Blood Diamonds

Edwin Lopez Ms. Korbelack English 121 13 November 2012 â€Å"Blood† Diamonds in Africa â€Å"In Sierra Leone, more than 10,000 people have suffered amputation because of the diamond trade, which has become a trademark atrocity for the rebels†. Unfortunately, Ibrahim Fofana, a diamond miner, shared a similar fate to the thousands that suffered brutal amputations from the Rebels. Ibrahim Fofana is like many of the miners who are forced to work long brutal hours in diamond mines. And according to UK Channel 5 â€Å"The True Story† Documentary Series, â€Å"In April 1998 the RUF attacked his village.Rebels confronted his neighbor demanding diamonds, when he said he had none he was shot and killed. A different fate awaited Ibrahim, they chopped his hands off. † Diamonds are known to contain such an essential significance in which we take part of in our everyday lives. From fashion statements to wedding rings, diamonds have been in the competitive trading busine ss for years and the demand will continue to grow as long as our society greatly cherishes them. Diamonds are one of the most solicit natural resources available, but unfortunately, the origins of these diamonds are not as pleasant as the diamonds themselves.Unethical diamond businesses are adding fire to the already heated Africa, and it needs to stop. The high demands for diamonds outside of Africa are primarily the reason these different civil wars have been created, and should be thwarted. When there is a lack of enforcement, control, and basic human rights, action needs to be taken to prevent corrupt business trades and future bloodshed. In times of a civil war being fueled by the â€Å"blood† diamonds, Africa is in desperate need of laws and enforcement.Enforcing laws and regulations will prevent a majority of murders and give more security to the people suffering from the rebel’s brutal attacks. According to the United Nations, â€Å"On 1 December 2000, the Uni ted Nations General Assembly adopted, unanimously, a resolution on the role of diamonds in fuelling conflict, breaking the link between the illicit transaction of rough diamonds and armed conflict, as a contribution to prevention and settlement of conflicts. † To thwart these unauthorized black-market sales, the government has to get involved and needs to enforce strict laws punishing these felonies.Also, in other words of the United Nation, â€Å"Governments, inter-governmental and non-governmental organizations, diamond traders, financial institutions, arms manufacturers, social and educational institutions and other civil society players need to combine their efforts, demand the strict enforcement of sanctions and encourage real peace. † Getting all of these key players on the same page will greatly affect the changes of the unethical business, which is known to fund the rebel’s weapons. Although some laws have been placed that undermine some black-market trad es, governments are not doing enough to stop them.There is minimum enforcement, which enables the rebels to freely control the helpless people to work for them. Different parts of the African government should enforce laws in the creation of contracts that encourages legal diamond trades, which would greatly minimize the demand for rebels to try and sell diamonds illegally. To elucidate on the point of a government’s need to enforce diamond trade laws, a brief article from the New Internationalist states, â€Å"Ottawa MP Paul Dewar is working to pass the Trade in Conflict Minerals Act' (Bill C-571).But even if the bill is eventually passed, says Nutt, there will be no way to enforce it. She believes both the government and cell phone producers need to take the initiative. † Furthermore, the profits from illegal diamond trading pays for the rebel’s weapons, which must be thwarted to prevent future civil wars from breaking out. In most parts of Africa, black-marke t sales of blood diamonds are the fuel to a civil war’s fire. In terms of profit, rebels use the money from diamonds to buy more weapons and they use them to brutally murder the innocent.In the words of Barak Richman, professor of law at Duke University, Durham, N. C, â€Å"The profits from the â€Å"blood† or â€Å"conflict† diamond trade–a small but significant fraction of the world market–have been used to finance dictatorial regimes and terrorist organizations†. This elucidates the idea that black market trading rarely benefits the economic status but different corrupt organizations. Businesses should find a way to properly trade legal diamonds, while benefiting the country’s economic system. Although the natural resources in some parts of Africa are rich, the people are extremely poor.In other words, Richman also states, â€Å"The great irony of this, and what concerns the industry most, is that the item is being sold as a part of a romantic, everlasting, and pure relationship, but there are a lot of ugly shadows that have contributed to the industry's success. † Industries must end their contribution to the blood diamonds that fuel this nation’s civil wars. In addition to all the corruption in business and government regulation in Africa, the abominable crimes and inhumane conditions of labor workers in the mines need to end.With the high demand in diamonds, Rebels used this to their advantage and decided to treat the innocent Africans as their slave worker. According to the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights state, â€Å"No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms. No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. † The unethical business decisions being made with other countries need to end because they are a major cause to these violations of huma n rights.These violations deal with innocent people being murdered and arms being amputated for the demand of diamonds. Everyday people live in fear of a rebel attacking their village for their diamonds. If the major diamond corporations would begin to create proper contracts with professional diamond mining industries that hire proper employees, rebels would not have the great demand to force slaves into labor. But most businesses decide to go with the unethical, cheaper option of illegally buying blood diamonds.Although businesses benefit from the illegal diamond trade, the government must take action to express the pain the African people are going through. In terms of the opposing view, diamond corporations would argue that the African economy is benefited with the profits that the industries offer them. Diamonds also benefit Africa in terms of using the profit to generate different beneficial organizations and schools. According to the organization that run the website, Diamond facts. org, they have proven that â€Å"Diamond revenues enable every child in Botswana to receive free education up to the age of 13. This is greatly beneficial to the African society because there is a lack of education and schools in many parts of Africa. The amount of money diamond sales bring in would benefit the children of Africa and provide hope for the future. Also stated in Diamondfacts. org, â€Å"Approximately $8. 5 billion worth of diamonds a year come from African countries† which elucidates the fact that a large amount of money can be made. Also, â€Å"an estimated 5 million people have access to appropriate healthcare globally thanks to revenues from diamonds†The amount of money that is created from the diamonds is enormous, but can also benefit the global economy positively. Which would lead the opposing view to adamantly state that the diamond business in Africa is much needed. It would also give them reason to say that diamonds give the people of Af rica a chance to be employed because this would create many more jobs and raise the overall employment. The education system would also improve in terms of the profits earned would open schools. In Botswana, because of diamond revenue, the children are able to go to school for free.Is this enough to say that the benefits overcome the negative affects? With an economic point of view, one must not make a fallacy of composition on such a crucial topic with lives at stake. One cannot compare the benefits of a small percentage of the African people and expect it to work on every other country. Innocent lives have been brutally taken and blood has shed because of this great demand in diamonds. To disprove that the money brought in by diamonds is mostly beneficial to the African economy, the Unisol Organization states, â€Å"approximately $125 million worth of rough diamonds were bought by just Europe.This means that this staggering amount of money went to fund the RUF who killed thousand s of people during the civil war in Sierra Leone. † These numbers prove that the money not only goes towards building school and creating jobs, but it fuels a civil war with weapon that are paid with using the money earned in diamond trading. Assuming that the diamond trade will mostly benefit the economy is incorrect because a big chunk of it is not reported to the government but to the rebels fighting the civil war.In other words of the United Nation organization, â€Å"Neighboring and other countries can be used as trading and transit grounds for illicit diamonds. Once diamonds are brought to market, their origin is difficult to trace and once polished, they can no longer be identified. † This elucidates the fact that diamonds can easily be traded in the black-market without a trace. The money does not touch the government and the people are not benefited. In the final analysis of the blood diamond markets, it can be concluded that the money earned by a majority of t he diamonds traded are not directly benefiting the African economy.A fallacy of composition must be avoided when the government thinks that a small success in some parts of a more controlled territory will work in most parts of Africa. There are many organizations fighting to create hope for the people who have been affected in this diamond fueled civil war. The United Nations plays a big part in helping the restoration of human rights, but they cannot do it alone. A major organization, Hands For Africa, is fighting to protect the people and their basic human rights. In their words, â€Å"What we can do together?With one million signatures we can push Congress to put pressure on the international diamond trade. The United States is the premier retail market for diamonds; it has the clout to force a cleanup. Major diamond trading companies seem determined to turn a blind eye. The United States must force that eye open. You can be part of this amazing movement! † With your help , we can enlighten our society of these appalling stories and can provide the basic necessities that the people of Africa need to survive this horrid civil war. We need you to gather a small community and tell them about the crisis that is happening over blood diamonds.We are responsible as a society because we cherish and demand the diamonds as a fashion statement. The slave workers of Africa need justice. No human being deserves this gruesome fate. Works Cited Ritchie, Joshua. â€Å"Connect With Us. †Ã‚  MintLife Blog. Mint. com, 2 Sept. 2009. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. ;http://www. mint. com/blog/investing/the-history-of-the-diamond-trade/;. Stephen. â€Å"Blood Diamonds. †Ã‚  , African Conflict. Names. co. uk, 14 Aug. 2012. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. ;http://www. mymultiplesclerosis. co. uk/interesting-documentary/blood-diamonds. html;. United Nations â€Å"Conflict Diamonds. †Ã‚  UN News Center.UN, 21 Mar. 2001. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. ;http://www. un. org/peace/africa/Diamond. html;. â€Å"Diamonds worth their weight in blood. †Ã‚  USA Today  [Magazine] Jan. 2007: 8+. Academic OneFile. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. ;http://go. galegroup. com. libproxy. howardcc. edu/ps/i. do? id=GALE%7CA157655613;v=2. 1;u=colu91149;it=r;p=AONE;sw =w;. â€Å"Coltan mining fuels Congo violence. †Ã‚  New Internationalist  Mar. 2011: 57. Academic OneFile. Web. 13 Nov. 2012. ;http://go. galegroup. com. libproxy. howardcc. edu/ps/i. do? id=GALE%7CA253866943;v=2. 1;u=colu91149;it=r;p=AONE;sw=w;. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UDHR, Declaration of Human Rights, Human Rights Declaration, Human Rights Charter, The Un and Human Rights. â€Å"UN News Center. United Nations, n. d. Web. 05 Nov. 2012. . United Nations, . â€Å"Human Rights, United Nations, International Laws UNIOSIL . †Ã‚  Human Rights, United Nations, International Laws UNIOSIL  . n. page. Web. 14 Nov. 2012. . The World Diamond Council, . n. page. Print. . Blood Diamonds Autry 1 Mary Prof. W. Jaye English 102-603 Movie Evaluation 2 March 2013 Blood Diamonds Blood Diamonds explores the underground world of the diamond trade in Sierra Leone, where rare diamonds are used to fund military rebels at war. The film is based on Archer, a man with a survival instinct and a passion for collecting conflict diamonds. Archer finds himself involved with Solomon, a fisherman who was kidnapped and forced into slavery. Solomon was forced to work in the diamond mining fields under the command of a cruel fearless leader named Captain Poisen.When Captain Poison captures all of these innocent people, many men, women, and children were separated from their families and normal lives. The rebel group that captured Solomon and his family was called the Revolutionary United Front (RUF)(Blood Diamonds). The RUF used the diamonds they forced their slaves to mine to support their war, they would trade the blood diamonds for guns and armed weapons. While Solomon slaved away worki ng for the terrible RUF, in the diamond fields, Solomon found a pink diamond.Solomon takes a quick look around and decides to ask if he may go to the restroom. After being searched heavily Solomon runs of into the wood and stashes the diamond deep in the ground. Solomon already scared for him and his family's lives, doesn't know that Captain Poison spotted him stealing. As soon as Captain Poison attempts to find the diamond that Solomon hid they were attacked by government troops. Both Solomon and Captain Poison were taken as prisoners. Around the same time this was taking place, Danny Archer was also taken as a prisoner.When Captain Poison arrive at the prison and sees Solomon he begins screamed about the large diamond so everyone can hear, Poison even offers other prisoners amounts of money to kills Solomon right where he stood. Autry 2 After Archers' release he arranges help getting Solomon out of the prison because of Archers' interest in the large diamond. Blood Diamonds,shows that Archer now has discovered from his childhood to not that the conflict diamonds are the reasoning behind the war. Later a convoy is attacked and the remaining news teams are killed, while Archer, Solomon and Bowen escape from the scene.Solomon runs into Colonel Coetzee, a man who also wants the diamond and later almost kills Solomon and Archer for it. There is a plane coming to pick them up now, but Archer is hit by a gun and is slowly losing blood and ends up getting left. Solomon escapes Africa, and travels to London with the help of Bowen. She helps Solomon trade the diamonds so he can reunite with his family once again. Danny finally realizes his faults in his inner self when it's too late. Danny knew all along in his heart that smuggling was illegal and wrong, but ignored his heart and chased that dream anyway.In the end, Danny gets shot and lies in horrible pain. He then realizes that it was all because of him contributing in the diamond smuggling. Danny did manage to rega in his salvation when he handed Solomon the diamond and told Solomon and his son to leave him there to die, so that they could escape with the diamond together. Although the movie is covered with violence, it holds the viewers attention. This makes the viewer feel like they are walking in the shoes of the characters within the film. When viewing this film, it really opened my eyes to real life situations and events that child slaves must face on a daily basis.It’s hard to place yourself in the perspective of the poor children being forced to work and even killed. It makes the viewer realize how lucky they are to live within a democracy, were they can freely speak for themselves and they decide of what is right and what is wrong. It forces the viewer to acknowledge slavery, instead of just neglecting it completely like I realized I have done for so long. When you view Blood Diamond, it has an effect on you as soon as you see the brutal ways in which children are treated.This m ovie would be a great educational piece to show to anyone viewing something that has more of a meaning and realism. Blood Diamonds,has tons of historical significance because of being based on a true story about African Blood diamonds, the movies shows so much that Autry 3 goes on. Blood Diamonds,was for the most part accurate but not entirely. In Blood Diamonds, the documentary showed how not only men had a hard time, but also women, and children(A;E Television Networks). It showed how women were raped for no reason, how their was no justice for the women who ad been rapped (A;E Television Networks). After the men would leave they were killed, so the women couldn't emotional heal. As much as I learned and like the movie, Blood Diamonds, I feel they should have used more of a storyline telling something about what others went through as well, especially the women. Autry 4 Works Cited Zwick, Edward, Dir. Blood Diamond. Perf. Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly, and Djimon Hounsou. W arner Bros. Pictures, 2006. lood Diamonds. The History Channel. A&E Television Networks, 2006.

Etosha: Place of Dry Water Essay

Etosha is an ecosystem that contains many interacting species of organisms and their physical environment. As the seasons change, the temperature and climate affect the biotic and abiotic factors. Biotic factors are the living organisms that are affected by abiotic factors. Abiotic factors are the non-living or physical factor that directly affects the living organisms. Etosha displays all type of biotic and abiotic factors as the seasons change and the rainy seasons come again to start the cycle again. A biotic factor is the predator and prey relationship. Etosha displays this through many of its organisms- turtle and dove, cheetah and zebra, lion and frog, and snake and frog respectively. The parasite and host relationship constitutes as a biotic factory. An example of this is the squirrel, the host and the fleas, the parasite. There exists mutualism in Etosha. The mother fox finds bugs on its young ones and this provides food for the mothers. The bugs use the mother to live on and to live off of. Therefore, each organism benefits from their relationship. Competition exists between male bullfrogs over the female bullfrogs for mating. They may go to the extent of eating one another. The male lions also fight one another over the female lioness for mating. An example of a food chain in Etosha starts with bugs. Then, the bullfrogs eat the bugs. Bullfrogs eat other bullfrogs for competition and a lion eats the bullfrog. The squirrel has a long tail to shade it from the sun, which is an example of adaptation. Another adaptation is the large ears of the bat ear fox, which allow it to hear sounds of the bugs in the ground for food. The bullfrog camouflage in the swamp by cryptic coloration. It is the same color as its environment. These are the major biotic factors, which exist in Etosha. The abiotic factor that persists in Etosha is the soil, which turns dry from the heat and sun. It turns to a desert and many animals move away until the next large rainfall, which creates lakes for the animal activity in a year. The precipitation in Etosha is an important factor because it provides water for the animals and the plants. It is also a home for small organisms such as the bullfrog. The heat causes the lakes to dry and the movement of animals until the next rainy season. This heat even kills some animals such  as the pelicans. The animals start to the water holes before morning because of the extreme heat. The animals get light from the sun as their main source. On a whole, many animals go to sleep when the sun goes down and will start again in the morning for their quest for food and survival. A chemical cycle that occurred in Etosha was the Nitrogen Cycle. Nitrogen fixation occurs when the thunderstorms pass through Etosha. In the soil, bacteria convert ammonia to nitrate through nitrification. Assimilation occurs when plant proteins convert to animal protein with the herbivores like the giraffe. The pelican goes through ammonification when it dies; the bacteria decompose into ammonia again. Lastly, denitrification occurs when nitrate converts to nitrogen, which is released into the environment. These are the major abiotic and biotic factors within the Etosha environment.

A Food Supermarket Chain Marketing Essay

A Food Supermarket Chain Marketing Essay INTRODUCTION Whole Foods Market is a food supermarket chain founded in 1980, which emphasizes in â€Å"natural and organic products†, based in Austin, Texas. John Mackey, founder of Whole Foods Market, has currently 331 supermarket stores in both the United States and Europe. In this report, PEST analysis and Porter’s 5-Forces would be used to analysis the general environment of Whole Foods Market. Using the above mentioned analysis, a value chain would then be recommended to identify which areas or stages of the product would need to be changed in order to improve Whole Foods Market market value, allowing it to remain competitive and ensure business sustainability. ADDED VALUE IDENTIFICATION Whenever a customer intends to patronize Whole Foods Market, the first thought that comes into majority of customer’s minds is that foods sold there are healthier choices. And with the presence of Whole Foods Market’s house brand, 365, customers would be able to purc hase healthier foods at affordable prices. As compared to Whole Foods Market’s competitor, Kroger Supermarkets, Kroger does not emphasize on selling healthier foods, in fact they emphasize more on selling produces at affordable prices. Majority of customers patronizing Kroger Supermarkets have the idea that it’s a one-stop shopping place. Both companies also give their customers the idea that poultry, meat and other fresh produces are of the freshest and highest quality. PEST ANALYSIS The PEST analysis is a business tool used for measuring market growth or decline, hence allowing the business to identify its position, potential and direction. PEST analysis comprises of Political, Economic, Social and Technological factors shown in (fig1.1): (fig. 1.1) POLITICAL Before June 2011, body care products sold at Whole Foods Market need not comply with U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) standards for sale as being organic. After June 2011, body care products are needed to c omply with USDA standards to be labeled as organic. ECONOMIC Economy in the U.S has been declining due to its global huge debt incurred. Recession has set in causing high unemployment rates and failed businesses. The same situation has been experienced in Europe, Euro Crisis, due to Greece’s huge debt incurred. Fall in value of the U.S. dollar and Euro currency has been experienced until present day. SOCIAL Consumer trends have also changed. Modern day consumers tend to go for â€Å"healthier choice† foods, especially organic products. Consumers also tend to shun away from foods, especially poultry and meat, where animals have been treated inhumanely. Organizations actively involved in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are more welcomed by consumers. TECHNOLOGICAL Present day consumers are more engaged in on-line shopping from the internet. Compared to other sectors, the supermarket sector has fewer technologies being implemented in its day to day operations. CONCL USION The supermarket industry is being regulated regularly with new legislations being imposed to improve quality of foods sold. This industry needs to constantly adapt to the needs of consumers which are ever changing based on population, lifestyle, and buying power of consumers. This industry would continue to see growth due to consumers welcoming organic foods.

Smith and Marx Document Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Smith and Marx Document Analysis - Essay Example The Wealth of Nations (1776) composed by Adam Smith is a historical text which advances the idea of capitalism. Capitalism sets the foundation for America’s government and economy. Adam Smith’s view is to encourage a liberalization of the world market with no barriers to trade. Smith lives and writes The Enlightenment period of world history during which the light of reason shines. Revolutions are being kindled; old social orders are being done away and free-thinkers emerge with new perspectives. Regimes such as aristocracy, monarchy and feudalism begin to experience the action of undermining and another group is surging into power, the nouveau-riches – a people who earn fortunes from industry. Absolute control is no longer pleasing to the enlightened ear. Instead, independence obtains wide currency. According to the Communist Manifesto, the essence of history comprises of class struggle. Marx and Engels commence with the statement that "the history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of class struggles." The Marxist document launches into a narrative explaining that from the dawn of Greco-Roman civilization to the time of the manifesto’s publication, history has its roots deep in the conflict of dual ideologies. One dominant camp, â€Å"the oppressor,† seeks to retain a monopoly on wealth and power; whereas the recessive consisting of â€Å"the oppressed† serves to fulfill the interests of the powerful. The divergence of ideas engenders both overt and subtle war between ruling and servant classes. Again,  Marx  and Engels reiterate that â€Å"the history of all past society has consisted in the development of class antagonisms† (The Communist Manifesto). The pyramidal structure or gradation of society remains as a threat to harmony among social classes. From antiquity to modernity, the dichotomous conflict with respect to class

Analysis of performance management of Marks and Spencer with interview Essay

Analysis of performance management of Marks and Spencer with interview questions - Essay Example From this research it is clear that the multi-channel sale is one of the reasons why the company is successful in the U.K. The customers are also more fashion conscious and are less sensitive to prices. They would be ready to go for the trendiest clothes even if it is overly priced. The existences of competition in the market with other brands that are equally high priced have helped the brand to survive in the U.K. market with the high end products. There is abundance of shoppers in Britain who make their purchases from the high end stores. The people of the British Market are more conscious about their health. Therefore they would go for the luxury food products. The sales of these products reach the peak during Christmas. The company also has a strong brand presence in UK. Most of the shoppers go to the stores and are ready to pay high because of the label under which they are buying. Company’s approach towards dealing with the customers and understanding the pulse of the m arket was the reason for company’s sudden growth. When the strategy that our team took became successful in the homeland of the brand the senior management of Marks & Spencer took a decision to engage our entire team in China to understand the market situation and to help increase the sales figures in the country. Hence sending this team for handling the China market was again a strategic move by the senior management of M&S to increase the market share in China. ... The customers are also more fashion conscious and are less sensitive to prices. They would be ready to go for the trendiest clothes even if it is overly priced (Kurtz, 2010, p. 147). The existences of competition in the market with other brands that are equally high priced have helped the brand to survive in the U.K. market with the high end products. There is abundance of shoppers in Britain who make their purchases from the high end stores. The people of the British Market are more conscious about their health. Therefore they would go for the luxury food products. The sales of these products reach the peak during Christmas. The company also has a strong brand presence in UK. Most of the shoppers go to the stores and are ready to pay high because of the label under which they are buying. Company’s approach towards dealing with the customers and understanding the pulse of the market was the reason for company’s sudden growth. When the strategy that our team took became successful in the homeland of the brand the senior management of Marks & Spencer took a decision to engage our entire team in China to understand the market situation and to help increase the sales figures in the country. Hence sending this team for handling the China market was again a strategic move by the senior management of M&S to increase the market share in China. Our team had been entrusted with the duty of analyzing the market properly and to find out how the sales can be increased. The target market had to be identified and the pricing strategies had to be developed to make an impact on the bottom line. The brand commenced its operations in China in 2008. We opened up 14 stores in different parts of China. The shop

Media and Society Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Media and Society - Essay Example The researchers used a survey sampling method and a panel design technique in which the same samples were observed at different points in time (Lowery and DeFleur, 1983) . Locational parameter was in Erie County in Ohio because it was culturally homogenous with a population of 43,000 being stable for 40 years. The people living in Erie County were all white and the farmers and the industrial labor force were evenly distributed. Thus, this would help in classifying the respondents. It was also relevant that the tri-media were present; 3 newspapers, 2 radio stations and all major network channels were represented. Importantly, Erie County had the record of deviating a little less from national voting pattern as far as the twentieth century was concern. During the study, there were 3,000 sampling respondents, 600 persons each for 4 stratified samples referred to as "panel" and 600 persons each also for the 3 control groups. Panel and control groups were used as there were qualms that th e process would greatly affect the results which eventually turned out to be the otherwise. There were several influential factors that could affect voters of Erie County and that included political index, religion, demography, socio-economic status and cross pressures among all others. There were three main patterns of change in cross pressure voting. According to the study, 28% were crystallizers (Lowery and DeFleur, 1983). They changed vote up to the last minute. On the other hand, 15% were waverers. Waverers were those whose decision pattern was like a wave. They started out with a clear decision then during the campaign period slowly changing sides but then later vote on their original choice. Finally, the party changers were self-explanatory and composed 8% of the samples. Cross pressure votes were simply a delay of the final decision of the voter. As such, potential voters whose low interest in the campaign and the cross pressure voters became media campaign targets. The challenge with media-mediated campaign was how to effectively deliver the message that a certain candidate was way far better than the others. The problem also lies on media exposure. How well-spread was the exposure. Surprisingly, radio comprised 50% of those surveyed when asked about the most important source of political information (Lowery and DeFleur, 1983). The media however, was a big contributor in political campaigning through three major patterns of influence; activation (awareness), reinforcement (continuing justification) and conversion (switch sides through persuasion). The two-step flow of communication stated that ideas and arguments would from the media to the opinion leaders then finally to the less active portions of the population. It was emphasized in this chapter the importance of mass media in influencing the voting behavior of the people. There maybe other factors that can affect any individual's vote but media-mediated campaign can greatly affect voter's decision up to the last second of the election period. Therefore, with all these political propaganda and strategy using mass media, Franklin D. Roosevelt won the political race. Chapter 5 Audiences for Daytime Radio Serials: Uses and Gratifications In the late 1930's, America

McDonalds in Cameroon Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

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Individual Career Plan Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Individual Career Plan - Essay Example The timely fashion that is required during all journalistic encounters ensures that events are relayed and communicated in the best possible way. This is the only way that all events and activities witnessed are communicated to all parties in the best possible way. Packaging is necessary in the field of journalism. This is because proper packaging ensures that all the information collected is as palatable as possible (Kobre 2008). The role of journalism cannot be ignored in any given society. This is because, at each and every point, the public interest in what is happening all over the world is very high. This is possible because of the aspects of journalism that look into the events all over the world. The coordination of information and pictures is able to communicate all the needed information about a situation. The condensation of information and pictures about any situation totals to journalism. This is the only way that the public is aware of their surroundings. Photojournalis m Photojournalism is one area in the entire field of journalism. Each new story has the sole aim of communicating information. For it to appeal to all the involved parties, it is accompanied by still pictures and images that complement the story (Kobre 2008). As compared to all other forms of photography, photojournalism has been stipulated to follow certain ethical and pictorial considerations. They are entitled to remain as ethical and impartial to communicate the specifics of what should be reported. They complementary role that photojournalism plays has been reported to bring any story alive. Many people that have been interviewed in many researchers conclude that they watched and participated in news surveys as a result of what they watch. This is as compared to what they hear (Kobre 2008). Many life events were reversed as a result of what images were relayed to accompany a story. There are very many examples that show what the research concluded. The genocide in Rwanda in 199 4 and the civil war in Sudan got worldwide attention as a result of chilling images that accompanied the stories. These are some few random examples from all over the world in line with the effects of photojournalism. It is imperative that, at each and every point the aspects of photojournalism should be governed by timeliness, narration and objectivity. This means that all pictures and images should be timely in how they complement the story line. This is through the introduction of a cutline. The images and pictures should also be very objective in the sense that the pictures should have a high sense of what the story line is about. Without the connection, they will be of absolutely no benefit to the story. The connection between the pictures and the story line is through the introduction of a narrative. Narration ensures that the audience is able to relate the story and picture. This creates a perfect view for all those that are watching (Kovach 2007). Job Description and Skills Profile Photojournalism entails the use and application of photographic equipment. The equipment has the ability to capture images as they appear. Once a photojournalist is in the zone, the camera is zoomed to view all aspects of what is being filmed. It is necessary for the journalist to zoom and project the image from all the necessary angles. Aspects of creativity come into sharp focus as any form of angle alteration could lead to the complete

Summary and response Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 3

Summary and response - Essay Example Some of the robots that will take part in the competition have artificial intelligence that is slightly lower than that of human being. As such, they require little human interception. Some are able to walk on four artificial leg with multiple joints that enables it to climb a ladder and hoofer around a building or an object. According to the article, participants reckons that the competition is a challenging affair as they impressive innovation from major manufacturers in America. In this case, the competitors equate the challenge with that of autonomous car challenge. On the positive note, they argue that the competition will improve the present day humanoid robots that can respond to disasters such as the nuclear plant disasters that have hit various parts of the world. Some of the robots such as the CHIMP will have legs that can fold and double as treads. These features enable the robot to operate in rough terrain and hence very efficient in rescue missions. Lastly, the article suggests that robots challenge will ensure great improvement especially in the consecutive years. As a consequence, it is most likely that advanced robots will serve human kind in various ways. I normally visualize the concept of robots as a convenient replacement of inefficiencies caused by human being. Though robots require human interception in their operations, it is worth noting that they are more efficient that human beings, especially in difficult tasks. I believe that robots can perform serious tasks in environments that are inaccessible or that pose danger to human being. The competition that is described in this article presents a prime opportunity to manufacturers of robots. Firstly, I believe that even those who will not participate will have a chance of gauging the level of technology exhibited in the competition. Secondly, the participants have a chance of walking away with huge sums of money as prices. This creates an

Self-Evaluation and Pay Discrimination Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Self-Evaluation and Pay Discrimination - Essay Example However, the employer may be asked to make some modification in his self evaluation program incase it does not meet the general standards. The third step is that OFCCP reviews the documents that the contractor keeps to undertake the self-evaluation program. After the review of the documents, a technical team is employed by OFCCP to determine whether the contractor self-evaluation program complies with the general standards as speculated by the voluntary guidelines provided by OFCCP (Rosen 19). This is followed by treating the information provided by the contractor as confidential. This implies that the information cannot be released to the public as long as the contractor is in the business. To ensure that the contractors self-evaluation program is effective, OFCCP allows the contractor to certify the compliance of his program with 41 CFR 60-2.17(b) (3) in order to avoid legal disputes. However, this is undertaken when the contractor produces the results of the self evaluation progra m to OFCCP. To conduct an evaluation, our company must maintain documents that indicate justification of its decisions with respect to Similarly Situated Employee Groupings (SSEGs). Additionally, statistical data that depicts the results of the two years statistical analyses must be provided to OFCCP. In case of disparities, the company must retain the documents that were used in any follow-up investigation. Such documents must be retained for two years. For an effective self evaluation program, the company should form a SSEGs that involves 30 employees with extra 5 members representing non-minority/ minority or male or female. With an all inclusive employees groupings, Rosen 26 argues that an employer will effectively undertake a self evaluation program that will ensure adoption of motivation factors focused at improving the performance of the

Chemistry class xii project Essay Example for Free

Chemistry class xii project Essay Theory What is rust? Rust is the common name of a compound, iron oxide. Iron oxide, the chemical Effie, is common because iron combines very readily with oxygen so readily, in fact, that pure Iron Is only rarely found In nature. Iron (or steel) rusting Is an example of corrosion an electrochemical process involving an anode (a piece of metal that readily gives up electrons), an electrolyte (a liquid that helps electrons move) and a cathode (a piece of metal that readily accepts electrons). Causes When a piece of metal corrodes, the electrolyte helps provide oxygen to the anode. As oxygen combines with the metal, electrons are liberated. When they flow through the electrolyte to the cathode, the metal of the anode disappears, swept away by the electrical flow or converted into metal actions in a form such as rust. For iron to become Iron oxide, three things are required: Iron, water and oxygen. Heres what happens when the three get together: When a drop of water hits an Iron object, two things begin to happen almost immediately. First, the water, a good electrolyte, combines with carbon dioxide in the air to form a weak carbonic acid, an even better electrolyte. As the acid is formed and the iron dissolved, some of the water will begin o break down Into Its component pieces hydrogen and oxygen. The free oxygen and dissolved iron bond into iron oxide, in the process freeing electrons. The electrons liberated from the anode portion of the iron flow to the cathode, which may be a piece of a metal less electrically reactive than iron, or another point on the piece of Iron Itself, Consequences Rusting has a number of effects on metal objects. It makes them look orange and rough. It makes them weaker, by replacing the strong Iron or steel with flaky powder. Some oxides on some metals such as aluminum form Just a thin layer on top which lows down further corrosion, but rust can slowly eat away at even the biggest piece of iron. If a piece of Irons strength Is important for safety, such as a bridge support or a cars brake caliper. It Is a good Idea to Inspect It for rust damage every now and then. Rust also can cause metal parts that are supposed to slide over one another to become stuck. Rust can make holes In sheet metal. Rusty car mufflers sometimes develop holes in them, and the sheet steel making the outer bodies of cars will often rust through, making holes. Rust Is a lot less magnetic than Iron. An iron magnet will probably still work almost as ell when It has a thin coating of rust on It, but If It has rusted so badly that most of the metal is gone, then it will not work very well as a magnet. 1 OFF which is a metallic conductor. So if some electrical connection is made with iron, its likely to go bad when the iron surface rusts. Rust is associated with degradation of iron-based tools and structures. As rust has a much higher volume than the originating mass of iron, its build-up can also cause failure by forcing apart adjacent parts ? a phenomenon sometimes known as rust packing. It was the cause of the collapse of the Missus river bridge in 1983, when he bearings rusted internally and pushed one corner of the road slab off its support. Rust was also an important factor in the Silver Bridge disaster of 1967 in West Virginia, when a steel suspension bridge collapsed in less than a minute, killing 46 drivers and passengers on the bridge at the time. Prevention and Protection Because of the widespread use and importance of iron and steel products, the prevention or slowing of rust is the basis of major economic activities in a number of specialized technologies. A brief overview of methods is presented here; for detailed overage, see the cross-referenced articles. Rust is permeable to air and water, therefore the interior metallic iron beneath a rust layer continues to corrode. Rust prevention thus requires coatings that preclude rust formation. Some methods of prevention of rusting are as follows: Gallivanting:- Globalization consists of an application on the object to be protected of a layer of metallic zinc by either hot-dip gallivanting or electroplating. Zinc is traditionally used because it is cheap, adheres well to steel, and provides catholic protection to the steel surface in case of damage of the zinc layer. In more corrosive environments (such as salt water), cadmium plating is preferred. Coating and Painting:- Rust formation can be controlled with coatings, such as paint, lacquer, or varnish that isolate the iron from the environment. Large structures with enclosed box sections, such as ships and modern automobiles, often have a wax-based product (technically a slashing oil) injected into these sections. Such treatments usually also contain rust inhibitors. Covering steel with concrete can provide some protection to steel because of the alkaline pH environment at the steel-concrete interface. Humidity Control:- Rust can be avoided by controlling the moisture in the atmosphere. An example of this is the use of silica gel packets to control humidity in equipment shipped by sea. Metal Coupling:-Len this method, the iron is coupled with other metal and if the metal is above iron in electrochemical series(meaner more electrostatics)then in the galvanic cell is formed by the contact of the iron and that metal, iron will go under reduction it will be safe from rusting. If the metal is below iron in electrochemical series then iron will go under oxidation and rusting will be facilitated.

Ethics in Professionals Essay Example for Free

Ethics in Professionals Essay . Salgo v Leland Sanford University Board of Trustees notes that if the health professional do not present all the necessary facts that will form the basis for the decision of the patient, the professional has committed a violation. The patient has to undergo an operation in the heart, in his aorta. Before the operation, he is well. After the operation, the patient experienced paralysis in his lower extremities and that the condition is permanent. There has been negligence in the part of the doctors and they fail to explain to the patient all the details of the procedure (Standford 1957). 2. Arato v. Avedon states that the physicians must present the accurate statistics regarding the life expectancy of patients regarding their case so they could plan for their death. Arato was suffering from an illness in his pancreas. He was told by the doctors to undergo F. A. M. chemotherapy. The doctors have failed to give the patient the chances of recovering after the chemotheraphy (LSU Law Center 1993). 3. The Schloendorff case has been part of the history of informed consent when the concept was made upon the decision of the judge that adults and those who are capable of thinking well can determine what can be done to his body and that any professionals who work on a patient’s body without the latter’s consent is guilty of assault and is liable of any charges. It says that as long as the patient is capable of right thinking, he can give his consent regarding the operation to his body. The victim has some problems in her stomach. When she was under anesthesia, the doctor performed removal of fibroid tumor. The patient only gave her consent to have ether examination. After the operation, the patient has to be amputated because of infection and gangrene (Szczygiel). 4. Canterbury v. Spence also states that all information regarding the result, the risks, benefits of the operation must be revealed to the patient. The patient was suffering from back pains. The doctors performed an operation which resulted in paralysis. The doctors failed to disclose the risks of the operation (Stanford, 1972). 5. The Patient Self-Determination Act provides a document of the rights of the patients to participate in making decisions for their own safety and make directives. It also says that violation of it makes the health professionals ethically liable. B. Timeline Schloendorff case (1914) ? Salgo v. Leland Sanford University Board of Trustees (1957) ? Canterbury v. Spemce (1972) ? Arato v. Avedon ? Patient Self-Determination Act (PSDA) (1991) C. Informed Consent Informed Consent involves the participation of the patient regarding the decision to whether a procedure will be done to the patient or not. The patient has the right to give consent. Informed consent means that the patient is informed regarding all the information that is necessary for the patient to have a basis in making his decision. Information includes the status of his illness, the life expectancy, the treatment that could be done and its risks and benefits, and all other possible treatments. The patients must also be informed to the possible consequences of not performing the treatment or even the consequences if the treatment is performed Works Cited: LSU Law Center. 1993. No duty to inform patient of non-medical information ARATO v. AVEDON 858 P. 2d 598 (Cal 1993) available from http://biotech. law. lsu. edu/cases/ consent/ARATO_v_AVEDON. htm [15 February 2009] Stanford University. 1957. Salgo v. Leland Stanford etc. Bd. Trustees, 154 Cal. App. 2d 560 available from http://www. stanford. edu/group/psylawseminar/Salgo. htm [15 February 2009] . 1972. Canterbury v. Spence. , 464 F. 2d 772 (D. C. Cir. 1972) available from http://www. stanford. edu/group/psylawseminar/Canterbury. htm [15 February 2009] Szczygiel, Tony. 1914. Mary E. Schloendorff, Appellant, v. The Society of the New York Hospital, Respondent available from http://wings. buffalo. edu/faculty/research/ bioethics/schloen0. html [15 February 2009]

Writing Culture: the Poetics and Politics of Ethnography

Writing Culture: the Poetics and Politics of Ethnography Introduction During the 25 years since the publication of Writing Culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography, a great deal of discussion has accompanied it. In this essay I place this book in the context of the literary turn in anthropology, and concern with the postcolonial encounter as well. Throughout the analysis of the main themes in the book, attention is paid to the construction of ethnographic authority and two relationships of ethnographer/reader and ethnographer/informant centered in Writing Culture. The essay also provides a perspective of the influential power of the book by presenting some ethnographies conducted by Chinese anthropologists. Finally, I will argue the risks of the textualism trend and different patterns in Writing Culture approach. Background of the Book: In and Beyond Anthropology More than ten years after the publication of Writing Culture, in a review article, George Marcus (1998:5) quoted Schneiders words referring to the book: I dont think Jim Clifford is famous for his monograph on Leenhardt. I dont think that George Marcus has achieved some notoriety because he worked on Tonga. Indeed, I dont know anybody whos read the ethnography he wrote. In fact, Ive often talked to people and asked them, Hay, have you read George Marcuss ethnography? No!-but I read that other damn book. It is a very typical and interesting comment. As an anthropologist, George Marcus is best remembered for editing the collection of essays rather than his own ethnographic work; and similarly, James Clifford, a historian, is frequently regarded as an anthropologist by force of being the editor of the same book. The comment also reveals that the book is controversial, and it has witnessed harshly criticism after its appearance. However, there is no denying that Writing Culture is one of the most important books throughout the history of anthropology-the milestone of the post-modern era and the cornerstone of the experimental ethnography (Gao 2007, Scholte 1987). 1. The literary turn There is nothing outside the text. (Derrida) The book, with eleven essays in it (including the introduction and afterword), is based on a series of seminars at the School of American Research in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the United States of America in April 1984(Clifford and Marcus 1985). By taking the making of ethnographic text (Clifford and Marcus 1986:vii) as the focal point of their seminars, the participants not only viewed WRITING as a elementary method, but also the central issue of social cultural anthropology. Ethnographic writing is then critically examined in aspects of social context, the use of rhetoric devises, the limitations of disciplinary traditions, the definition of its genre, the political engagement, and historical transformations.[1] Why is writing becoming a principle thing in anthropology? In order to answer this question, inevitably, we take into consideration the literary turn, or say textualism trend in anthropology in the 1980s. The literary turn, just as its name implies, by taking text, writing and literary devices as key concepts and employing textual and literary analyses, is a radical shift which provides strikingly different epistemological and methodological approaches in the discipline of anthropology (Scholte 1987). Although it is difficult to figure out whether Writing Culture is more a cause or a result of the literary turn, the book is definitely a key ingredient of it. I would further suggest that Levi-Strauss, Geertz and Writing Culture should be considered as a sequence in the context of the literary turn. What the Writing Culture authors claim, such as the diversity of representations, possibilities of interpretations, at a glance, are totally different from Levi-Strausss pure unity, reduced models and deep culture grammar. At the same time, Levi-Strausss strong sense of symbol and meaning within a symbolic language system and his linguistic analogy approach (Barrett 1996) are valuable legacies to Geertz and Writing Culture. Furthermore, his research on mythology threw fresh light on the interdisciplinary studies across anthropology and literature. Then, Geertz, who is profoundly influenced by Levi-Strauss and Weber, has a more important and complex influence on Writing Culture. Firstly, his concern of anthropological interpretations and thick descriptions, fieldwork and post fieldwork, (Geertz 19751983) provided the basis for Writing Culture explorations. Secondly, Geertzs local knowledge, natives point of view (Geertz 19751983) and assertion of an amiable and intelligible style insp ired Writing Culture authors to portray fieldwork as a dialogical approach, and consequently take the interactions of ethnographers/the indigenous people (Barrett 1996) and ethnographers/readers in to account. Thirdly, Geertzs ethnographies became important materials of Writing Culture 2. Postcolonial encounter and Cultural Representation I used to rule the world Seas would rise when I gave the word Now in the morning I sweep alone Sweep the streets I used to own One minute I held the key Next the walls were closed on me And I discovered that my castles stand Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand Lyrics of Viva la Vida (Coldplay 2009) The birth of this book is not narrowly concerned with the inheritance and development of theory and methodology within the discipline, but rather deeply rooted in the historical background and the reconstruction among the entire academic community. As an academic discipline, anthropology is developed in the context of imperialism and colonialism. The long-time contact between European conquerors and the colonists shaped forms of power and knowledge, and anthropologists at that time entered into non-European aboriginal communities as observers and describers (Asad 2002). Anthropology narrated power relations; at the same time it was also potentially counter-hegemonic (Clifford 1986:9). In 1980s, which was the postcolonial and postwar era without the umbrella of the colonial power, anthropology started to face a more complex nexus of power relations. The postcolonial situation affected the main interests of anthropology and challenged the authority of ethnography. Moreover, anthropology from then on, was not only carried out by Europeans and Americans, but also by those from the so-called Third World who were studying their own cultures; and neither Western culture nor the non-Western cultures remained the same in the ever-changi ng world (Clifford 1986, Layton 1997). In Writing Culture, the analyses of ethnographic discourses- asking who speaks? who writes? when and where? with or to whom? under what institutional and historical constrains?(Clifford 1986)-is a repercussion of the postcolonial encounter. Another important feature of the 1980s is the increasing flow of so-called postmodernism in academia-grand narrative was abandoned and details of everyday life took their place. Accordingly, singular culture was replaced by the plural one, and cultures were understood as representations and knowledge; and man with a small m took place of Man with variability. More importantly, the process of rethinking cultural representation again called into question the authenticity of representation itself and Writing Culture elegantly captured the main themes in this discussion. Three Main Themes of the Book In general, Writing Culture is an introspection, which attempts to examine anthropology traditions (especially the traditional ethnography) as well as anthropologists themselves. I will explore three main themes in the reflections. 1. Partial truth Knowledge is power,and that one must never reveal all of what one knows. Saramaka folktale, in Price (1983:14) cited in Clifford (1986:7) The most essential and fundamental point in Writing Culture is the questioning of ethnographic authenticity. In the 1920s, ethnography was defined and established not only as a genre of cultural description depending on intensive participant observation (Clifford 1983), but also a main research method internalised as a academic criterion in the field of anthropology (Gao 2006). This new style of ethnography-scientific ethnography, built by Malinowski, investigated the totality of culture with a holistic view and documented different layers of ethnographic reality(Kuper 1996). About 50 years later, the theorizing of ethnographic realism sprung up. In 1977, Paul Rabinow, who is a contributor of Writing Culture, published his book Reflections on Fieldwork in Morocco. His provocative descriptions of the fieldwork itself and his own feelings in the field reveal that fieldwork is a process of intersubjective construction of liminal modes of communication (1977:155) which constantly involve s valuation, and the ethnographer is not a objective observer but a real person with self-consciousness and certain cultural background who makes and remakes facts. Unlike the revelations of Malinowskis fieldwork dairy and the Mead-Freeman controversy, anthropologists started to look at themselves consciously and pondered-what is the ethnographic truth. This issue has been argued throughout the book. Take for example Vincent Crapanzanos Hermess Dilemma: The Masking of Subversion in Ethnographic Description (1986); he analyses three ethnographic texts by George Catlin, Wolfgang von Goethe and Clifford Geertz to probe how does the ethnographer make his/her work convincing. The three authors use distinctive figures, namely hypotyposis, external theatrical narrativity and interpretive virtuosity, to convince the readers of the descriptions in their texts. He argues that, as a matter of fact, their rhetoric tools make the described events devoiced from the original settings, and finally, it is the ethnographers authority which covers the subversion up. However, the ethnographers authority-his/her presence, perceptual ability, disinterested perspective, objectivity and sincerity (1986:53), is questionable. Does being there mean witnessing everything? Is the perceptual ability trained in a certain culture adequate and reliable? Is disinter ested perspective or objectivity even possible? If not, how can one reach the whole truth by selected fragmentary information? The underlying institutional system and power relations work through all these issues and enmesh in the anthropological knowledge, not to mention the cultural filtering, the information is not completed at the source. Crapanzanos essay reminds us that the ethnographer, like Hermes who decodes and interprets messages, promised to tell no lies but did not promise to tell the whole truth (1986:76). From this perspective, ethnographic truth no longer pursues the true view of the whole world, as Clifford and Rabinow point out in the book, ethnographic truths are partial, committed and incomplete (Clifford 1986:7) and in bondage to cultural settings. 2. Literary devices All constructed truths are made possible by powerful lies of exclusion and rhetoric. As I have mentioned before, Writing Culture is related to the literary turn of anthropology with the foundation of seeing ethnographies as texts. It is easy to point out that another major theme of the book is the literary devices employed in ethnographies, and in which the rhetoric issue has been mostly discussed. For instance, Renato Rosaldos From the Door of His Tent: The Fieldworker and the Inquisitor (1986), by comparing The Nure written by Evens Pritchard with Montaillou written by French social historian Ladurie, demonstrates how ethnographic rhetoric could assist in building authority and objectivity. Needless to repeat, The Nure is a ethnographic masterpiece, and for Montaillou, it is famous for providing an ethnographic analysis of a French community in fourteenth century by using inquisition record. Rosaldo states that, in the first place, in the introductory section, by frankly acknowledging the inequality between the inquisitor / his subjects, the fieldworker/ the Nuer, the authors both indicate the calm presence of mind(1986:89); then, they style themselves as honest men through complaining about the difficulties in gaining information in uneasy tensions between investigators and informants. After that, they claim their information is gradually collected in particles in order to construct the reliability; meanwhile, distanced normalizing mode of discourse, rhetorical absences[2], correspondences[3], etc. are used to enhance the sense of objectivity. In sum, the rhetorical work in introductory parts of the two books by means of separating the context of colonial domination from the production of ethnographic knowledge (1986:93)establish the authors innocence and the ethnographic authority as well. Furthermore, in both authors, the pastoral mode is invoked. The literary mode of pastoral is, firstly a symbol of the spiritual liberty, secondly a mobile position of speaking, and thirdly a label of courtesy and respect. Rosaldos essay interestingly illustrates that, although the power and knowledge relations have not been completely kicked off, to a great extent, they are concealed by the rhetoric tools. Ethnographic rhetoric has a strong impact on the understandings of the ethnographic texts (Scholte 1987). 3. Writing of Self Continued from the preceding paragraph, the mobility in ethnographers positions is demonstrated cumulatively in other chapters of Writing Culture as well. Fieldwork in Common Places by Mary Louis Pratt (1986) provides an illustration. Her essay focuses on the significant history of the relationship between personal narrative and impersonal description (1986:27) in ethnographies and travel writings. Pratt starts with a controversy that anthropology graduate Florinda Donners work Shabobo: A True Adventure in the Remote and Magical Heart of the South American Jungle is facing accusations of plagiarism, because there are some events in her book which are the same as others. Here, Pratt asks a very inspiring question: as ethnography demands accurate descriptions, for describing the same events at the same place, how could Donners work not resemble others? Pratt argues that the authority of ethnography, in some sense, is based on the unique and original personal experience in the field not the factual accuracy (1986:29) of a certain ethnography. From this perspective, personal narratives cannot be eliminated from ethnography, and it also explains why the subgenre of formal ethnography, such as Malinowskis diaries, has not been killed by science (1986:31), but turned into a prolonged tradition of anthropology. Even in formal ethnographies, personal narrative is an integral part. It marks the relationship among the fieldworker, indigenous people, and the audience. It also serves as a regulator, reconciling the inconsistency between the subjective engagement in fieldwork, and the detachment; the self-effacement in formal ethnographic writing. Moreover, her analysis shows that, even in the time of so-called scientific ethnography, ethnographers were writing from multiple, constantly shifting positions, and self is never a scientist-observer (1986:39). To consider further from this point, we could identity a difference between classical ethnography and experimental ethnography. For Malinowski, and his students Firth and Evens-Prichard, the writing of self is a strategy serving for building the authority of scientific ethnography; however, for Rabinow and his contemporary anthropologists, the consciously self-realization in ethnographic writing successfully opens up a dimension for reflective thinking. The self, thus, is public, and mediates in different cultures. The appearance of the new kind of self writing is very provocative: epistemologically, in view of the production and explanation of the knowledge,it penetrates into the relationship between knowledge of self and knowledge of the Other and how knowledge is hermeneutically represented(Rapport, and Overing 2000); methodologically, it seeks for the diversity of ethnographic writing, more specifically, the expression of the subjectivity, the utilization of rhetoric, or, I would say, the writing style. 4. A summary of the three themes: one centre and two basic relationships Throughout all three themes-ethnographic truth, rhetoric in ethnography, and the writing of self, there is a central point-the construction of ethnographic authority, which cannot be comprehended without reference to the power relations. The power relations derive from the Foucaultian intertwining of knowledge and power in the academic discipline as well as the fluctuant historical and political affiliation. Here, I will not repeat these issues which I have argued in the first part, rather, I would suggest two relationships existing in the main themes of Writing Culture: a) ethnographers and the natives they studied, and b) anthropologists and their readers. Having inherited the tradition of Geertzs interpretive anthropology, Writing Culture highlights the reconstruction of the ethnographer/informant relations (Wang Gao). Indigenous people and their culture are no longer viewed as silent and uniform objects. Ethnographic knowledge, as suggested by Rabinow (1977), is built on a bilateral understanding in certain cultural contexts. At the same time, more importantly, the book pays close attention to the relationship between anthropologists and the readers. Same as the literary outputs, ethnographies shape the relations with the audiences through texts (Xu 2001). Both the completed texts and reading activities are certainly influenced by the literary processes (Clifford 1986). By scanning how ethnographies communicate with their readers, the reflexive essays[4] portray ethnography as a kind of dialogue, and the conversational readership allows, or I could say, encourages the readers to take part in the investigation of ethnographic writing. In addition, the discussions regarding the ethnographers distinguished positions in describing others and expressing Self, permit the readers to obtain the different perspectives which the ethnographers have themselves. As Spencer indicated (1989), the correspondence to multiple positions provided by a master hand is a feature of a good ethnography. Why is it important to tak e the readership of ethnography into consideration? I think it depends largely on the unique and versatile character of this readership. Marcus and Cushman (1982) present six categories of readerships of ethnography. The categories differ in purpose, positions, and some of them may merge with another (the first and second one in particular) or others: (1) the specialist readership, (2) the general anthropological readership, (3) readerships from the other social sciences (4) the student readership, (5) the action oriented readership,(6)the popular readership(1982:51-52). Ethnography, firstly, as a genre and a method as well, interposes itself between humanities (relating to category 1 and 2) and social sciences (relating to category 3); secondly, serves as a puberty rite for professional anthropologists (relating to category 4); thirdly, emerges into social and political decision-making for certain historical and institutional reasons (relating to category 5); and finally, attracts common readers thanks to its literary feature and exotic nature (relating to category 6). It is obvious that the readerships of ethnography are extremely complicated and should be carefully identified. Both ethnographers and readers must be self-conscious (Rapport 2000). Hence, the ethnographer/reader relation issue raised by Writing Culture writers, from this angle, is stimulating from the 1980s till today. The ethnographer/reader relation, together with the ethnographer/informant relation, is located in the power discourse and knowledge discourse. Once again, the two relationships echo the central idea of Writing Culture-the authority and power. In a word, although the three themes I proposed are not a very complete summary of the book, the one centre and two basic relationships they conveyed, in my opinion, have demonstrated the most insight and innovation of Writing Culture. Writing Culture: the Chinese Experience In the preliminary report of the Writing Culture seminar and papers, Clifford and Marcus state that Writing Culture is lacking the feminist point of view as well as Third World or non-European approach (Clifford and Marcus 1985). For the former omission, I agree with Schotle (1987) that, some feminist perspectives is inconspicuously harbored in Pratts essay. However, for sure, there is not a so-called Third World standpoint in Writing Culture, which I think is a significant irony for its analysis of power play in the post-colonial time. In Third World countries, anthropology is in a very different context. Their people and cultures have for a long time been discovered, observed, described, and represented by Westerners. Non-Western anthropologists and their ethnographic works are the symbols of the reconfiguration within the discipline, and most of them naturally locate their fieldwork sites in their own cultures to study their own people. Generally speaking, anthropology[5] of the Third World witnesses a fruitful period in the postwar era, which is also the golden age of experimental ethnography, and to some extent, it could be taken as anthropology at home which employs the self-reflexive approach mentioned in Writing Culture. I will then, taking China as an example, look at some ethnographic cases conducted by Chinese anthropologists relating to Writing Culture. I assume it a good perspective to explore the influential power of Writing Culture and its echoes. The first case is Huang Shumins ethnography The Spiral Road:Change In A Chinese Village Through The Eyes Of A Communist Party Leader(1998). Depending on his one-year fieldwork (first ten chapters) and a revisit (chapter 1112) in a village in Fujian province, China, Huang provides a picture of the huge political and economic change and development in a Chinese village from the founding of Peoples Republic of China to the 1990s as well as the impact on the personal and pubic life of a peasant, who is the a political leader in the community. The political struggles, the hardship of raising a family, and the peasants life wisdom are vividly described through a first-person narrative life history approach. Although his novel-like ethnography is first published in English, Huang is regarded as one of the best Chinese anthropologists for his proficient writing skills and great success in narrating the complexity of historical events in rural China in a lighter tone. The second case is drawn from Li Chunxias PhD dissertation Television and the Life of Yi People in China (2005)[6]. As a Yi[7] anthropologist, her ethnography explores how television profoundly incorporated into the fabric (2005: 5) of local peoples daily life. In the text, Lis fieldwork notes collected during her three-year fieldwork at her own village give expression to her close emotional ties with native people, and deliver her concerns and worries of the ethnic minorities living circumstances in contemporary China. Meanwhile, as a scholar, she keenly captures the metaphorical meaning of modernization, development and prosperity by television. Her analysis penetrates into the relations of Yi people/Han people, and pre-modern/modern. The reflexivity about the periphery/centre relations is a main steam in contemporary anthropology of China. The third case is Zhuang Kongshaos ethnographic research on a hot topic in Chinese culture and society: the family education (Zhuang and Feng 2006). He describes the communications and conflicts between a mother and her seven years old daughter and the relations among school education, family education and social education. Zhuang is a pioneer in anthropology of China, not only because he introduces a new approach called educational anthropology, most importantly, the final production of Zhuangs fieldwork is an ethnographic film named My Wife, My Daughter. It is actually beyond the scope of Writing Culture, because it is no longer about the writing and the text. I adopt this case here, trying to argue that, Writing Culture highlights the diversity of ethnography, and now, facing the radical form of ethnography, can the arguments in Writing Culture on ethnographic texts fit in ethnographic films? What is the same and the difference between the grammars of ethnographic writing and seei ng? Are pictures more worthy than words in constructing ethnographic authority? Can texts and films be combined in ethnographic enterprise? Why and how? The book it self is an open ended text, and constantly simulates new questions for anthropologists in the post Writing Culture era, and that also explains why Writing Culture, after more than twenty years, is still being quoted and debated all over the world. It is true, as Schotle harshly points out (1987), that lots of questions in this book remains unclear and unsettled. However, I appreciate the original questions it raised and the appeal to dialogue. Rethinking Writing Culture Following the reflexive direction, I have three points to make on rethinking the book. Before that, I present a brief schema of the three-stage ethnographic research as follows. There is nothing new, however, my questions are based on it. First, with the text-orientation, has the importance of writing been stressed over that of doing ethnography in the book? The potential risk in the textualism emphasized in Writing Culture is that fieldwork retires from the leading position, it has provided a context for substituting the empirical research. As we can see from the schema, fieldwork is the centre of ethnographic research in time and space, and it is also the foundation of anthropology. In this experimental moment, we should not only look at the outcome of fieldwork, but also reflect upon the limitations and new characteristics in fieldwork processes in this Writing Culture or post Writing Culture era. Second, going back to the very first stage, I would argue, different backgrounds of Western and non-Western ethnographers shape two distinguished patterns of reflexive thinking. First, the Western pattern could be called coming home, after studying the Other, from outside in, anthropologists return to the Self, their reflexive thinking is about their own tradition in their own cultural institutions. Second, the non-Western pattern could be named as being home, they do not have a return perspective, their reflexive thinking is still deeply in relation to the West. I fear, in reflexive anthropology, which is greatly established by Writing Culture, anthropologists in the Third World would be more marginalized through their resistance in this centre-periphery discourse. My final thought is on rhetoric issue, which is still an incomprehensible question to me. If rhetoric is an integral component of ethnographic writing, as Rosaldo (1986) argued, there are using and abusing of descriptive rhetoric, then, the next obvious question is: what is the boundary between use and abuse of rhetoric? It seems to me that, use, is a kind of abuse in itself, if so, how can one control it? Epilogue In the final part of my essay, I would like to do an experiment. I will write about my reading experience instead of the conclusion of the whole passage. I originally read this book in Chinese in my junior year at college. As a literature student, I found the book interesting and inspiring, and it positively influenced me in the choosing of anthropology for graduate study. Later, I reread the book both in English and Chinese, and accessed some related articles written by Writing Culture writers. Surprisingly, I found several articles written in collaboration with Clifford and Marcus. Other than this landmark book, Marcus, together with Cushman, wrote Ethnographies as Texts (1982), which is a harbinger of Writing Culture; and he, later, with Fischer, produced the companion volume of Writing Culture-Anthropology as Cultural Critique (1986). Behind these collaborations, I can imagine the interactions of sparkling thoughts as well as understandings and communications. They are spirits of academic research, and also the anthropological endeavor. References Archetti, E.P. (ed.) (1994) Exploring the written: anthropology and the multiplicity of writing. Oslo: Scandinavian University Press. Asad, T. (1986) The concept of cultural translation in British social anthropology, in Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (eds.) Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography. Berkeley: University of California Press. Asad, T. (2002) From the history of colonial anthropology to the anthropology of Western hegemony, in Vincent, J. (ed.) InThe Anthropology of Politics: A Reader in Ethnography, Theory and Critique, Oxford: Blackwell. Barrett, S.R. (1996) Anthropology: a students guide to theory and method. Toronto. Buffalo: University of Toronto Press. Clifford, J. (1983) On ethnographic authority, Representations, 2, pp. 118-146. JSTOR[Online]. Available at:http://www.jstor.org/stable/2928386 (Accessed: 13 March 2010) Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (1985) The making of ethnographic texts: a preliminary report, Current Anthropology, 26(2), pp. 267-271. JSTOR[Online].Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2743141 (Accessed: 13 March 2010) Clifford, J. (1986) Introduction: partial truth, in Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (eds.) Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography. Berkeley: University of California Press. Clifford, J. and Marcus (1986) Preface, in Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (eds.) Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography. Berkeley: University of California Press. Crapanzano, V. (1986) Hermess Dilemma: The Masking of Subversion in Ethnographic Description, in Clifford, J. and Marcus, G.E. (eds.) Writing culture: the poetics and politics of ethnography. Berkeley: University of California Press. Fabian, J. (1990) Presence and representation: the Other and anthropological writing, Critical Inquiry, 16(4), pp. 753-772, SAGE[Online].Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1343766 (Accessed: 13 December 2009) Gao, BZ. (2006) The three periods in the development of ethnography-translators preface to Writing Culture, Journal of Guangxi University for Nationalities (Philosophy and Social Sciences Edition), 28(3), pp 58-63. CNKI[Online]. DOI: cnki:ISSN:1002-3887.0.2006-03-012 (Accessed: 10 November 2009) Gao, BZ. et al.(2007) On Writing Culture, Reading, 2007(4), CNKI[Online]. DOI: CNKI:ISSN:0257-0270.0.2007-04-026 (Accessed: 10 November 2009) Geertz, G. (1975) The interpretation of cultures. London: Hutchinson. Geertz, G. (1983) Local knowledge: further essays in interpretive anthropology. New York: Basic Books. Geertz, G. (1988) Worksandlives: the anthropologist as author. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Harrell, S. (2001) The anthropology of reform and the reform of anthropology: anthropological narratives of recovery and progress in China, Annual Review of Anthropology, 30, pp. 139-161. JSTOR[Online]. Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3069212 (Accessed: 03 March 2010) Huang, JB. (2004) The contending of Writing Culture-Post-modern discourse in anthropology and the change in the sudies, Thinking, 30 (4), pp. 39-43. CNKI[Online]. Available at: cnki:ISSN:1001-778X.0.2004-04-009 (Accessed: 10 November 2009) Huang, SM. (1998) The Spiral Road: Change in a Chinese Village Through theEyes of a Communist Party Leader. 2nd edn. Boulder: Westview Press. James, A. Hockey, J. and Dawson, A. (eds.) (1997) After writing culture: epistemology and praxis in contemporary anthropolog

Discrimination Against Those with AIDS :: Discrimination AIDS

Discrimination has grown over the years to be a major problem around the world. There are many different issues that discrimination addresses. One of the main issues that it evaluates is HIV/AIDS. Many people who are infected with the disease are discriminated against for something that they cannot control after they are diagnosed. More specifically, insurance companies and employers are one of the big factors in discrimination of these people in the work place. It is very important to them because they need the money in order to live and they need to coverage in order to stay healthy. Many people go through this battle of live with companies in order to survive, like Devin a middle aged man. These are very important issues that needs to be evaluated closely at and also their needs to be a solution for this problem in the world today. The Issue Do insurance companies and employers discriminate against people after they are informed that a person has HIV/AIDS? This is an important question at issue because many people and their loved ones are affected with terminal diseases, such as HIV/AIDS. Also, it is important because they are treated with disrespectful and it is not how any human being should be treated or cared for. They are regular looking and acting humans that happen to be infected with this horrific disease and that is the sole reason that they are being discriminated against. The public is unaware that they will not get the disease by touching the victim or using the same products or utensils as them. The only way that they could catch the disease from anyone is if they have sexual relations with them or if the share needles by taking drugs with someone who is infected with the virus. â€Å"Two decades after HIV first appeared an estimated 30 million people worldwide have contracted the virus; 11.7 million people have dies of AIDS† (Frankowski xi). This deadly virus has continually and rapidly spread to all different people. Around the world this virus is a major problem and is affecting more women and children then ever before. Although when this disease first appeared it was male dominated, but they have passed it on to the women and in which case they pass on to their children when they are in the womb.

Wal-Mart International Essay -- Business Management, Case Study, solut

Wal-Mart International Introduction In 1993, Wal-Mart had become America’s leading retailer, with net sales of $67 billion from its Wal-Mart stores, Sam’s Clubs, and Wal-Mart Supercenters. The Company had grown at a rate of 25% per year since 1990, and it was clear that to continue at its current rate of growth, Wal-Mart would have to seriously consider continuing its recent international expansion. During 1992, Wal-Mart had entered into a joint venture with CIFRA, Mexico’s largest retailer, which currently operated 24 stores in Mexico and had plans to open 70 new stores by 1995. The Company had also recently completed the acquisition of 122 Woolco department stores in Canada. Each of these expansions had presented unique challenges for Wal-Mart to adapt its operations to suit local market demands, but Wal-Mart had successfully risen to the challenge. Given the Company’s successful track record, it seemed logical to continue to expand internationally. If Wal-Mart didn’t expand internationally, David Glass, Wal-Mart’s CEO, felt that companies would start to come to the US and increase competitive pressures domestically. International expansion would drive growth and help in maintaining Wal-Mart’s dominant domestic position. Namely, entrance into foreign markets would force competitors to focus on their primary markets. If Wal-Mart planned to maintain its dominant position in the U.S., international expansion would not only drive growth, but it would also keep potential competitors trying to operate stores in their home markets rather than expanding into the U.S. Wal-Mart Company Background: Sam Walton began his retail career working at J.C. Penney while in college and later leased a Ben Franklin franchised dime store in Newport, Arkansas (1945). In 1950, he relocated to Bentonville and opened a Walton Five and Dime. By 1962, Walton owned 15 Ben Franklin stores under the Walton Five and Dime name. Walton felt that big supermarkets would eventually destroy the smaller, traditional five and dimes and in 1962, Walton opened his own supermarket discount store. Eight years later, the Company was trading on Wall Street and had 30 stores. Wal-Mart’s growth accelerated greatly during the 1970s. The Company aggressively marketed itself to middle class shoppers by advertising "Everyday Low Prices." Walton motivated his employees by impleme... ...ring Argentina with a local partner, analysts expected the new stores to be able to capture additional market share and initially achieve lower operating and administrative expenses than if Wal-Mart entered on its own. Martin wondered which of these alternatives would be most beneficial to Wal-Mart. Summary The annual shareholders meeting was coming up, and Bob Martin needed to make a recommendation to Glass on how to proceed. Although Glass agreed with Martin that international expansion needed to continue, he wasn’t convinced Argentina was the best choice. Glass wanted to be sure that they had considered all of the risks involved before making such a large investment in a new country. If Martin did decide that Wal-Mart should invest in Argentina, Martin wondered which alternative to recommend. He needed to finish his analysis and prepare a report for Glass that compared the alternatives. Whatever Martin’s recommendations, he knew they needed to be presented with a compelling argument. This was a critical year for Wal-Mart, and Glass would want to be able to demonstrate to Wal-Mart’s investors that the Company could overcome its slow down in growth during the last year.

Essay --

The question today’s society is facing is marijuana. Should marijuana remain illegal or become legalized in the United States of America. Marijuana is a dry shredded mix of flowers, stems, seeds and leaves of the hemp plant called Cannabis sativa. People usually smoke it as a cigarette or in a pipe. Marijuana is the most commonly abused illegal drug in the United States. Abusing marijuana can cause problems with memory, learning, and social behavior. Although marijuana has negative side effects it also has medicinal properties that help aid people with needs. First there is some terminology you should know. Marijuana legalization is laws or policies that make the possession and use of marijuana legal under state law. Marijuana decriminalization are laws or policies adopted in a number of state and local jurisdictions which reduce the penalties for possession and use of small amounts of marijuana from criminal sanctions to fines or civil penalties. Medical marijuana are state laws which allow an individual to defend him or herself against criminal charges of marijuana possession if the defendant can prove a medical need for marijuana under state law. There are 7 strains of marijuana; dried flower; kief; hashish; tincture; hash oil; infusion; pipe resin. Dried flower generally refers to the dried flowers and leaves of the female marijuana plant. This dried flower strain of marijuana is the most widely consumed form which contains 3%-22% THC. Cannabis varieties used to produce industrial hemp has less than 1% of THC. All other strains of marijuana come from this dried flower state. The second strain of marijuana is kief, which is a powder and can be sifted from leaves and flowers of the marijuana plant. This strain can then be comp... ...heir crop to protect the marijuana from wood Marijuana 5 rats. Now this may not seem like it affects the environment because most people think of the air, carbon footprints, and emissions however this could affect animals, which are indeed apart of the environment. Every organism on Earth plays an important role in the ecosystem. In recent Alaska news petitioners are currently gathering signatures all over the state in order to reach the requirements to initiate for the August 2014 primary election ballot that will make possession of marijuana level for adults and regulate it’s cultivation and sale in manners similar to alcohol. As of December 1, 2013 they have gathered a total of 40,886 gross signatures, which leaves them another 4,114 signatures left to reach the requirements to make initiative towards making the possession of marijuana on the ballot. (mpp.org)

Ikea Children Labour

KEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) In May 1995, Marianne Barner faced a tough decision. After just two years with IKEA, the world’s largest furniture retailer, and less than a year into her job as business area manager for carpets, she was faced with the decision of cutting off one of the company’s major suppliers of Indian rugs. While such a move would disrupt supply and affect sales, she found the reasons to do so quite compelling.A German TV station had just broadcast an investigative report naming the supplier as one that used child labor in the production of rugs made for IKEA. What frustrated Barner was that, like all other IKEA suppliers, this large, well-regarded company had recently signed an addendum to its supply contract explicitly forbidding the use of child labor on pain of termination. Even more difficult than this short-term decision was the long-term action Barner knew IKEA must take on this issue. On one hand, she w as being urged to sign up to an industry-wide response to growing concerns about the use of child labor in the Indian carpet industry.A recently formed partnership of manufacturers, importers, retailers, and Indian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) was proposing to issue and monitor the use of â€Å"Rugmark,† a label to be put on carpets certifying that they were made without child labor. Simultaneously, Barner had been conversing with people at the Swedish Save the Children organization who were urging IKEA to ensure that its response to the situation was â€Å"in the best interest of the child†Ã¢â‚¬â€whatever that might imply. Finally, there were some who wondered if IKEA should not just leave this hornet’s nest.Indian rugs accounted for a tiny part of IKEA’s turnover, and to these observers, the time, cost, and reputation risk posed by continuing this product line seemed not worth the profit potential. The Birth and Maturing of a Global Company1 To understand IKEA’s operations, one had to understand the philosophy and beliefs of its 70year-old founder, Ingvar Kamprad. Despite stepping down as CEO in 1986, almost a decade later, Kamprad retained the title of honorary chairman and was still very involved in the company’s activities.Yet perhaps even more powerful than his ongoing presence were his strongly held values and beliefs, which long ago had been deeply embedded in IKEA’s culture. Kamprad was 17 years old when he started the mail-order company he called IKEA, a name that combined his initials with those of his family farm, Elmtaryd, and parish, Agunnaryd, located in the ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________ Professor Christopher A.Bartlett, Executive Director of the HBS Europe Research Center Vincent Dessain, and Research Associate Anders Sjoman prepared this case. HBS cases are developed solely as the basis for class discuss ion. Certain details have been disguised. Cases are not intended to serve as endorsements, sources of primary data, or illustrations of effective or ineffective management. Copyright  © 2006 President and Fellows of Harvard College. To order copies or request permission to reproduce materials, call 1-800-545-7685, write Harvard Business School Publishing, Boston, MA 02163, or go to http://www. bsp. harvard. edu. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the permission of Harvard Business School. 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) forests of southern Sweden. Working out of the family kitchen, he sold goods such as fountain pens, cigarette lighters, and binders he purchased from low-priced sources and then advertised in a newsletter to local shopkeepers.Wh en Kamprad matched his competitors by adding furniture to his newsletter in 1948, the immediate success of the new line led him to give up the small items. In 1951, to reduce product returns, he opened a display store in nearby Almhult village to allow customers to inspect products before buying. It was an immediate success, with customers traveling seven hours from the capital Stockholm by train to visit. Based on the store’s success, IKEA stopped accepting mail orders. Later Kamprad reflected, â€Å"The basis of the modern IKEA concept was created [at this time] and in principle it still applies.First and foremost, we use a catalog to tempt people to visit an exhibition, which today is our store. . . . Then, catalog in hand, customers can see simple interiors for themselves, touch the furniture they want to buy and then write out an order. †2 As Kamprad developed and refined his furniture retailing business model he became increasingly frustrated with the way a tight ly knit cartel of furniture manufacturers controlled the Swedish industry to keep prices high. He began to view the situation not just as a business opportunity but also as an unacceptable social problem that he wanted to correct.Foreshadowing a vision for IKEA that would later be articulated as â€Å"creating a better life for the many people,† he wrote: â€Å"A disproportionately large part of all resources is used to satisfy a small part of the population. . . . IKEA’s aim is to change this situation. We shall offer a wide range of home furnishing items of good design and function at prices so low that the majority of people can afford to buy them. . . . We have great ambitions. †3 The small newsletter soon expanded into a full catalog. The 1953 issue introduced what would become another key IKEA feature: self-assembled furniture.Instead of buying complete pieces of furniture, customers bought them in flat packages and put them together themselves at home. So on, the â€Å"knockdown† concept was fully systemized, saving transport and storage costs. In typical fashion, Kamprad turned the savings into still lower prices for his customers, gaining an even larger following among young postwar householders looking for well-designed but inexpensive furniture. Between 1953 and 1955, the company’s sales doubled from SEK 3 million to SEK 6 million. 4Managing Suppliers: Developing Sourcing Principles As its sales took off in the late 1950s, IKEA’s radically new concepts began to encounter stiff opposition from Sweden’s large furniture retailers. So threatened were they that when IKEA began exhibiting at trade fairs, they colluded to stop the company from taking orders at the fairs and eventually even from showing its prices. The cartel also pressured manufacturers not to sell to IKEA, and the few that continued to do so often made their deliveries at night in unmarked vans.Unable to meet demand with such constrained loc al supply, Kamprad was forced to look abroad for new sources. In 1961, he contracted with several furniture factories in Poland, a country still in the Communist eastern bloc. To assure quality output and reliable delivery, IKEA brought its knowhow, taught its processes, and even provided machinery to the new suppliers, revitalizing Poland’s furniture industry as it did so. Poland soon became IKEA’s largest source and, to Kamprad’s delight, at much lower costs—once again allowing him to reduce his prices.Following its success in Poland, IKEA adopted a general procurement principle that it should not own its means of production but should seek to develop close ties by supporting its suppliers in a 2 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) 906-414 long-term relationship. a Beyond supply contracts and technology transfer, the relationship led IKEA to make loans to its suppliers at reasonable rates, repayable through future sh ipments. â€Å"Our objective is to develop long-term business partners,† explained a senior purchasing manager. We commit to doing all we can to keep them competitive—as long as they remain equally committed to us. We are in this for the long run. † Although the relationship between IKEA and its suppliers was often described as one of mutual dependency, suppliers also knew that they had to remain competitive to keep their contract. From the outset they understood that if a more cost-effective alternative appeared, IKEA would try to help them respond, but if they could not do so, it would move production. In its constant quest to lower prices, the company developed an unusual way of identifying new sources.As a veteran IKEA manager explained: â€Å"We do not buy products from our suppliers. We buy unused production capacity. † It was a philosophy that often led its purchasing managers to seek out seasonal manufacturers with spare off-season capacity. There were many classic examples of how IKEA matched products to supplier capabilities: they had sail makers make seat cushions, window factories produce table frames, and ski manufacturers build chairs in their off-season. The manager added, â€Å"We’ve always worried more about finding the right management at our suppliers than finding high-tech facilities.We will always help good management to develop their capacity. † Growing Retail: Expanding Abroad Building on the success of his first store, Kamprad self-financed a store in Stockholm in 1965. Recognizing a growing use of automobiles in Sweden, he bucked the practice of having a downtown showroom and opted for a suburban location with ample parking space. When customers drove home with their furniture in flat packed boxes, they assumed two of the costliest parts of traditional furniture retailing—home delivery and assembly. In 1963, even before the Stockholm store had opened, IKEA had expanded into Oslo, Norway.A decade later, Switzerland became its first non-Scandinavian market, and in 1974 IKEA entered Germany, which soon became its largest market. (See Exhibit 1 for IKEA’s worldwide expansion. ) At each new store the same simple Scandinavian-design products were backed up with a catalog and offbeat advertising, presenting the company as â€Å"those impossible Swedes with strange ideas. † And reflecting the company’s conservative values, each new entry was financed by previous successes. b During this expansion, the IKEA concept evolved and became increasingly formalized. (Exhibit 2 summarizes important events in IKEA’s corporate history. It still built large, suburban stores with knockdown furniture in flat packages the customers brought home to assemble themselves. But as the concept was refined, the company required that each store follow a predetermined design, set up to maximize customers’ exposure to the product range. The concept mandated, for ins tance, that the living room interiors should follow immediately after the entrance. IKEA also serviced customers with features such as a playroom for children, a low-priced restaurant, and a â€Å"Sweden Shop† for groceries that had made IKEA Sweden’s leading food exporter. At the same time, the range gradually This policy was modified after a number of East European suppliers broke their contracts with IKEA after the fall of the Berlin Wall opened new markets for them. IKEA’s subsequent supply chain problems and loss of substantial investments led management to develop an internal production company, Swedwood, to ensure delivery stability. However, it was decided that only a limited amount of IKEA’s purchases (perhaps 10%) should be sourced from Swedwood. b By 2005, company lore had it that IKEA had only taken one bank loan in its corporate history—which it had paid back as soon as the cash flow allowed. 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Chall enge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) expanded beyond furniture to include a full line of home furnishing products such as textiles, kitchen utensils, flooring, rugs and carpets, lamps, and plants. The Emerging Culture and Values5 As Kamprad’s evolving business philosophy was formalized into the IKEA vision statement, â€Å"To create a better everyday life for the many people,† it became the foundation of the company’s strategy of selling affordable, good-quality furniture to mass-market consumers around the world.The cultural norms and values that developed to support the strategy’s implementation were also, in many ways, an extension of Kamprad’s personal beliefs and style. â€Å"The true IKEA spirit,† he remarked, â€Å"is founded on our enthusiasm, our constant will to renew, on our cost-consciousness, on our willingness to assume responsibility and to help, on our humbleness before the task, and on the simplicity of our behavior. † As well as a summary of his aspiration for the company’s behavioral norms, it was also a good statement of Kamprad’s own personal management style.Over the years a very distinct organizational culture and management style emerged in IKEA reflecting these values. For example, the company operated very informally as evidenced by the open-plan office landscape, where even the CEO did not have a separate office, and the familiar and personal way all employees addressed one another. But that informality often masked an intensity that derived from the organization’s high self-imposed standards. As one senior executive explained, â€Å"Because there is no security available behind status or closed doors, this environment actually puts pressure on people to perform. The IKEA management process also stressed simplicity and attention to detail. â€Å"Complicated rules paralyze! † said Kamprad. The company organized â€Å"anti-bureaucrat week† every year, requiring all managers to spend time working in a store to reestablish contact with the front line and the consumer. The workpace was such that executives joked that IKEA believed in â€Å"management by running around. † Cost consciousness was another strong part of the management culture. â€Å"Waste of resources,† said Kamprad, â€Å"is a mortal sin at IKEA. Expensive solutions are often signs of mediocrity, and an idea without a price tag is never acceptable. Although cost consciousness extended into all aspects of the operation, travel and entertainment expenses were particularly sensitive. â€Å"We do not set any price on time,† remarked an executive, recalling that he had once phoned Kamprad to get approval to fly first class. He explained that economy class was full and that he had an urgent appointment to keep. â€Å"There is no first class in IKEA,† Kamprad had replied. â€Å"Perhaps you should go by car. † The executive completed the 35 0-mile trip by taxi. The search for creative solutions was also highly prized with IKEA. Kamprad had written, â€Å"Only while sleeping one makes no mistakes.The fear of making mistakes is the root of bureaucracy and the enemy of all evolution. † Though planning for the future was encouraged, overanalysis was not. â€Å"Exaggerated planning can be fatal,† Kamprad advised his executives. â€Å"Let simplicity and common sense characterize your planning. † In 1976, Kamprad felt the need to commit to paper the values that had developed in IKEA during the previous decades. His thesis, Testament of a Furniture Dealer, became an important means for spreading the IKEA philosophy, particularly during its period of rapid international expansion. (Extracts of the Testament are given in Exhibit 3. Specially trained â€Å"IKEA ambassadors† were assigned to key positions in all units to spread the company’s philosophy and values by educating their subordinates a nd by acting as role models. 4 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) 906-414 In 1986, when Kamprad stepped down, Anders Moberg, a company veteran who had once been Kamprad’s personal assistant, took over as president and CEO. But Kamprad remained intimately involved as chairman, and his influence extended well beyond the ongoing daily operations: he was the self-appointed guardian of IKEA’s deeply embedded culture and values.Waking up to Environmental and Social Issues By the mid-1990s, IKEA was the world's largest specialized furniture retailer. Sales for the IKEA Group for the financial year ending August 1994 totaled SEK 35 billion (about $4. 5 billion). In the previous year, more than 116 million people had visited one of the 98 IKEA stores in 17 countries, most of them drawn there by the company’s product catalog, which was printed yearly in 72 million copies in 34 languages. The privately held company did not report profi t levels, but one estimate put its net margin at 8. 4% in 1994, yielding a net profit of SEK 2. billion (about $375 million). 6 After decades of seeking new sources, in the mid-1990s IKEA worked with almost 2,300 suppliers in 70 countries, sourcing a range of around 11,200 products. Its relationship with its suppliers was dominated by commercial issues, and its 24 trading service offices in 19 countries primarily monitored production, tested new product ideas, negotiated prices, and checked quality. (See Exhibit 4 for selected IKEA figures in 1994. ) That relationship began to change during the 1980s, however, when environmental problems emerged with some of its products.And it was even more severely challenged in the mid-1990s when accusations of IKEA suppliers using child labor surfaced. The Environmental Wake-Up: Formaldehyde In the early 1980s, Danish authorities passed regulations to define limits for formaldehyde emissions permissible in building products. The chemical compoun d was used as binding glue in materials such as plywood and particleboard and often seeped out as gas. At concentrations above 0. 1 mg/kg in air, it could cause watery eyes, headaches, a burning sensation in the throat, and difficulty breathing.With IKEA’s profile as a leading local furniture retailer using particleboard in many of its products, it became a prime target for regulators wanting to publicize the new standards. So when tests showed that some IKEA products emitted more formaldehyde than was allowed by legislation, the case was widely publicized and the company was fined. More significantly—and the real lesson for IKEA—was that due to the publicity, its sales dropped 20% in Denmark. In response to this situation, the company quickly established stringent requirements regarding formaldehyde emissions but soon found that suppliers were failing to meet its standards.The problem was that most of its suppliers bought from subsuppliers, who in turn bought t he binding materials from glue manufacturers. Eventually, IKEA decided it would have to work directly with the glue-producing chemical companies and, with the collaboration of companies such as ICI and BASF, soon found ways to reduce the formaldehyde off-gassing in its products. 7 A decade later, however, the formaldehyde problem returned. In 1992, an investigative team from a large German newspaper and TV company found that IKEA’s best-selling bookcase series, Billy, had emissions higher than German legislation allowed.This time, however, the source of the problem was not the glue but the lacquer on the bookshelves. In the wake of headlines describing â€Å"deadly poisoned bookshelves,† IKEA immediately stopped both the production and sales of Billy bookcases worldwide and corrected the problem before resuming distribution. Not counting the cost of lost sales and production or the damage to goodwill, the Billy incident was estimated to have cost IKEA $6 million to $7 million. 8 5 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A)These events prompted IKEA to address broader environmental concerns more directly. Since wood was the principal material in about half of all IKEA products, forestry became a natural starting point. Following discussions with both Greenpeace and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF, formerly World Wildlife Fund) and using standards set by the Forest Stewardship Council, IKEA established a forestry policy stating that IKEA would not accept any timber, veneer, plywood, or layer-glued wood from intact natural forests or from forests with a high conservation value.This meant that IKEA had to be willing to take on the task of tracing all wood used in IKEA products back to its source. 9 To monitor compliance, the company appointed forest managers to carry out random checks of wood suppliers and run projects on responsible forestry around the world. In addition to forestry, IKEA identified four other a reas where environmental criteria were to be applied to its business operations: adapting the product range; working with suppliers; transport and distribution; and ensuring environmentally conscious stores.For instance, in 1992, the company began using chlorine-free recycled paper in its catalogs; it redesigned the best-selling OGLA chair— originally manufactured from beech—so it could be made using waste material from yogurt cup production; and it redefined its packaging principles to eliminate any use of PVC. The company also maintained its partnership with WWF, resulting in numerous projects on global conservation, and funded a global forest watch program to map intact natural forests worldwide. In addition, it engaged in an ongoing dialogue with Greenpeace on forestry. 10 The Social Wake-Up: Child LaborIn 1994, as IKEA was still working to resolve the formaldehyde problems, a Swedish television documentary showed children in Pakistan working at weaving looms. Amon g the several Swedish companies mentioned in the film as importers of carpets from Pakistan, IKEA was the only highprofile name on the list. Just two months into her job as business area manager for carpets, Marianne Barner recalled the shockwaves that the TV program sent through the company: The use of child labor was not a high-profile public issue at the time. In fact, the U. N. Convention on the Rights of the Child had only been published in December 1989.So, media attention like this TV program had an important role to play in raising awareness on a topic not well known and understood—including at IKEA. . . . We were caught completely unaware. It was not something we had been paying attention to. For example, I had spent a couple of months in India learning about trading but got no exposure to child labor. Our buyers met suppliers in their city offices and rarely got out to where production took place. . . . Our immediate response to the program was to apologize for our ignorance and acknowledge that we were not in full control of this problem.But we also committed to do something about it. As part of its response, IKEA sent a legal team to Geneva to seek input and advice from the International Labor Organization (ILO) on how to deal with the problem. They learned that Convention 138, adopted by the ILO in 1973 and ratified by 120 countries, committed ratifying countries to working for the abolition of labor by children under 15 or the age of compulsory schooling in that country. India, Pakistan, and Nepal were not signatories to the convention. 1 Following these discussions with the ILO, IKEA added a clause to all supply contracts—a â€Å"black-andwhite† clause, as Barner put it—stating simply that if the supplier employed children under legal working age, the contract would be cancelled. To take the load off field trading managers and to provide some independence to the monitoring process, the company appointed a third-party agent to monitor child labor practices at its suppliers in India and Pakistan. Because this type of external monitoring was very unusual, IKEA had some difficulty locating a reputable and competent company to perform the task. Finally, they appointed a 6IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) 906-414 well-known Scandinavian company with extensive experience in providing external monitoring of companies’ quality assurance programs and gave them the mandate not only to investigate complaints but also to undertake random audits of child labor practices at suppliers’ factories. Early Lessons: A Deeply Embedded Problem With India being the biggest purchasing source for carpets and rugs, Barner contacted Swedish Save the Children, UNICEF, and the ILO to expand her understanding and to get advice about the issue of child labor, especially in South Asia.She soon found that hard data was often elusive. While estimates of child labor in India var ied from the government’s 1991 census figure of 11. 3 million children under 15 working12 to Human Rights Watch’s estimate of between 60 million and 115 million child laborers,13 it was clear that a very large number of Indian children as young as five years old worked in agriculture, mining, quarrying, and manufacturing, as well as acting as household servants, street vendors, or beggars.Of this total, an estimated 200,000 were employed in the carpet industry, working on looms in large factories, for small subcontractors, and in homes where whole families worked on looms to earn extra income. 14 Children could be bonded—essentially placed in servitude—in order to pay off debts incurred by their parents, typically in the range of 1,000 to 10,000 rupees ($30 to $300). But due to the astronomical interest rates and the very low wages offered to children, it could take years to pay off such loans. Indeed, some indentured child laborers eventually passed on t he debt to their own children.The Indian government stated that it was committed to the abolition of bonded labor, which had been illegal since the Children (Pledging of Labour) Act passed under British rule in 1933. The practice continued to be widespread, however, and to reinforce the earlier law, the government passed the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act in 1976. 15 But the government took a less absolute stand on unbonded child labor, which it characterized as â€Å"a socioeconomic phenomenon arising out of poverty and the lack of development. The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act of 1986 prohibited the use of child labor (applying to those under 14) in certain defined â€Å"hazardous industries† and regulated children’s hours and working conditions in others. But the government felt that the majority of child labor involved â€Å"children working alongside and under the supervision of their parents† in agriculture, cottage industries, and s ervice roles. Indeed, the law specifically permitted children to work in craft industries â€Å"in order not to outlaw the passage of specialized handicraft skills from generation to generation. 16 Critics charged that even with these laws on the books, exploitive child labor—including bonded labor—was widespread because laws were poorly enforced and prosecution rarely severe. 17 Action Required: New Issues, New Options In the fall of 1994, after managing the initial response to the crisis, Barner and her direct manager traveled to India, Nepal, and Pakistan to learn more. Barner recalled the trip: â€Å"We felt the need to educate ourselves, so we met with our suppliers. But we also met with unions, politicians, activists, NGOs, U. N. rganizations, and carpet export organizations. We even went out on unannounced carpet factory raids with local NGOs; we saw child labor, and we were thrown out of some places. † On the trip, Barner also learned of the formation o f the Rugmark Foundation, a recently initiated industry response to the child labor problem in the Indian carpet industry. Triggered by a consumer awareness program started by human rights organizations, consumer activists, and trade unions in Germany in the early 1990s, the Indo-German Export Promotion Council had joined up with key 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) Indian carpet manufacturers and exporters and some Indian NGOs to develop a label certifying that the hand-knotted carpets to which it was attached were made without the use of child labor. To implement this idea, the Rugmark Foundation was organized to supervise the use of the label. It expected to begin exporting rugs carrying a unique identifying number in early 1995.As a major purchaser of Indian rugs, IKEA was invited to sign up with Rugmark as a way of dealing with the ongoing potential for child labor problems on products sourced from India. On her return to Sweden, Barner again met frequently with the Swedish Save the Children’s expert on child labor. â€Å"The people there had a very forward-looking view on the issue and taught us a lot,† said Barner. â€Å"Above all, they emphasized the need to ensure you always do what is in the best interests of the child. † This was the principle set at the heart of the U. N.Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), a document with which Barner was now quite familiar. (See Exhibit 5 for Article 32 from the U. N. Convention on the Rights of the Child. ) The more Barner learned, the more complex the situation became. As a business area manager with full profit-and-loss responsibility for carpets, she knew she had to protect not only her business but also the IKEA brand and image. Yet she viewed her responsibility as broader than this: She felt the company should do something that would make a difference in the lives of the children she had seen.It was a view that was not universally held within IKEA, where many were concerned that a very proactive stand could put the business at a significant cost disadvantage to its competitors. A New Crisis Then, in the spring of 1995, a year after IKEA began to address this issue, a well-known German documentary maker notified the company that a film he had made was about to be broadcast on German television showing children working at looms at Rangan Exports, one of IKEA’s major suppliers.While refusing to let the company preview the video, the filmmaker produced still shots taken directly from the video. The producer then invited IKEA to send someone to take part in a live discussion during the airing of the program. Said Barner, â€Å"Compared to the Swedish program, which documented the use of child labor in Pakistan as a serious report about an important issue without targeting any single company, it was immediately clear that this German-produced program planned to take a confrontational and aggressive approac h aimed directly at IKEA and one of its suppliers. For Barner, the first question was whether to recommend that IKEA participate in the program or decline the invitation. Beyond the immediate public relations issue, she also had to decide how to deal with Rangan Exports’ apparent violation of the contractual commitment it had made not to use child labor. And finally, this crisis raised the issue of whether the overall approach IKEA had been taking to the issue of child labor was appropriate. Should the company continue to try to deal with the issue through its own relationships with its suppliers?Should it step back and allow Rugmark to monitor the use of child labor on its behalf? Or should it recognize that the problem was too deeply embedded in the culture of these countries for it to have any real impact and simply withdraw? 8 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) 906-414 Exhibit 1 IKEA Stores, Fiscal Year Ending August 1994 a. Historica l Store Growth 1954 Number of Stores 0 1964 2 1974 9 1984 52 1994 114 b. Country’s First StoreFirst Store (with city) Country Sweden Norway Denmark Switzerland Germany Australia Canada Austria Netherlands Singapore Spain Iceland France Saudi Arabia Belgium Kuwait United States United Kingdom Hong Kong Italy Hungary Poland Czech Republic United Arab Emirates Slovakia Taiwan Year 1958 1963 1969 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1978 1980 1981 1981 1983 1984 1984 1985 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1991 1991 1992 1994 City Almhult Oslo Copenhagen Zurich Munich Artamon Vancouver Vienna Rotterdam Singapore Gran Canaria Reykjavik Paris Jeddah Brussels Kuwait City Philadelphia Manchester Hong Kong Milan Budapest Platan Prague Dubai Bratislava TaipeiSource: IKEA website, http://franchisor. ikea. com/txtfacts. html, accessed October 15, 2004. 9 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) Exhibit 2 IKEA History: Selected Events Year 1943 1945 1948 1951 1955 1 956 1958 1961 1963 1965 1965 1973 1974 1978 1980 1980 1985 1985 1991 Event IKEA is founded. Ingvar Kamprad constructs the company name from his initials (Ingvar Kamprad), his home farm (Elmtaryd), and its parish (Agunnaryd). The first IKEA ad appears in press, advertising mail-order products. Furniture is introduced into the IKEA product range.Products are still only advertised through ads. The first IKEA catalogue is distributed. IKEA starts to design its own furniture. Self-assembly furniture in flat packs is introduced. The first IKEA store opens in Almhult, Sweden. Contract with Polish sources, IKEA’s first non-Scandinavian suppliers. First delivery is 20,000 chairs. The first IKEA store outside Sweden opens in Norway. IKEA opens in Stockholm, introducing the self-serve concept to furniture retailing. IKEA stores add a section called â€Å"The Cook Shop,† offering quality utensils at low prices.The first IKEA store outside Scandinavia opens in Spreitenbach, Switzer land. A plastic chair is developed at a supplier that usually makes buckets. The BILLY bookcase is introduced to the range, becoming an instant top seller. One of IKEA’s best-sellers, the KLIPPAN sofa with removable, washable covers, is introduced. Introduction of LACK coffee table, made from a strong, light material by an interior door factory. The first IKEA Group store opens in the U. S. MOMENT sofa with frame built by a supermarket trolley factory is introduced. Wins a design prize. IKEA establishes its own industrial group, Swedwood.Source: Adapted from IKEA Facts and Figures, 2003 and 2004 editions, and IKEA internal documents. 10 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) 906-414 Exhibit 3 â€Å"A Furniture Dealer’s Testament†Ã¢â‚¬â€A Summarized Overview In 1976, Ingvar Kamprad listed nine aspects of IKEA that he believed formed the basis of the IKEA culture together with the vision statement â€Å"To create a better everyd ay life for the many people. † These aspects are given to all new employees through a pamphlet titled â€Å"A Furniture Dealer’s Testament. † The following table summarizes the major points: Cornerstone 1.The Product Range—Our Identity 2. The IKEA Spirit—A Strong and Living Reality 3. Profit Gives Us Resources Summarize Description IKEA sells well-designed, functional home furnishing products at prices so low that as many people as possible can afford them. IKEA is about enthusiasm, renewal, thrift, responsibility, humbleness toward the task and simplicity. IKEA will achieve profit (which Kamprad describes as a â€Å"wonderful word†) through the lowest prices, good quality, economical development of products, improved purchasing processes and cost savings. â€Å"Waste is a deadly sin. † 4.Reaching Good Results with Small Means 5. Simplicity is a Virtue Complex regulations and exaggerated planning paralyze. IKEA people stay simple in st yle and habits as well as in their organizational approach. IKEA is run from a small village in the woods. IKEA asks shirt factories to make seat cushions and window factories to make table frames. IKEA discounts its umbrellas when it rains. IKEA does things differently. â€Å"We can never do everything everywhere, all at the same time. † At IKEA, you choose the most important thing to do and finish that before starting a new project. The fear of making mistakes is the root of bureaucracy. † Everyone has the right to make mistakes; in fact, everyone has an obligation to make mistakes. 6. Doing it a Different Way 7. Concentration—Important to Our Success 8. Taking Responsibility—A Privilege 9. Most Things Still Remain to be IKEA is only at the beginning of what it might become. 200 stores is Done. A Glorious Future! nothing. â€Å"We are still a small company at heart. † Source: Adapted by casewriters from IKEA’s â€Å"A Furniture Dealer†™s Testament†; Bertil Torekull, â€Å"Leading by Design: The IKEA Story† (New York: Harper Business, 1998, p. 12); and interviews. 11 906-414 IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge: Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) Exhibit 4 a. Sales IKEA in Figures, 1993–1994 (fiscal year ending August 31, 1994) Country/region Germany Sweden Austria, France, Italy, Switzerland Belgium, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Norway North America (U. S. and Canada) Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia Australia SEK billion 10. 4 3. 9 7. 7 7. 3 4. 9 0. 5 0. 4 35. 0 Percentage 29. 70% 11. 20% 21. 90% 20. 80% 13. 90% 1. 50% 1. 00% b. PurchasingCountry/region Nordic Countries East and Central Europe Rest of Europe Rest of the World Percentage 33. 4% 14. 3% 29. 6% 22. 7% Source: IKEA Facts and Figures, 1994. Exhibit 5 The U. N. Convention on the Rights of the Child: Article 32 1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral, or social development. . States Parties shall take legislative, administrative, social, and educational measures to ensure the implementation of the present article. To this end, and having regard to the relevant provisions of other international instruments, States Parties shall in particular: (a) (b) (c) Provide for a minimum age for admission to employment Provide for appropriate regulation of hours and conditions of employment Provide for appropriate or other sanctions to ensure the effective enforcement of the present article.