worship No Other Gods Unless They Are Celebrities. Personality and Individual Differences, 32, 1157-1172. Jump up^Maltby; McCutcheon, Lowinger (06/01/2011).Brief report: celebrity worshipers and the five-factor model of personality..North American Journal of Psychology13(2): Table 1. Retrieved 29 June 2013. Jump up^Moore, JD. (2006)Confusing Love with Obsession. Hazelden Books, Center City, MO Jump up^Why People Stalk Celebrities: johndmoore.net| retrieved 12-12-17 ^Jump up to:abhttp://www.uic.edu/depts/owa/stalking_profiles.html Jump up^http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/celebrity-stalking-victims-gallery-1.45896?pmSlide=1.89946 Jump up^http://bjp.rcpsych.org/content/176/3/206.full Jump up^http://psychologyofstalking.wikispaces.com/Typology+of+Stalkers ^Jump up to:abchttp://www.researchgate.net/publication/10935546_A_clinical_interpretation_of_attitudes_and_behaviors_associated_with_celebrity_worship/file/d912f50d5e0f69bca6.pdf Jump up^Maltby, J., Houran, J., Ashe, D., McCutcheon, L.E. (2001). The Self-Reported Psychological Well-Being of Celebrity Worshippers. North American Journal of Psychology, 3, 441-452. Jump up^Maltby, J., Day, L., McCutcheon, L.E., Gillett, R., Houran, J., Ashe, D. (2004). Celebrity Worship using an adaptational-continuum model of personality and coping. British Journal of Psychology. 95, 411-428. Jump up^Maltby, J., Giles, D., Barber, L. McCutcheon, L.E. (2005). Intense-personal Celebrity Worship and Body Image: Evidence of a link among female adolescents. British Journal of Health Psychology, 10, 17-32. Jump up^Maltby, J., Day, L., McCutcheon, L.E., Houran, J. Ashe, D. (2006). Extreme celebrity worship, fantasy proneness and dissociation: Developing the measurement and understanding of celebrity worship within a clinical personality context. Personality and Individual Differences, 40, 273-283. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_worship_syndrome [1] Wikipedia retrieved 17/4/14 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fandom [2] Wikipedia retrieved 17/4/14 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_worship_syndrome [3] Gibson (2009 retrieved) 16/4/14 from http://psychology.about.com/b/2009/09/01/the-psychology-behind-celebrity-worship.htm [4] . Mc Cutcheon (2002) McCutcheon, L. E., Lange, R., Houran, J. (2002). Conceptualization and measurement of celebrity worship. British Journal of Psychology, retrieved 17/4/14 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_worship_syndrome [5] North, A.C., Sheridan, L. Maltby, J. Gillett, R. (2007). Attributional style, self-esteem, and celebrity worship.Media Psychology, retrieved 17/4/14 from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2008/11/23/the-psychology-of-celebrity-worship/ [6] Keas 2006 [7] Fischoff, Ph.D., senior editor,Journal of Media Psychology, retrieved 17/4/14 from http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Healthday/story?id=7941766page=2 [8] Harrison 2008 [9] Aronwitz [10] Hollander, M.D., retrieved 16/4/14 from [11] Aronowitz, retrieved 17/4/14 from http://www.webmd.com/balance/features/new-age-celebrity-worship?page=4 [12] Downing, Alexandrea. Calista Flockheart And Britney Spears: Celebrity Culture And Its Role In Shaping Adolescent Identity. Conference Papers American Sociological Association (2004): 1-12. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 30 Oct. 2013. [13] Hareyn 2006 [14] (Wang, 2010 [15] Giles, D. C. (2004). Parasocial interaction: a review of the literature and a model for future research.Media Psychology. Retrieved 16/4/14 from http://psychologicalgirl.wordpress.com/2013/01/02/the-psychology-behind-celebrity-worship/ [16] Wikipedia retrieved 16/4/14 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celebrity_worship_syndrome [17] Thompson 2009, [18] Aronowitz retrieved 17/4/14 from http://www.webmd.com/balance/features/new-age-celebrity-worship?page=4

Foucault - death of the author :: essays research papers

M. Foucault, "What is an Author?† Michel Foucault (1926 – 1984) dealt with many aspects of social philosophy during his career, but it is his philosophy surrounding the role and dominance of the author in modern literature that this essay aims to deal with. From the 19th century onwards, Foucault notices that through social and political frameworks, the presence of an author vastly dominates the content and categorisation of any publication of that author. He also throws into question the idea of when an author becomes an author and what writings that he produces should become known as his work. The example he gives refers to items such as letters of correspondence or even simple lists that although might have been constructed by the same author of a canonical text, are not recognised as works of literature. What makes works of literature stand out is the content. Indeed, if one can recognise some basic principles of an authors works that may be used to relate previously anonymously published work, does that n ot disprove the existence of an original author. Foucault argues that when these common principles are identified (he himself recognises four in this essay) another could simply produce identically styled work according to these, thus rendering the author obsolete. When considering Marx or Freud who both claim in their work that an individual is only a component of the unconsciousness or political agenda, how can an author as an individual even exist? He recognises the author as a fleeting figure, only known through the â€Å"singularity of his absence and his link to death† (p.1624) and thereby questions further the role of the individual. Firstly, one must consider the rise of the author and how the idea of the figure’s importance came to be. Foucault considers Greek mythology when debating this claming that once it was the hero in such plays that was granted his immortality and the author remained largely anonymous. In the middle ages, this assumption changed as names of those who were involved in scientific discoveries were used to verify their truthfulness. Foucault states that in arguments, statements were in the order of â€Å"Hippocrates says†¦ or Pliny tell us that†¦..† (p.1629). This changed in the seventeenth and eighteenth century during the boom of scientific discoveries as that which was held true in scientific spheres was simply part of a greater truth. There was no need to verify the author as the facts were self evident through their existence.

The Crazy Horse Electric Baseball Game

The story starts of while they are playing their first baseball game of the season against the Crazy Horse Electrics. They decide to put beer in the opposition team's water bottles as a prank, so that they could win. After that Willie decides to go fishing with his dad. They have deep conversations, and they start talking about why Willie's mom does not fish like she used too. Then they get into talking about Missy, Willie's little sister who died of SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). After that the book cuts into another baseball game, they are playing against the Crazy Horse Electrics. Sal, a big guy on the Crazy Horse, and Johnny get into a verbal argument, and then Johnny says something personal about him and he wound up and decked Johnny one. They break it up and continue the game. When Willie was about to pitch he looses his balance and Sal hits a good pitch. Then out of pure luck and talent, Willie stretches himself out and robs Sal of a sure triple. Willie becomes a minor legend. On their way home from school Jenny and Willie hook up. Then on the weekend, Jenny, Johnny, Willie and his family decide to go to the lake. Willie and Jenny set the table for a picnic when Johnny is out skiing. Willies mom complains about him never being safe enough. Next it is Willie's turn to water-ski. As Willie was doing a 360 ° turn, he caught the tips of his skis under the water and he crashed. Willies dad was in shock, Jenny had to give Willie mouth to mouth, and save his life. The left the boat, got into the vehicle, and drove to the hospital. Willie ends up with a speech impediment, and problems walking. He ends up doing crazy things, like acid, and drinking. He talks to a counselor whom he really likes. Willie does not want to go into a Special Ed class that the school is referring him to. He feels hopeless, and even jealous of his girlfriend for her athletics. He tries to play racquetball, but his dad gets frustrated with him. That night he hears his parents arguing over him. He hears his dad say that he thinks it would have been easier if Willie had died in the accident. From there he suspects Jenny and Petey of getting together, and finds out that they are. Willie freaks out on Petey when he trips of Willies cane, and then Petey unintentionally turns all of the attention over to Willie. Willie decides that night that he is going to run away. He goes to the bank, and tells the teller that he is going to buy a VCR, then he goes to the bus depot. He starts off on the bus with no regret, and no guilt. He arrives in Oakland, and has to take a bus transfer from there to get to the bus that will take him to San Francisco. On his way to the bus he meets a gang called the Jo Boys. They try to take his money, but when the bus came he jumped right on it to get away. They get on the bus too. He talks to the bus driver, and the bus driver says that he will try to stall the gang, but that's about all he can do. So he tries to run away as fast as he can with his handicap, and they catch up, beat him up, and take all four hundred dollars from Willie. Willie passes out. When he wakes up, there is the bus driver. He helps him up, then takes him to a restaurant where he agrees to let Willie stay the night, and ONLY the night. Willie ends up staying for good, under the agreement that he will clean up, and stay out of Lacey's (The bus driver) way. Willie finds out when Lacey says Human Relations Management, that he is a pimp. The next day Lacey and Willie go to look at the school. Willie goes in while Lacy stays in the car. It is a private school, and the owner, Andre, offers free tuition as long as Willie will help keep it clean. Andre explains that the school is for people who have any handicaps, physical disabilities, or things that cause them to have learning problems. So Willie accepts and is getting a tour, when a tall gangly blond kid, named Jack comes up and starts repeating over and over again, â€Å"This school is a chicken-shit rip-off†. Finally Andre calms him down, and they finish the tour. After a few days, Willie begins to actually try to be normal again. Though he is slow, Jack asked him to play a game of basketball. They went to an abandoned court, and started a game. This was when Jack started to call himself the â€Å"Telephone Man†. People start to watch the game, and Willie starts to get nervous. Finally the game ends, and Willie goes into the office with the Phys Ed teacher, Lisa. She asks him if he wants some help with getting control back. He says that he doesn't have any money, but he finds out she is doing it for a university paper. So they start with learning how to find his center. Willie stays in Lacey's apartment and practices dancing to some horrid music. He is learning how to place one foot in front of the other with applying the same amount of pressure on both sides. Suddenly Lacey comes home with a girl from Willie's school, Angel. Lacey is extremely drunk, and has the girl around the waste. Willie figured it out. She was a whore. Willie goes to bad, and then wakes up to screaming. He runs into Lacey's room to find him beating Angel. He takes his cane, and pounds it across Lacey until Lacey is flat out cold. Then Angle runs and calls the ambulance, and gets mad at Willie. She tells Willie that when Lacey wakes up he is going to kill Willie. So the next day Willie goes to the hospital. Andre had offered for Willie to stay in the basement of the school if he needed too a little while ago. Willie went in there, and he saw Lacey. At first Lacey was pissed off, but when Willie said that he would move, Lacey asked him to stay. Later on Willie was practicing basketball again. He was doing it a lot. Andre saw him and said that he was starting to look like a player. Willie rebounds the compliment to Lisa, because she was the one who was helping him so much. Andre asked him why he doesn't hang around with the kids. Willie replied that he doesn't do drugs. Andre gets a little angry and says that that is not the only way to get into the school. They play a little more, and Willie says that he will try to make friends. Later that night, after Willie finished polishing Lacey's car, Willie gets a phone call. It is Lacey's ex-wife, and she told him to tell Lacey that his son is still rotting away. Will decides to relay the message just to â€Å"your ex wife called. † Willie had never pried into Lacey's personal life, but when Lacey came home, he read the message. Then Willie and Lacey get into his car, and drive down to an old facility. When they look in they see Lacey's son, staring into blind air, damaged permanently. Lacey had abused him when he was younger. Lacey told Willie that Then Willie asks if that was the reason that Lacey took him in was to make up for what happened to his son. The next day at school, Lisa told Willie to ask Lacey for a hundred and forty dollars, for a special course. She said to tell Lacey that all the students were taking it, and Willie was getting a deal. So Lacey gave him the money, and the next morning Lisa picked up Willie, and they went to a gym to work out, then Willie got introduced to Sammy, who was Lisa's â€Å"boyfriend†. He taught Willie how to protect himself, and to use his â€Å"set-backs† as an advantage. Later on, Willie saw Angel, and he asked her if she was still working for Lacey. She said that she still was. He told her that he had talked to Lacey, and he said he would promise to tell her that she could go. He had told her, but she didn't want to give it up. It was the only way that she could get money, and she had been raped when she was younger. During the weekends, Willie and a bunch of people would go to the school and fix it up. Then one day, Willie went into the school, and found spray painted all over Jo Boys. He cleaned it up, and left. Then the next morning he found it again, and left it for Andre to find. Hawk got really angry about this, and was going to beat the Jo Boys up. Then Willie went to the washroom to find Jack in there, sick to his stomach from eating Bisquick and strawberry-scented shampoo. He told him to wait there while he grabbed him some clothes from the lost and found, and then sent him to run home and get changed. Willie went back to class, and then when he heard, â€Å"fight†. Hawk ran up and found Jack on the floor and the lead Jo Boy, Kam, against the wall. So Hawk beat him up. Then Hawk convinced Willie into letting them come into the school, since Willie had the keys, and wait for the Jo Boys to come, and they would catch them in the act, and beat them up. So that night Willie went, and they never showed up. The Jo Boys came and set the school on fire. Willie beat up Kam in the dark with his cane, and then went back and got him before he burned in the fire. Kam got sent to a Juvenile Delinquent Center. Willie was a hero. Then the book cuts to graduation. Willie thanks all the people that helped him along the way, and the next day he heads home. When he gets there, his parents are divorced, his dad is a drunk. His mom has remarried to a guy named Don. His dad doesn't want anything to do with him. Jenny is still angry at him because everyone thought that he was dead, and she felt guilty. He works things out with his family, and then goes to see his old house. When he gets there he sees a tiny baby, in his room. He sticks his finger out for her to grab and she does. He begins to cry. The mother says that her name is Melinda. He says, â€Å"Thank-you, she's beautiful†, turns around, leaves and head back to southern Oakland.

A Woman’s Beauty Essay

In reading Susan Sontag’s â€Å"A Woman’s Beauty†, she explains that women think they have an obligation to be beautiful and that they consider how they look more important than who they are. Sontag also adds that women are sometimes obsessed with their outer beauty that they lose sight of their inner beauty. Fashion and the Media both have taken outer beauty way too far for women. In this society today, women are more pressured by other women on how they look. Women judge other women about their looks but men don’t do the same, because it is considered† unmanly† as Sontag states. Women naturally try to be appropriate and beautiful to attract men. Unfortunately, they have gone to very high levels of obsession with themselves that they lost track of their purpose of being beautiful and their position in this society. Sontag also argues that women at the same time have the idea in their minds that being beautiful will earn them a certain reputati on and place in society, and that beauty brings power and success. Even young women grow up have these same ideas in their minds and according to Sontag, â€Å"they are taught to see their bodies in parts and to evaluate each part separately†. In modern days beauty is administered as a form of self-oppression. In the process of growing up, young women may forget how intelligent they are and their goals in life. According to some people who have been surveyed about women’s success in the society, good looks are a great advantage in many areas of life. Let’s go back to the point that women try to make themselves beautiful to attract the best men possible. Women forget that beauty is also the power to attract. In women’s view, men come in whole packages together with being handsome and successful. On the other hand, men just want just want healthy and decent women with good personality. Susag Sontag’s essay is indeed very accurate in revealing some important facts about women’s beauty and the way the society looks at women. The world is not a beauty pageant where every woman has to look perfect. There are many people that think that beauty is more important, but there are also people that feel that a woman with a good head and personality will get than based on just looks alone. It is a fact that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and everyone has their own view on what’s beautiful to them.

Response to Phil. of law Essay

Response to Phil. of law Essay Response to Phil. of law Essay Response Paper (6) The holding of the case is in concurrence with the principles the judge used to make his decision. â€Å"The principle which lies at the bottom of the maxim volenti non fit injuria should be applied to such a case, and a widow should not, for the purpose of acquiring, as such, property rights, be permitted to allege a widowhood which she has wickedly and intentionally created† (152). The reasoning is that one cannot take the â€Å"fruit† of crime, or in this case one cannot take the inheritance of another through an unlawful act, or murder. It would also be a reproach of jurisprudence of the country if one could receive monetary items in the instance of one’s life being taken in a feloniously way. The dissenting opinion decides in the opposite way. The courts do not have the ability to change the guidelines of a testamentary, and the judge states, â€Å"I cannot find any support for the argument that the respondent’s succession to the property should be avoided because of his criminal act, when the laws are silent†(152). Therefore the criminal act and the testamentary should be handled as separate means in the courts, and the courts can simply not interfere with a dead man’s final testamentary. Public policy does not specifically define what should happen, or what form of punishment, in dealing with someone who acts criminally in order to gather monetary items. I believe the holding and the reasoning of the majority to best reflect Dworkin’s theory of â€Å"the

agustus essays

agustus essays Augustuss approach to change was effective in many ways that differenced from Julies Creasers. He was the general who dominated the strongest army that ruled the state. Augustus saw how diverse to the Roman polity civil war was. He understood that control of the legions by the civil government was necessary for the establishment of peace and order throughout the Roman Empire. He wanted to make some gradual change to make sure it wouldnt rise again. Augustus used a good approach when he chose to change the length of military service. The Roman legion became a specialized, long service force with an espirit decorp that earlier legions did not have. An officer witch Augustus personally appointed commanded to each legion, and the legionnaires pledged their allegiance to Augustus leader. Furthermore, Augustus recruited soldiers from the Roman provinces. Augustus reformed the provincial administrative system by creating a large civil service whose members came from a group of capable administrators that he had picked himself. Augustus had these new governors hold long terms of office in order to have sufficient long-term reforms. In order to hold back corruption, Augustus saw that the governors were paid fairly for their work. Their big financial problems problem facing Augustus was how to raise money for military wages and pensions. This financial problem was solved when he obtained Egypt as his personal possession. All the wealth of Egypt went directly to the imperial treasury. Therefore, Augustus directly controlled the imperial treasury. There was reliability on Augustus that funds would be paid. He also created new taxes to boost the government's income: a sales tax, and inheritances tax and slaves tax. Therefore, Augustus gradual change placed a big importance on the traditional religion of Rome. He believed that prosperity and peace in the state relied on ...

The Catcher in the Rye Themes, Symbols, and Literary Devices

'The Catcher in the Rye' Themes, Symbols, and Literary Devices J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is a classic coming-of-age story. Narrated by sixteen-year-old Holden Caulfield, the novel paints a portrait of a struggling teenage boy as he attempts to hide his emotional pain behind cynicism and false worldliness. Through the use of symbolism, slang, and an unreliable narrator, Salinger explores themes of innocence vs. phoniness, alienation, and death. Innocence vs. Phoniness If you had to choose one word to represent The Catcher in the Rye, it would be phony, Holden Caufield’s insult of choice and a word he uses to describe most of the people he meets and much of the world he encounters. For Holden, the word implies artifice, a lack of authenticity- pretension. He views phoniness as a sign of growing up, as if adulthood were a disease and phoniness its most obvious symptom. He has moments of faith in younger people, but invariably condemns all the adults as phonies. The flip side of this is the value Holden puts on innocence, on being unspoiled. Innocence is typically assigned to children, and Holden is no exception, regarding his younger siblings as worthy of his affection and respect. His younger sister Phoebe is his ideal- she is intelligent and perceptive, talented and willful, but innocent of the terrible knowledge that Holden himself has gained with his extra six years (most notably concerning sex, which Holden wishes to protect Phoebe from). Holden’s dead brother, Allie, haunts him precisely because Allie will always be this innocent, being deceased. Part of Holden’s torment is his own phoniness. While he does not consciously indict himself, he engages in many phony behaviors that he would abhor if he were to observe them in himself. Ironically, this prevents him from being innocent himself, which explains to some degree Holden’s self-loathing and mental instability. Alienation Holden is isolated and alienated throughout the entire novel. There are hints that he is telling his story from a hospital where he is recovering from his breakdown, and throughout the story his adventures are consistently focused on making some sort of human connection. Holden self-sabotages constantly. He feels lonely and isolated at school, but one of the first things he tells us is that he’s not going to the football game everyone else is attending. He makes arrangements to see people, and then insults them and drives them away. Holden uses alienation to protect himself from mockery and rejection, but his loneliness drives him to keep trying to connect. As a result, Holden’s sense of confusion and alarm grows because he has no true anchor to the world around him. Since the reader is tied to Holden’s point-of-view, that terrifying sense of being completely cut off from everything, of everything in the world not making sense, becomes a visceral part of reading the book. Death Death is the thread that runs through the story. For Holden, death is abstract; he’s not primarily afraid of the physical facts of the end of life, because at 16 he can’t truly understand it. What Holden fears about death is the change that it brings. Holden continuously wishes for things to remain unchanged, and to be able to go back to better times- a time when Allie was alive. For Holden, Allie’s death was a shocking, unwanted change in his life, and he is terrified of more change- more death- especially when it comes to Phoebe. Symbols The Catcher in the Rye. There’s a reason this is the title of the book. The song Holden hears contains the lyric if a body meet a body, coming through the rye that Holden mishears as if a body catch a body. He later tells Phoebe that this is what he wishes to be in life, someone who catches the innocent if they slip and fall. The ultimate irony is that the song is about two people meeting for a sexual encounter, and Holden himself is too innocent to understand that. The Red Hunting Hat. Holden wears a hunting cap that he frankly admits is kind of ridiculous. For Holden it is a sign of his otherness and his uniqueness- his isolation from others. Notably, he removes the hat whenever he is meeting someone he wants to connect with; Holden knows full well the hat is part of his protective coloring. The Carousel. The carousel is the moment in the story when Holden lets go of his sadness and decides he will stop running and grow up. Watching Phoebe ride it, he is happy for the first time in the book, and part of his happiness is imagining Phoebe grabbing for the gold ring- a risky maneuver that could get a kid a prize. Holden’s admission that sometimes you have to let kids take risks like that is his surrender to the inevitability of becoming an adult- and leaving childhood behind. Literary Devices Unreliable Narrator. Holden tells you he is the most terrific liar you ever saw. Holden lies constantly throughout the story, making up identities and masking the fact that he’s been kicked out of school. As a result, the reader can’t necessarily trust Holden’s descriptions. Are the people he calls phonies really bad, or is it just how Holden wants you to see them? Slang. The story’s slang and teenage vernacular are out of date today, but the tone and style were remarkable when it was published for the way Salinger captured the way a teenager sees and thinks about things. The result is a novel that still feels authentic and confessional despite the passage of time. Holden’s style of telling the story also underscores his character- he uses profanities and slang words very self-consciously to shock and to demonstrate his jaded and worldly ways. Salinger also employs the use of filler phrases in Holden’s story, which gives the narrative the feeling of being spoken, as if Holden were actually telling you this story in person.

Current event summary Personal Statement Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Current event summary - Personal Statement Example he comprehensive history of Luther is one that explains a leader who was willing, and motivated the society towards championing for their rights (Fandel & Bascle 28). The history of America is one that recalls the towers built by Luther that are transmitted from one generation to the next. Achua &Lussier indicate that Desmond Tutu is a leader that portrayed a lot servant leadership (332). Tutu derived a lot of meaning from an apprehension that their legacy is crucial in providing their followers with a foundation of self development, accord and companionship (Achua &Lussier 332). Tutu was a charismatic leader who made numerous sacrifices and suffered meaningfully on behalf of his people (Achua &Lussier 332). Abrams says that Thambo Mbeki is a leader that will be remembered for his commitment to leadership (88). He was dedicated and devoted to the people of South Africa, and fought continuously for his people. He is remembered for his fight against apartheid, and as a president, he attempted to heal the wounds of oppression from previous decades (24). Curtis & Manning is of the thought Adolf Hitler is one that is a good example of negative historical significance (23). Hitler as a leader during his tenure in 1919-1945, is indicated to have a lot of weaknesses, and used suggestion to lead (Curtis & Manning 23). Though Hitler had a good beginning, he had numerous personal weaknesses that led to his isolation, and label as a dictator (Curtis & Manning 23). Niagawoe is of the opinion that Charles Taylor, as a leader is one of the major contributors of the Liberian civil war (21). Taylor is accused of corrupt scandals that siphoned a lot of funds from the Liberian government. With crimes against humanity befalling his shoulders, Taylor has a lot of cases to answer with the International Criminal Court. Laufs says that Robert Mugabe is yet another leader that displayed vices of a manipulative leader (18). Mugabe is a leader that has resulted to not embracing

PRODUCT RECALL AND BRAND STRATEGY A Case Study on Toyota Corporation Essay

PRODUCT RECALL AND BRAND STRATEGY A Case Study on Toyota Corporation - Essay Example mmand a healthy following, the company has however concentrated its efforts in marketing the principal brand which is Toyota and its sub-brands (Daye & Van Auken, 2010). Until the product recalls, Toyota’s brand architecture hinged primarily on the Toyota name. It is typical for Japanese companies to focus their business and marketing efforts on a single corporate brand (Daye & Van Auken, 2010). This strategy has obvious advantages, such as the development of a strong culture around the master-brand and therefore making their marketing efforts more efficient (Thomson, 2010). It has strong implications in its production approach also, because the single brand allowed the firm to lessen the number of components it needed. Toyota’s sub-brands shared a large number of common parts, reducing design efforts and concentrating production on these shared components. â€Å"Compare this approach with US rival GM, which, until recently, was operating a house of brands structure with 11 distinct marques, and the reason for much of Toyotas success and GMs decline, becomes apparent† Daye & Auken, 2010). While there are obvious strengths, there is one glaring weakness in the brand focus strategy. Negative publicity which may attach for any reason to the master brand is going to affect not only all its existing sub-brands at the moment of the controversy, but also all future sub-brands still to be designed. It appears that this is the reason why Toyota’s strategy for 2011 and the near future is to shift global marketing emphasis to its Lexus brand (Toyota Annual Report for 2011, p. 11). The executive report also places emphasis on quality and safety as its two major parameters. Hence, the company strives to bring constant development in its operational and management process. Toyota’s production system â€Å"is steeped in the philosophy of ‘the complete elimination of all waste’ imbuing all aspects of production in pursuit of the most efficient methods† (Toyota

Neoliberalism is a fundamental new approach in International Relations PowerPoint Presentation

Neoliberalism is a fundamental new approach in International Relations theory. Discuss - PowerPoint Presentation Example Neo-liberalism works to move a part of the economy’s control to the private sector from the public sector. That is to say that neo-liberalism is an economic conception that values the ideals of free and unregulated market and globalization. Therefore, neo-liberalism occupies a fundamental position in the theory of International Relations. Neo-liberalism is a concept of political and economic practices that put forwards that human welfare can best be developed by liberating personal industrial freedoms and expertise inside an institutional framework typified by sound private property rights, unregulated and free markets along with free trade (Harvey, 2007). In the period after 1945, the liberals resorted to international institutions to perform several functions that the state could not carry out. This was the mechanism behind the integration theory in Europe and pluralism theory in the United States of America. Near the beginning of the 1970s, pluralism had built up a considerable challenge to realism and showed the way to neo-liberalism. Neo-liberalism stands for a more refined theoretical challenge to existing realism. They give explanation to the durability of institutions in spite of significant changes in circumstances. As said by neo-liberals, institutions exercise a causal influence on international relations, determining state preferences and fastening them in to two-way co-operative arrangements. It concentrates on new players like transnational corporations, NGOs (non-governmental organizations) and new types of relations like interdependence and integration (Galbreath, n.d.). Basically neo-liberalism states that free trade and unregulated market along with unobstructed supply of capital will lead to the production of the most efficient products that are most economically, socially and politically viable. It emphasizes on the significance of sound institutions like property rights, freedom of agreement, open markets, rules of legal responsibility,

Create a Balanced Scorecard and Strategy Map for the company (TESCO) Essay - 1

Create a Balanced Scorecard and Strategy Map for the company (TESCO) - Essay Example Strategy map has been prepared on the basis of analysis done while preparing the balance scorecard. The strategy map is drawn in order to show how strategic objectives identified through balance scorecard and KPIs will work together in helping Tesco Plc achieve its business objectives. In the final part, on the basis of analysis done in the report, suitable recommendations are given to enable Tesco to improve business performance in a comprehensive manner. For last 20 years, interest in performance measurement and management (PMM) has increased among scholars and companies at an exponential rate (Valmohammadi and Servati, 2011). In such context, Kaplan and Norton (1996) proposed the concept of Balance Scorecard (BSC) in order to formulate a performance management framework, which can measure performance of all important business activities. Haapasalo, Ingalsuo and Lenkkeri (2006) stated that companies use the balance scorecard in order to formulate strategy map, which in turn provides direction to strategic initiatives. It is evident from the theoretical argument that companies use balance scorecard and strategic map as composite unit in order to control performance outcome and shape business strategies. In similar context, balanced scorecard and strategy map can be applied to Tesco in order to understand dimensions of their business strategies. Before going further into the main discussion, the study will discuss business operations of Tesco Plc so as to develop a functional background. Tesco Plc is a renowned British multinational general merchandise and grocery retailer, which has established more than 6000 retail stores across the globe (Tesco Plc, 2014). In UK, Tesco Plc is regarded as the largest retail chain, while worth of the brand is above  £2.6 billion (Tesco Plc, 2014). The company was established in 1919 and is headquartered at Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, England (Tesco Plc,

The Stamp Act The Coming of the American Revolution Essay

The Stamp Act The Coming of the American Revolution - Essay Example Resistance also increasingly arose when the British attempted to raise more revenue from the colonialists. The unity of the colonies in violence against the British increased as they resisted the colonial ideas of raising more revenue from taxes. Violence become regular and eventually the now united colonies voiced their grievances from a central legislature. This resistance led to rebellion that consequently led to war (Williams 120). The colonialists formed a national congress through which they expanded their rebellion against Great Britain. The result of such unity was the creation of the colonial military that fought to see declaration of independence in 1776 to establish the United States of America. The British underestimated the political consensus existing among the colonialists about the essence of republican government. They also underestimated the ability of the colonialists to organize and inform one another and work together to build bounds of national community. This ignorance boosted the American rebellion since they organized themselves across the different regions, ethnics and economic conditions (Williams 234). The colonials used newspapers, committees, pamphlets, group protests and community organizations to discover their shared concerns and to foster a new American identity of independence against the British. Communities must not just be local to form a nation. There can be national, regional or international communities that form a nation. This is the philosophy the binds the United States of America as a nation. This was the message that saw the realization of an American dream to move away from the British Empire to declare their independence (Great Britain public records office

Management Skills Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Management Skills - Case Study Example Since decisions and plans made by the vacuum process approach normally do not consider the consequences of counter-decisions that are likely to be taken by the affected parties, this conventional approach could be possibly shortsighted. This paper will describe how the coevolutionary gaming theory facilitates the group decision making. Often a decision made on the basis of the current and historical data may bring worse outcomes if reactionary moves are not taken into account appropriately. It can be illustrated using the example of a new market entrant who plans to implement a low price strategy to dominate over the existing market players. Based on the data available, this low price strategy may seem a simple approach because it is just to trim down prices and to charge lower than what the competitors charge for the same product. However, this plan conveniently assumes that the existing market players who share the entire market will simply ignore the newcomer. What the available data do not tell is that the market leaders are in a better position to engage in a price war than the new market entrant because they will probably have a stronger financial base. Taking advantages of the economies of scale, market leaders can aggressively compete with the newcomer to the extent where they set prices below the breakeve n point of the new market entrant. At this point, the newcomer would struggle to survive because the firm’s operating expenses outweigh its sales revenues. According to Perc and Szolnoki (2010), the coevolutionary gaming approach is capable of addressing the limitation of the conventional decision making practice because when making decision and plans based on coevolutionary gaming approach, possible counter-decisions and plans of affected parties are considered, and the impacts of those reactions are well scrutinized for the purpose of making changes to the decisions and plans being developed before they are

The Stamp Act The Coming of the American Revolution Essay

The Stamp Act The Coming of the American Revolution - Essay Example Resistance also increasingly arose when the British attempted to raise more revenue from the colonialists. The unity of the colonies in violence against the British increased as they resisted the colonial ideas of raising more revenue from taxes. Violence become regular and eventually the now united colonies voiced their grievances from a central legislature. This resistance led to rebellion that consequently led to war (Williams 120). The colonialists formed a national congress through which they expanded their rebellion against Great Britain. The result of such unity was the creation of the colonial military that fought to see declaration of independence in 1776 to establish the United States of America. The British underestimated the political consensus existing among the colonialists about the essence of republican government. They also underestimated the ability of the colonialists to organize and inform one another and work together to build bounds of national community. This ignorance boosted the American rebellion since they organized themselves across the different regions, ethnics and economic conditions (Williams 234). The colonials used newspapers, committees, pamphlets, group protests and community organizations to discover their shared concerns and to foster a new American identity of independence against the British. Communities must not just be local to form a nation. There can be national, regional or international communities that form a nation. This is the philosophy the binds the United States of America as a nation. This was the message that saw the realization of an American dream to move away from the British Empire to declare their independence (Great Britain public records office

Money or Happiness Essay Example for Free

Money or Happiness Essay The general belief is that the rich tend to pamper their children by buying them all sorts of â€Å"toys†, while the poorer children do not do this because they cannot afford to. It is usually presented in stories- especially in movies that rich children are bad while those from poorer families struggle all their lives. Consequently it may be believed that children from rich families are happier than those from poorer ones. This may be the case in some instances, but is definitely not always true. Children can be happy whether they are from rich or poor families. We hear of cases where poor families make all sorts of sacrifices so that their children – or one of them – can have a certain comfort. Fathers are known to work at extra jobs so that their children can have expensive toys for Christmas or for their birthdays. On the other hand, the children of the rich are not always given everything they want. Rich fathers are known to make their children work for a living and earn their pocket money. Other fathers have refused to give their children expensive toys so that they will learn the value of hard work. Hence it is not the riches of the parents that can make the children happy but what the parents do to the child. Happiness can never be equated with having money or having rich parents for that matter. It is possible that poor parents have a close relationship with their child. In this way the child has something far better; it has love. Having enough love, the child will be happy – at least much happier than if it did not receive love. On the other hand it is possible that the child of rich parents have everything she wants but does not get the love and concern that she needs. The parents of rich children are sometimes too busy spending their money and earning more. Often we hear stories of â€Å"poor little rich children†. Though many of the stories we hear are fiction, some of them are real indeed. Sometimes the parents of rich children believe that their child will be happy if he is provided with everything he needs. They try to substitute money for love and care. In such instances, the rich child can be very happy indeed. In addition, children brought up in this way tend to be very poor in relationships. They do not know how to value things like friendships. Such a child is poor indeed, in spite of being financially rich. Using money and surrounding himself with all sorts of toys the child is apt to grow up with the wrong sense of what is true happiness. Then one day when he realizes that money does not always buy happiness, he will not know which way to turn. Hence children from rich families may not always be happier than those from poorer families. In fact both are capable of being happy, with or without money.

Responses to Genocide: Political and Humanitarian Strategies

Responses to Genocide: Political and Humanitarian Strategies Political expediency and humanitarian imperatives in response to genocide   This dissertation examines the humanitarian crisis in the Sudanese region of Darfur during 2003-2004, a situation that has continued through to 2005. Recent reports from the World Food Programme estimate that the violence carried out by the tacitly government-supported militias against the non-Arab civilian population in the region has left 3.5 million people hungry, 2.5 million displaced by the violence and 400, 000 dead.   The Darfur crisis has been a humanitarian disaster unseen since the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. It has been a situation that ultimately foreign governments and international organisations have been unable to ignore. Chapter two examines firstly the theoretical questions behind humanitarian intervention. The realist theory of international affairsis at the heart of the debate – realism suggests that states should puttheir own security and self interest before any moral obligation to intervene. Set in the context of Darfur, there was nothing within the individual national interest of other individual states to intervene, yet at some point in the crisis the common assumption moved towards afeeling that intervention on the basis of humanity was required.   The Rwandan genocide of 1994 and the international response at the time isused as an example of realism dictating the initial response of theinternational community, only to be overtaken by a more moral based response once the sheer scale of the crisis and human rights abuses became apparent. Chapter three looks at events in Darfur in detail, from the beginnings of the crisis to the current situation. Using media sourcesas well as reports from organisation such as the UN and Human Rights Watch, this chapter summarises the main events of the crisis, with examples of the indiscriminate violence used by the government-backed Janjaweed militias against the civilian population in Darfur. The response of the Sudanese government along with the steps it took to prevent humanitarian intervention are describes, as are the actions, or in many cases, the inaction of sections of the international community.  Ã‚   The actions of the Sudanese Government would appear to be driven by the state centric realism that Webber and Smith term â€Å"acentral driving force for human motivation, namely a quest for power† Chapter Four attempts to analyse events in Darfur against the theoretical frameworks detailed in chapter two. Realist assumptions continue to carry a certain weight in international politics, but there are examples of some more ethical policy making within the international community. The roles of the Sudanese Government, the UN, the US and other Western nations are looked at against theoretical positions. Chapter Five offers some conclusions on the internationalresponse to Darfur. At the heart of any analysis of the international response to thecrisis in Darfur lies the question why should anyone care about Darfur.Whilst theories supporting just wars and humanitarian intervention fromthe likes of Kaldor and Walzer argue that there is a basic humanmorality that requires states that are able to intervene to stop thesuffering of oppressed people, a realist perspective, one thatrepresented the initial international response to Darfur, is that thekey value of national interest is independence and security.   It is aquestion that has been at the crux of international relations forcenturies – intervention in the affairs of another sovereign state isan issue that has generated much debate. State sovereignty has long been a fundamental pillar of internationalsociety and non-intervention has ensured that individual states canmaintain their political independence and territorial integrity.International organisations have generally supported this principlewith, for example, Resolution 2131 of the UN General Assembly in 1965stating: â€Å"No state has the right to intervene, directly or indirectly in theinternal or external affairs of any other state. Consequently, armedintervention and all other forms of interference or attempted threatsagainst the personality of the State or against its political,economic, or cultural elements are condemned†. Regional organisationshave taken a similar stance – the Organisation of American Statestotally prohibits direct or indirect intervention in the affairs ofanother state. A wide range of political theory also supports the viewthat sovereignty is all-important and one state should not interfere inthe affairs of another. Nonetheless, international affairs since the establishment of thenation-state have seen intervention by states in the affairs of otherfor a number of reasons. The earliest interventions were for economicand strategic reasons and to secure territorial security – nineteenthcentury European interventions in Africa and Asia to establish coloniesserve as an example of this. In the early twentieth century the USbegan to utilise a different type of intervention, intervening in theaffairs of Central American states such as Nicaragua to encouragedomestic political order, reduce economic corruption and reinforce itsown influence in the region. Such action drew the attention of realistcritics who have influence US foreign policy thinking more recently.Realists have alleged that the adherence to moral principles and thefailure in the past to understand the â€Å"power essence† of interstaterelations has led to unwise and unsuccessful policies , for example tofailed humanitarian int ervention in Somalia. Certainly, the memories ofSomalia will have effected thinking on a political and humanitarianresponse to Darfur. The Cold War saw intervention across the globe by the two superpowerseither to enhance their own strategic security or to advanceideological goals, for example the USSR moving to strengthen communismin Czechoslovakia in 1968 or the US challenging anti-democratic forcesin Grenada in 1983. It is however, humanitarian intervention that is most relevant to thesituation in Darfur, an type of intervention that according to JackDonnelly is foreign intervention that seeks â€Å"to remedy mass andflagrant violations of the basic rights of foreign nationals by theirgovernment†Ã‚  Ã‚   The failure of states and subsequent abuses of humanrights in the latter stages of the twentieth century have presentedother governments with numerous scenarios where they have to makedecisions as to whether military intervention for humanitarian reasonsis justified. It is a complex issue that poses a number of legal andmoral issues. Amstutz argues that humanitarian intervention presents a legalchallenge to the accepted systems of state sovereignty along with amoral challenge to the right of self-determination. Whilst the demandfor order, justice, stability and human rights may override theseconcerns, politicians are also faced with the decision as to whether,how and when their country should instigate humanitarian intervention.Such interventions can generally be justified if two criteria are met:firstly that humanitarian intervention be in the interests of theintervening state, i.e. that it perceives the human rights abuses inthe foreign state as a general threat to the order, legitimacy andmorality of global society, or as a particular threat to its owneconomic prosperity; secondly that the intervention must be in theinterests of the civilian population of the intervened state and thatthe legal and moral issues around military intervention can bejustified by the overall good that is accomplished. NATO intervent ionin Bosnia can be seen as an example of a situation that met the formercriteria, the situationsin both Rwanda and Darfur would appear to meetthe latter. Michael Walzer who has written extensively on just war theory andintervention argues that humanitarian intervention should be seen asdifferent from instigating a military conflict. As well as the legalistargument against intervention in the affairs of another state, there isalso the difficulty of intervention in a country that has not committedaggression against another state – there is a danger that interveningstates can be seen as portraying the message treat your people the waywe believe you should or be subject to the threat of armed punishment.Walzer nonetheless believes that even if intervention threatens theterritory and political independence of another state, there are timeswhen it can be justified. The onus of proof of justification howeverlies with the leader of the state that intervenes and this can be aheavy burden, â€Å"not only because of the coercions and ravages thatmilitary intervention brings, but also because it is thought that thecitizens of a sovereign state have a right, insofar as they are to becoerced and ravaged at all, to suffer only at one another’s hands†. Arguments that states should, regardless of how they are governed,should be left to deal with own affairs and influenced by the thoughtsof John Stuart Mill who argued from a utilitarian viewpoint stronglyfor the right of a single political community to determine its ownaffairs – whether or not its political arrangements are free is not anissue for other states – members of any political society mustcultivate their own freedom in the way that individuals must cultivatetheir own virtue, self-help rather than intervention from an externalforce must be the way towards a just society. Such arguments do notstand up when applied to some of the systematic and well-documentedhuman rights abuses of the twentieth century – foreign governments makedecisions based on a realist perspective not to intervene, butnon-intervention based on the idea of self-determination is to avoidthe issue and hide behind outdated ideas. There is a point at whichrealism has to be put aside and so me form of moral stance must betaken. For Walzer, there are three situations in which theinternational resistance to boundary crossings can be ignored: 1.  when a particular set of boundaries clearly contains two or morepolitical communities, one of which is already engaged in a large-scalemilitary struggle for independence; that is, when what is at issue issecession or ‘national liberation’ 2.  when the boundaries have already been crossed by the armies of aforeign power, even if the crossing has been called for by one of theparties in a civil war, that is, when what is at issue iscounter-intervention; and 3.  when the violation of human rights within a set of boundaries is soterrible that it makes talk of community or self-determination or‘arduous struggle’ seem cynical or irrelevant, that is, in cases onenslavement or massacre His criteria present a realistic scope for intervention. For all theideas of ethical foreign policies there has to be some realism ininternational relations in that states cannot simply intervene in everydispute between neighbours or outbreaks of political unrest in otherstates. Walzer’s criteria, particular his third, limit interventionwhen serious abuses of human rights appear to be taking place. At thispoint, political expediency and national self-interest should be putaside. Ultimately, Walzer’s thinking lead him towards an ethical theory ofpeace on the basis of sovereignty and other widely accepted states’rights. His values form the basis of a legalist paradigm, which providethe moral and legal structure for maintaining international peace. Hislegal paradigm also outlines the criteria for use of force tointervene. Its six key principles are: 1.  An international society of independent states exists; 2.  The states comprising the international society have rights,including the rights of territorial integrity and political sovereignty; 3.  The use of force or threat of force by one state against another constitutes aggression and is a criminal act; 4.  Aggression justifies two types of action: a war of self-defence bythe victim and a war of law enforcement by the victim and any othermembers of the international society; 5.  Nothing but aggression justifies war 6.  After the aggressor state has been militarily repulsed, it can be punished. Irrespective of the situation in a particular state and the legal ormoral issues around any form of intervention, the realist view ofinternational affairs can lead statesmen to decide againstintervention. Realists from Thucydides, Hobbes and Machiavelli throughto the likes of Kissinger and Waltz remain strictly sceptical aboutmoral concepts within international relations and assume that statesgoing to war or engaging in any form of intervention are more motivatedby power and their own national security than any moral issues. Thephrase â€Å"all’s fair in love and war† is often applied to the realistperspective with Walzer writing â€Å"referring specifically to war,realists believe that it is an intractable part of an anarchical worldsystem, that it ought to be resorted to only if it makes sense in termsof national self-interest†Ã‚   – in effect there are no moralconsideration in regard to military intervention, the human rightsabuses occurring in another state are of little importance to realists,intervention will only be considered if it is considered to beeconomically or strategically of value to the intervening state or itsleaders. This value can be political on occasions. There is littledoubt of the power of modern media to put pressure on politicians. TheUS intervention in Somalia and NATO action in Bosnia were to someextent related to public pressure on politicians to do something aboutscenes being broadcast into the homes of the electorate. Thinking on humanitarian intervention has had to adapt more recently tothe new type of wars that have proliferated across the globe since theend of the Cold War, for example the conflicts in the former Yugoslaviadriven by ancient ethnic hatreds. Certainly with the demise of thestand off between two military superpowers there has been greater scopefor the UN and individual states to become involved in conflictresolution and throughout the 1990s the UN has found itself constantlyinvolved in providing humanitarian aid, establishing safe havens,disarmament and demobilisation operations, monitoring and maintainingceasefires. New wars have involved a blurring of the distinction between war(usually defined as violence between states or organised politicalgroups), organised crime (violence undertaken by privately organisedgroups for private purposes, usually financial gain) and large-scaleviolations of human rights (violence undertaken by states orpolitically organised groups against individual).   Some of the ethnichatred that has fuelled new wars has in particular led to terriblehuman rights abuses; events that put moral pressure on others states toconsider intervention. Mary Kaldor suggests that there are two types ofresponse to new wars – one is to draw on the old war idea of the nationstate and look for solutions along the lines of intervention and peacekeeping whilst the other response is a more negative and fatalisticoutlook: â€Å"because the wars cannot be understood in traditional terms,they are thought to represent a reversion to primitivism or anarchy andthe most that can be done there fore is to ameliorate the symptoms. Inother words, wars are treated as natural disasters.† Kaldor’s view rightly challenge the realist assumption that statesshould not involve themselves in humanitarian intervention unless thereis some advantage to be gained in a self-interested pursuit of power.What is required is a more political response to new wars and theattacks on human rights that accompany them. The internationalcommunity should be looking towards politics of inclusion that capturethe hearts and minds of protagonists and any such politicalmobilisation should override traditional geopolitics or short termdomestic concerns. This type of thinking moves closer to a type ofneo-realism which places more of an emphasis on the structural featuresof the international system and avoids the stress on the often anarchicstriving for power that reflects traditional realism.   The drawback tothe neo realist approach is that its reliance on the determining impactof the structure of the international system allow policy makersrelatively little discretion. This can be seen to some extent in Darfuras representative from various states struggled to find a solution tothe crisis that met with consensus. There have of course been embarrassments for individual states andinternational organisations with attempts at humanitarian interventionin the 1990s, setbacks that will give weight to realist theory thatsovereign states should on the whole be left well alone. Kaldorconcludes that humanitarian intervention has had mixed success: â€Å"at best, people have been fed and fragile ceasefires have beenagreed†¦.at worst the UN has been shamed and humiliated, as, forexample, when it failed to prevent genocide in Rwanda, when theso-called safe haven of Srebrenica was overrun by Bosnian Serbs, orwhen the hunt for the Somali warlord Aideed ended in a mixture of farceand tragedy†. Nonetheless, the arguments for humanitarian intervention remain strong.Darfur is as good an example as any for this. As Orend writes â€Å"whyshould foreign states, which themselves respect human rights, be barredin principle from intervening in such illegitimate regimes?†Ã‚   Rwanda in particular serves as an example of both foreign states andinternational organisations initially taking a realist stance only toeventually to be spurred into action by the sheer scale of the genocidetaking place. In France’s case, the links between the powerful elitesin the two countries had long been established – not only had Francelong supported the Hutu regime but Francois Mitterand and RwandanPresident Habyarimana were personal friends, whilst their sons, JeanChristopher and Jean-Pierre were also friends and business associates.The two countries had mutual economic interests and there is evidencethat Jean Christopher was one of France’s biggest arms dealers to Rwanda. The French response to the developing crisis, when it came, was farfrom glorious. Rather than intervene to provide further killings itdecided to pull out its troops. In the previous week, the first of thegenocide they had evacuated as many as 1361 people including 450 Frenchnationals and 178 Rwandan officials and their families. No otherRwandan nationals were evacuated, not even Tutsi personnel from theFrench embassy or well-known opponents of the regime who had alreadybeen targeted by the militia.   The role of the United Nations mission (UNAMIR) has receivedconsiderable criticism in analyses of the genocide. The UN had its owninternal politics to contend with and its policies on Rwanda were inturn determined to some extent by realist self-interest. As anorganisation it was largely reliant on the support of its most powerfulmembers on the Security Council. These nations, mindful of thedisastrous US intervention in Somalia were wary of investing troops andfinances into another African conflict. Realism came to the forefrontof the early decision making process. Human Rights Watch, in additionto criticism of the UN for not taking heed of Dallaire’s warnings, isalso critical of the scale of the mandate itself.   It describes thedetails of the mandate as follows: â€Å"Not only was the UN slow, it was also stingy. The United States, whichwas assessed 31 per cent of UN peacekeeping costs, had suffered fromthe enormous 370 per cent increase in peacekeeping expenses from 1992to 1993 and was in the process of reviewing its policy on such operations. Quite simply the UN was not equipped to keep the peace in Rwanda.Members on its influential Security Council did not have the politicalwill to get involved, nor were they willing to take on the financialburden. The US and the UK, although less involved in Rwanda thanFrance, were similarly guilty of happily ignoring warnings of possiblegenocide and working towards the maintenance of the status quo. Bothhad sold arms to the Hutu regime and had trading links with Rwanda.Both also had little desire to see their own troops caught up as partof an UN force in Rwanda. The theory of non-intervention, as opposed torealism is another view that opposes humanitarian intervention. The keyassumptions and values for this concept are †¢Ã‚  the existing anarchic international system is morally legitimate †¢Ã‚  peoples have a right to political self-determination †¢Ã‚  states have a juridical right to sovereignty and territorial integrity †¢Ã‚  states have an obligation to resolve conflicts peacefully †¢Ã‚  force is a illegitimate instrument for altering the existing territorial boundaries Non –intervention theory argues in favour of an internationallegitimacy of states in which existing states are entitled to autonomyand domestic legitimacy which assumes that states are entitled torespect and support when they fulfil their core obligations as states.In terms of domestic legitimacy, in the light of the fact that thereare wide disparities in conceptions of human rights, this canessentially be interpreted that whether a state is entitled tonon-intervention depends largely on its subject’s approval of theregime itself. The counter-arguments of realism and moral intervention continue toplay a major role in international politics and are likely to continueto do so. It is a sad fact that the list of oppressive governments andmassacred populations is lengthy. Walzer points out that for every Naziholocaust or Rwanda there will be a number of smaller examples ofinjustice and abuse – so many that the international community cannothope to deal with. On a small scale at least, Walzer’s suggestion thatâ€Å"states don’t send their soldiers into other states, it seems, only tosave lives. The lives of foreigners don’t weigh that heavily in thescales of domestic decision-making†Ã‚   rings true – humanitarianintervention in smaller-scale situations is simply not realistic. Agreater test for the moral resolve of NGOs and wealthier nations istheir response in the face of large-scale humanitarian disasters andhuman rights abuses, again using Walzer’s words, when deal ing with actsâ€Å"that shock the moral conscience of mankind†. Ethical questions around the issues of international moral obligationstowards nations suffering from oppressive regimes and human rightsabuses are not easily resolved. Whilst humanitarian aid or interventionis generally seen as a morally correct route of action, politicalexpediency quite often takes precedence. Whilst it is generallyaccepted that, as Grotius believed, war ought not to be undertakenexcept for the enforcement of right and   when once undertaken it shouldbe carried on   within the bounds of law and good faith,  Ã‚   national selfinterest does not always allow for a strategy led by such moralincentives. In Darfur, the action of the Khartoum Government couldcertainly not be described as driven by moral incentives whilstelsewhere early responses to the crisis were driven by politicalexpediency   Major states have to ask themselves which moral valuesshould influence their foreign policies and which international valueis more important – sovereignty or human r ights? The answer should behuman rights, yet there is a fine line between using these values froma moral perspective or manipulating them into a realist opportunity toindulge the national interest with intervention elsewhere. There areother difficult questions – do human rights violations justify foreignintervention and at what scale?   Does international political moralityrequire the removal of illegal military regimes and the restoration ofdemocracy?   There are countless regimes around the world to which theworld might turn its attention and ask itself these questions. For themost part, small conflicts and small-scale abuse of human rights are,rightly or wrongly, ignored. The situation in Darfur from 2003 onwardshowever gave the international community a scenario that it could notignore. The world had to make decisions upon hundreds of thousands oflives would rest. Chapter Three – The crisis in Darfur The current situation in Darfur can be traced back to February 2003when fighters from the Sudanese Liberation Movement (SLM) and theJustice and Equality Movement (JEM) launched joints attacks againstgovernment garrisons in protest at what they saw as decades ofpolitical oppression and economic neglect by the Sudanese government.The attacks came at the same time that there had been high hopes of apeace settlement to the war in southern Sudan that had been ongoingbetween the government and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army(SPLM/A) since independence in 1965. The government’s response was unequivocal. Citing the rebels as anaggressive force against the state it set out to crush the rebellion byforce and utilised the powerful force of Arab Janjaweed militias toattack not particularly rebel soldiers but the civilian populationsfrom where the rebels would have originated.   The government expectedto crush the revolt, partly as it had done so in 1991 when a SPLA unitinfiltrated Darfur, and partly as it expected a lack on internationalinterest as Darfur was an internal Northern Sudanese issue with noChristian population and no oil interests involved. Khartoum –ledmilitary activity in late 2003 to early 2004 was brutal (â€Å"acounter-insurgency of extraordinary ferocity†)   and carried out whilstthe government prevented any humanitarian aid reaching the civilianpopulation. It was an action led by political expediency withabsolutely no regard for the human rights of an innocent civilianpopulation. Hugo Slim describes th e military action as completelydisproportionate to the targeted guerrilla warfare of the two Darfurinsurgent groups and states that â€Å"systematic and widespread governmentand Janjaweed assaults on civilians, their villages, theirinfrastructure and their livelihoods along with forced displacement andland-grabbing, intended to make it impossible for the terrorised andevicted populations to return. As this went on, the Government alsoenforced what was almost a complete ban on humanitarian aid accessingthe country between October 2003 and February 2004. Early talks on the crisis saw the Khartoum Government deliberatelystonewall on major issues. It objected to upgrading the small AUobserver force from 300 to 3500,with an increase in its mandate toinclude protecting civilians, and was then forced to accept thismeasure by the UN Security Council. It was a realist approach – lookingsolely after its own interests and using delay in an internationalresponse to move along with its aim to displace the population ofDrafur. Government and Janjaweed Cooperation There is little realdoubt that the government has worked closely with the Janjaweedmilitias. Human Rights Watch (HRW) investigations concluded thatgovernment forces and militia troops have taken part in massacres andsummary executions of civilians, burnings of towns and villages andforcible depopulation of areas across Darfur. †We are the government†has been a common response of Janjaweed at checkpoints and whenentering villages and HRW reports that â€Å"the government and itsJanjaweed allies have killed thousands of Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa –often in cold blood, raped women and destroyed villages, food stocksand other supplies essential to the civilian population.†. In the early stages of the conflict, the Sudanese government barelyattempted to conceal its close working with the Janjaweed. Mans writesthat â€Å"the Janjaweed militias are said to be of largely Chadian originand finance themselves through plunder and pillage, reportedly enjoyingimplicit support from the Government in Khartoum.† But this isunderstating the relationship between the two. In April 2004, theSudanese Foreign Minister, Mustafa Osman Ismail, admitted a commoncause with the Janjaweed stating â€Å"the government may have turned ablind eye to the militias†¦This is true. Because these militia aretargeting the rebellion.†Ã‚   President Bashir also had spoken on 31December 2003 of the government’s determination to defeat the SLArebellions and warned darkly that â€Å"the horsemen† would be one of theweapons it would use. There is other clear evidence of well established links between thegovernment and Janjaweed leaders. Many of the militia leaders areestablished emirs or omdas from Arab tribes who have previously workedin government. For example, Abdullah abu Shineibat, an emir of the BeniHalba tribe is a Janjaweed leader in the Habila-Murnei area, whilstOmar Saef, an omda of the Awlad Zeid tribe is leader of the Janjaweedfrom Geineina to Misterei. Other evidence pointed to a similarconclusion of complicity between government and militia: Janjaweedbrigades were organised along army lines with forces wearing similaruniforms and officers using the same stripes; militia forces used thesame land cruisers and satellite phones as army personnel and there isevidence that Janjaweed members were given assurances that they wouldnot face local prosecution for crimes, with police forces beinginstructed to leave them alone.   Again, the prevailing issue here ispolitical expediency overcoming any possible humani tarian response.Both the Government and Janjaweed had interests in devastating Darfur –there was political gain for the Government and financial gain for theJanjaweed. Both took the realist option of looking after themselves. Government and Militia forces attack civilians One of the mostnotable traits of the crisis in Darfur has been the fact that bothgovernment and militia forces have largely ignored rebel forces,preferring to use their weapons against the civilian population inareas that rebels may have originated from. HRW investigationsuncovered 14 incidents in Dar Masalit alone between September 2003 andFebruary 2004 in which 770 civilians were killed. It also gatheredwitness testimony to mass executions in the Fur areas of Wadi Salihprovince over the same period.   Aerial bombardment of civilians has also been commonplace. The SudaneseGovernment has made extensive use of attack aircraft, dropping bombsloaded with metal shards to cause maximum injury and also utilisinghelicopter gun ships and MiG jet fighters. Bombing has also beendeliberately targeted at villages and towns where displaced citizenshave gathered – for example on August 27 2003, aircraft carried out anattack on the town of Habila which was packed with displaced civiliansfrom surrounding areas. 24 were killed. Government and Janjaweed forces have also systematically attacked anddestroyed villages, food stocks, water sources and other essentialitems essential for the survival of villages in West Darfur. Refugeesin Chad have confirmed a sweep south east of Geneeina in February 2004saw the destruction of a number of villages including Nouri, Chakoke,Urbe, Jabun and Jedida. The International Response The international response to the situation in Darfur has been mixed,characterised by a willingness to condemn the Sudanese Governmentalongside a dragging of heels in actually intervening to stop what theUS Government has labelled genocide. Alex De Waal suggests thatpolitical repercussions for the Sudanese Government were gravewriting:   â€Å"International attention and condemnation exceeded allexpectations, culminating in Darfur being brought before the UnitedNations Security Council in July 2004† This analysis however fails tomention the scale of the crisis in the preceding months and suggests amore positive and effective response by the international communitythan was actually the case.. The international community may eventuallyhave come around to taking Darfur seriously – but much later than wasrequired. As Hugo Slim concludes: â€Å"the international community has notdenied, but it has delayed and dithered. Once engaged it fumbled andtook far too long to achie ve a united and sufficiently assertiveresponse.†Ã‚   There was a notable reluctance from the UN in particular to use theword genocide in relation to Darfur, a similar pattern to that had beenfollowed in Rwanda a decade earlier. It was in fact US Secretary ofState Powell that announced on September 9th 2004 that the USgo