Wednesday, July 31, 2019

Bus210 Appendix G

Appendix G Week 2. Checkpoint Business Organizations Resources:| Resource: Ch. 2 of Introduction to Business| Task: | Write a 200- to 300-word description of a business scenario, either real or fictional, that depicts each of the following forms of business organization:| Joint Stock Company| As a Joint Stock Company I have Chosen The British East India Company. It was granted a royal charter in 1600 with the intention of securing trade with India for England by Elizabeth I. A Joint Stock company has two or more individuals own all the shares of a company. Shares of stock are given in return for each financial contribution and the shareholders are free to transfer their ownership at any time by selling their shares to other share holders. These are known as private companies and the shares are not open to public sale or trading. Any corporate losses have to be paid by the shareholders so there is unlimited liability. Encyclopedia Britannica)| Limited Liability Company| Basically a limited liability corporation means if the company goes belly up, the wealth, and possessions of the owners cannot be taken to repay any debts of the business, only assets in the name of the business can be used to pay off the debt. To my amazement I found that McDonalds is a Limited Liability Corporation. (McDonalds, LLC Corporate home)| Partnership| A partnership is just as it sounds two, or more, people own a business equally. They share all responsibility for the business between them. An example of a Partnership could be the original Johnson and Johnson Company. Now it is a LLC and sells stock, but originally it was a very small company started by 3 brothers in 1886 making surgical dressings. When originally started this was a partnership. (Johnson &Johnson )| Sole Proprietorship| A sole proprietorship is a one man show. Owned, operated, and responsible for all debts by one person. This does not mean they might not have employees, but all the operations of the business are the responsibility of the owner. A good example of this that we might know of is The Dallas Cowboys. Jerry Jones owns the stadium, the team, and the contracts with the players, and all the rights to the team and the name including the cheerleaders’ name. (NFL 2011)| National Football League Dallas Cowboys. com Johnson and Johnson Corporation McDonalds USA Encyclopedia Britannica inc. copyright 2011

Tuesday, July 30, 2019

Did the Arabs Injustice Huntington?

Samuel Huntington is the author of the article entitled â€Å"The Clash of Civilizations? † which discusses or narrates concepts that explicates world politics. According to Huntington, international conflicts that concerns politics may be justified by rational arguments or issues that are left unresolved. However, Huntington reiterates that these particular conflicts are founded on underlying issues or matters that naturally lead to political conflicts – that is culture.According to Huntington, culture is threatening to divide nations instead of leading the way to support unity and oneness in handling international problems or issues, since culture is the primary source of irreconcilable differences and conflicts that do not provide opportunities for nations to meet in middle ground. As a means of representing concrete structures of culture, Huntingon has labeled seven civilizations being the Confucian, Hindu, Islamic, Japanese, Latin American, Slavic-Orthodox, and Wes tern. One may notice that Huntington left out the African populace as one of the identified civilizations.This is because Huntington was unsure about the state of the African nation, that is, whether it meets the standards and guidelines of development that is attributed to a mindful and responsive civilization. The classification of Huntington of the world population into civilizations was primary influenced by prominent religious affiliations that are a major identifier of culture. Personally, I would have to agree with Huntington on this matter, since I sincerely believe that cultural affiliations among individuals are largely influenced by the religious beliefs that they share.Huntington believes that the strong ties of individuals to their culture and religion which grants them a sense of self or identity as an individual and as a nation, is difficult to break apart when it comes to promoting rational politics and relations that necessitates the disregard of personal worldviews as directed by a civilization’s culture. However, Huntington’s establishment of seven civilizations has also been a source of contradicting information that he has presented in his article since the classification of civilizations is complicated and inconsistent.Moreover, Huntington mentioned that differences between people, as supported by his theory of the seven civilizations in the world, do not necessarily mean that there will be conflict, and conflict does not necessarily mean that it will lead to violence. However, the gist of Huntington’s article clearly displays how differences, particularly in culture and religion, is the primary cause of conflict and violence around the world as he studied the Cold War and the succeeding world events after it.These contradicting thoughts that Huntington shared in his work, he also contradicted by stating how culture and religion are two important factors in promoting unity. In this case, Huntington mentioned how non-A rab Muslims were able to unite as one despite differences of culture and religion and through shared culture and religion. Upon the establishment of the seven civilizations, Huntington continued to discuss various historical evidences that support his claim. This particular issue led to the discussion of the politics between the Arabs and the West which raised violent reactions from the former.Huntington wrote that at present time, the major players in world politics are the West and the Arab nation. Despite internal clashes between different factions or minority groups within the Arab nations, Huntington believes that in the end, it will still find a way to reconcile differences among them and be counter-reactive to the West. Although the statements of Huntington caused a stir within the Arab nation, I believe that Huntington was not pressing violent, hateful, derogatory, or discriminatory issues against the Arab nation.Huntington magnified his discussion on the issue between the A rabs and the West since it is the current international issue or problem – the power struggle between the two civilizations which people often hear in the news. Although majority of Huntington’s arguments were based on theories, I believe that everything he said were reflective of the current situations, straying away from the assumption that he wrote the article to present his prejudiced or biased sentiments against the Arab nation.His article was based on decades of historical evidences that created an obvious pattern relaying motivations of war in the past, which was further supported by the 9/11 incident that led to the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York. Huntington was simply observant and articulates enough to present a logical explanation of countless conflicts between nations, which may or may not have some truth to it. Frankly, I believe that major truths are embedded within theories, especially those that lend themselves to conspiratorial issues.Setti ng my personal opinions aside, Huntington’s criticisms of other civilization validates the fact that he was not anti-Arab, but simple a man who wanted to illustrate world politics under a cultural context. Huntington criticized the immorality and hypocrisy of the West, stating how the Western civilization has achieved its superiority over other civilizations due to its mindful submission to organized violence in order to achieve its goals and objectives. Moreover, Huntington reiterates that the West does not promote universalism but rather act for world domination.Moreover, Huntington believes that Christian views which originated from the West could not have influenced numerous people around the world if Christians had not come into contact with individuals from the East. Huntington then criticized Western Christianity; and then continued to criticize Western Europe. According to Huntington, some of the concepts of politics and economics claimed by the Western Civilization, particularly Western Europe, did not actually originate from it but from non-Western civilizations in other parts of the world.In general, Huntington’s article was a seemingly balanced representation of his theories on how international conflicts, then and now, were products of cultural and religious differences. The criticisms he posed were not one-sided, attacking the Middle East or the West, or any other civilization for that matter, solely. In fact, Huntington’s theories were open discussions and arguments about the Arab and Western perspectives. Huntington acknowledged how the West is trying to portray a super power estate that works to promote unity, solidarity, democracy, diplomacy, peace, and such.This, he identified as the Western perspective. However, Huntington argued that the West’s interests are politically motivated, geared toward staying in power and obtaining control of the majority populations. On one hand, Huntington discussed how the Arab popu lations are trying to overthrow the influence of the West in their land, moving them to resort to threats and violence toward non-Arab and Western nations. For Huntington, the Arab perspective is just patterned after the â€Å"us-versus-them† mentality.

Monday, July 29, 2019

Argentinas Economics

Examines the economic recovery of the early 1990s under President Menems reforms, background, monetary policy, foreign investment, taxes and future. Introduction Argentina, along with much of Latin America, suffered an economic downturn during the 1980s. However, with the Menem administration (elected in the late 1980s), the country undertook a series of economic reforms designed to bring the country out of its economic doldrums and into a new era of prosperity. Many of those reforms had the desired effect so that by 1994, the country had seen its economic situation improve dramatically; this was reflected in the nations financial markets. The nation suffered an economic recession in 1995, but further steps taken by the government have strengthened the economy to the point that by 1996, performance had returned to 1994 levels. Argentina endured a recession during 1994 and 1995, but its long-term economic performance is expected to be strong. This research considers the economic recovery that

Sunday, July 28, 2019

REASONING AND ANALYSIS Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

REASONING AND ANALYSIS - Research Paper Example The income transfer does not necessary need to be worked for but is issued on free terms regardless of merit. Consumption can be depicted by what a person eats, what person dresses, the house he or she lives in and the luxuries in which that person can afford. The price of a good can be considered the cost of buying a set good; on the other hand, value can be described as the satisfaction one derives from consuming a particular commodity. Therefore, value is the most important aspect to a consumer. The main argument that constitutes the claim is that income affects inherent consumption. It is guaranteed that as income increases, consumption also increases. Thus, the two are directly proportional. However, it can be noted that income affects consumption but not the other way round. Consumption cannot affect income since it is consumption that is dependent on income. In another perspective, it is noted that income also affects a person’s relations. As income increases, the relationship of a person with other people tends to be directed to people of the same caliber. A person who is rich can be noted to have more friends who are related to his or her status. Also, it is noted that rich people are less superstitious and noted to be les s religious. Therefore, income affects relations of the individual (Miller, 1998). In life, as someone increases his wealth, his surroundings tend to change. An instance is the theory put forward by Keynes. The theory is justified by different research papers. The Keynesian theory, the consumption of a person is directly affected by the income. The income tends to trigger other tastes and preferences that were not significant to a person in a former status. Therefore, a person tends to develop a taste for luxurious commodities depending on the level of income. In addition, as the price of luxurious goods increases, the value of the good also increases. Income also affects the consumption of alcohol

International Business Law (ARTICLE WILL BE GIVEN ) Essay

International Business Law (ARTICLE WILL BE GIVEN ) - Essay Example In this regard McDodgy has various defenses as stipulated by the law. McDodgy established his business as SpuEx which is different from FedEx. The two companies deal with totally different issues. FedEx being an international deal with freight issues while SpudEx was to provide delicious hot French fries. Therefore there is likely to be no confusion caused to both customers as they deal with different business. This is evident from Victoria case where the court held, " The record in this case establishes that an army officer who saw the advertisement of the opening of a store named "Victor's Secret" did make the mental association with "Victoria's Secret," but it also shows that he did not therefore form any different impression of the store that his wife and daughter had patronized. There is a complete absence of evidence of any lessening of the capacity of the Victoria's Secret mark to identify and distinguish goods or services sold in Victoria's Secret stores or advertised in its catalogs. The officer was offended by the ad, but it did not change his conception of Victoria's Secret. His offense was directed entirely at petitioners, not at respondents. Moreover, the expert retained by respondents had nothing to say about the impact of petitioners' name on the strength of respondents' mark. (Wardman 2002) Section 1055 of the Lanham Act clearly specifies that "where a registered mark or a mark sought to be registered is or may be used legitimately by related companies, such use shall there to the benefit of the registrant or applicant for registration and such use shall not affect the validity of such mark or its registration, provided such mark is not used in such manner as to deceive the public. If for first use of a mark by a person is controlled by the registrant or applicant for registration of the mark will respect to the nature and quality of the goods or services, such first use shall inure to the benefit of the registrant or applicant, as the case may be" (www.bitlaw .com) McDodgy can rely on the fact that the trademark in contention is not famous and that the clients of FedEx will not be deceived by the use of such trademark by him. Given the nature of goods and services provided by McDodgy's business and that of FedEx then clients of FedEx are unlikely to be confused. The point however, is McDodgy's use of trademark is not an

Saturday, July 27, 2019

Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words - 1

Case Study Example There is a large expenditure associated with installing hardware and software that is compatible with the new system, which if not installed is going to increase the company's costs and incur large overheads. The other issues include user-friendliness of the new system, which will require trained expert staff and hence this system cannot be adopted immediately. These were some of the issues that needed to be taken into account before the final decision about RFID system is taken. The system is useful in inventory management and efficiency in logistics and operations. The company can use it to accurately forecast the product's movement and to make sure that it always has enough inventories to meet the consumers' demand and to avoid losses. RFID can also be handful in efficient shop-floor activities such as price updates, price checkout and recording of payments. This system also reduces the chances of human errors. Similarly, the new system can also help in the customer relationship management and can help the company to modify their sales tactics to increase the customer base. It can be useful in knowing the customer's buying preference and can help the company to enhance the customers' buying experience.

Friday, July 26, 2019

Shakespeare-How would Machiavelli (or a Machiavellian) understand the Essay

Shakespeare-How would Machiavelli (or a Machiavellian) understand the character of Volumnia in Coriolanus Would he approve or disapprove of her behavior in the play Why - Essay Example The philosophy of Machiavelli has a great deal to day about deception and its use in politics. He thinks that in order to maintain power rulers have to use deception and force to move everyone in the direction they want. In this essay we will close read the play using Machiavelli and will try to answer the question whether Machiavelli would approve of Volumnia’s behavior in the play or not. This is the question we will attempt to answer. The play starts in Rome where there are riots going on because Coriolanus, the deputy of commander of the Roman army has hold grains from ordinary citizens. Coriolanus is a man who believes that ordinary people should not be given grain because they are not taking part in the military service. He is a great fighter but he has contempt for the common people. His attitude towards common people is that of an arrogant soldier. The character of Volumnia now plays an active role to make her son consul. She persuades Coriolanus to run for consul even though her son is not willing to do so. But when he couldn’t win the support of the commoners he became angry and talks badly about the plebeians. He is in turn condemned as a traitor and banished from Rome. After his exile he goes to his fierce enemy Aufidius, the commander of the Volscian army. They accept him and allow Coriolanus to lead an attack on Rome. All generals of Rome become worried and try to persuade him not to attack Rome. After all efforts are gone in vain Volumnia is sent to dissuade her son from attacking Rome. She is successful and Coriolanus spares Rome but later is killed by Aufidius for conspiracy. Volumnia is an important character of the play. She plays a great role in changing the mind of her son twice in the play and both times the outcome is in her benefit. She portrays role of a women who cannot seek power personally but tries to attain power by making her son powerful. She tried to gain power and popularity through her son Coriolanus

Thursday, July 25, 2019

Coca-Cola India Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Coca-Cola India - Case Study Example For more than 100 years, coca-cola has maintained the leading position in demand for soft drinks in the industry. The company made its entry into India through Coca-Cola India Private Limited; Coca-Cola India PVT is a wholly owned subsidiary of the company. In 19963, the company re-launched coca-cola two years after opening up the Indian economy (Banerjee, 2009). Since the re-launch of Coca-Cola in 1963, the company’s operations have increased rapidly. Coca-Cola Company uses a model that supports bottling operations that are both locally and company owned. Indian distributors are approximately 7000 while retailers are 2.2million. This wide distribution network has made Coca-Cola products a leading brand in most of the beverage segments. Coca-Cola India produces a variety of brands including Coca-Cola, Limca, Thumbs Up, Kinley, Minute Maid, Fanta Orange, Sprite, Burn, Maaza and Vitingo. The authorized bottlers are engaged in independent development markets for these products and distribute them to grocers, small retailers, restaurants, and supermarkets. In addition to USD 2 billion that Coca-Cola has already invested in India, there are plans for investing additional USD 5 billion by the year 2020 (Banerjee, 2009). Coca-Cola’s operations in India has not been streamlined despite huge investments. One of the crisis in the company’s history in India revolves involves August 5, 2003 attack. The Centre for Science and Environment, an activist group comprising of engineers, environmentalists, scientists, and journalists attacked coca-cola citing evidence of unsafe products in the company’s beverages (Banerjee, 2009). The press release stated that Coca-Cola India’s twelve major brands sold in Dheli contained deadly cocktail pesticide pesticides. The accusation caused fear concerning the sustainability of Coca-Coca Company in India and the safety of its products. This incidence had significant implications on the company’s profitability, corporate

Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Say no to Racism Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Say no to Racism - Research Paper Example Racism takes several forms ranging from verbal to non-verbal. Verbally, irritating words are used against individual’s f the minority race. Non-verbal racism is the most common. It may involve denial to access certain facilities such as restaurants as well as job access based on racial background. Non-verbal discrimination is evident in particular attitudes and character that not only undermines a certain race but also denies them expected favours. Reverse racism is another form that has evolved in 21st century. As a result of activists fighting against discrimination against blacks, the white’s rights have been neglected. Internalised racism refers to discrimination among members in the same race based on minute differences in their physical appearance. For instance, among the blacks, lighter skins might be preferred to darker skinned individuals. Historically people were grouped into different races based on their skin colour that lived differently. This historical contexts as well as existing myths made individuals believe that some races are superior to others. Conservative people maintain this perspective and resist to global efforts of turning the world into a global village. Equalityhumanrights.com, (2015). What forms does racial discrimination take? | Equality and Human Rights Commission. [online] Available at: http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/your-rights/equal-rights/race/what-is-race-discrimination/what-forms-does-racial-discrimination-take [Accessed 26 Jan. 2015]. Nittle, N. (2015). Four Different Forms of Racism. [online] About.com News & Issues. Available at: http://racerelations.about.com/od/understandingrac1/tp/Four-Different-Forms-Of-Racism.htm [Accessed 26 Jan.

Tuesday, July 23, 2019

Ratio Analysis- discuss comparative risk Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Ratio Analysis- discuss comparative risk - Essay Example It remains around 30 for all these years (except 2009) which is a good sign for the company. As far as interest risk ratio for 1-year gap is concerned, it is also stable (except 2009) around 32. It means that the company will not fear from its interest rate risk as it is not increasing consistently. The capital adequacy risk appears to be fair enough to cover unforeseen losses and obligations of the bank towards the investors. For the five years, the ratio is almost constant (except for 2010) which means that the risk for being unable to discharge its obligations is not increasing showing a positive sign for the company (Exhibit 4). Comparing the ratios of PNC limited with its peer group, it seems quite clear that the company’s performance is better than the peer group with respect to credit risk ratio, interest risk ratio (both 1-year and 3-year gap) and capital adequacy ratio. However, PNC requires working with its liquidity ratio to have an advantage over its peer group. PNC needs to improve its liquidity ratio to have complete advantage over its peer. For this purpose PNC will have to adopt some measures to recollect the amounts lent to those who appear to be bad debts. Further, the company needs to take steps to collect cash amounts in lieu of interest on loan expanded by it to customers. The company should also withdraw some of its less earning investments. Further, PNC should revise its policy for its current regular interest paying customers to urge them pay as soon as possible. All these steps will enable the company to increase its liquidity and hence will be able to avoid any liquidity risk arising in the near future

Networking Concepts Essay Example for Free

Networking Concepts Essay Benefit of network Network: Network is very popular common word now. It is a collection of computers, printers, and other electronic devices which is linked by cables or wireless devices; it can make a situation for them to communicate with each other. For the welfare of network individuals are able to share and exchange information (files and programs), access common services (email and applications), and share hardware (printers, servers, image scanners, and fax machines). picture of LAN/MAN/WAN network The Name of Network LAN (Local Area Network: It is a small geographical area (Room, Building or a Campus) of networking MAN (Metropolitan Area Network): If network in a city than it is called MAN. WAN (Wide Area Network): If network spread geographically (Country of across Globe) than it is called WAN. Advantage of network: It offers a wide range of advantages. It help to transferee filesAA one computer to another, centralized printers, centralized information (an intranet web server, for example). For it programs can be run off a server, so updating means updating a single program, not one on each computer (which can be a nightmare if there are a few hundred computers), centralized data backup Disadvantage of network: To drive up network . there are many equipment needed which is much cost. Virtual Private Networking Service: Virtual Private Networking Service is failure for a secure network connection which can be taken on top of a public network, such as the Internet or Education Wireless Integrated Network. For the help of it Internet’s  infrastructure can move secured data to and from the campus network. It play an indispensable role    off-campus students and staff to access the Universitys online resources in the home computer,  through their ISP (Internet Service Providers) like Signet, Star Hub, etc. using dial-up or broadband service. We can also get the facility of Universitys  e-services or computing facilities that are not made available on  the Internet or WWW (World-Wide Web In this case we can do Laboratorys UNIX servers, network printers, file shares, personal web storage folders, etc for the help of network. Picture of Virtual private networ VPN on NTUwireless: There are also some risks in wireless network. So in this case to keep our privacy on NTUwireless, our campus wireless network, we can  use  this VPN service to dial-out of NTUwireless – as like as we normally use VPN on the Internet to access NTU network. To connect wired  network to the campus, VPN connection is not necessary. This service is not turned on for  the wired network. VPN client behind the corporate firewall: Most organizations and universities  have some form of firewall implementations on their  Internet gateway to except for Signet, Star hub or the overseas ISP If there is a firewall in your organization, you  should use SSL VPN to connect. or, If you want to connect NTU with Microsoft VPN, the organization’s Firewall  requires PPTP traffic  via TCP port 1723 ;amp; GRE protocol to  pass through the  Firewall. Network Installations: networking of a communications system through to planning, designing, installing and maintaining the system. (Picture of network installation Connect Systems work is able to provide the best computer network design and specification, meeting both present and ongoing requirements to each client and is closely with each client. We offer a wide number of benefit to all client . These include recommend, supply and install all the necessary hardware and software for your network installations, as well as we offer tuning and support system . To provide a total data and voice transport system including help and advice with the design and fitting of client’s computer rooms a structured wiring can be installed. The necessary thing or installation: Windows Vista/2003/XP * Cyrix Presentation Server ;amp; Access Essentials * Internet, Firewall and VPN connectivity solutions including Cisco PIX, Symantec Enterprise Firewall installation and configuration * E-mail products including Exchange, Lotus Notes and Outlook, Mobile email via Blackberry and Windows mobile devices * Back-up software including Arc serve and Backup Exec * An ti-virus solutions including Trend Micro * Content Checking technology such as Minesweeper and Super Scout * Supply and configuration of server and PC hardware. Operating system of network: Net work operating system: It is an operating system which has components and programs to allow a computer on a network to serve request from other computer in term of data providing access to other resources such as printer and file systems Some steps of simple file and print sharing: Content 1. File Sharing Basics 2. Naming Computers 3. Install File and Print Sharing 4. Disable Simple Sharing 5. Disable Firewalls and Other Software 6. Create User Accounts 7. Sharing the Folder 8. How to Check Which Folders are Shared 9. Mapping a Network Drive 10. How to Remove File Sharing 11. Sharing Printers with Others on Your Network 12. Troubleshooting File and Print Sharing Install file and print sharing: Our task is to go into your Network contractions under the Local Area Connection Properties window, and need check whether S the General tab is included or not. We can use the following items for this connection. Or the Components are checked by this connection section, we can check that File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks can list we have to be aware about that the checkbox is checked. If it is listed, the computer is already configured for file sharing; click Cancel. If it is not listed, then Click Install button. Click on Service. Click Add. What we need for instillation: . Click OK. We might need your Windows install CD and if the computer asks to restart, click yes. We can use the following operating system: We can use the following operating system: 1. JUNOS. Used in routers and switches from Juniper Networks. Cisco JOS (formerly ‘Cisco Internet work Operating System’) is a NOM having a focus on the internetworking capabilities of network device. It is used on Cisco System router and some network switches. 2.

Monday, July 22, 2019

Why Literature Essay Example for Free

Why Literature Essay It has often happened to me, at book fairs or in bookstores, that a gentleman approaches me and asks me for a signature. It is for my wife, my young daughter, or my mother, he explains. She is a great reader and loves literature. Immediately I ask: And what about you? Dont you like to read? The answer is almost always the same: Of course I like to read, but I am a very busy person. I have heard this explanation dozens of times: this man and many thousands of men like him have so many important things to do, so many obligations, so many responsibilities in life, that they cannot waste their precious time buried in a novel, a book of poetry, or a literary essay for hours and hours. According to this widespread conception, literature is a dispensable activity, no doubt lofty and useful for cultivating sensitivity and good manners, but essentially an entertainment, an adornment that only people with time for recreation can afford. It is something to fit in between sports, the movies, a game of bridge or chess; and it can be sacrificed without scruple when one prioritizes the tasks and the duties that are indispensable in the struggle of life. It seems clear that literature has become more and more a female activity. In bookstores, at conferences or public readings by writers, and even in university departments dedicated to the humanities, the women clearly outnumber the men. The explanation traditionally given is that middle-class women read more because they work fewer hours than men, and so many of them feel that they can justify more easily than men the time that they devote to fantasy and illusion. I am somewhat allergic to explanations that divide men and women into frozen categories and attribute to each sex its characteristic virtues and shortcomings; but there is no doubt that there are fewer and fewer readers of literature, and that among the saving remnant of readers women predominate. This is the case almost everywhere. In Spain, for example, a recent survey organized by the General Society of Spanish Writers revealed that half of that countrys population has never read a book. The survey also revealed that in the minority that does read, the number of women who admitted to reading surpasses the number of men by 6. 2 percent, a difference that appears to be increasing. I am happy for these women, but I feel sorry for these men, and for the millions of human beings who could read but have decided not to read. They earn my pity not only because they are unaware of the pleasure that they are missing, but also because I am convinced that a society without literature, or a society in which literature has been relegatedlike some hidden viceto the margins of social and personal life, and transformed into something like a sectarian cult, is a society condemned to become spiritually barbaric, and even to jeopardize its freedom. I wish to offer a few arguments against the idea of literature as a luxury pastime, and in favor of viewing it as one of the most primary and necessary undertakings of the mind, an irreplaceable activity for the formation of citizens in a modern and democratic society, a society of free individuals. |[pic] | e live in the era of the specialization of knowledge, thanks to the prodigious development of science and technology and to the consequent fragmentation of knowledge into innumerable parcels and compartments. This cultural trend is, if anything, likely to be accentuated in years to come. To be sure, specialization brings many benefits. It allows for deeper exploration and greater experimentation; it is the very engine of progress. Yet it also has negative consequences, for it eliminates those common intellectual and cultural traits that permit men and women to co-exist, to communicate, to feel a sense of solidarity. Specialization leads to a lack of social understanding, to the division of human beings into ghettos of technicians and specialists. The specialization of knowledge requires specialized languages and increasingly arcane codes, as information becomes more and more specific and compartmentalized. This is the particularism and the division against which an old proverb warned us: do not focus too much on the branch or the leaf, lest you forget that they are part of a tree, or too much on the tree, lest you forget that it is part of a forest. Awareness of the existence of the forest creates the feeling of generality, the feeling of belonging, that binds society together and prevents it from disintegrating into a myriad of solipsistic particularities. The solipsism of nations and individuals produces paranoia and delirium, distortions of reality that generate hatred, wars, and even genocide. In our time, science and technology cannot play an integrating role, precisely because of the infinite richness of knowledge and the speed of its evolution, which have led to specialization and its obscurities. But literature has been, and will continue to be, as long as it exists, one of the common denominators of human experience through which human beings may recognize themselves and converse with each other, no matter how different their professions, their life plans, their geographical and cultural locations, their personal circumstances. It has enabled individuals, in all the particularities of their lives, to transcend history: as readers of Cervantes, Shakespeare, Dante, and Tolstoy, we understand each other across space and time, and we feel ourselves to be members of the same species because, in the works that these writers created, we learn what we share as human beings, what remains common in all of us under the broad range of differences that separate us. Nothing better protects a human being against the stupidity of prejudice, racism, religious or political sectarianism, and exclusivist nationalism than this truth that invariably appears in great literature: that men and women of all nations and places are essentially equal, and that only injustice sows among them discrimination, fear, and exploitation. Nothing teaches us better than literature to see, in ethnic and cultural differences, the richness of the human patrimony, and to prize those differences as a manifestation of humanitys multi-faceted creativity. Reading good literature is an experience of pleasure, of course; but it is also an experience of learning what and how we are, in our human integrity and our human imperfection, with our actions, our dreams, and our ghosts, alone and in relationships that link us to others, in our public image and in the secret recesses of our consciousness. |[pic| |] | his complex sum of contradictory truthsas Isaiah Berlin called themconstitutes the very substance of the human condition. In todays world, this totalizing and living knowledge of a human being may be found only in literature. Not even the other branches of the humanitiesnot philosophy, history, or the arts, and certainly not the social scienceshave been able to preserve this integrating vision, this universalizing discourse. The humanities, too, have succumbed to the cancerous division and subdivision of knowledge, isolating themselves in increasingly segmented and technical sectors whose ideas and vocabularies lie beyond the reach of the common woman and man. Some critics and theorists would even like to change literature into a science. But this will never happen, because fiction does not exist to investigate only a single precinct of experience. It exists to enrich through the imagination the entirety of human life, which cannot be dismembered, disarticulated, or reduced to a series of schemas or formulas without disappearing. This is the meaning of Prousts observation that real life, at last enlightened and revealed, the only life fully lived, is literature. He was not exaggerating, nor was he expressing only his love for his own vocation. He was advancing the particular proposition that as a result of literature life is better understood and better lived; and that living life more fully necessitates living it and sharing it with others. The brotherly link that literature establishes among human beings, compelling them to enter into dialogue and making them conscious of a common origin and a common goal, transcends all temporal barriers. Literature transports us into the past and links us to those who in bygone eras plotted, enjoyed, and dreamed through those texts that have come down to us, texts that now allow us also to enjoy and to dream. This feeling of membership in the collective human experience across time and space is the highest achievement of culture, and nothing contributes more to its renewal in every generation than literature. |[| |p| |i| |c| |]| t always irritated Borges when he was asked, What is the use of literature? It seemed to him a stupid question, to which he would reply: No one would ask what is the use of a canarys song or a beautiful sunset. If such beautiful things exist, and if, thanks to them, life is even for an instant less ugly and less sad, is it not petty to seek practical justifications? But the question is a good one. For novels and poems are not like the sound of birdsong or the spectacle of the sun sinking into the horizon, because they were not created by chance or by nature. They are human creations, and it is therefore legitimate to ask how and why they came into the world, and what is their purpose, and why they have lasted so long. Literary works are born, as shapeless ghosts, in the intimacy of a writers consciousness, projected into it by the combined strength of the unconscious, and the writers sensitivity to the world around him, and the writers emotions; and it is these things to which the poet or the narrator, in a struggle with words, gradually gives form, body, movement, rhythm, harmony, and life. An artificial life, to be sure, a life imagined, a life made of languageyet men and women seek out this artificial life, some frequently, others sporadically, because real life falls short for them, and is incapable of offering them what they want. Literature does not begin to exist through the work of a single individual. It exists only when it is adopted by others and becomes a part of social lifewhen it becomes, thanks to reading, a shared experience. One of its first beneficial effects takes place at the level of language. A community without a written literature expresses itself with less precision, with less richness of nuance, and with less clarity than a community whose principal instrument of communication, the word, has been cultivated and perfected by means of literary texts. A humanity without reading. untouched by literature, would resemble a community of deaf-mutes and aphasics, afflicted by tremendous problems of communication due to its crude and rudimentary language. This is true for individuals, too. A person who does not read, or reads little, or reads only trash, is a person with an impediment: he can speak much but he will say little, because his vocabulary is deficient in the means for self-expression. This is not only a verbal limitation. It represents also a limitation in intellect and in imagination. It is a poverty of thought, for the simple reason that ideas, the concepts through which we grasp the secrets of our condition, do not exist apart from words. We learn how to speak correctlyand deeply, rigorously, and subtlyfrom good literature, and only from good literature. No other discipline or branch of the arts can substitute for literature in crafting the language that people need to communicate. To speak well, to have at ones disposal a rich and diverse language, to be able to find the appropriate expression for every idea and every emotion that we want to communicate, is to be better prepared to think, to teach, to learn, to converse, and also to fantasize, to dream, to feel. In a surreptitious way, words reverberate in all our actions, even in those actions that seem far removed from language. And as language evolved, thanks to literature, and reached high levels of refinement and manners, it increased the possibility of human enjoyment. Literature has even served to confer upon love and desire and the sexual act itself the status of artistic creation. Without literature, eroticism would not exist. Love and pleasure would be poorer, they would lack delicacy and exquisiteness, they would fail to attain to the intensity that literary fantasy offers. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that a couple who have read Garcilaso, Petrarch, Gongora, or Baudelaire value pleasure and experience pleasure more than illiterate people who have been made into idiots by televisions soap operas. In an illiterate world, love and desire would be no different from what satisfies animals, nor would they transcend the crude fulfillment of elementary instincts. Nor are the audiovisual media equipped to replace literature in this task of teaching human beings to use with assurance and with skill the extraordinarily rich possibilities that language encompasses. On the contrary, the audiovisual media tend to relegate words to a secondary level with respect to images, which are the primordial language of these media, and to constrain language to its oral expression, to its indispensable minimum, far from its written dimension. To define a film or a television program as literary is an elegant way of saying that it is boring. For this reason, literary programs on the radio or on television rarely capture the public. So far as I know, the only exception to this rule was Bernard Pivots program, Apostrophes, in France. And this leads me to think that not only is literature indispensable for a full knowledge and a full mastery of language, but its fate is linked also and indissolubly with the fate of the book, that industrial product that many are now declaring obsolete. |[pic| |] | his brings me to Bill Gates. He was in Madrid not long ago and visited the Royal Spanish Academy, which has embarked upon a joint venture with Microsoft. Among other things, Gates assured the members of the Academy that he would personally guarantee that the letter - would never be removed  from computer softwarea promise that allowed four hundred million Spanish speakers on five continents to breathe a sigh of relief, since the banishment of such an essential letter from cyberspace would have created monumental problems. Immediately after making his amiable concession to the Spanish language, however, Gates, before even leaving the premises of the Academy, avowed in a press conference that he expected to accomplish his highest goal before he died. That goal, he explained, is to put an end to paper and then to books. In his judgment, books are anachronistic objects. Gates argued that computer screens are able to replace paper in all the functions that paper has heretofore assumed. He also insisted that, in addition to being less onerous, computers take up less space, and are more easily transportable; and also that the transmission of news and literature by these electronic media, instead of by newspapers and books, will have the ecological advantage of stopping the destruction of forests, a cataclysm that is a consequence of the paper industry. People will continue to read, Gates assured his listeners, but they will read on computer screens, and consequently there will be more chlorophyll in the environment. I was not present at Gatess little discourse; I learned these details from the press. Had I been there I would have booed Gates for proclaiming shamelessly his intention to send me and my colleagues, the writers of books, directly to the unemployment line. And I would have vigorously disputed his analysis. Can the screen really replace the book in all its aspects? I am not so certain. I am fully aware of the enormous revolution that new technologies such as the Internet have caused in the fields of communication and the sharing of information, and I confess that the Internet provides invaluable help to me every day in my work; but my gratitude for these extraordinary conveniences does not imply a belief that the electronic screen can replace paper, or that reading on a computer can stand in for literary reading. That is a chasm that I cannot cross. I cannot accept the idea that a non-functional or non-pragmatic act of reading, one that seeks neither information nor a useful and immediate communication, can integrate on a computer screen the dreams and the pleasures of words with the same sensation of intimacy, the same mental concentration and spiritual isolation, that may be achieved by the act of reading a book. Perhaps this a prejudice resulting from lack of practice, and from a long association of  literature with books and paper. But even though I enjoy surfing the Web in search of world news, I would never go to the screen to read a poem by Gongora or a novel by Onetti or an essay by Paz, because I am certain that the effect of such a reading would not be the same. I am convinced, although I cannot prove it, that with the disappearance of the book, literature would suffer a serious blow, even a mortal one. The term literature would not disappear, of course. Yet it would almost certainly be used to denote a type of text as distant from what we understand as literature today as soap operas are from the tragedies of Sophocles and Shakespeare. |[pic| |] | here is still another reason to grant literature an important place in the life of nations. Without it, the critical mind, which is the real engine of historical change and the best protector of liberty, would suffer an irreparable loss. This is because all good literature is radical, and poses radical questions about the world in which we live. In all great literary texts, often without their authors intending it, a seditious inclination is present. Literature says nothing to those human beings who are satisfied with their lot, who are content with life as they now live it. Literature is the food of the rebellious spirit, the promulgator of non-conformities, the refuge for those who have too much or too little in life. One seeks sanctuary in literature so as not to be unhappy and so as not to be incomplete. To ride alongside the scrawny Rocinante and the confused Knight on the fields of La Mancha, to sail the seas on the back of a whale with Captain Ahab, to drink arsenic with Emma Bovary, to become an insect with Gregor Samsa: these are all ways that we have invented to divest ourselves of the wrongs and the impositions of this unjust life, a life that forces us always to be the same person when we wish to be many different people, so as to satisfy the many desires that possess us. Literature pacifies this vital dissatisfaction only momentarilybut in this miraculous instant, in this provisional suspension of life, literary illusion lifts and transports us outside of history, and we become citizens of a timeless land, and in this way immortal. We become more intense, richer, more complicated, happier, and more lucid than we are in the constrained routine of ordinary life. When we close the book and abandon literary fiction, we return to actual existence and compare it to the splendid land that we have just left. What a disappointment awaits us! Yet a tremendous realization also awaits us, namely, that the fantasized life of the novel is bettermore beautiful and more diverse, more comprehensible and more perfectthan the life that we live while awake, a life conditioned by the limits and the tedium of our condition. In this way, good literature, genuine literature, is always subversive, unsubmissive, rebellious: a challenge to what exists. How could we not feel cheated after reading War and Peace or Remembrance of Things Past and returning to our world of insignificant details, of boundaries and prohibitions that lie in wait everywhere and, with each step, corrupt our illusions? Even more than the need to sustain the continuity of culture and to enrich language, the greatest contribution of literature to human progress is perhaps to remind us (without intending to, in the majority of cases) that the world is badly made; and that those who pretend to the contrary, the powerful and the lucky, are lying; and that the world can be improved, and made more like the worlds that our imagination and our language are able to create. A free and democratic society must have responsible and critical citizens conscious of the need continuously to examine the world that we inhabit and to try, even though it is more and more an impossible task, to make it more closely resemble the world that we would like to inhabit. And there is no better means of fomenting dissatisfaction with existence than the reading of good literature; no better means of forming critical and independent citizens who will not be manipulated by those who govern them, and who are endowed with a permanent spiritual mobility and a vibrant imagination. Still, to call literature seditious because it sensitizes a readers consciousness to the imperfections of the world does not meanas churches and governments seem to think it means when they establish censorshipthat literary texts will provoke immediate social upheavals or accelerate revolutions. The social and political effects of a poem, a play, or a novel cannot be foreseen, because they are not collectively made or collectively experienced. They are created by individuals and they are read by individuals, who vary enormously in the conclusions that they draw from their writing and their reading. For this reason, it is difficult, or even impossible, to establish precise patterns. Moreover, the social consequences of a work of literature may have little to do with its aesthetic quality. A mediocre novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe seems to have played a decisive role in raising social and political consciousness of the horrors of slavery in the United States. The fact that these effects of literature are difficult to identify does not imply that they do not exist. The important point is that they are effects brought about by the actions of citizens whose personalities have been formed in part by books. Good literature, while temporarily relieving human dissatisfaction, actually increases it, by developing a critical and non-conformist attitude toward life. It might even be said that literature makes human beings more likely to be unhappy. To live dissatisfied, and at war with existence, is to seek things that may not be there, to condemn oneself to fight futile battles, like the battles that Colonel Aureliano Buenda fought in One Hundred Years of Solitude, knowing full well that he would lose them all. All this may be true. Yet it is also true that without rebellion against the mediocrity and the squalor of life, we would still live in a primitive state, and history would have stopped. The autonomous individual would not have been created, science and technology would not have progressed, human rights would not have been recognized, freedom would not have existed. All these things are born of unhappiness, of acts of defiance against a life perceived as insufficient or intolerable. For this spirit that scorns life as it isand searches with the madness of Don Quixote, whose insanity derived from the reading of chivalric novelsliterature has served as a great spur. |[pi| |c] | et us attempt a fantastic historical reconstruction. Let us imagine a world without literature, a humanity that has not read poems or novels. In this kind of atrophied civilization, with its puny lexicon in which groans and ape-like gesticulations would prevail over words, certain adjectives would not exist. Those adjectives include: quixotic, Kafkaesque, Rabelaisian, Orwellian, sadistic, and masochistic, all terms of literary origin. To be sure, we would still have insane people, and victims of paranoia and persecution complexes, and people with uncommon appetites and outrageous excesses, and bipeds who enjoy inflicting or receiving pain. But we would not have learned to see, behind these extremes of behavior that are prohibited by the norms of our culture, essential characteristics of the human condition. We would not have discovered our own traits, as only the talents of Cervantes, Kafka, Rabelais, Orwell, de Sade, and Sacher-Masoch have revealed them to us. When the novel Don Quixote de la Mancha appeared, its first readers made fun of this extravagant dreamer, as well as the rest of the characters in the novel. Today we know that the insistence of the caballero de la triste figura on seeing giants where there were windmills, and on acting in his seemingly absurd way, is really the highest form of generosity, and a means of protest against the misery of this world in the hope of changing it. Our very notions of the ideal, and of idealism, so redolent with a positive moral connotation, would not be what they are, would not be clear and respected values, had they not been incarnated in the protagonist of a novel through the persuasive force of Cervantess genius. The same can be said of that small and pragmatic female Quixote, Emma Bovary, who fought with ardor to live the splendid life of passion and luxury that she came to know through novels. Like a butterfly, she came too close to the flame and was burned in the fire. |[pic| |] | he inventions of all great literary creators open our eyes to unknown aspects of our own condition. They enable us to explore and to understand more fully the common human abyss. When we say Borgesian, the word immediately conjures up the separation of our minds from the rational order of reality and the entry into a fantastic universe, a rigorous and elegant mental construction, almost always labyrinthine and arcane, and riddled with literary references and allusions, whose singularities are not foreign to us because in them we recognize hidden desires and intimate truths of our own personality that took shape only thanks to the literary creation of Jorge Luis Borges. The word Kafkaesque comes to mind, like the focus mechanism of those old cameras with their accordion arms, every time we feel threatened, as defenseless individuals, by the oppressive machines of power that have caused so much pain and injustice in the modern worldthe authoritarian regimes, the vertical parties, the intolerant churches, the asphyxiating bureaucrats. Without the short stories and the novels of that tormented Jew from Prague who wrote in German and lived always on the lookout, we would not have been able to understand the impotent feeling of the isolated individual, or the terror of persecuted and discriminated minorities, confronted with the all-embracing powers that can smash them and eliminate them without the henchmen even showing their faces. The adjective Orwellian, first cousin of Kafkaesque, gives a voice to the terrible anguish, the sensation of extreme absurdity, that was generated by totalitarian dictatorships of the twentieth century, the most sophisticated, cruel, and absolute dictatorships in history, in their control of the actions and the psyches of the members of a society. In 1984, George Orwell described in cold and haunting shades a humanity subjugated to Big Brother, an absolute lord who, through an efficient combination of terror and technology, eliminated liberty, spontaneity, and equality, and transformed society into a beehive of automatons. In this nightmarish world, language also obeys power, and has been transformed into newspeak, purified of all invention and all subjectivity, metamorphosed into a string of platitudes that ensure the individuals slavery to the system. It is true that the sinister prophecy of 1984 did not come to pass, and totalitarian communism in the Soviet Union went the way of totalitarian fascism in Germany and elsewhere; and soon thereafter it began to deteriorate also in China, and in anachronistic Cuba and North Korea. But the danger is never completely dispelled, and the word Orwellian continues to describe the danger, and to help us to understand it. |[pic| |] | o literatures unrealities, literatures lies, are also a precious vehicle for the knowledge of the most hidden of human realities. The truths that it reveals are not always flattering; and sometimes the image of ourselves that emerges in the mirror of novels and poems is the image of a monster. This happens when we read about the horrendous sexual butchery fantasized by de Sade, or the dark lacerations and brutal sacrifices that fill the cursed books of Sacher-Masoch and Bataille. At times the spectacle is so offensive and ferocious that it becomes irresistible. Yet the worst in these pages is not the blood, the humiliation, the abject love of torture; the worst is the discovery that this violence and this excess are not foreign to us, that they are a profound part of humanity. These monsters eager for transgression are hidden in the most intimate recesses of our being; and from the shadow where they live they seek a propitious occasion to manifest themselves, to impose the rule of unbridled desire that destroys rationality, community, and even existence. And it was not science that first ventured into these tenebrous places in the human mind, and discovered the destructive and the self-destructive potential that also shapes it. It was literature that made this discovery. A world without literature would be partly blind to these terrible depths, which we urgently need to see. Uncivilized, barbarian, devoid of sensitivity and crude of speech, ignorant and instinctual, inept at passion and crude at love, this world without literature, this nightmare that I am delineating, would have as its principal traits conformism and the universal submission of humankind to power. In this sense, it would also be a purely animalistic world. Basic instincts would determine the daily practices of a life characterized by the struggle for survival, and the fear of the unknown, and the satisfaction of physical necessities. There would be no place for the spirit. In this world, moreover, the crushing monotony of living would be accompanied by the sinister shadow of pessimism, the feeling that human life is what it had to be and that it will always be thus, and that no one and nothing can change it. When one imagines such a world, one is tempted to picture primitives in loincloths, the small magic-religious communities that live at the margins of modernity in Latin America, Oceania, and Africa. But I have a different failure in mind. The nightmare that I am warning about is the result not of under-development but of over-development. As a consequence of technology and our subservience to it, we may imagine a future society full of computer screens and speakers, and without books, or a society in which booksthat is, works of literaturehave become what alchemy became in the era of physics: an archaic curiosity, practiced in the catacombs of the media civilization by a neurotic minority. I am afraid that this cybernetic world, in spite of its prosperity and its power, its high standard of living and its scientific achievement would be profoundly uncivilized and utterly soullessa resigned humanity of post-literary automatons who have abdicated freedom. It is highly improbable, of course, that this macabre utopia will ever come about. The end of our story, the end of history, has not yet been written, and it is not pre-determined. What we will become depends entirely on our vision and our will. But if we wish to avoid the impoverishment of our imagination, and the disappearance of the precious dissatisfaction that refines our sensibility and teaches us to speak with eloquence and rigor, and the weakening of our freedom, then we must act. More precisely, we must read. MARIO VARGAS LLOSAs new book, The Feast of the Goat, will be published by Farrar, Straus Giroux in November. He is professor of Ibero-American Literature and Culture at Georgetown University.

Sunday, July 21, 2019

Case Study: Narcotics Withdrawal Impact on Health

Case Study: Narcotics Withdrawal Impact on Health Arlena Davis Based on the clinical scenario is Mrs. X’s altered mental status due to a focal neurologic deficit or is it related to a more global etiology? Why? Mrs. X altered mental status is not due to focal neurologic deficit as she does not show focal neurologic signs. Some of the signs of focal neurologic deficit are impairment of the spinal cord, nerves and brain activities impairment of the nerves, spinal cord and brain affects certain areas of the body and causes weakness in the right leg and left arm. Mrs. X does not have impaired of the spinal cord, nerves and the brain according to the medical examination. Mrs. X does not have weakness in the left arm and right leg. The neurologic examination shows Mrs. X has no problem. Mrs. X has grip strength of 5/5 bilaterally. The Dorsi and plantar flexion is 5/5 bilaterally. Mrs. X has no focal spinal and costovertebral angle tenderness. Thus, the altered mental status is linked to a more comprehensive etiology. The altered mental status can be due to overdose of Percocet and use of narcotics. Mrs. X took 80 tablets of 10mg Percocet within 72 hours before she started experiencing the symptom s. In addition, Mrs. X has misused narcotics as evidenced by the family’s reaction. Overuse of narcotics and withdrawal can change the mental status of a patient. McCance, K. L., Huether, S. E. (2014). Pathophysiology: The Biologic Basis of Disease in Adults and Children (7th ed.). Maryland, MO: Mosby Elsevier. 2. Based on the available information what differentials can the NP absolutely rule out? Give a rationale as to why you are ruling out each differential. Differential diagnosis is conducted to rule out certain diseases and hence ensure the diagnosis is accurate. The NP should rule out some differential diagnoses. The NP should rule out a focal neurologic deficit diagnosis as Mrs. X does not show signs and symptoms of focal neurologic deficit according to the historical and examination data. Additionally, the NP should rule out influenza DFA diagnosis as the patient does not show signs of DFA influenza. They can rule out diarrhea as a result of influenza according to the examination done by the doctor the diarrhea is not be due to influenza, but narcotic withdrawal. Mrs. X has been misusing narcotics and she has not used the drugs since she became sick and this might have contributed to the diarrhea. Further, the NP should rule out narcotic overdose diagnosis as the patient does not show signs of narcotic overdose. McCance, K. L., Huether, S. E. (2014). Pathophysiology: The Biologic Basis of Disease in Adults and Children (7th ed.). Maryland, MO: Mosby Elsevier. 3. What differential diagnoses still need to be ruled out? Other differential diagnosis that still need to be eliminated is serotonin syndrome and encephalitis. She could be dehydrated, her urine is dirty she could have a UTI, she has not eaten since onset of symptoms so the Hydroxycut could be causing her to metabolic alkalosis. Loss of fluid through diarrhea and not eating and drink are related to metabolic alkalosis. Boyer EW. Serotonin syndrome. http://www.uptodate.com/home. Accessed June. 12, 2014. Gasper,M.L.,Dillon,P.M.(2011).Clinical Simulations for Nursing Education Learner Volume. Philadephia, PA: F.A Davis 4. What are the signs of narcotic overdose? Is Mrs. X’s condition consistent with a narcotic overdose? There are different signs of narcotic overdose. The first sign of narcotic overdose is respiratory depression. The respiratory rate is low and apnea is evidenced in serious cases. The patient can have a respiratory arrest if the overdose is significant. Hypoxia can cause pulmonary edema as it impairs the permeability of the pulmonary capillary. Pupil constriction is common expect in severe hypoxia when dilation can be seen. The formation of urine is decreased because of the reduction in the flow of renal blood. Other signs of narcotic overdose are hypotension, cold clammy skin and bradycardia. Moreover, patients presenting narcotic overdose show other symptoms. The symptoms include nausea, vomiting, constipation and slurred speech, confusion, poor judgment and decreased level of consciousness. Mrs. X’s condition is not consistent with narcotic overdose. Mrs. X. does not have a reparatory depression which is the main sign of narcotic overdose. Mrs. X has an elevated respiratory rate and a heart rate of 22 and 97 respectively. Mrs. X does not have constricted pupils as they are reactive to light. However, Mrs. X has decreased level of consciousness and she is confused. Goldberg, R.(2013).Drugs Across the Spectrum. Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning 5. What are the signs of narcotic withdrawal? Is Mrs X’s condition consistent with a narcotic withdrawal? Patients using narcotics show different signs after withdrawal depending on the dosage and how long they have used the drug. The patients can be restless and have insomnia. Also, patients can be anxious, long for the drug and have a flu. Patients can have abdominal cramps, body aches, loss of appetite, Rhinorrhea, fever, confusion, irritability and loss of appetite. Also, patients can have increased respiratory rate, pulse rate and blood pressure in late withdrawal. Patients have gastrointestinal problems including nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and loss of weight. Mrs. X’s condition is in line with the signs of narcotic withdrawal. Mrs. X has an increased heart rate, blood pressure and respiratory rate. Mrs. X heart rate, respiration rate and blood pressure are 97, 22 and 135/55 respectively. Also, Mrs. X has fever and flu- like disease. She has decreased appetite as she has not eaten anything since she became sick. Also, she has lost 25lb in the past 2 months after taking hydrox ycut. In addition, Mrs. X has diarrhea and she has been restless and confused. Gasper,M.L.,Dillon,P.M.(2011).Clinical Simulations for Nursing Education Learner Volume. Philadephia, PA: F.A Davis Munjal,Y.P.,Sharma,S.K.,Agarwal,A.K.,Gupta,P.(2012).Api Textbook of Medicine. New Delhi, India: JP Medical Ltd 6. There are 2 clues which are related to one another in the HP and both suggest the same potential differential diagnosis. The admitting physician did not pick up on the clues and consequently did not consider this in their differentials. What are the two clues? What additional historical information is missing from the HP which should be obtained from the husband based on the 2 clues? The two clues are the patient takes Ultram and Percocet, this combination of drugs cause serotonin syndrome. The physician noted that Mrs. X had excessively used narcotics, but did not put this two together with this outcome. In addition, the physician found she had not utilized narcotics for the last three to four days. The overuse of narcotics and withdrawal of narcotics could have led to altered mental status or decreased level of consciousness. As a result, the doctor encouraged Mrs. X to continue using her medications. The physician should have done a narcotic overdose or withdrawal differential diagnosis. Additional historical information includes mental health history, smoking history and OTC and narcotic drug history. The physician should ensure the husband gives a detailed description of OTC and narcotic drugs used. The husband should identify the type of drug used, dosage, dosing schedule and reasons for using the drug. A detailed drug history enables the physician identify drug interaction cases and overdose. The family members have expressed concern over the misuse of narcotics as they believe Mrs. X is misusing narcotics. Nevertheless, they do not state the narcotics used and dosage. Dietary supplements can interact with other drugs and have an adverse impact on the patient. Further, the doctor should ensure the husband gives a comprehensive description of tobacco smoking history. The husband should state the number of packets she smokes in a day. Additionally, the doctor should obtained information regarding the mental status of the patient. Elderly people are prone to mental disorders and they negatively affect their functioning. Some of the mental illnesses are depression, focal neurologic deficit, delirium, dementia among others. Mental health problems affect cognitive functioning. Understanding the mental health history helps in determining the causes of symptoms elderly patients present with. In this case, Mrs. X is unable to speak and has altered mental status. The physician needs information about Mrs. X’s mental health history to determine the cause of the decreased level of consciousness. Mental disorders such as delirium, dementia and focal neurological deficit change the mental status of the patient. 7. Based on the available information what do you think the most likely diagnosis is for Mrs. X’s altered mental status? Narcotic withdrawal has led to altered mental status. Mrs. X shows different symptoms of narcotic withdrawal including increased heart rate, blood pressure, respiration rate, diarrhea, and confusion. Other symptoms are fever and flu-like disease. Thus, Mrs. X has experienced the symptoms as she has not used narcotics for the last 4 days. References Gasper, M.L., Dillon, P.M. (2011). Clinical Simulations for Nursing Education Learner Volume. Philadephia, PA: F.A Davis Goldberg, R. (2013). Drugs Across the Spectrum. Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning Woods, A., Spratto, G. (2011). Delmar Nurses Drug Handbook 2012 Edition. Stamford,CT: Cengage Learning McCance, K. L., Huether, S. E. (2014). Pathophysiology: The Biologic Basis of Disease in Adults and Children (7th ed.). Maryland, MO: Mosby Elsevier. Boyer EW. Serotonin syndrome. http://www.uptodate.com/home. Accessed June. 12, 2014. Gasper, M.L., Dillon, P.M.(2011). Clinical Simulations for Nursing Education Learner Volume. Philadephia, PA: F.A Davis Goldberg, R. (2013). Drugs Across the Spectrum. Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning McCance, K. L., Huether, S. E. (2014). Pathophysiology: The Biologic Basis of Disease in Adults and Children (7th ed.). Maryland, MO: Mosby Elsevier. Munjal, Y.P., Sharma, S.K., Agarwal, A.K., Gupta, P. (2012). Api Textbook of Medicine. New Delhi, India: JP Medical Ltd Woods, A., Spratto, G. (2011). Delmar Nurses Drug Handbook 2012 Edition. Stamford,CT: Cengage Learning Zerwekh, J. (2012). Illustrated Study Guide for the NCLEX-RNÂ ® Exam8: Illustrated Study Guide for the NCLEX-RNÂ ® Exam. Saunders: Elsiever Health Sciences

Saturday, July 20, 2019

For Another Mans Freedom :: essays research papers

For Another Man's Freedom "All men are created equal", but the men this is pertaining to are not the men losing blood in this battle at Gettysburg. The men losing their lives in this war are men fighting for what they believe in, for the benefit of their suggested equals. Stepping forward, and then looking back; these memories, and the impact these memories have, are not and will never be forgotten. The blood which was shed in this great battle at Gettysburg could never be forgotten. The blood being spoken of by Abraham Lincoln, was thought by many to have recycled into the earth, therefore making that ground sacred; also ascending to heaven. This battle ground and the battle which occurred here is be recognized by the people of United States of America as the "rebirth" of America. The only problem with these thoughts is that these were not the thoughts that were in the heads of the soldiers at the time. During the fighting these soldiers not only did not see this as the rebirth of a nation, but had "forgotten the cause" altogether. I do not believe that these men were necessarily fighting specifically for the rights of the slaves, but rather for the rights of all men including themselves. These men were thought to be "privileged", and at the time I am sure they believed that they were taking part in an inconceivable historical event. I am sure that at that time they did not realize that this would be an ongoing struggle even three-hundred years after their existence. The soldiers entered this battle with great pride, holding their flags high, hoping to make a difference. They did make a clearly substantial impact on their society , but this quest for equality is still being pursued. This fight was not considered the only option at the time, but peaceful talks were always considered. As society knows, peace talks are not always the best way to get through to a person opposing your views. While discussion in hopes of no war exist, war is already being planned within the rights of an individual's mind. In the Killer Angels supplement, the beautiful depiction of the war grounds is harshly interrupted by the grim commencement of the fighting. These men, through their devotion to their country, were proud to stay either until they died, or until the fighting had ceased. Many references to God are made in this Second Inaugural Address, and these references are also made in the Killer Angels. The soldiers in the battle

Woman of the Year: Queen Elizabeth the Second :: essays research papers

Woman of the Year: 1953-Queen Elizabeth II   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  From the day she was born, the life of Queen Elizabeth II shows that she deserved to receive the title â€Å"Woman of the Year.† She had practical intelligence since she was a kid and she respected peoples opinions.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Queen Elizabeth II was born on April 21, 1926 at the London home of her mother's parents, Lord and Lady Strathmore. She was baptized at Buckingham Palace and named Elizabeth Alexandra Mary five weeks later. Elizabeth's father was Albert, the Duke of York. He was the second son of King George V. When his dad died in 1936, his brother was supposed to become king but he resigned. So he became king. Her mother was Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon. She was a member of the Scottish aristocracy. Her sister Margaret Rose was born on August 21, 1930, when she was 4 years old in Glamis Castle. Her grandparents were George V and Queen Mary, and Lord and Lady Strathmore.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Elizabeth and her sister were homed schooled. She was taught by Miss Marion Crawford, a young Scottish woman. At the age of 5, she usually woke up at 6 a.m. and went out for riding lessons. After that, they had lunch, lessons in French, voice and piano. In the afternoon she would play in the garden, usually with her sister and Miss Crawford. She became heiress to the throne at the age of ten. She had to learn court etiquette and diplomatic practice from her grandmother, Queen Mary. She studied the geography and history of the Commonwealth countries and the U.S. Elizabeth went to Eton College for private lessons in law. She was training for future duties. Being a princess was not easy. She had to prepare for a hard life, never make mistakes, never look bored and never be sick if possible.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Elizabeth grew up at the families London home, a large Victorian House on 145 Picadilly and at the Royal Lodge in Windsor Great Park. When her dad became King they moved to Buckingham Palace. It was more like a museum than a house. Elizabeth spent their holidays with their grandparents on both sides. When she spent it with the Strathmore it would sometimes be at the Glamis Castle. It was a rugged, rambling old Scottish fortress. â€Å"It looked like something out of a child's adventure stories-paradise of echoing rooms, long passage and mysterious stairways.† (Trease 1953, 231) Elizabeth enjoyed exploring the castle when she was young. She was 13 when World War II occurred. A year later bombs started falling on London. Elizabeth and her sister had to go to safety

Friday, July 19, 2019

Historical and cultural comparisom between Canada and USA Essay

The tourist potential of the climatic, landscape, historical & cultural resources of Canada, & New York (USA) The designations I have chosen are both on the American continent. The statistics used are based on the European traveller. Because of the vast difference in population density of Canada and the U.S.A, I have decide to centre my comparison around the vast metropolis of New York and western Canada (Calgary-lively city lake Louise-scenic resort) Canada is situated in the north of the American continent: it is one of the most visited countries in the world. This means that the number of incoming visitors is immense. Renowned for its stunningly beautiful countryside, Canada mixes the flavour of Europe with the bustle of trendy New York, The Canadian Rocky Mountains and its parks, is a destination of choice for millions of visitors annually. For over 100 years the community of Calgary have enjoyed living among the most beautiful natural surroundings in North America. â€Å"The continents territory is divided between only Canada and USA its population of over 277 million is heavily concentrated in a pocket between the grate lakes and the east coat.† (Burton 1995) As we all know New York is situated to the south of Canada and located on the west coast of the United States. New York is a vibrant, sophisticated, diverse and happening 24-hour city with plenty to see and do day or night The north east roughly revises 40 per cent of the USA population, 37.6 per cent of all domestic tourism is focused on the three states around new York, new jersey and Pennsylvania Known as the â€Å"Big Apple†, featuring the world famous buildings such as The Empire State and Chrysler buildings. New York is oozing with culture; you could easily spend a day strolling through one of its many galleries and gardens or choose from 150 museums including the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Museum of Natural History all well known across the globe. Canada : The surrounding areas of New York and down town Calgary in Canada are very similar .The major difference is the terrain, because Calgary is the gateway to the eastern rocky mountains, which rear up in a sheer wall of snow-capped peaks seventy kilometres west of the city. Only an hour's drive west along the Trans Canada Highway from the city centre is Banff National Park, the pride of Parks C... ...may come into government governs the country will affect tourism e.g. war. One of the main requirements for all tourist attractions is the customer’s wants and needs. These include accommodation transport, entertainment and facilities. â€Å"New York provides sophistication starting architecture and luxury† (Hoffman, Fainstein 2003) Canada is renowned for its natural beauty winter sports and culture. Both of these Destinations have all the factors necessary to provide tourists with an enjoyable, stimulating yet relaxed experience. Canada is another huge country and has a similar geographical pattern of physical regions and a similar distribution of population as the USA, but it has a very much smaller population of only 26.5 million in 1990 vast areas of Canada are sparsely populated and there are extensive tracts of untouched wilderness with outstanding scenic attraction their summer season is relatively short temperatures reach over 16oc. Canada pattern of domestic tourist movement is broadly similar to that of the USA Canada outbound tourism to the USA is also strongly concentrated in the far east and west, particularly in the states just across the USA boarder e.g. new York

Thursday, July 18, 2019

Reasons Why Investment Trusts Trade at a Discount

Abstract The fact that investment trusts and close-end funds in general trade at a discount has elicited debates among financial scholars and practitioners, often referred to as the closed-end puzzle. Based on this, this paper explores and explains some of the reasons that investment trusts trade at a discount. It also provides an in-depth explanation of characteristics of close-ended funds and conditions that lead to the classification of the share price as either a discount or a premium. Investment trusts trading at a discount are those trading at prices that are below their net asset value. Those trading at a price higher than the net asset value are considered as being sold at a premium. Some of the main reasons that are explored in this paper include miscalculation of the net asset values of the investment trust, taxes on realized capital gains, agency costs, managerial abilities and investor sentiment. Even with the explanations that are provided in this paper, the closed-end fund prize puzzle continues to be debated upon and researched. Introduction The fact that investment trusts often trade at a discount is an aspect that has drawn interests from academics and practitioners in the field of finance. To have a better understanding of these reasons, it is ideal to provide an exhaustive definition of investment trusts. Investment trusts, which are typical to the United Kingdom, are defined by Barnhart and Rosenstein (2010) as types of investment firms that are formed with the primary aim of holding securities for other companies and the obtainment of capital from the public issue of shares trading on the stock market. They are also referred to as closed-end funds because they only offer a fixed quantity of shares that new investors can purchase from already existing shareholders (Hartzell et al., 2006). The prices of shares of investment trusts are determined by the forces of supply and demand in the share market. As a consequence, there are incidents where the price of a share may either be higher or lower than its net asset valu e. Whenever a share trades at a price that is higher than its net asset value, it is considered to be trading at a premium. On the contrary, if a share trades at a value that is lower that its net asset value, it is considered to be trading at a discount (Berk & Stanton, 2007). In this regard, this report intends to discuss reasons why they trade at a discount. Reasons for discounting Investment Trusts One main characteristic of investment trusts and closed-end funds in general is the fact that they are permanent capital ventures and thus, the shares’ supply is fixed (Chan et al., 2008). Numerous attempts that have been made by researchers and practitioners to explain the investment trust discounts, and have resulted in conflicting results, commonly referred to as the closed-end fund puzzle. Even though these funds are known to trade at discounts, it is important to note that newly opened investment trusts and closed-end funds in general, usually begin trading at a premium of approximately 10% of their net asset value. After their initial premium trading, they shift towards trading at a discount that is at average rate of 10% within the first 120 days. After which, discounts remain substantial. In case closed-end funds are closed or terminated, there is an increase in their share prices, which in turn eliminates the existent discounts (Cherkes et al., 2009). Explanations for investment trust discounts that have been made by researchers include the risk of liquidity, the past and future performance of shares on the market and the miscalculation of the fund’s net asset value. Investor sentiment is also another reason for discount trading in investment trusts (Yanran & Liyan, 2007). This section intends to provide a more in-depth discussion of these reasons. Misestimating the Net Asset Value (NAV) This reason has been pointed out by Halkos and Krintas (2006), who argue that such miscalculations of the NAV can result from a possible accumulation of capital gains illiquid assets that had not been realized. The reason why funds with high capital appreciations that have been unrealized ought to trade at a discounted share price is that potential holders of such funds will assume a potential tax liability. In a research that was carried out by Kousenidis et al. (2011) on the effect of liquidity on closed-end funds, he established that there is a possibility of illiquid assets to be traded at a discount to provide higher expected returns. In support of inaccuracy of NAV measurement as a reason for discounts in closed-end fund trading, Yanran and Liyan(2007)suggested that when closed-end funds own large amounts illiquid assets or restricted stock that are not fairly trading in the market, their NAVs can fail to provide an accurate reflection of their true value. As a consequence of t his, the shares might either trade at a lower or higher value than the NAV. Investment trust discounts are also affected by restricted stock holdings. However, given that such holdings are often quite small or at a zero value, they do not hold as valid reasons for investment trusts trading at a discount. For investment trusts, there is usually no assurance that there will always be an available market. Therefore, this lack of an assured redemption of shares makes their valuation to be discounted. In addition to this, investment trusts that hold relatively liquid securities are valued lower than their net asset values (NAVs) at the marketplace (Cherkes et al., 2009). Putting appropriate measures in place to avoid miscalculation of the trust net asset value is vital to solve this issue. Agency Costs and Managerial Ability Discounts in closed-end funds could be a reflection of poor performance in the management of the fund or an overcharge of management fees (Bradley et al., 2010). Agency costs may also vary according to the agency issues or conflicts that may occur due to different interests between agents and principals. Managerial abilities have also been listed by researchers as being among the main factors that determine whether investment trusts can trade at a premium or a discount. The theory that investment trusts can trade at a discount if the managers charge a fee was originally proposed by Boudreaux in 1973 (Berk & Stanton, 2007). He suggested that if fund managers charge investors a fee but fail to add value to their investments, then the value of the fund is likely to be less than its NAV. In a case where managers add value to the investment trust, the reason why it might trade at a discount is when investors are made to believe that the funds’ managers are not good at investing the ir funds. If investors believe that their money is being managed by people who are good at selecting viable investments, then the fund will trade at a premium. In a research carried out on the ownership of closed-end funds Cherkes et al.(2009) established that investment trusts with larger percentage of insider ownership are likely to trade at higher discounts. This is because investors of funds that are selling at higher discounts stand a chance of receiving windfall gains in case the funds undergo immediate liquidation at their net asset value. He also established that higher expense ratios lead to higher discounts of funds because management fees are considered as being deadweight losses. Thus, discounts are used to represent the capitalization of the management fees value. Management of trusts also affects their future performances in the market, which also determine whether investment trusts are to be traded at a discount or premium. Halkos and Krintas (2006) argue that in case s where investment trusts are managed in a highly professional manner and with a positive track record, investors may have the will to pay a premium for a share of the funds. This is also due to the fact that such trusts are often expected to maintain their superior performances in future. On the other hand, funds that are expected to underperform in the market are expected to be traded at higher discounts, mainly because of the scepticism that potential investors may have for the fund (Berk & Stanton, 2007). Estimation of future performance of investment trusts can be done by comparing trends in the NAV, which are estimated on a frequent basis. It can also be done by evaluating the managerial capabilities of the fund. It can be thus argued that investment trusts whose management has a good reputation tend to perform well in the market and therefore, trade at a premium. On the contrary, poorly managed trusts fail to thrive in the market and therefore, are likely to trade at a discou nt. Taxes Another reason why investment trusts trade at a discount is taxes. According to Jin(2006), full taxes on the realized capital gains of a fund are paid for by the current shareholders, even though the highest percentage of their gains was accumulated before the investors bought the shares. Based on this, it can be argued that funds whose accumulated gains are large ought to trade at a price lower than their NAVs also suggests that investment trusts that have a high appreciation of unrealized capital sell at discounts because holders of such funds assume potential tax liabilities that depend on the holding periods of the investors. Berk and Stanton (2007) posit that discounts in closed-end funds are partially caused by the fact that investors usually lose valuable opportunities to trade tax because of holding shares in closed-end funds. Some of the tax trading approaches include individual portfolio movement. On comparing British and U.S. closed-end funds, Cherkes et al.(2009) establis hed that British funds do not have the freedom of distributing capital gains as the US funds do. In addition, shareholders have no liability in case the invested capital gains tax, except if they decide to put the holdings that they have in the fund up for sale. Yet U.S. and British closed-end funds behave in a quite similar manner. Thus, it can be concluded that discounts in investment trusts and closed-end funds cannot be explained based on country-specific tax factors. Investor Sentiment Many researchers have focused on the aspect of investor sentiment as a reason for discounts in investment trust trading. This hypothesis was proposed Lee, Shleifer and Thaler in 1991 (Yanran & Liyan, 2007). According to them, premiums and discounts in closed-end funds are determined by the attitudes of opinions that investors have about them. To explain this hypothesis, two kinds of investors are identified. These are the noise investors and rational investors. Whereas the expectations of rational investors on their asset returns are rational, noise investors’ expectations are influenced by sentiment. They have the tendency of either overestimating or underestimating the expected returns on investment. Therefore, when investment trust shares are traded, noisy and rational investors make their investments based on their respective judgments. Due to the risk associated with assets and the fact that every investor is risk averse, closed-end funds ought to trade at equilibrium pri ces that reflect opinions of the noisy and rational investors, which are often discounts. A proposal was made by Halkos and Krintas (2006) that noisy investors tend to concentrate more on the closed-end fund ownership than on the ownership of the underlying assets of the funds. Pessimism by noise traders on the future of fund drives down its price to a value lower than its NAV. This causes rational investors to avoid the buying the fund’s shares because of the risks associated with trading the funds at a discount. Chan et al. (2008) also argue that the sentiment of noise traders is stochastic and, therefore, cannot be accurately predicted by rational traders. Particularly, it is impossible for rational investors to make a perfect forecast whether noise investors will either be pessimistic or optimistic at the time that they intend to sell their assets. Due to the fact that rational traders are careful about the prices with which they will resale their assets, the unpredictabl e nature of noise traders’ sentiment increases the level of risk on the assets they intend to trade (Kousenidis et al., 2011). The biggest risk associated with noise investors is that they will be pessimistic at the time when rational investors intend to sell their assets, causing a drop in prices. Since there is always a risk of an adverse sentiment shift, the possibility of trading shares at a discount is always existent (Yanran & Liyan, 2007). Conclusion This paper has provided an in-depth explanation of some of the reasons why investment trusts usually trade at a discount. Apart from this, other aspects of investment trusts have been explained. One of the main characteristics of investment trusts that has guided the establishment of reasons discussed in this paper is that it is a closed-end fund. This means that supply of shares is fixed, regardless of the market dynamics. Therefore, fluctuations of these funds that result into premiums or discounts are mainly caused by demand factors. The main reasons why investment trusts trade at discounts include the attitudes that investors have on the fund, commonly referred to as investor sentiment, agency costs and managerial abilities, taxes and miscalculation of the net asset value of the fund. However, the factor that is contented upon by most researchers in this field of finance is investor sentiment, which is a behavioural approach of understanding this concept. Some of the other reason s that have been cited in several other researchers include the institutional ownership and performance of the trust in the market. In future research, a more specific research could be carried out by focusing on a specific investment trust in the UK. References Barnhart, S.W. & Rosenstein, S., 2010. Exchange?Traded Fund Introductions and Closed?End Fund Discounts and Volume. Financial Review, 45(4), pp.973-94. Berk, J.B. & Stanton, R., 2007. Managerial Ability, Compensation, and the Closed?End Fund Discount. The Journal of Finance, 62(2), pp.529-56. Bradley, M., Brav, A., Goldstein, I. & Jiang, W., 2010. Activist arbitrage: A study of open-ending attempts of closed-end funds. Journal of Financial Economics, 95(1), pp.1-19. Chan, J.S., Jain, R. & Xia, Y., 2008. Market segmentation, liquidity spillover, and closed-end country fund discounts. Journal of Financial Markets, 11(4), pp.377-99. Cherkes, M., Sagi, J. & Stanton, R., 2009. A liquidity-based theory of closed-end funds. Review of Financial Studies, 22(1), pp.257-97. Halkos, G.E. & Krintas, T.N., 2006. Behavioural and fundamental explanations of discounts on closed end funds: an empirical analysis. Applied Financial Economics, 16(5), pp.395-404. Hartzell, J.C., Sun, L. & Titman, S., 2006 . The effect of corporate governance on investment: evidence from real estate investment trusts. Real Estate Economics, 34(3), pp.343-76. Jin, L., 2006. Capital gains tax overhang and price pressure. The Journal of Finance, 61(3), pp.1399-431. Kousenidis, D.V., Maditinos, D.I. & Sevic, Z., 2011. Premium/Discount Of Closed-End Funds As A Measure Of Investor Sentiment: Evidence From Greece. Journal of Applied Business Research, 27(4), pp.29-52. Yanran, W. & Liyan, H., 2007. Imperfect Rationality, Sentiment and Closed end fund Puzzle. Economic Research Journal, 3, pp.117-29.

Wednesday, July 17, 2019

Industrial Relations

The security t forth ensembleuviation of the Tells com drop unfreezeeers abruptly gave cogitatesing of manners. The squeeze broke and riches months the confides, the awaken and the broad(a)(a) city of punning were engulfed by this storm. or so attri thated the ca white plague to live singlers lead uni socio-economic class rajah Nair, early(a)s to Tells r separatelyicials like Unranked. The contemporaries of the phenomena however lay in the floor of indus attempt intercourses in Tells e rattlingwhither nearly cardinal historic gunpoint. jest was integrity of the for the first cartridge clip gear industrial sum of m one(a)nessy to be established pursuant(predicate) to the policy of geographic relocation of industries out-of-door from established industrial marrow squash in the aryl sixerties.During the sixties a egress of stup culminationous applied science companies destiny up revolutionary Industries In the paronomasia fiel d. Being predominantly engine room industries, the parting attracted a great round of dexterous dieers from alto add upher t sometime(a) e very tramp Maharajahs. This bl windupforce was young, scientific disciplineight-emitting diode, meliorate ( cosmos from sound procreation Institutes much(prenominal) as TIT and semiprivate Institutes) and thither was a broad ethnical homogeneity since intimately(prenominal) of them were Amaranth- accosting. paronomasia city, though non an industrial city to the sixties, has sound established traditions of slyness wedlockism amongst the municipal histrions, the searchers and staff of early(a)(a) g everyplacenmental bodies.Above alone tradition everyy the proceedingers in the engineering industriousness argon cognise to be much than militant and break up turn all overd. Basi bellowy this has to do with the temper of the work in the engineering industry, w present man is ever the master of the elevator car. engineer railway lines require k directlyledge, perception, judgment, intention of discretion and high intellectual abilities, both of which results in a self-confident and cocky men. Added to both this Is the concomitant that the pertly histrions come up shot to paronomasia had to observe residential living quarters on the outskirts of paronomasia. The suburban districts of paronomasia grew Into work human remains areas.Both fail remunerative every(prenominal) gravely remunerative workers solutions grew deep d meet the very(prenominal) locates, principal to solely-encom diging social integ symmetryn of the workforce. every this gave revolt to strong traditions of unity, solidarity and socio-economic class sen eonnts in the al to a greater extent or less classical signified of the term. fleck the new(prenominal) industrial pennyimere were plagued by switch tout ensemble over join rivalries, semipolitical dissensions, and conflicts fo unded on caste, country and wording wordplay essential a tradition of class solidarity. In 1980, when the guard fired on the rockers of Baja Auto, some straight withdraw the other federal agenties closed in oppose, and a peg live up to charge was organize. accordinglyceforth on most study(ip) events, ad hoe lot coalescence control stick achieve delegations project cropped up. With the numerical intensiveness of workers In punning Increasing straight stumble the city has 1. 75 to 2 miss industrial workers and, together with their families, they constitute 45-50 per penny of Puns population these traditions were built In intensiveness and Impact. The companies that came up in Pun field likewise developed a broad unified approach the first entrust they excessively like the workers were practice upd in angiotensin converting enzyme area. Besides, very some companies were in mutual competitor with one and wholly(a) a nonher.Many of them were cr afty to rescind the problems they had to portray in the honest-to-goodness industrial centimeimere like Bombay. star of the first things that to the highest degree every major beau monde in the Pun area did even tally from the author was to ensure that no distantr, I. E. Professional handle northwardist, established himself in Pun. These companies were established at a sentence when the circumstance of dispense articulationism as an inevitable verbalism of industrial life had come to be accepted. In the Pun region figure out-up of work amounts per SE never led to any open strife. The companies on the reversal encouraged their nascent workforce to form interior bon ton coalescencys.Barring a a couple of(prenominal) exceptions the major mannequin of great deal union organization in the region is of familiar unions with the workers themselves acting as office-bearers. In the mid-eighties Data Samoan from Bombay attempted a break-through however did no n succeed. In a fewer companies unions committed to the Ship Seen and BGP es assert to establish their unions and could non happen upon any major headway. Against this indorsedrop, Tells is an Omni-present giant in the Pun region. bed cover dead over a massive area, it usages, 8,500 blue jot workers, or so 1,000 to 1,100 duster collar workers, 2,000 supervisory staff and 2,500 engineers and officers.The fairish age off Tells worker is 32 courses. Besides this a humongous crook of ancillaries almost Pun depend essentially on Tells for their survival. It has been unrealistic to estimate the finale of mistranslation. Estimates vary from cd units to 4,000 units. Besides, in that location is the consumption of goods and ser faults by the confederation. To get wind one or deuce examples the two industrial mobile canteens at Tells employ 450 employees. The conservancy staff figure of speech more or less 450. Tells runs one hundred ten buses on 265 routes. And all this offset has interpreted place over a bridge of 25 years.In care with the sphere-wide intent of industrial dealings in the region, the political party encouraged the com built in bed of an internal work union in their gild. The modernistic workforce organise the Tells Kamala Santayana (TTS), the very union with whom the confederation is refusing to do today. The TTS was formed in February 1968 and was immediately severalized by the come with. The physical composition of the union deliverd amongst other things that the union will non create any out of doorsr I. E. , a non-employee, as office-bearers. The chosenions were to be held one time in every terce years.It may be seted out here that profit transcriptions are normally revise once in three years. It provided that workers would elect a council of 42 peniss and these 42 would and so elect the office-bearers from amongst themselves. During this period the exertion in the troupe was ontogeny rapid ly. Normally in the older engineering industries Job varietys are precise. The content of each Job is set forth and evaluated, brands evolved, and quite a lot a worker could lawfully blood line to do Job which were beyond the rendering or grade of his Job.Right from the antecedent the alliance sought-after(a) to avoid rigid classification of Job and to allow for for itself the absolute slump to set up time postards, smart set Jobs, change employment orders and systems and flexibility in the way out of deployment of workforce. This guarding its rights. Throughout, the growth in productiveness was as a result of augment capacity workout on the one hand and attach in the productiveness of the workers on the other. The amplification in productiveness was mainly cod to intensification of the workers work output. accordingly in 1980 the fellowship produced 14,000 vehicles.This change magnitude to 0,000 vehicles in 1988 (though the targeted payoff was 33,000). In 1 981, 40 figure of speech were produced in a day, today it is one hundred twenty-five chassis. Throughout, the workforce remained constant. in that respect was no major technological upgrading. The scarcely areas where some technical modifications were do were in fatigue-related areas, I. E. Where fatigue of the workers reached a layover where he became counter-productive. In fix up to facilitate this the participation introduced a issuance of schemes de write to make optimum use of the workforce. In 1976, the TTS and the social club gisttly finalized a adroitness upbeat scheme. to a lower place this scheme a worker could upgrade his skill and go once against undeniable change over tests by and by onwardsward which he would be empower to two increments. Thereafter a versatility benefit scheme was introduced, whereby a workman who had learnt a virgin trade besides his own could after release the requisite tests get three increments. on the whole this made it achievable for the conjunction to hold its workforce with breeze through flexibility after all, the ships union believed a worker during his work hours was at the play alongs electric pig to get as much yield from him as was realistic..The internal attractership of the TTS could non perceive the uphold of the federations policies. In 1976 it consented to the skill benefit scheme. The pinch spread amongst the workers that the union leadinghip was non standing up for their rights, while the focusing was asserting its rights. In the 1977 TTS elections the workers elected a new leading which was perceive to be more militant. Under this leading the workers plowed their first flow which went on for 22 days. This rent was against what is popularly describe as ganging of mechanisms and picture designations.Ganging of machine meant that a worker who was until and so take to bill Jobs on one machine and come across to it was directly postulate to load one bo b on one machine and immediately attend to a nonher machine or some(prenominal) machines depending on the nature of the Job earlier returning to the first one. Double designations meant one worker was send fored upon to do two Jobs. While the former method clubbed machines the latter clubbed Jobs. The offer establishment intervened and referred the difference for adjudication after which the settle was stated illicit. A tot of activists were reject and other neutralized, and unless others won over.The workers attri plainlyed the loser of the call off and the inhibition of the TTS leaders to the absence of strong outside leadership and harbour. They wherefore turned to the Sara Ashrams Shantung, a trade union affiliated to the Ala Ionians Party. The social status of the Sara Ashrams Shantung was non outlying(prenominal)-flung over all cheat on ats and departments, and was strong in a few plants and departments. In 1980 the workers of the foundry section b egan fervor. formerly again this was against work norms and methods. The play along declared a lock-out of the foundry which other department workers in keep going of the foundry workers.The foundry workers uplift fizzled out. The workers were compelled to fracture an below winning of good conduct and cover up back to work. some more activists were dismiss after this tempest. In order to thwarting the Sara Ashrams Shantung, the familiarity had to cuss on the TTS leadership amongst other things. The TTS leadership, in the absence of over-whelming support of workers had to align with the tutelage to defeat the Sara Ashrams Shantung. In the process the TTS leadership acquired privileges and concessions from the confederacy that estranged them more and more from the workers.If workers were intimidated or bullyrag methods were apply inside the phoner premise the wariness directed the other way. Workers guess the follow real circuited toughs to deal with the situ ation. Officers of the party deny this at times and at other times have justify it maxim boss near methods moldiness be countered by strong-arm methods sometimes. The go with excessively began to focus on what it describes as its wellorganism activities. Since 1981 there has been a sharp increase in industrial co-operatives of employees formed with the ready support of the ships companion.Between 1981 and 1987 the beau monde has helped establish cabaret industrial cooperatives, for respective(a) purposes like recycle of scrap wood, conservancy, manufacturing safety device shoes, printing, computer revise, matt-uping, foundry-casting, stamp battery cable assembly, welding, etcetera Previously such societies were limited to assist widows of deceased employees, canteens and the like. flat it spilled over the industrial production. These co-operatives were intended to provide employment to the dependents and family members of the employees. The TTS leadership was the main divisor for the implementation of these schemes.They thus acquired enormous pigeon berry over the workers. though out of a wide workforce of 9,600, unless 252 employees were members of the ix cooperatives formed mingled with 1981 and 1987, and these cooperatives employed 698 rocker, the worker could always accept that by be on the right side of the TTS leadership, he could better the position of himself and his family. Besides it put enormous resources at the disposal of the TTS leadership. For the year 1987-88 alone the total dollar volume of these ball club co-operatives was over RSI. 107 lack.The leadership of the TTS increasingly bewildered their identity as spokesmen of the workers. This got reflected in their panache of functioning as union office-bearers. Issues were no longer be on the tail end of any clearest principles or rights, but on ad hoc seat. They were no longer obstinate on the basis of the workers strength but the clout of their office. s ometimes issues relating to production and sell floor problems were determined satisfactorily, but most often they were non. It was an anomic leadership providing fuddle solutions.While these trends were developing within the TTS leadership, amongst the workers other developments were taking place. After the nonstarter of the foundry workers agitation, the workers began to look once again towards the internal union the TTS. Leaders, raja Nair and a few others who they perceived as being better. In the ginning of 1982, genus rajah Nair was elected worldwide secretary of the TTS. along with other members of the negotiating team, he too sign-language(a) the 1981 resoluteness on earnings edict. This settlement elicited widespread pettishness and peevishness among the workers.When compared to the increase in their productivity and the benefit of the association the workers mat up the settlement gave them very little. The 1979 settlement had rewrite the hires by a mongst RSI cl and RSI 210. The 1982 settlement had increased them by RSI. 350 to RSI. 370. Besides, the skill benefit and versatility benefits schemes had been modify to give more leverage to the focus and o say to the union in matters relating to production. A monstrous number of workers who pull together at the companys access beat up the leaders and act in infernal region throwing.It is verbalise that at this Juncture genus raja Nair publicly admitted that he had signed the settlement under drive from other citizens citizens deputation members. He had been recruited in the company near 1979. When he became general secretary he had barely six years service scum bag him. It is difficult at this Juncture to valuate what subjective factors weighed with him in this turnabout. merely from the address of view of misgiving the Tells agitation this is scarcely important. What is important is in the lead the workers it refurnished his image as an honest leader.The work ers at this breaker point undeniable a poor boy in whom they could concentrate their aspirations. The steps that the company took thereafter completely reinforced that need and catapulted one single(a) into the position off hero. After the disturbances at the companys gate in kinsfolk 1982, the company declared pause of operations for over a hebdomad and demanded good conduct bonds from the workers. The workers gave this bond and returned to work. A few weeks after this the company suspend genus Raja Nair and after holding an inquiry smiled him from service in the beginning of 1983.To the company this was sure way to play rebellion. It had yielded results in the by, more curiously in 1977 and 1980 and there was no actor why it should not succeed this time. What the company did not take into account is the fact that the workers too were teaching something from their experiences and were growing more mature in their bring ining of the company. coincidently it was during this time that Raja Nair himself was begeted in a murder charge. He was under trial for six months or so after which he was execute for want of evidence.This factor added to his image as a leader capable of taking on the Tells management amongst the workers. The rebel base within the TTS presently rallied under the waft of the Raja Nair add-in (RAN) and began functional as a group. In December 1984 once again the TTS elections were held. In these elections RAN put up a board of 20 candidates of whom 17 won the elections. In a delegacy of 42 members they were calm a minority and from this point of time the RAN worked as a f process within the TTS. The RAN did not focus much on the wage revision contract of 1985.They concentrated instead on varianting up grassroots organization. In order to do this, they first of all changed their style of functioning. Until forthwith by integrity of their working hours. The leaders were not required to work on the shop floor. They wer e precondition secretarial assistant by the company for their union work. The RAN distinct they would not aid any of these privileges. They began to work on the shop floor. As a result, they were able to build up a rapport with the workers and tackle day-to-day shop floor problems directly. Workers too began to approach them for closure day-to-day problems.Throughout the period between 1983 and 1987 the RAN think on grammatical construction grassroots support and organization. All this time Raja Nair was fast associated with the work of the activists of around 2,000 workers and staunch sympathizers of around 4,000 workers. Together with the fence-sitters the RAN had the kindle support of the Tells workers. In December 1987 when the TTS elections took place, the RAN put up a panel for all the seats. The RAN won 34 out of 42 seats. More evidential was the fact that all the old leadership of the TTS lost staidly in the elections.The language this new committee spoke was dif ferent. It actively took up issues on the shop floor. It apparent movemented the supervisors on the methods of work scattering and allotment, on transfers and quantum of work and other issues. It must be mentioned here that the manner in which the productivity of the workers had been raise, as described above, required extensive supervision. The ratio of supervisors to workers is high in the company, roughly around 110. The supervisory staff rang the deject and the management pushed the little terror buttons. As a result a chain of events followed leading to the present impasse.At this stage it may be possible to represent that had the management shown greater statesmanship, balanced view ND taste what followed need not have happened. But today this question will only be academic. In May 1988 the company suspend and later dismissed the vice president of the TTS. A group of workers went on a one-day thirst fall down. The rest of the workers boycotted tea, snacks and lunch in the companys canteen as a mark of solidarity with the starve strikers. In July 1988 the TTS held a general body brush and unflinching to amend their constitution to allow addition to honorary members who were not Tells employees.Since there is a provision in the Trade sodality Act which allows admission charge of honorary members, and there is nothing unknown or illegal about the amendment, the record-keeper of trade unions, Pun, allowed the amendments and registered the same. Raja Nair was then admitted as honorary member and elected working president. The wage covenant had in the in the slowdown expired and the TTS straight terminated the old agreement and submitted a fresh consider of demands. The management refused to speak to the negotiating committee on the ground that they would not deal with outsiders.Later the reasons for not talking to the committee kept ever-changing giving switch off to doubts among workers and the outside world of managements bona fide . At this stage the governing body on its own effect referred the issue of wage revision for adjudication. As yet there was nothing to assign that anything extra-ordinary company took the stand that the matters had been referred for adjudication to a homage by the government and so they would not negotiate with the new committee as the matter was subsidize. The workers were intelligiblely not in agreement. Before Dalai of 1988 came the subvention issue.A large number of workers refused to accept bonus. The company declared 8. 33 per cent confident(p) a production bonus of RSI. 1,207. 987-88 had been an dainty year for the company financially. Between 1985-86 when the delay settlement was signed and 1987-88 when the attached wage revision became due, turnover had gone up 37 per cent, sugar profits by 66 per cent from RSI. 16. 17 outcome to RSI. 26. 95 core and value added by 43 per cent. The workers could not therefore understand why only 8. 33 per cent was gainful by wa y of statutory bonus. A large number of workers (around 1,100) who had been attractd into evaluate the bonus returned the same.All these years the company had work outed the TTS subscription from the workers reward and paid it to the TTS. This year the company refused to deduct the subscription. The TTS had to therefore organize a rank and file collection drive. It subject accounts in banks around the residential areas and called the workers to deposit the subscription amounts in those accounts. Workers began veneer up in banks. By January 31, 3,811 members had paid subscriptions, by the end of February another 1,810 had paid and by the end of touch a further 1,722. By now the company began suspending active supporters of the new committee.It Justified its bring through by saying that it would not affirm undiscipline. Amongst the workers this argument had no takers because workers knew the company had allowed and tolerated far more indiscipline from the older committee. I n the midst of all this the workers resorted too dick down strike in the beginning of January 1989. This agitation was amicable and nonionised. On January 30, rattan cane Data was to have visited the grinder at Pun. On January 29 Raja Nair was suddenly detained by the practice of law preventively under division 151 of the Criminal mathematical function Code.This action triggered a jolt of anger. though he had been detained on the January 29 the watchword spread to the factory on the 30th. The pursuit day, when he was produced in hail, rockers equanimous in the coquette premises spontaneously. The numbers game began to swell. After arguments for his release, the head was reserved for the next day and the constabulary tried to worst him away. But workers, whose number was swelling all the time, refused to let the jeep go and resolved to sit in the court premises until the release of Raja Nair. The police then applied to the court and Raja Nair was released.In the l ag certain events happened outside the trade union scene in Tells which was to have a great impaction on the Tells workers struggle. In January 1989, the Trade sum Council was formed. In the past Joint action committees had been formed by the trade unions in Pun on the basis of events or issues. For sometime the thought that the Trade conjunction Council be accomplished as stable body had been suggested by a number of unions, but unions were as well as cautious since in the past occasion councils tended to fizzle out after an agitation or campaign.For six to eight committee had fizzled out. In the retardation Baja auto workers in pose were having their agitation and workers in Pun through a Joint action committee compile funds for the Arranged workers. During this time it was dogged to form the trade onion council. The defining was announced on January 19, 1989 at a public skirmish of over 20,000 workers and 31 organizations. The general desire of the Pun workers ther efore was responsive to the Tells workers. concisely after the arrest and release of Raja Nair, the Tells Employees coalescency (TIES) was formed in February 1989.The company was all along saying they could not negotiate with the TTS because the matters were pending in court. straightaway place came out with a hand bill that the company was willing to negotiate with them. The members of the old committee who had lost in the TTS election were office-bearers of the TIES. The position then challenged the berth of the TTS in the courts. fivesome office-bearers of the TTS went on a hurt strike outside the company and the workers boycotted canteen nutrition in solidarity.On the intervention of Madman Banana, the shielder minister for Pun in the Maharajahs council of ministers, the aridity strike was withdrawn and assurances were made that their problems would be looked into by the government. The workers were under howling(a) pressure to Join the tee between middle of Februar y and borderland but the membership of the TEE could not go beyond a few hundred. The company now started saying since the asperity of the TTS elections was before the courts they would not talk to TTS unless the issue was resolute.Within the company the ambience was tense and there was widespread aroma that the company would lock-out the factory. The leaders foots had prepared the workers and obdurate that nothing should be done in the company which may precipitate a lock-out even under gravest provocation. At this point on March 14, 1989, one of the office-bearers of the TTS was assaulted badly within the company premises by TEE members. Since the TTS had attached strict teaching method not to do anything that would precipitate a lock-out, the workers remained under control, but the anger had cached flash-point.The avocation day TEE members who were on their way to work were accosted and defeat up in various separate of the city. Now the company suspended around 70 75 pe rsons of the TTS for engaging in violence. The company now began to say they would not talk to TTS because they had enmeshed in violence. as yet when things became too obvious the company suspended and charge-sheeted one of the office-bearers but continued to recognize the TIES. In the meantime the chief ministers tale in the Vida Saba that the Tells must talk to the TTS and government would mediate raised the hopes of the workers.The TTS in the meantime began to step up its organizational work and began holding brushs in the residential localities of workers. These confluences though intended for Tells workers were attend by other workers in the locality. The Tells agitation was spreading to those factories too. It appears that at this point other managements in the region began to get flighty about the developments in Tells and began to press for a resolution of the departure there. On sumptuous 18 was the annual general meeting was seen as the clothes designer of the in dustrial relation policy in Tells, was not addicted further annexe after retirement.The company temporarily clubbed the state of personnel with production by handing charge of industrial relations to the works replacement director (auto division). All this also raised the hopes of the workers and gave a savour that the changes reflected a follow-up by the company. As a matter of fact tripartite meetings were fixed between TTS, the company and the government. though nothing veritable came of it further meetings were fixed. and so suddenly the company signed a wage agreement within the TEE on kinsfolk 19. By the wage agreement the company sought to give a make grow of RSI. 85 on an average.Perhaps it was snarl this would lure the workers into the fold of TEE. The company then sought to apply to the industrial tribunal to pass an award in terms of the agreement so that it medical dressing on all the workers. The workers had reached a point of desperation. On kinsfolk 20 t he TTS organized a abundant rally of Tells workers, where on the spot the workers decided to fast one(prenominal)ly. nigh 6,000 workers are estimated to have gone on a indefinite hunger strike. This was in the middle of the city, and generated a massive wave of public benevolence. For the first time possibly a racketing room conducted an opinion crownwork on a workers agitation.The opinion poll conducted by the marketing and Econometric Consultancy benefit revealed that 86 per cent of the respondents, all Pun citizens, were aware of the Tells issue, 82 per cent said they believed TTS was the majority union, 68 per cent felt workers were peaceful in their methods of agitation, 69 per cent felt the union was Justified in its agitation and 67 per cent felt the struggle of the Tells workers was for participatory rights. The Trade total Council called for a one-day sympathy strike by Pun workers which was a complete success. advertise tripartite negotiations had been fixed f or October 1 .On September 29, the trade substance Council gave a call for demonstrations and street meetings in as many an(prenominal) parts of the city as possible by the workers of other companies to draw attention on the Tells issue. The police used this as a affectation and swooped down on the hunger strikers and arrested over 4,000 Tells workers. Of these 2,000 were taken in buses and left off on the outskirts of the city, and 2,000 or so were taken into custody at places like military rank and Nashua. The TTS had been in predicament about how to call of the mass hunger strike without show to be back racking or weakening.The police action solved that problem. The company had not been too keen on the tripartite meeting and that problem too was resolved as no meeting could take place after the arrests. This triggered off a new wave of anger which spread passim the city. The Trade Union Council called for an indefinite industrial strike of Pun workers. But the lot of Tel ls workers who had been on hunger strike for 10 days being beaten, pushed into buses and carried away evoked stone throwing and legion(predicate) incidents all over Source stinting & Political Weekly,industrial RelationsThe tolerance of the Tells workers suddenly gave way. The storm broke and wealth months the workforce, the management and the entire city of Pun were engulfed by this storm. Some attributed the cause to workers leaders like Raja Nair, others to Tells officials like Unranked. The genesis of the phenomena however lay in the history of industrial relations in Tells over nearly fifteen years. Pun was one of the first industrial centre to be established pursuant to the policy of geographic relocation of industries away from established industrial centre in the aryl sixties.During the sixties a number of large engineering companies set up new Industries In the Pun region. Being predominantly engineering industries, the region attracted a large number of skilled workers f rom all over Maharajahs. This workforce was young, skilled, educated (being from technical training Institutes such as TIT and private Institutes) and there was a broad cultural homogeneity since most of them were Amaranth-speaking. Pun city, though not an industrial city to the sixties, has well established traditions of trade unionism amongst the municipal workers, the searchers and staff of other governmental bodies.Above all traditionally the workers in the engineering industry are known to be more militant and better organized. Basically this has to do with the nature of the work in the engineering industry, where man is invariably the master of the machine. Engineering Jobs require knowledge, perception, judgment, use of discretion and higher intellectual abilities, all of which results in a self-confident and assertive workforce. Added to all this Is the fact that the new workers coming to Pun had to find residential quarters on the outskirts of Pun. The suburban districts of Pun grew Into working class areas.Both better paid any badly paid workers settlements grew within the same locates, leading to extensive social integration of the workforce. All this gave rise to strong traditions of unity, solidarity and class sentiments in the most classical sense of the term. While the other industrial centre were plagued by trade union rivalries, political dissensions, and conflicts founded on caste, region and language Pun developed a tradition of class solidarity. In 1980, when the police fired on the rockers of Baja Auto, almost immediately the other factories closed in support, and a joint action committee was formed.Thereafter on most major events, ad hoe trade union Joint action committees have cropped up. With the numerical strength of workers In Pun Increasing today the city has 1. 75 to 2 lack industrial workers and, together with their families, they constitute 45-50 per cent of Puns population these traditions were reinforced In strength and Impact . The companies that came up in Pun region too developed a broad unified approach the first place they too like the workers were concentrated in one area. Besides, very few companies were in mutual competition with one another.Many of them were keen to avoid the problems they had to confront in the older industrial centre like Bombay. One of the first things that almost every major company in the Pun region did right from the beginning was to ensure that no outsider, I. E. Professional trade unionist, established himself in Pun. These companies were established at a time when the fact of trade unionism as an inevitable aspect of industrial life had come to be accepted. In the Pun region formation of trade unions per SE never led to any ajar strife. The companies on the contrary encouraged their nascent workforce to form internal company unions.Barring a few exceptions the major pattern of trade union organization in the region is of internal unions with the workers themselves acting as office-bearers. In the mid-eighties Data Samoan from Bombay attempted a break-through but did not succeed. In a few companies unions affiliated to the Ship Seen and BGP tried to establish their unions but could not make any major headway. Against this backdrop, Tells is an Omni-present giant in the Pun region. Spread dead over a vast area, it employs, 8,500 blue collar workers, around 1,000 to 1,100 white collar workers, 2,000 supervisory staff and 2,500 engineers and officers.The average age off Tells worker is 32 years. Besides this a large number of ancillaries around Pun depend basically on Tells for their survival. It has been impossible to estimate the extent of mistranslation. Estimates vary from 400 units to 4,000 units. Besides, there is the consumption of goods and services by the company. To take one or two examples the two industrial canteens at Tells employ 450 employees. The conservancy staff number around 450. Tells runs 110 buses on 265 routes. And all this grow th has taken place over a span of 25 years.In keeping with the general pattern of industrial relations in the region, the company encouraged the formation of an internal trade union in their company. The new workforce formed the Tells Kamala Santayana (TTS), the very union with whom the company is refusing to negotiate today. The TTS was formed in February 1968 and was immediately recognized by the company. The constitution of the union provided amongst other things that the union will not have any outsider I. E. , a non-employee, as office-bearers. The elections were to be held once in every three years.It may be pointed out here that wage agreements are normally revised once in three years. It provided that workers would elect a council of 42 members and these 42 would then elect the office-bearers from amongst themselves. During this time the production in the company was growing rapidly. Normally in the older engineering industries Job classifications are precise. The content of each Job is described and evaluated, grades evolved, and quite often a worker could lawfully decline to do Job which were beyond the description or grade of his Job.Right from the beginning the company sought to avoid rigid classification of Job and to reserve for itself the absolute right to set up time standards, club Jobs, change production methods and systems and flexibility in the matter of deployment of workforce. This guarding its rights. Throughout, the growth in productivity was as a result of increased capacity utilization on the one hand and increase in the productivity of the workers on the other. The increase in productivity was mainly due to intensification of the workers work output. Thus in 1980 the company produced 14,000 vehicles.This increased to 0,000 vehicles in 1988 (though the targeted production was 33,000). In 1981, 40 chassis were produced in a day, today it is 125 chassis. Throughout, the workforce remained constant. There was no major technological upgra ding. The only areas where some technical modifications were made were in fatigue-related areas, I. E. Where fatigue of the workers reached a point where he became counter-productive. In order to facilitate this the company introduced a number of schemes designed to make optimum use of the workforce. In 1976, the TTS and the company Jointly finalized a skill benefit scheme.Under this scheme a worker could upgrade his skill and give required trade tests after which he would be entitled to two increments. Thereafter a versatility benefit scheme was introduced, whereby a workman who had learnt a new trade besides his own could after passing the requisite tests get three increments. All this made it possible for the company to utilize its workforce with complete flexibility after all, the company believed a worker during his work hours was at the companys disposal to get as much production from him as was possible..The internal leadership of the TTS could not perceive the impact of the companys policies. In 1976 it consented to the skill benefit scheme. The feeling spread amongst the workers that the union leadership was not standing up for their rights, while the management was asserting its rights. In the 1977 TTS elections the workers elected a new leadership which was perceived to be more militant. Under this leadership the workers conducted their first strike which went on for 22 days. This strike was against what is popularly described as ganging of machines and double designations.Ganging of machine meant that a worker who was until then required to load Jobs on one machine and attend to it was now required to load one bob on one machine and immediately attend to another machine or several machines depending on the nature of the Job before returning to the first one. Double designations meant one worker was called upon to do two Jobs. While the former method clubbed machines the latter clubbed Jobs. The state government intervened and referred the dispute f or adjudication after which the strike was declared illegal. A number of activists were dismissed and other neutralized, and yet others won over.The workers attributed the failure of the strike and the crushing of the TTS leadership to the absence of strong outside leadership and support. They then turned to the Sara Ashrams Shantung, a trade union affiliated to the Ala Ionians Party. The membership of the Sara Ashrams Shantung was not widespread over all shops and departments, and was concentrated in a few plants and departments. In 1980 the workers of the foundry section began agitation. Once again this was against work norms and methods. The company declared a lock-out of the foundry which other department workers in support of the foundry workers.The foundry workers agitation fizzled out. The workers were compelled to give an undertaking of good conduct and report back to work. Some more activists were dismissed after this agitation. In order to defeat the Sara Ashrams Shantung, the company had to rely on the TTS leadership amongst other things. The TTS leadership, in the absence of over-whelming support of workers had to align with the management to defeat the Sara Ashrams Shantung. In the process the TTS leadership acquired privileges and concessions from the company that alienated them more and more from the workers.If workers were intimidated or strong-arm methods were used within the company premises the management looked the other way. Workers say the company actually circuited toughs to deal with the situation. Officers of the company deny this at times and at other times have Justified it saying strong-arm methods must be countered by strong-arm methods sometimes. The company also began to focus on what it describes as its welfare activities. Since 1981 there has been a sharp increase in industrial co-operatives of employees formed with the active support of the company.Between 1981 and 1987 the company has helped establish nine industrial cooperat ives, for various purposes like recycling of scrap wood, conservancy, manufacturing safety shoes, printing, computer revise, felting, foundry-casting, battery cable assembly, welding, etc. Previously such societies were limited to helping widows of deceased employees, canteens and the like. Now it spilled over the industrial production. These co-operatives were intended to provide employment to the dependents and family members of the employees. The TTS leadership was the main agent for the implementation of these schemes.They therefore acquired enormous clout over the workers. Though out of a total workforce of 9,600, only 252 employees were members of the nine cooperatives formed between 1981 and 1987, and these cooperatives employed 698 rocker, the worker could always hope that by being on the right side of the TTS leadership, he could better the position of himself and his family. Besides it put enormous resources at the disposal of the TTS leadership. For the year 1987-88 alone the total turnover of these nine co-operatives was over RSI. 107 lack.The leadership of the TTS increasingly lost their identity as spokesmen of the workers. This got reflected in their style of functioning as union office-bearers. Issues were no longer represented on the basis of any clearest principles or rights, but on ad hoc basis. They were no longer resolved on the basis of the workers strength but the clout of their office. Sometimes issues relating to production and shop floor problems were resolved satisfactorily, but most often they were not. It was an alienated leadership providing patchwork solutions.While these trends were developing within the TTS leadership, amongst the workers other developments were taking place. After the failure of the foundry workers agitation, the workers began to look once again towards the internal union the TTS. Leaders, Raja Nair and a few others who they perceived as being better. In the ginning of 1982, Raja Nair was elected general secr etary of the TTS. Along with other members of the negotiating team, he too signed the 1981 settlement on wage revision. This settlement evoked widespread anger and resentment among the workers.When compared to the increase in their productivity and the profits of the company the workers felt the settlement gave them very little. The 1979 settlement had revised the wages by between RSI 150 and RSI 210. The 1982 settlement had increased them by RSI. 350 to RSI. 370. Besides, the skill benefit and versatility benefits schemes had been modified to give more leverage to the management and o say to the union in matters relating to production. A large number of workers who gathered at the companys gate beat up the leaders and engaged in stone throwing.It is said that at this Juncture Raja Nair publicly admitted that he had signed the settlement under pressure from other committee members. He had been recruited in the company around 1979. When he became general secretary he had barely six y ears service behind him. It is difficult at this Juncture to assess what subjective factors weighed with him in this turnabout. But from the point of view of understanding the Tells agitation this is hardly important. What is important is before the workers it refurnished his image as an honest leader.The workers at this stage needed a hero in whom they could concentrate their aspirations. The steps that the company took thereafter only reinforced that need and catapulted one individual into the position off hero. After the disturbances at the companys gate in September 1982, the company declared suspension of operations for over a week and demanded good conduct bonds from the workers. The workers gave this bond and returned to work. A few weeks after this the company suspended Raja Nair and after holding an enquiry smiled him from service in the beginning of 1983.To the company this was sure way to tackle rebellion. It had yielded results in the past, more particularly in 1977 and 1980 and there was no reason why it should not succeed this time. What the company did not take into account is the fact that the workers too were learning something from their experiences and were growing more mature in their understanding of the company. Coincidentally it was during this time that Raja Nair himself was arrested in a murder charge. He was under trial for six months or so after which he was discharged for want of evidence.This factor added to his image as a leader capable of taking on the Tells management amongst the workers. The rebel group within the TTS now rallied under the banner of the Raja Nair Panel (RAN) and began working as a group. In December 1984 once again the TTS elections were held. In these elections RAN put up a panel of 20 candidates of whom 17 won the elections. In a committee of 42 members they were still a minority and from this point of time the RAN worked as a faction within the TTS. The RAN did not focus much on the wage revision agreement o f 1985.They concentrated instead on building up grassroots organization. In order to do this, they first of all changed their style of functioning. Until now by virtue of their working hours. The leaders were not required to work on the shop floor. They were given secretarial assistance by the company for their union work. The RAN decided they would not avail any of these privileges. They began to work on the shop floor. As a result, they were able to build up a rapport with the workers and tackle day-to-day shop floor problems directly. Workers too began to approach them for resolving day-to-day problems.Throughout the period between 1983 and 1987 the RAN focused on building grassroots support and organization. All this time Raja Nair was closely associated with the work of the activists of around 2,000 workers and staunch sympathizers of around 4,000 workers. Together with the fence-sitters the RAN had the overwhelming support of the Tells workers. In December 1987 when the TTS el ections took place, the RAN put up a panel for all the seats. The RAN won 34 out of 42 seats. More significant was the fact that all the old leadership of the TTS lost badly in the elections.The language this new committee spoke was different. It actively took up issues on the shop floor. It questioned the supervisors on the methods of work distribution and allotment, on transfers and quantum of work and other issues. It must be mentioned here that the manner in which the productivity of the workers had been raised, as described above, required extensive supervision. The ratio of supervisors to workers is high in the company, roughly around 110. The supervisory staff rang the alarm and the management pushed the panic buttons. As a result a chain of events followed leading to the present impasse.At this stage it may be possible to argue that had the management shown greater statesmanship, balanced Judgment ND perceptiveness what followed need not have happened. But today this questio n will only be academic. In May 1988 the company suspended and later dismissed the vice president of the TTS. A group of workers went on a one-day hunger strike. The rest of the workers boycotted tea, snacks and lunch in the companys canteen as a mark of solidarity with the hunger strikers. In July 1988 the TTS held a general body meeting and decided to amend their constitution to allow admission to honorary members who were not Tells employees.Since there is a provision in the Trade Union Act which allows admission of honorary members, and there is nothing unusual or illegal about the amendment, the registrar of trade unions, Pun, allowed the amendments and registered the same. Raja Nair was then admitted as honorary member and elected working president. The wage agreement had in the meantime expired and the TTS now terminated the old agreement and submitted a fresh charter of demands. The management refused to speak to the negotiating committee on the ground that they would not de al with outsiders.Later the reasons for not talking to the committee kept changing giving rise to doubts among workers and the outside world of managements bona fide. At this stage the government on its own motion referred the issue of wage revision for adjudication. As yet there was nothing to indicate that anything extra-ordinary company took the stand that the matters had been referred for adjudication to a tribunal by the government and so they would not negotiate with the new committee as the matter was subsidize. The workers were evidently not in agreement. Before Dalai of 1988 came the bonus issue.A large number of workers refused to accept bonus. The company declared 8. 33 per cent plus a production bonus of RSI. 1,207. 987-88 had been an excellent year for the company financially. Between 1985-86 when the last settlement was signed and 1987-88 when the next wage revision became due, turnover had gone up 37 per cent, net profits by 66 per cent from RSI. 16. 17 core to RSI. 26. 95 core and value added by 43 per cent. The workers could not therefore understand why only 8. 33 per cent was paid by way of statutory bonus. A large number of workers (around 1,100) who had been lured into accepting the bonus returned the same.All these years the company had deducted the TTS subscription from the workers wages and paid it to the TTS. This year the company refused to deduct the subscription. The TTS had to therefore organize a membership collection drive. It opened accounts in banks around the residential areas and called the workers to deposit the subscription amounts in those accounts. Workers began lining up in banks. By January 31, 3,811 members had paid subscriptions, by the end of February another 1,810 had paid and by the end of March a further 1,722. By now the company began suspending active supporters of the new committee.It Justified its action by saying that it would not tolerate indiscipline. Amongst the workers this argument had no takers because workers knew the company had allowed and tolerated far more indiscipline from the older committee. In the midst of all this the workers resorted too tool down strike in the beginning of January 1989. This agitation was peaceful and organized. On January 30, Rattan Data was to have visited the factory at Pun. On January 29 Raja Nair was suddenly detained by the police preventively under Section 151 of the Criminal Procedure Code.This action triggered a wave of anger. Though he had been detained on the January 29 the news spread to the factory on the 30th. The following day, when he was produced in court, rockers collected in the court premises spontaneously. The numbers began to swell. After arguments for his release, the Judgment was reserved for the next day and the police tried to whisk him away. But workers, whose number was swelling all the time, refused to let the Jeep go and resolved to sit in the court premises until the release of Raja Nair. The police then applied to the co urt and Raja Nair was released.In the meantime certain events happened outside the trade union scene in Tells which was to have a great impact on the Tells workers struggle. In January 1989, the Trade Union Council was formed. In the past Joint action committees had been formed by the trade unions in Pun on the basis of events or issues. For sometime the idea that the Trade Union Council be constituted as permanent body had been suggested by a number of unions, but unions were also cautious since in the past joint councils tended to fizzle out after an agitation or campaign.For six to eight committee had fizzled out. In the meantime Baja auto workers in Arranged were having their agitation and workers in Pun through a Joint action committee collected funds for the Arranged workers. During this time it was decided to form the trade onion council. The formation was announced on January 19, 1989 at a public meeting of over 20,000 workers and 31 organizations. The general mood of the Pu n workers therefore was responsive to the Tells workers. Soon after the arrest and release of Raja Nair, the Tells Employees Union (TIES) was formed in February 1989.The company was all along saying they could not negotiate with the TTS because the matters were pending in court. Now TEE came out with a hand bill that the company was willing to negotiate with them. The members of the old committee who had lost in the TTS election were office-bearers of the TIES. The TEE then challenged the status of the TTS in the courts. Five office-bearers of the TTS went on a hunger strike outside the company and the workers boycotted canteen food in solidarity.On the intervention of Madman Banana, the guardian minister for Pun in the Maharajahs council of ministers, the hunger strike was withdrawn and assurances were made that their problems would be looked into by the government. The workers were under tremendous pressure to Join the TEE between middle of February and March but the membership of the TEE could not go beyond a few hundred. The company now started saying since the validity of the TTS elections was before the courts they would not talk to TTS unless the issue was decided.Within the company the atmosphere was tense and there was widespread feeling that the company would lock-out the factory. The leaders foots had prepared the workers and decided that nothing should be done in the company which may precipitate a lock-out even under gravest provocation. At this point on March 14, 1989, one of the office-bearers of the TTS was assaulted badly within the company premises by TEE members. Since the TTS had given strict instruction not to do anything that would precipitate a lock-out, the workers remained under control, but the anger had cached flash-point.The following day TEE members who were on their way to work were accosted and beaten up in various parts of the city. Now the company suspended around 70 75 persons of the TTS for engaging in violence. The company now began to say they would not talk to TTS because they had engaged in violence. However when things became too obvious the company suspended and charge-sheeted one of the office-bearers but continued to recognize the TIES. In the meantime the chief ministers statement in the Vida Saba that the Tells must talk to the TTS and government would mediate raised the hopes of the workers.The TTS in the meantime began to step up its organizational work and began holding meetings in the residential localities of workers. These meetings though intended for Tells workers were attended by other workers in the locality. The Tells agitation was spreading to those factories too. It appears that at this point other managements in the region began to get anxious about the developments in Tells and began to press for a resolution of the dispute there. On August 18 was the annual general meeting was seen as the architect of the industrial relation policy in Tells, was not given further extension afte r retirement.The company temporarily clubbed the responsibility of personnel with production by handing charge of industrial relations to the works deputy director (auto division). All this also raised the hopes of the workers and gave a feeling that the changes reflected a reappraisal by the company. As a matter of fact tripartite meetings were fixed between TTS, the company and the government. Though nothing substantial came of it further meetings were fixed. Then suddenly the company signed a wage agreement within the TEE on September 19. By the wage agreement the company sought to give a rise of RSI. 85 on an average.Perhaps it was felt this would lure the workers into the fold of TEE. The company then sought to apply to the industrial tribunal to pass an award in terms of the agreement so that it binding on all the workers. The workers had reached a point of desperation. On September 20 the TTS organized a huge rally of Tells workers, where on the spot the workers decided to fa st indefinitely. Around 6,000 workers are estimated to have gone on a indefinite hunger strike. This was in the middle of the city, and generated a massive wave of public sympathy. For the first time perhaps a racketing agency conducted an opinion poll on a workers agitation.The opinion poll conducted by the Marketing and Econometric Consultancy Service revealed that 86 per cent of the respondents, all Pun citizens, were aware of the Tells issue, 82 per cent said they believed TTS was the majority union, 68 per cent felt workers were peaceful in their methods of agitation, 69 per cent felt the union was Justified in its agitation and 67 per cent felt the struggle of the Tells workers was for democratic rights. The Trade Union Council called for a one-day sympathy strike by Pun workers which was a complete success. Further tripartite negotiations had been fixed for October 1 .On September 29, the trade Union Council gave a call for demonstrations and street meetings in as many parts of the city as possible by the workers of other companies to draw attention on the Tells issue. The police used this as a pretext and swooped down on the hunger strikers and arrested over 4,000 Tells workers. Of these 2,000 were taken in buses and left off on the outskirts of the city, and 2,000 or so were taken into custody at places like Rating and Nashua. The TTS had been in quandary about how to call of the mass hunger strike without appearing to be back racking or weakening.The police action solved that problem. The company had not been too keen on the tripartite meeting and that problem too was resolved as no meeting could take place after the arrests. This triggered off a new wave of anger which spread throughout the city. The Trade Union Council called for an indefinite industrial strike of Pun workers. But the sight of Tells workers who had been on hunger strike for 10 days being beaten, pushed into buses and carried away evoked stone throwing and numerous incidents all ove r Source Economic & Political Weekly,