Lecture 12: Energy and Ecology – Capitalist the cause for degradation

“There will be blood” is a movie that follows the rise to power of Daniel Plainview – a charismatic and ruthless oil prospector, driven to succeed by his intense hatred of others and psychological need to see any and all of his competitors to fail. When he learns of an oil-rich land in California that can be bought cheaply, he moves his operation there and begins manipulating and exploiting the local landowners into selling him their property. Using his young adopted son H.W. to project the image of a caring family man, Plainview gains the cooperation of almost all the locals with lofty promises to build schools and cultivate the land to make their community flourish. Over time, Plainview’s gradual accumulation of wealth and power causes his true self to surface, and he begins to slowly alienate himself from everyone in his life.

 

From this movie, it portrays Plainview as a capitalist who has people in his life only to benefit from them financially. Through the development of new technology, he was able to drill into the ground to tap on the oil below. His unscrupulous methods to gain wealth at the expense of the people around are reflective of the capitalist that Marx claimed. Capitalism is a selfish system that exploited labours and allowed owners to take profit for themselves without caring for the welfare of anyone else or society at large. With increasing development, the level of consumption increases thus driving the demand for energy to fuel our consumption. Every child born in an industrial nation consumes eight times as much of the earth’s natural resources as a child born in a developing country (Gosling, 2001).

 

With increasing demand, consumption among the rich also increases exponentially. The rich consume too much, wastefully and without thought for the present or future generations; they have set up a technology of death to defend their privileged position. The poor, victims of the rich, consume less and, in order to survive, live in unhealthy conditions, cut down forests, contaminate waters and soil, kill rare animals and so on. During the 1970s, while the developed world was considering the effects of the global population explosion, pollution and consumerism, the developing countries, faced with continued poverty and deprivation, regarded development as essential – to meet their need for the necessities of food, clean water and shelter.

 

Mrs Indira Gandhi’s speech at the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment at Stockholm in 1972, acknowledged the wanton destruction of forest and wildlife, but also drew attention to the problem of meeting the needs of the poor:

 

When they themselves feel deprived, how can we urge the preservation of animals? How can we speak to those who live in villages and in slums about keeping the oceans, the rivers and the air clean when their own lives are contaminated at the source? The environment cannot be improved in condition of poverty.

 

How can a developing country protect its environment and still attract needed investment if the country on its border is willing to relax its own environmental standards? Taking advantage of the developing countries, capitalist benefit from the natural resources obtained from these countries and in turn causes a degradation of their environment. E.g. the operation of Shell in Nigeria caused detrimental impact to the host communities. This included oil spills over 4000 times since 1960 which contaminated food supplies, destroyed natural habitats and way of the life of the locals.

 

How can we obtain a socio-economic system that would produce a decent sufficiency for all? This is the great challenge raised by the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth. Managing levels of consumption and resources would require the modification of individual lifestyles, and to apply ideas like ethnic consumerism and decarbonisation while using technology to research for more environmentally friendly methods to help generate more energy while preserving the ecology. 

 

 

References

Gosling, David L., Ninian Smart (2001), “Religion and Ecology in India and Southeast Asia”, Routledge

 

Leonard Boff and Virgil Elizondo, Ecology and Poverty: Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor

http://www.concilium.org/english/intro955.htm

 

Geofile, 2006 “Transnational Corporations”, January

Lecture 11: Technology and Global Society – Handphones

How important is your handphone to you? Are you able to leave the house without it and yet still feel normal or does it feel it has become a part of you and leaving it behind makes you feel incomplete? Well to me, my handphone has become a part of who I am and something which I cannot live without. The handphone is more than just a device for me to call my family and friends, but it also serves as an organiser, an alarm clock, a camera and a source of entertainment while I am on the public transport.

 

Nowadays, one can lose his purse. However, losing one’s handphone would cause one to feel uneasy and a little lost. Handphones have become an indispensable “necessaries” for the life of ordinary people from untouchable “luxuries” in the past, after undergoing nearly 10 years of development since the mid-1990s. Mobile phones can be seen everywhere, from rampant mobile phone ads on TV to advertisers on the streets handing out flyers, and from departmental stores in shopping centres to neighbourhood heartland stalls. The handphone has become a social trend among the youngsters as each competes to keep up with the latest models and designs. It has become a social norm to own a handphone and those who fail to do so are termed as “old fashion”. Today, the handphone is not only seen to be carried by teenagers or the adults, even children as young as eight or senior citizen as old as 70 own a handphone. This shows how technology has been included into our everyday life and that such a phenomenon has no age limits. 

 

In 2005, it was reported in the People’s Daily Online that China has become the biggest country in the production and sales for handphones in the world. It was estimated that there would be more than 400 million phone users in 2005. With the handphone gaining popularity and the continuous network and science innovations, new technologies including multimedia message and WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) have been applied in a wide range. As a result, the handphone has been endowed with new functions such as Internet browsing, commercial information transmission and newspaper reading (cases more common in China than in Singapore). With the incessant enhancement of media tendency, the handphone has been acknowledged by some experts as the “fifth media” after newspaper, radio, television and the Internet. Handphones have over the years been integrated into our lives and become an essential part of our everyday life. It is no longer just a mere handphone with the basic function for calling; it now has added functions which many have relied heavily upon.

 

However, the very thing that brought people happiness has also brought people unhappiness. Communication between family and friends has broken down and miscommunications have been seen to occur during numerous occasions. Have you ever been in a situation when you are sitting in a car and your parent is talking to you, but occasionally you would look down at your phone to reply your friend’s message? How often do we actually hear everything that our parents are saying or how often are we constantly engaged in a few conversations?  Technology has evolved to a point where we are expected to be reachable 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Such that when we are not contactable it has become an offense and instances when people get frustrated when they are unable to reach a particular person.

 

At the end of the day the question is, are we able to live without a handphone? In an increasingly fast paced society where time is money, can we survive without a handphone? Have we become too dependent on the handphone?

 

 

References

 

People’s Daily Online, Mobile phone changes Chinese people’s life, 9 September 2005.

(http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200509/09/eng20050909_207650.html)

Lecture 10: Population and Health – Beggars in Singapore

“You go down New York, Broadway. You will see the beggars; people of the streets…Where are the beggars in Singapore? Show me.” Lee Kuan Yew.

 

Is it true that there are really no beggars in Singapore? I beg to differ.

 

How do we react when a beggar approaches us for money? The most common reaction would be to shun these people and carry on with our daily life. I think this is because Singaporeans have become more sceptical of such beggars and the genuine need for money for survival. Over the past month while travelling to school on a particular public bus, occasionally I would encounter an old woman begging from passengers to give her $2 for food. A typical unkempt old woman in rugged clothes and uncombed hair, you would think that at least one of the passengers would give her the money. Instead most of the passengers were eager to shun from this woman, motioning their hand in negative response of refusal to give any money. I must admit, I was guilty of turning her down too. One of the aunties on the bus commented, “You give her money now, later she’ll ask again. Don’t even know where she’s gonna spend that money.” Even these aunties knew that giving her money would not have solved her problem but only serve to encourage her to continue asking from more people for money. Living under a government that does not believe in a welfare state, such characteristics are reflected in the citizens.

 

To society, such beggars have become a form of social problem, a nuisance to the public. Especially in a country that places emphasis on the importance of self independence, Singaporeans tend to be more careful with their money. We have been socially constructed by the government that these poor and homeless are considered as socially offensive and we should not encourage such behaviour by giving them money. While most Singaporeans associate themselves as the middle class, such beggars are seen as the lower class and there would be a tendency to segregate these people. With an increasing number of reports of organised beggars on the street, more Singaporeans are becoming more wary of donating to these people. With references to an article from Asian One “China amputees beg to get quick money”, it states how these “professional” beggars “work” only during the morning and evening peak periods and would return to their hotels at the end of the day. Most of them earning as much as $50 within an hour and own a mobile phone to contact their “minders” at the end of the day.  

 

While the Ministry of Community Development (MCYS) emphasize that the ‘significant’ increase of beggars were mainly foreigners from China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, accounting for 74 of the 181 people picked up. In actual fact, the bulk of these beggars were mainly Singaporeans. Thus conflicting his statement that “There is no reason for any needy Singaporean to beg or be a vagrant”. Such begging at hawker centres, temples and MRT stations have been a common sight that it is surprising that Kishore Mahbubani, Singapore’s permanent representative to the UN are ignorant of the situation. “There are no homeless, destitute or starving people [in Singapore]…Poverty has been eradicated.” Thus one starts questioning, what has the government been doing to solve this problem? If begging is an offense in Singapore and those who have at least two previous begging records can be fined up to $3,000 and jailed for up to two years, why is it that the numbers of beggars have increased?

 

References:

Money No Enough (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_lzrGUGAWM)

Begging, Razor TV (http://www.razor.tv/site/servlet/segment/main/)

Asian One News, “China amputees beg to get quick money”

(http://news.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne%2BNews/Singapore/Story/A1Story20080204-48203.html)

Tan Theresa “Rise in number of beggars”, Straits Times 30 September 2008

Lecture 9: Urbanisation – Urban Sprawl

The urbanisation process refers to much more than simple population growth; it involves changes in the economic, social and political structures of a region. Rapid urban growth is responsible for many environmental and social changes in the urban environment and its effects are strongly related to global change issues. The rapid growth of cities strains their capacity to provide services such as energy, education, health care, transportation, sanitation and physical security.  This is because governments have less revenue to spend on the basic upkeep of cities and the provision of services; cities have become areas of massive sprawl, serious environment problems and widespread poverty.

 

During the 19^th and 20^th centuries, urbanisation resulted from and contributed to industrialisation. New job opportunities in the cities motivated the mass movement of surplus population away from the countryside. At the same time, migrants provided cheap, plentiful labour for the emerging factories. Today, due to movements such as globalisation, the circumstances are similar in developing countries. Hence the concentration of investments in cities attracts large numbers of migrants looking for employment, thereby creating a large surplus labour force, which keeps wages low. This situation is attractive to foreign investment companies from developed countries that can produce goods for far less than if the goods were produced where wages were higher. Thus, one might wonder if urban poverty serves a distinct function for the benefit of global capital. One of the major effects of rapid urban growth is “urban sprawl” – scattered development that increases traffic, saps local resources and destroys open space. Urban sprawl is responsible for changes in the physical environment, and in the form of spatial organisation of cities.

 

Developed and less developed countries of the world differ not only by the percent living in cities, but also in the way in which urbanisation is occurring. Urban sprawl is takes a serious toll in developed countries like Los Angeles (L.A.). Urban sprawl is common due to the affluence of the population. They are able to afford private cars and demand for spacious living conditions in a pleasant environment. The government is thus pressured to build highways and this encourages further suburbanisation and encroachment of agricultural land. The built-up area of LA stretches for over 115km from east to west. This urban sprawl has taken over much of the former farm land in order to create a number of ‘edge cities’ e.g. Mission Viego in Orange Country. However, more problems are surfaced with the formation of the edge cities in L.A., such as the dilemma the government is facing regarding the railway system. Other problem associated is the high infrastructural cost incurred due to leapfrogging and this occurs as private developers often buy and develop land haphazardly. However, in less developed countries, the governments do not have the resources and manpower to handle urban sprawl. For e.g. Squatter settlements litter the periphery of most large cities such as Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Problems with poor housing conditions and unsanitary living conditions are unsightly and unhygienic. In Mexico City (950 square miles), urban sprawl exists as nearly 40% of city dwellers live in the urban periphery in poverty and environment degradation. These high density settlements are often highly polluted owing to the lack of urban services, including running water, trash pickup, electricity or paved roads.

 

This shows that whether it is in a developed or developing country, both are plagued with the same problem and urban sprawl is of increasing concern with rapid population growth. However, the problem of urban sprawl in developing countries is less acute since the transport infrastructure is not as well-developed. Most people still want to live near the CBD so as to save on transport cost.

Lecture 8: Politics of Identity and Globalisation – Racism

Singapore is first and foremost concerned about its image in the world market. Adopting multiracialism as a fundamental pillar for postcolonial Singapore, it is a political ideology that has been actively promoted by the government to recognise Singapore as a racially and culturally diversified society. Singapore considers herself to be a racially tolerant and harmonious country with four official groups, the Chinese, Malay, Indian and Others (CMIO) having coexisted peacefully since independence in 1965. However, this does not mean that racial discrimination and intolerance are non-existent. In 2006, Selvaraj Velayutham researched about racism in Singapore and found out that racist acts are common on a daily basis. The most common form being ‘name-calling’ with specific references to ones physical appearances, the body and colour of skin becomes the point of reference for ridicule, insult and verbal abuse. Another instance where we can relate to more easily is the frequent encounters on public transports. The involuntary proximity created by a crowded bus or train and a vacant seat can potential generate expressions of discomfort and subtle racism. The question is why do we have such feeling when we see another stranger of different colour skin than ourselves?

 

In the movie “Crash”, it tells the story of different people from wildly disparate walks of life as they collide and intersect with one another. Each life is in some way personally affected, changed, damaged or victimised by racism. In some way, all of them were guilty of racism themselves. Different incidents but they all had one similarity is that many of them categorized people according to their skin colour and made assumptions of others which prevented them from seeing the actual person standing before them.  Ethnic stereotyping comes to play as certain characteristics are ascribed to the particular ethnic. An example was when the district attorney’s wife was so frightened by the street encounter that she has the locks changed, and then assumes that the locksmith who is black is a gang member, would return with his “homies” to attack them when he is actually a family man. Ethnocentrism can also be seen throughout the play. Asian Americans speech patterns are made fun of, like the term “blaking” for braking. Ethnocentrism means that people in a social organisation have the tendency  to regard their culture as central to the universe and to believe that their own ideas, values and rules must be true, which leads to the judging of other people. Through the movie, one is able to identify how the different stereotypes society has created for those backgrounds affect their judgements, beliefs and actions. “You think you know who you are, hmm? You have no idea.”

 

In Singapore, such scenes may not be widely visible as racism is not tolerated and anyone who is seen as being racist can be charged or jailed. On October 7 2005, two young men were given landmark jailed sentences just because of the inflammatory racist and vicious remarks about Muslims and Malays that they posed on the Internet. ‘They must realise that callous and reckless remarks on racial or religious subjects have the potential to cause social disorder, in whatever medium or forum they are expressed.’ Senior District Judge Richard Magnus. As much as we try to deny that we not racist or try to solve the problem of racism, such a problem would be hard to solve. This is because it is human nature to categorise and people are naturally prone to developing stereotypes.  Furthermore, such racism is perpetuated mainly through our daily socialization and interaction with our families and communities, thus making it difficult to change such views and attitudes. Even though through education, it may seem that Singaporeans are more tolerant of other races but is this really the case or is it mainly due to the political constrains to voice out our opinions?  

 

References:

Chong Chee Kin (2005) “SINGAPORE: Racist bloggers jailed” The Straits Times, 8 October

(http://www.asiamedia.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=31206)

 

Selvaraj Velayutham (2006) Centre for Research on Social Inclusion, “Everyday Racism in Singapore”

http://www.crsi.mq.edu.au/news_and_events/documents/selvarajvelayutham_000.pdf

Lecture 7: Democracy and Human Rights – Democracy in Singapore

Democracy is the system in which all members of society, mindless of race, colour or creed have a direct or indirect say in the political decisions that may affect a governing body. The system of democracy is the most advanced form of government in the world today. It is an ever-evolving process. As early as the beginning when people organized themselves as bands, they practiced participatory democracy, in which all decisions were made by the citizenry meeting together. However, this was superseded by representative democracy eventually, under which the populace elects the members of any decision-making body through a process called voting. Voting enables each involved individual to choose the representative they feel most capable for the task at hand.

 

Many political theorists argue that other rights besides voting are equally essential if a system is to be considered democratic. Most important are the rights to freedom of speech, freedom of press, freedom of assembly, freedom to organize politically and so on. The opinions of the people must be given an outlet if they are to be more effectively heard. John Locke in the 17^th century believed that all men have natural rights which are Life, Liberty and Property and that the purpose of the government was to protect these rights.

 

Singapore has all along priced itself to be a democratic society, and PAP insists that it is democratic because it conducts elections once every four to five years. However, in the elections in 1997, the PAP announced that if the voters did not vote for its candidates, their housing estates and apartments which are all government-owned, would not be refurbished and would eventually turn into slums. Knowing that that the housing estates were every citizen’s priced possession, PAP was able to secure their position as the dominant ruling party. Up till today, PAP still holds a highly authoritarian position over Singaporeans despite its claims of being a democratic party. In 2008, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew warned Singapore voters against putting the opposition at the helm of government “in a moment of fickleness or just sheer madness” when they get “bored” at some point in the future. He also states that the Singapore opposition would ruin the wealthy city-state’s achievements in five years if they ever gained power.

 

In addition, Singapore has the Internal Security Act (ISA) which allows the Government to arbitrarily arrest citizens and detain them without trial. Many oppositionists, trade union leaders, journalists and activists were imprisoned under the ISA for opposing the ruling PAP. The longest-serving prisoner is Mr Chia Thye Poh who was detained for 32 years without ever given a trial. Moreover, the media such as the newspaper, TV and radio stations are all own and highly controlled by the Government. Even the foreign press has come under control when it was sued repeatedly or had their circulation curtailed by the Singapore Government. This shows how much control the Government has over Singapore and that all claims on democracy are merely falsify.

 

Furthermore, it is only in Singapore that the gathering of five or more persons for political purposes is considered illegal assembly and that the Government outlaws public rallies and protests. In other countries, the right to riot or protest is the basic form of democracy and gaining equal rights.

 

Besides, the Government leaders continue to take opposition members to court in financially-debilitating lawsuits. Francis Seow, Singapore’s former solicitor-general now living in exile in the US, said: “Supremely confident in the reliability of his judiciary, the Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew uses the courts as a legal weapon to intimidate, bankrupt or cripple the political opposition, and ventilate his political agenda. He has distinguished himself in numerous legal suits against dissidents and detractors for alleged defamation in Singapore courts, and has won them all. The idea that he could possibly lose is so fanciful that it could be dismissed out of mind. Which judge would be so reckless or foolhardy to award a decision against him?”

 

Despite all that the PAP has done for Singapore for the past four decades, would it be beneficial if Singapore continues to allow PAP to govern and have control over Singapore?

 

References

ThinkQuestTeam(2000) http://library.thinkquest.org/15816/thespirit.article1.html

Singapore Window (2003) http://www.singapore-window.org/sw03/030916sj.htm

Lecture 6: War and Terrorism – Child Soldiers

“I still dream about the boy from my village who I killed. I see him in my dreams, and he is talking to me, saying I killed him for nothing, and I am crying.” — Mary, a 16-year-old demobilized child soldier forced to join an armed rebel group in Central Africa 

 

Due to the technological advances in weaponry and the proliferation of small arms, many children around the world have fallen prey to this increasing use of child soldiers. UNICEF estimates that more than 300,000 children under 18 are currently being exploited in over 30 armed conflicts worldwide. While the majority of child soldiers are between the ages of 15 and 18, some are as young as 7 or 8 years of age. Furthermore, this number is growing rapidly every year as more children are recruited for use in active combat. 

 

Many of these innocent children are denied of a childhood and are often subjected to horrific violence.  Physically vulnerable and easily intimidated, children typically make obedient soldiers. The AK-47s and M-16s are commonly used weapons by the children as they are light weighted automatic weapons that are simple to operate and easily accessible.  These children are most of the time pushed to the front lines of combat, to serve as human mine detectors, participate in suicide missions, carry supplies, and act as spies, messengers or lookouts. “They used us for reconnaissance and other things like that because if you’re a child the enemy doesn’t notice you much; nor do the villagers.” – Former child soldier from Burma/Myanmar

 

As society breaks down during conflicts, this usually leaves the children no access to schools, thus driving them from their homes and separation from their families. Many are abducted or recruited by force and often compelled to follow orders under the threat of death. They were constantly beaten for no reason and were taught to fight against the enemy in a war that most of them did not understand. While some of the children joined the armed groups out of desperation as they perceived that joining the armed groups was the best chance for survival. However, the reality was that many of these children were malnourished as food was scarce and were forced to walk with heavy loads much too heavy for their small bodies. Others seek escape from poverty or join military forces to avenge family members who have been killed.

 

Children are especially vulnerable to military recruitment because of their emotional and physical immaturity. They are easily manipulated and can be drawn into violence that they are too young to resist or understand. Child soldiers are often killed and wounded, while those who managed to escape or survive the war often suffer from multiple traumas and psychological scarring. Conservative MoD figures from the last Gulf war show that 19 per cent of troops have been diagnosed with a psychological problem. Mike Sterba, a former medic during the Falklands conflict, has spent the last 20 years trying to cope with the severe depression and post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) triggered by his experiences. As a result, these children’s personal development is often irreparably damaged and many who do return are often rejected by their home communities. Statistics have shown at the rate of suicide has increased from 12.4 per 100,000 people in 2003 to 18.1 per 100,000 in 2007, according to information from the Department of the Army. There were 935 serious suicide attempts across the Army in 2007.

 

Despite of the traumatic experiences that these armed forces put these innocent children through, there are few peace treaties that recognise the existence of child soldiers or make provisions for their rehabilitation and reintegration into society. Many former child soldiers do not have access to the educational programs, vocational training, family reunification, or even food and shelter that they need to successfully rejoin civilian society. As a result, many end up on the street, become involved in crime, or are drawn back into armed conflict.

 

References:

Human Right Watch 2006: Children Rights
(http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/facts.htm)

Lecture 5: Crime and Globalisation – Sociopaths vs. Gangs

Have you ever wondered what causes a man to commit crimes? Are such people born with a criminal mind or are they socially created? I believe that the majority of the criminals today are socially conditioned to commit such acts but there is an exception of a certain group of people known as Sociopaths who are naturally born with such criminal characteristics.

 

A Sociopath is born without a conscience. Studies have shown that such behaviour can be traced back as early as the childhood. Children who intentionally hurt animals are one of the top traits for people who grow into serial killers and rapists or sadists. ¹ A Sociopath does not understand that other people have rights and feelings too and they are incredibly deceitful and manipulative. They do not know how to feel remorseful for what he has done. So when they hurt or kill someone, he is able to move on with his life without giving it a second thought.

 

However, the second group of people are the socially structured criminals such as those in gangs. One commonly known gang is the Mara Salvatrucha or MS 13, the most dangerous gang in the United States. ² MS 13 was originally formed by Salvadoran immigrants who fled to the USA during the El Salvador’s civil war in the 1980s. They were a group of immigrants who were looking for low-cost housing and employment but faced alienation from the Mexican-Americans who were residing there. They were soon victimised by the local gangs which lead to the formation of the MS 13. They engaged in violent criminal acts that resulted in the deportment of the MS 13 members. However, this resulted in the expansion of the gang as recruitment began to grow. With little direction and opportunities, many Central American youths admired the MS deportees and wanted to learn more about their gang. Their interest was so big that over 40 kids asked to be initiated into the gang on one day alone.

 

³ “The gang is an important social institution for low-income male youths and young adults from newcomer and residual populations because it often serves social, cultural, and economic functions no longer adequately performed by family, school, and the local market.” (Spergel, et al., 1991, preface)

 

Gangs come into existence and flourish because the needs of the young people in a neighbourhood or culture or family are not or cannot be met through traditional and socially acceptable ways. The gang, in essence, fills the void and needs that these youths are facing. ³ Moore (1998) encapsulates the multi-causal perspective on gangs when he suggests that four community conditions often precede the transition from typical adolescent groupings to established youth gangs.  First, conventional socializing agents, such as families and schools, are largely ineffective and alienating.  Adult supervision is usually absent. These youths feel that through the joining of such gangs, they would be able to be part of a family, treated with unconditional love and thus develop a sense of belonging. Second, the adolescents must have a great deal of free time that is not consumed by other healthy social development roles.  Third, members must have limited access to appealing conventional career lines. Finally, the young people must have a place to congregate such as a well-defined neighbourhood.

 

Finally, what can be done to stop these gangs from forming? One formal MS 13 member mentioned that MS 13 would get stronger and more structured and it would become increasingly difficult to eradicate the MS 13. ² Despite the increasing efforts from the federal government to locate and deport illegal MS 13 members living in the nation, the lack of cooperation from any cities that support sanctuaries policies has made the government’s job an uphill battle. Thus this shows that more still needs to be done in order to solve this increasing social problem.

 

Reference:

¹http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/196216/without_conscience_the_
disturbing_world.html?page=3&cat=38

²http://www.knowgangs.com/gang_resources/profiles/ms13/

³http://faculty.missouristate.edu/m/MichaelCarlie/what_I_learned_about
/gangs/WHYFORM/why_gangs_form.htm

Lecture 4: Gender and Family – Discrimination against women

Around the world, massive changes are taking place in the relationship between work and family and in that between men and women. The ideal women of the past were that of the Victorian women whose sole devotion was to home and family. Despite the fact that women today are given more opportunities to work, many are faced with the increasing pressure of managing work and family.

 

Women are earning lesser than men for the same work. ¹ According to AAUW’s research report, “Behind the Pay Gap” showed that, one year out of college, women are earning only 80 percent as much as their male colleagues earn. Ten years after graduation, women are earning only 69 percent as much as men. It also has been reported that in ² 2001, even though more than two-thirds of Wal-Mart’s hourly workers were females, only one-third held managerial positions and less than 15% of store managers. Notwithstanding the fact that these women in average were more senior and held higher merit ratings than their male counterparts. This shows that despite movements to increase equality of women today, many are still faced with such discrimination in the twenty-first century. 

 

Moreover, women constitute a far greater percentage of single-parent households. ³ Statistics show that 10.5 million women are single parents, compared with only 2.5 million men. Even though women are now more willing to accept alternative arrangements such as divorce, single parenthood or unwed motherhood, they frequently bear the brunt of poverty. With higher levels of education, this resulted in a mindset-shift in terms of ideals and expectations of marriage and family life. Singapore is no exception with divorce rates hitting an all time high of 1.91 cases per thousand in 2004. This in turn has increased the vulnerability of families around the world, thus impacting other system in the society. In addition, such conditions are not favourable for the growing individual whose learning process is short changed.

 

In many parts of the world, girls are often treated as inferior and are socialized to put themselves last, thus undermining their self-esteem. Discrimination and neglect in childhood can initiate a lifelong downward spiral of deprivation and exclusion from the social mainstream. Inadequate nutrition, anaemia and early pregnancies threaten the health and life of young girls and adolescents. In some countries, infant girls are less likely to survive than infant boys because of parental discrimination and neglect. In addition, girls are more likely to drop out of school and to receive less education than boys because of gender discrimination. Due to the “One Child” policy, ⁴ statistics showed that in 1994, 117 boys were born for every 100 girls in China, though baby girls tend to have a higher survival rate than boys, that natural process has been dramatically reversed in China by infanticide. Maltreatment and malnutrition of females was common in a culture that regards boys as more desirable as they are responsible for carrying down the family name.

 

⁵ By 1947, the number of working women began to rise again. In 1951, 31% of all women worked. Conditions weren’t as bright as they seemed though. Women received lower paid salaries in factory and industrial work. There was nothing they could do though. No state legislature protected them. Despite these discriminations, a majority of these women stayed working. However, the worst was the number of young girls who worked in the sex slave trade. ⁶ Young girls from Cambodia and Vietnam are sold in the sex slave trade as young as 8 years old. Many of such girls were forced into this trade due to the growing demands of tourists who visited these places, and the idea that a young virgin girl would be able to cure them of AIDS. However, such acts has thus scar this young girls both emotionally and physically, many who have now turned their backs even to those who try to save them. 

 

Reference

¹ http://www.aauw.org/research/behindPayGap.cfm

² http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/facts/#gender

³ http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/
archives/families_households/009842.html

⁴ http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=14335

⁵ http://www.angelfire.com/ca/HistoryGals/Wesley.html

⁶ http://www.lifeinthefastlane.ca/sex-slave-trade-one-mans-mission-for-
salvation/offbeat-news 

Lecture 3: The Global Assembly – Division of Labour and Child Exploitation

In an increasingly globalized world, the division of labour has become more complex, with different parts of the world specializing in different task. According to Adam Smith, this was to aid the increase in efficiency of markets and in turn, minimize the cost of production and maximize profits. However, this usually resulted in the deskilling and profound alienation of workers from social and cultural life as raised by Karl Marx. Even though the creation of the New International Division of Labour (NIDL) enhanced the productivity of the world’s economy, this was usually at the cost of exploiting Third World Countries (TWC).

 

David Ricardo believed that national specialization is the key to world prosperity, and that specialization would lead to an efficient global system. However, this resulted in many people losing their jobs and receiving lower income. Economies were pressured to restructure such as a massive movement of Third World workers from farming to industrial work. Furthermore, specialization causes such developing countries to be vulnerable to any changes in the world economy. Developing countries such as those in EU find it difficult to re-structure so quickly. Education and training may not keep pace with a changing structure and sometimes the government is faced with a budget deficit which makes expenditure on education and re-training difficult. Moreover the industry which now has a comparative advantage may not be able to absorb the manpower from the declining industries. Also, it may not be easy for a country to find a new niche easily, thus resulting in increasing social problems.

 

Increasing mobility of labour and capital between countries resulted in outsourcing and technology sharing among countries. The search for cheap labour drove many capitalist to TWC, and resulting in the exploitation of workers, especially child labour as they are the cheapest, most willing to work for less than $2 a day.  Capitalist were more concerned about their increasing profits rather than the working conditions or welfare of their workers. ¹ In India’s commercial capital, Mumbai (Bombay), there are thousands of small units known as “zari factories”. Boys aged 6-14 work 20 hours a day, seven days a week, kneeling at low tables sewing beads and coloured threads on to vast lengths of fabric. A “zari factory” is a 3 m x 3 m room with dirty floors and hardly any ventilation. The boys have to work, wash, eat and sleep in the same room, with a small smelly bathroom in one corner. They are given only two meals a day.

 

² An estimated 158 million children aged 5-14 are engaged in child labour – one in six children in the world. Millions of children are engaged in hazardous situations or conditions, such as working in mines, working with chemicals and pesticides in agriculture or working with dangerous machinery. Most of these children are forced into the labour market due to acute poverty. At age 10, an Indonesian girl has to work 11 hours a day to earn 15 rupees (US 30 cents) to support her family. There is usually a lack of schools in their village; children grow up not receiving any education thus failing to realize that their basic rights are not met, therefore, resulting in these children working for extremely low wages. Despite efforts from the Maharastra state government to rescue the over 160,000 child laborers, many still went back to these sweatshops. ¹ “This is nothing but recycling of child labour,” Ashok Agarwal.

 

Theoretically, the New International Division of Labour would encourage a more efficient global system and free trade would spread global wealth more effectively. However in reality, NIDL only greatly benefited the capitalist who controlled the factors of production and caused an increasing income gap and greater social problems.  

 

References

¹ http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/jun2006/indi-j08.shtml

² http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_childlabour.html