IS PROPAGADA A TECHNIQUE OR A PHENOMENON Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

IS PROPAGADA A TECHNIQUE OR A PHENOMENON - Essay Example on, the analysis will seek to determine whether or not the presence of propaganda throughout the modern world is merely something that exists naturally or whether or not it is an purposeful and authored process. Firstly, it should be understood that the nature and definition of propaganda itself lends the reader to assume that the process of information distribution and purposeful deception is not something that merely â€Å"happens†. 1 Of course there are many instances throughout the world in which incomplete information is transmitted to the media participant; however, these inadvertent instances do not accurately define the conventional definition of â€Å"propaganda†. Ultimately, the use of propaganda, by its very definition and nature, is to deceive or mislead the media participant to understand the world or a particular situation within a given construct or manner. As such, it is painfully obvious that the majority of propaganda that exists is most certainly a technique by which entities, individuals, or governments attempt sway the opinions of societal stakeholders. Therefore, the reader can adequately assume that the types of â€Å"propaganda† under discussion is more likely than not an authored process that is intended to be misleading, untrue, or inaccurate.2 As with a legal discussion of motive, the question that has thus far been represented ultimately reduces to the intention of the way the information is represented. In the event that a particular entity, government, or individual represents information in a willfully deceitful manner as a means of swaying individual opinions, then it is clear and apparent that the process is a technique which is engaged as a means of effecting a particular goal.3 Yet, in the event that incomplete, untrue, or inaccurate information is represented to a group or an audience with no intention to deceive or mislead, then it cannot be said that such a process is propaganda; rather, it is an inadvertent process that

Xi Jinpings Negative Effect on China Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Xi Jinpings Negative Effect on China - Essay Example This paper examines how subsequent Chinese leaders, through China’s Communist Party (CCP) have helped the country reclaim its lost glory. In essence, former leaders such as Deng Xiaoping advocated for decentralized and non-personalistic leadership as the only way through which China could prosper. However, Xi Jinping, the current State President, and Party leader seems to be deviating from this ideology and is leading China to a darker period than that witnessed in the Mao era. Prior to the 1800s, China was experiencing an economic boom as a result of silver inflow into the country in exchange for Chinese exports. However, according to Naughton the British felt threatened by the Chinese and started importing excess amounts of opium into China1. The attempt by China to stop the influx of opium led to the opium war during which China suffered degrading defeat and severe economic meltdown Naughton2. Consequently, Chinese leaders started formulating ideologies that were geared towards regaining national pride. However, as Naughton writes, most of these strategies continued concentrating on centralized and personalistic leadership especially during the Maoist era3. These are the same strategies that Xi Jinping is continuing to advance on China, thus leading China on a dark retrogressive path. Deng Xiaoping is one of the most celebrated Chinese leaders credited for bringing about reforms aimed at controlling the abuse of power by the Party’s general secretaries. As a supreme leader, Deng was able to ensure the decentralization of power within the government, going as far as removing secretary generals whose policies were in conflict with national interest. For example, according to Lawrence and Martin, before his death in 1997, Deng had removed Jiang Zemin and Zhao Ziyang from the Party secretariat for leading the Tiananmen massacre4.However, China today has no such supreme leader with such powers. As such, when an opportunistic leader such as Xi Jinping comes into the office and tries to amass personal power, there are limited avenues of stopping controlling such personal interests.

Str Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Str - Essay Example Trends in the alcohol market Because Pernod Ricard produces many branded products, it is necessary to focus only on the alcohol industry which makes up the majority of their business success and market share against competition. As the business extended into more foreign markets, as identified by the case study, Pernod Ricard required a new structure philosophy to ensure that the business could operate effectively and competitively against large-scale alcohol producers. This required a decentralisation strategy in order to create an environment where sub-units of the company were empowered to act as their own consultant businesses. Taking ownership of individual development with a cross-functional ability to inter-link independent, self-managed divisions was in response to labour-based trends for productivity and support as well as producing a world-class business capable of revenue growth. Heavier emphasis on branding as identified in the case leads to the logical conclusion that th is business relies on marketing and operations in response to consumer trends. A detailed PESTEL analysis identified key competitive or non-competitive activities at the social level that impact consumer buying perception about consumer products. Heineken, a brand operating in the adult liquor markets internationally, refocused its previous position on quality as a competitive tool and adopted new packaging concepts to gain consumer interest, such as the mini-keg bottling format (Beverage World 2009). Even though this is not a direct competitor, the beer brand experienced a 100 percent increase in sales whilst other companies that did not restructure packaging experienced only a dismal 1.7 percent increase in sales volume (Beverage World). This is driven by consumer sentiment and their current buying trends that makes advertising through innovation a success factor for alcoholic beverage producers. However, this is problematic for Pernod Ricard due to the high regulatory influence t hat exists in foreign and/or domestic markets regarding the responsible use of advertising that depicts alcoholic products. â€Å"The Group (PR) has signed several voluntary self-regulation codes, which impose restrictions on the advertising of and promotions for alcoholic beverages† (pernod-ricard.com, 2010, p.3). The business recognises not only the restrictions placed on advertising, a key success factor for many of today’s businesses in multi-national markets, and places an emphasis on voluntary corporate social responsibility. Similar CSR efforts as an adaptation to existing business strategy has been identified in Anheuser-Busch, a leading alcoholic beverage producer, that â€Å"takes its role seriously†¦(and) has long invested in the communities where (they) live and work† (anheuser-busch.com, 2007, p.3). The efforts undertaken by this non-competitive entity only reinforces that business must restructure and change their strategic focus in order to r emain in control and flexible to meet key trends that impact buying behaviour. Like any other business, it is often in a servant position due to economic trends that affect customer disposable income and their product preferences. The technological

Persuasive Writing Essay Example for Free

Persuasive Writing Essay The next type of writing we will do is the persuasive essay. In this essay, you will be working to convince your reader of the rightness of your point of view on a specific topic. As I have already said, in some ways every type of writing is a form of persuasion: you are always trying to make your reader see the correctness of your opinion. In this assignment, however, you will stake out your position on a particular topic and argue forcefully and explicitly in favor of it. As always, you want to state your opinion explicitly in your thesis statement (of course, without saying, â€Å"I think that. . . .†). As always, you also want to pick a topic that is fairly focused, narrow, and specific: pick a topic that you can adequately discuss in four to five paragraphs. I will say it again: it is always better to say a lot about a small topic than to try to say a little bit about many aspects of a large topic. (For those who are counting, that is the 3,248th time I have said that this year.) Use the first paragraph to state and fully explain your thesis. The rest of your essay should then be the marshalling of evidence in support of your thesis statement and an explanation of and commentary on your evidence. Facts are necessary to support your thesis, but by themselves facts are not enough. You need to explain and comment on them fully; show how these facts support your view and not the view of the opposing side. Try to find three or four really strong pieces of evidence to support your opinion. There is no way you can say everything or think of every point; choose the strongest evidence you can. While arguing in favor of your position, you should also include arguments against the opposing view. For example, if I am writing about the wrongness of capital punishment, I should also include arguments showing the wrongness of arguments made in favor capital punishment. Try to anticipate the other side’s arguments. That will show you are thinking and will also strengthen your argument. In general, it is best to work from your weakest to your strongest argument. As usual, conclusions are difficult. End with a strong, powerful concluding paragraph that brings together your various ideas but does not merely restate them. Certainly do not end by saying something like, â€Å"For all these reasons . . . .† I have listed below a few sample thesis statements and a number of possible topics. Please do not be  limited by my suggestions. As with any piece of writing, you will do the best job if you write about something you care about. I will give you a sample essay. Your essay should be 1-2 pages typed or 4-5 sides handwritten, double-spaced either way. The essay is due Tuesday, 30 January. It is worth 100 points. We will work on the essay in class; you can always show me drafts. Do your best. SAMPLE TOPICS the dress code (or, better yet, some more significant and meaningful issue at school!) your allowance or curfew or some other family issue gun control, abortion, capital punishment (or any other political issue) your view on dating or relationships advocating for a particular religious or spiritual practice: for example, meditate everyday the need for more late-night activities for teenagers the war in Iraq of course, anything else you feel strongly about SAMPLE THESIS STATEMENTS Limiting civil liberties is not an appropriate way to keep this country safe from terrorism. Capital punishment is an unjust and immoral way to punish criminals. A vegetarian diet is a sensible and meaningful response to world starvation and environmental destruction. The dress code provides a meaningful way to minimize the economic competition between students and unite them in their common academic purpose. A vegetarian diet is a sensible and meaningful response to world starvation and environmental destruction. So many Americans are often caught up with finding the â€Å"perfect† diet. While such a diet does not exist, a vegetarian diet provides significant health, environmental, and political benefits. Choosing such a diet is a simple but significant way to make a real difference in one’s own life and the world. First of all, a vegetarian diet is far more healthful than the traditional  American diet that emphasizes meat. A meat-free diet is higher in fiber, lower in saturated fat, and richer in a wide range of vitamins and minerals than a meat-based one. While we do hear conflicting evidence about the various health claims of different diets, nutritionists and scientists seem to agree that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables provides the greatest health benefits. Some people might say that a vegetarian diet is boring: quite the contrary. Compared to the relatively few kinds of meats and ways to prepare them, there are scores of vegetables, fruits, grains, and legumes and almost countless ways to prepare them. A meat-based diet also puts far too much protein into the body, taxing the kidneys and wasting expensive food. As it is, Americans eat too much protein; eating a vegetarian diet is one way to reduce our intake of excessive and expensive protein. Eating a diet based on fruits and vegetables also creates less environmental havoc than a meat-based diet. Raising the animals necessary for the traditional meat-laden diet requires large amounts of land, mountains of processed feed, and the disposal of tons of waste. But a family of four could, if necessary, live for a year off the fruits, grains, and vegetables produced from a few acres of land. And, once the crop is taken, there are few or no ill effects. If the agriculture is done organically, vegetarian eating has even fewer harmful effects upon the land. In an age of diminishing arable land and resources and increasing populations, we need to find ways to get the most nutrition from our land use. A vegetarian diet provides such efficiency. Finally, a meat-rich diet consumes many more scarce resources than a vegetarian diet. It takes about 800 pounds of cattle feed to produce one pound of beef. In a world in which nearly one-fourth of the planet’s population is malnourished or starving, a meat-based diet is simply a luxury we can no longer afford (if we ever could have). In good conscience, it only makes sense to eat lower on the food chain – as we do with a plant-based diet. If everyone in the world ate a vegetarian diet, there would be an immediate surplus of food available to feed people at far lower cost and with wiser use of precious resources. In this way, vegetarianism becomes a moral choice. For reasons of politics, environment, health, and justice, vegetarianism is the only intelligent and compassionate choice in a world of scarce resources and increasing population. It may take some getting used to, but the benefits and rewards of a vegetarian diet – for the planet, the self, and the human race – far outweigh whatever minimal sacrifice may be involved. sentence in bold: thesis statement underlined sentences: topic sentences for each paragraph

Technology Essay -- essays research papers

Executive Overview There is a definite desire for better traffic data to give drivers more choice and control for avoiding traffic congestion. And what’s more, today there is no viable solution to alleviate the unnecessary aggravation and minimize the loss of valuable time & money. Interviewing a sample of commuter, taxi, and package delivery drivers identified a demand for timely and readily available traffic related congestion information. Package delivery, taxi/shuttle, rental car, and commuter drivers will benefit from a real-time system that provides accurate updated traffic condition information and offers alternative routing recommendations integrated with an existing in–vehicle navigation device. TAS © (Traffic Avoidance System) involves software that will integrate seamlessly with multiple hardware systems. It will be introduced to the time-sensitive package delivery companies that operate in the most traffic congested cities in the U.S. This device will benefit customers by saving them time and money. TAS will help these companies achieve competitive advantage by improving their services, reducing penalties, and improving customer retention. Business success and gaining competitive advantage are thus the compelling reason to buy, making TAS a highly desirable solution. II.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Problem Statement Most, if not all would agree that traffic congestion is a common problem in and around large, highly populated cities in the US today. Everyday in the US millions of people get into their vehicles and drive – some to get to and from work or school, others running errands, or traveling to close and far-away vacation destinations. Many are on the road all day and/or night because their jobs consist primarily of, or require extensive driving. People from different walks of life (who we have interviewed to-date ) share a common outrage from poor traffic conditions and a â€Å"helplessness† in their inability to avoid â€Å"being stuck† – most say they â€Å"hate traffic,† â€Å"wish they didn’t have to ever get on the road during rush hour,† â€Å"can’t wait until I start working from home to avoid the hours in traffic hell†¦Ã¢â‚¬  Rush hour / peak travel times, accidents, road construction, and detours are among the most common reasons for traffic problems, but regardless of the cause and impact, traffic jams always lead to frustra... ...traffic advisory system that provides accurate updated traffic conditions information and offers alternative routing recommendations at one’s vehicle, at every driver’s fingerprints in a proactive way. This system will be integrated with an existing in–vehicle navigation & information device. TAS is such a solution. To develop such a solution, our company has conducted a number of customer interviews as a crucial starting point for our (initial) market research and this paper will further explore the findings and study the market opportunity to launch TAS for success and alleviate many people’s traffic related frustrations, lost time & money. IV.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Market Analysis In analyzing the market opportunity we have focused on the classic model of estimating market size, deriving macro & micro segmentation and settling on selection criteria that would best match with trends suggested from customer feedback. XIII.  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Conclusion Market research has demonstrated a need for TAS. The product will be piloted with a small package delivery/courier company to ensure feasibility and customer satisfaction.

Alexis de Tocquevilles Democracy in America :: American America History

Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America Alexis de Tocqueville's visit to the United States in the early part of the nineteenth century prompted his work Democracy in America, in which he expressed the ability to make democracy work. Throughout his travels Tocqueville noted that private interest and personal gain motivated the actions of most Americans, which in turn cultivated a strong sense of individualism. Tocqueville believed that this individualism would soon "sap the virtue of public life" (395) and create a despotism of selfishness. This growth of despotism would be created by citizens becoming too individualistic, and therefore not bothering to fulfill their civic duties or exercise their freedom. Tocqueville feared that the political order of America would soon become aimed at the satisfaction of individual needs, rather than the greater good of society. Alexis de Tocqueville viewed participation in public affairs, the growth of associations and newspapers, the principle of self-interest properly understood, and r eligion as the only means by which American democracy could combat the effects of individualism. Given that despots have every interest in keeping people isolated, the individualism resulting from equality makes despotism a great danger to equality. "Despotism... sees in the separation among men the surest guarantee of its continuance, and it usually makes every effort to keep them separate" (399). Exercising freedom through participation in public affairs is therefore extremely vital because it gives people a personal interest in thinking about others in society. Local self-governments are important because they draw people together, and it is therefore more likely that they will exercise their liberty. Tocqueville states that "as soon as a man begins to treat of public affairs in public, he begins to perceive that he is not so independent of his fellow men as he had first imagined, and that in order to obtain their support he must often lend them his cooperation" (400). When people act together they frequently form dependencies on one another, especially when they are working for the good of the entire community. Another means by which Tocqueville believes it is possible to contest individualism is to form associations and write newspapers. He believes that like local governments, associations help people to realize their dependence on their fellow citizens and take interest in public affairs. It is crucial to have institutions and civic duties which force people to look beyond their own interests and think about the problems of the community.

Cultural Landscape Essay

A cultural landscape is a piece of land that possesses natural and cultural resources related to an historic event, person, or group of people. They are usually man-made lexis of relationships with the nature and/or society or culture. These can include grand estates, public gardens and parks, educational institutions, cemeteries, highways, and industrial sites. Cultural landscapes are also humanist works of art, texts and narratives of cultures that express regional and cultural identity. They also present relationship to their ecological perspective. Human activities have turned out to be a major cause of shaping most cultivated landscapes on the surface of Earth. Human, animal and machine labor expended in using the land can create outstanding cultural landscapes with high aesthetic, cultural and ecological value such as the paddy-field rice terraces of south-east Asia, but may as well result in land degradation as is the case in some regions in the Mediterranean. The distribution of landforms such as steep slopes, fertile plains, inundated valleys in a landscape sets the frame for land use by determining factors such as accessibility, water and nutrient availability, but may over long periods of time also be changed through land use. On the other hand, land use serves distinct socio-economic purposes: land may supply materials and energy through hunting, agriculture or forestry, it may host infrastructure, or it may be needed to absorb waste and emissions (Haberl et al. , 2004). Landscapes can be seen as the contingent and historically variable outcome of this interplay between socio-economic and biophysical forces. During the evolution of cultural landscapes throughout the world, humans have developed adaptive land-use techniques and created specific patterns of fields, farmsteads, remnant woodlots and the like that depended on both natural and socio-economic conditions. In European agricultural landscapes, the long history of land transformation has led to regionally distinct regular patterns of geometrically arranged landscape elements, reflecting the historical and cultural background of the prevailing land-use system of a region (Bell, 1999). The spatial distribution of ecotopes, the so-called landscape structure, has therefore often been regarded as a mosaic of ‘frozen processes’; i. e. landscape structure assumedly mirrors the processes which had been going on in a landscape. This perception has even become a central paradigm in modern landscape ecology. While many ecosystem processes are difficult to observe directly, landscape structure can be derived from mapping as well as from remote-sensing data; therefore, landscape structure was often not only used to evaluate the ecological value of landscapes, but also to judge ecological aspects of the sustainability of land-use patterns (Wrbka et al. , 1999b). The Influence Of Land Form On The Intensity Of Land Use Cultural landscapes have, in contrast to natural and semi-natural landscapes, special characteristics. The disturbance regime as well as the major material and energy fluxes in these transformed landscapes is controlled to a large extent by humans. This is done by the different land-use practices applied for meadows, arable land or forests. Decisions about land use are made according to the local agro-ecological characteristics which are nested in a hierarchy of social, economical and technical constraints. Cultural landscapes can thus only be understood by analyzing the interplay between biophysical and socioeconomic patterns and processes. Landscape Structure And Intensity Of Land Use Odum and Turner (1989) found that the landscape elements of the Georgia landscape in the early 1930s had a higher fractal dimension than the elements of the same region in the 1980s. During the same period of time the use of fertilizers, pesticides and other agrochemicals increased dramatically. This illustrates that the growing human impact on the land may result in a landscape with decreasing geometrical complexity. Human activities introduce rectangularity and rectilinearity into landscapes, producing regular shapes with straight borders (Forman, 1999; Forman and Moore, 1992). Various studies suggest that the rate of landscape transformation is a function of land-use intensity (Alard and Poudevigne, 1999; Hietala-Koivu, 1999; Mander et al. , 1999; Odum and Turner, 1989), and that the geometric complexity of a landscape in particular decreases with increasing land-use intensity accompanied by a decrease of habitat heterogeneity and an increase of production units. Applying the thermodynamic laws to landscape structure, Forman and Moore (1992) suggested that the concentrated input of energy (e. g. , by tractor ploughing, plant production, wildfire) decreases the entropy of patches compared to adjacent areas and produces straight and abrupt boundaries. In other words, energy is required to convert natural curvilinear boundaries into straight lines and energy is required to maintain them. The reduction of the energy input increases entropy and revegetation convolutes and softens landscape boundaries. This means that the ‘landscape structure’, in the sense of Forman and Godron (1986), can be regarded as ‘frozen processes’. Landscape Structure And Biodiversity Many surveys show that species richness of vascular plants and bryophytes normally decreases with land-use intensity (Luoto, 2000; Mander et al. , 1999; Zechmeister and Moser, 2001; Zechmeister et al. , 2003). As the link between landscape structure and land-use intensity could be established, shape complexity as a measure of land-use intensity seems to be also a good predictor of species richness (Moser et al. , 2002; Wrbka et al. , 1999a). Accordingly, higher species richness in areas with high LD and richness values can be expected. The use of shape complexity indices as indicators for plant species richness is based on an assumed correlation between geometric landscape complexity and biodiversity (Moser et al. , 2002). Obviously, this correlation is not mechanistic but it is supposed to be due to congruent effects of land-use intensity on landscape shape complexity and species richness. Moser et al. (2002) gives a good literature overview about the driving factors responsible for the decrease of landscape complexity with increasing land-use intensity, which resulted in the following key findings: * The majority of landscape elements in agricultural landscapes are designed by humans as rectangles with straight and distinct boundaries (Forman, 1999). * Outside boundaries of semi-natural or natural patches are straightened by neighboring cultivated areas (). * Increasing land-use intensity is accompanied by a decrease of semi-natural and natural areas (Alard and Poudevigne, 1999; Mander et al. , 1999), resulting in a decrease of natural curvilinear boundaries. * Intensification in agriculture tends to increase the size of production units (Alard and Poudevigne, 1999; Hietala-Koivu, 1999). In addition to that intensification of land use on the production unit, e. g. , by fertilizing or increased mowing intensity, also leads to a dramatic decrease of the species richness (Zechmeister et al. , 2003). The description of the degradation of semi-natural and agricultural landscapes shows clearly the interdependence of biodiversity and landscape heterogeneity, induced by closely interwoven ecological, demographical, socio-economic and cultural factors. For an effective conservation management of biodiversity and landscape eco-diversity, a clear understanding of the ecological and cultural processes and their perturbations is essential. Intermediate disturbance levels lead to a highly complex and diverse cultural landscape which can host many plant and animal species. Landscapes, with ‘eco-diversity hotspots’, can be regarded as hint for ‘biodiversity hotspots’. Landscape pattern indicators therefore play an important role for landscape conservation planning. The understanding of landscape processes is crucial for the conservation of both, landscape eco-diversity and biodiversity. Conclusions From a conservation biology point of view, the ongoing process of genetic erosion and biodiversity loss as well as the replacement of specific recognizable cultural landscapes by monotonous ubiquistic production sites will continue. The biophysical characteristics and natural constraints of the investigated landscapes are interwoven with the regional historic and socio-economical development. This interplay is the background for the development of a variety of cultural landscapes which have their own specific characteristics. Geo-ecological land-units provide one solution. This is of special importance when the relationship of landscape patterns and underlying processes is under investigation. Works Cited Alard, D. , Poudevigne, I. Factors controlling plant diversity in rural landscapes: a functional approach. Landscape and Urban Planning, 1999: 46, 29–39 Bell, S. , Landscape—Pattern, Perception and Process. E. &F. N. Spon, London, 1999 Forman, R. T. T. , & Godron, M. Landscape Ecology. Wiley, New York, 1986. Forman, R. T. T. , & Moore, P. N. Theoretical foundations for understanding boundaries in landscape mosaics. In: Hansen, F. J. , Castri, F. (Eds. ), Landscape Boundaries. Consequences for Biotic Diversity and Ecological Flows. Springer, New York, 1992, pp. 236–258. Forman, R. T. T. Horizontal processes, roads, suburbs, societal objectives in landscape ecology. In: Klopatek, M. , Gardner, R. H. (Eds. ), Landscape Ecological Analysis: Issues and Applications. Springer, New York, 1999, pp. 35–53. Haberl, H. , Wackernagel, M. , Krausmann, F. , Erb, K. -H. , Monfreda, C. Ecological footprints and human appropriation of net primary production: A comparison. Land Use Policy, doi:10. 1016/ j. landusepol. 2003. 10. 008. , 2004 Hietala-Koivu, R. Agricultural landscape change: a case study in Y lane, Southwest Finland. Landscape and Urban Planning , 1999: 46, 103–108. Luoto, M.. Modelling of rare plant species richness by landscape variables in an agriculture area in Finland. Plant Ecology , 2000: 149, 157–168. Mander, U. , Mikk, M. , Ku. lvik, M.. Ecological and low intensity agriculture as contributors to landscape and biological diversity. Landscape and Urban Planning , 1999: 46, 169–177.