To what extent was the United States responsible for the collapse of the Grand Alliance at the end of the Second World War Essay Example

To what extent was the United States responsible for the collapse of the Grand Alliance at the end of the Second World War Essay Example To what extent was the United States responsible for the collapse of the Grand Alliance at the end of the Second World War Paper To what extent was the United States responsible for the collapse of the Grand Alliance at the end of the Second World War Paper to complete the formation of a bloc of several European countries hostile to the interests of the democratic countries of Eastern Europe and most particularly to the interests of the Soviet Union. 8 (italics original). Some historians since have been sympathetic to this view; W. A. Williams argues that the postwar atmosphere degenerated into hostility in large part because of American insistence on an open-door policy of total free trade between nations, rather than, offer[ing] the Soviet Union a settlement based on other, less grandiose, terms. 9 However, this argument is predicated on the assumption that eastern Europe was already in economic isolation from the west, whereas in fact this was a state of affairs forcibly created by the USSR. Therefore, if the Marshall Plan did increase postwar tensions this was only because of the actions already taken by the Soviet Union; without communist domination of east Europe, a plan to revive shattered economies in former warzones would not have had the degenerative effect on international relations which it evidently did have. In this sense, the Marshall Plan was a response to the Soviet aggression which had caused Cold War tensions to increase, rather than an ipso facto cause of antipathy itself. There are other examples given of where the west was responsible for an increase in superpower hostility following 1945 however. One episode deserves special mention: US interference in the Italian general election of 1948. American and British officials were concerned that in the war-ravaged countries of France and Italy, economic hardship might result in communist parties coming to power through free elections; by 1946 such organisations already seemed poised to become the largest single political forces within those countries. 0 These worries quickly disappeared in the case of France, but when an election was scheduled for April 18th 1948 in Italy, the Italian communist party, at two million members the largest outside of the Soviet bloc, was poised certainly to win a large enough share of the vote to make it impossible to keep them out of a governing coalition, and possibly an outright majority. The United States decided to intervene. A massive letter-writing campaign was organised, resulting in some ten million letters being sent by Italian-Americans to relatives in Italy arguing against a vote for the communists, and the CIA in conjunction with the Catholic Church ran a huge anti-Marxist propaganda campaign. In addition, some $2-3 million was distributed by the CIA to various anti-communist political parties in Italy. When election day came the communists were humiliated, their share of the vote halved from what they had achieved in the 1946 local elections. 1 This is not the place to discuss whether American actions were justified, but undoubtedly the precedent set by the Italian effort, and its resounding success, resulted afterwards in the United States being far more willing to engage in anti-Soviet activities elsewhere, and this case is therefore cited as an instance where the actions of America contributed to the breakup of the Grand Alliance. Another reason sometimes given is the American monopoly on nucl ear weapons in the aftermath of World War Two. On July 16th 1945, the largest man-made explosion in history took place at the Alamogordo test site in New Mexico,12 and the United States was immediately catapulted into a position of total military superiority. Though the Soviet Union had ended the war with colossal conventional armed forces, the atomic bombings of Japan in August of that year left the Russians in no doubt that their on-paper ally had become indisputably the most powerful military force in the history of the world. It has therefore been argued that this obvious fact caused Stalin and his government to feel threatened and bullied by the United States, and that this was the reason for the antagonistic nature of postwar negotiations. Williams again writes: Particularly after the atom bomb was created and used, the attitude of the United States left the Soviets with but one real option: either acquiesce in American proposals or be confronted with American power and hostility. 13 Undoubtedly the US was sometimes guilty of flaunting its nuclear dominance: American officials evidently thought that the Paris Peace Conference of July 1946 would be far more productive were it to be immediately preceded by two nuclear weapons tests. 14 On the other hand, it is quite possible that considerations of American nuclear power did not factor significantly into Soviet thinking. At the Potsdam conference (July-August 1945), more than one western official observed Stalins surprising calmness, even nonchalance, when told by President Truman that the US was in possession of a new weapon of unusual destructive force. Only later did it transpire that not only did the USSR have an atomic weapons programme dating back to 1942 but that, due to the laxness of the Manhattan Projects managers respecting its wartime ally,15 the Soviets had spies passing nuclear secrets to Moscows scientists. 6 Stalin was therefore fully aware that the United States monopoly on atomic weapons would be only temporary, and therefore that this need not be factored into long-term Soviet strategic thinking. Furthermore, the aggressive actions taken by the USSR in the postwar period (see below) show no signs of restraint by Russian leaders on account of the destructive capability of the Americans nuclear arsenal. The Berlin Blockade (June 1948-May 1949) took place and concluded before the Soviets successfully tested a nuclear bomb of their own on August 29th 1949. 7 The USSRs leaders seem to have calculated, probably correctly, that the United States wanted to avoid war with the Soviet Union at almost any cost; after August 1949 this only became more true as MAD thinking began to gain widespread acceptance. The more orthodox interpretation of the postwar period is that the alliance collapsed primarily because of the actions taken by the Soviet Union after the defeat of Germany, especially concerning the areas of Europe occupied by soldiers of the Red Army. At the Yalta conference in February 1945, only months away from the defeat of Germany, major disputes arose over the fate of European nations such as Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia which had been liberated from German control by the troops of the Soviet Union. The western leaders, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill, wanted Stalin to conduct free and fair elections with the aim of establishing self-governing sovereign entities, but were under no illusions that the Soviet leader intended to turn them into friendly buffer states, and probably totalitarian one-party regimes at that. With respect to Poland especially, Stalin had already shown his contempt for national democracy movements by allowing the Wehrmacht to crush the Warsaw uprising in August-October 1944, and had a pro-Soviet puppet government ready and waiting to take over from the German authorities. 18 Previous Soviet treatment of Finland and the Baltic states gave every indication needed of how Stalin would react to attempts made at installing democracy in other countries. Section V pledged all of the allied powers, including the Soviet Union, to the earliest possible establishment through free elections of Governments responsive to the will of the people, and asserted the right of all people to choose the form of government under which they will live. 19 It does not need to be repeated that Stalin never had any intentions of carrying out the requirements of this passage. Immediately after the war the leaders of national communist parties, many of whom had spent the pre-war and wartime years in exile in Moscow and had long been subdued under Stalins whip, began their gradual accumulation of power. Invariably, the communists would contest a free-ish election under the auspices of the Red Army, win a minority of the vote (as little as 17% in Hungary and never more than 38%, in Czechoslovakia), and then agree to take part in a coalition government. Under pressure from Stalin, their rivals would agree to give communists control of ministries of justice and of the interior, which would then be used to disappear political opponents. In Poland the Soviet puppets methods were less subtle: a massive campaign of violence and intimidation preceded the first postwar elections in 1947, and the communists claimed 80% of the vote. 20 Despite assertions by some historians that western leaders handed over Eastern Europe to the Soviets at Yalta, short of a full-scale war with the USSR there was little if anything Roosevelt and Churchill could have done to prevent Stalin from turning eastern European countries into satellite states. Nevertheless, the dictators flagrant violations of the USSRs promises at Yalta created a chasm between the former Allies even before V-E Day, and is therefore frequently cited as the primary reason for the collapse of the Grand Alliance. As Roosevelts biographer Conrad Black has written, The issue of whether the British and Americans (and Frances) foremost ally would be Germany or Russia would be determined by whether Stalin could resist the temptation of enslaving Eastern Europe. 21

Practice These Italian Workbook Exercises

Practice These Italian Workbook Exercises Are you studying the Italian language? Here are some exercises to help you with your skills. Present Tense: First-Conjugation Regular Verbs A. Complete the following sentences with the correct form of the indicated verb. Loro ________________ lentamente. (camminare)Tu ________________ la macchina. (guidare)Adriana non ________________ il quaderno. (trovare)Marco ________________ lorologio. (guardare)Io ________________ i biglietti. (comprare)Voi ________________ ad alta voce. (cantare)________________ fino a tardi voi? (lavorare)Io ________________ il ricevitore. (alzare)Noi ________________ la lezione. (imparare)Loro ________________ in ritardo. (arrivare) Present Tense: Second-Conjugation Regular Verbs B. Complete the following sentences with the correct form of the indicated verb. Il professore non ________________. (rispondere)Noi ________________ un caffà ©. (bere)Loro ________________ un film. (vedere)Io ________________ la macchina. (vendere)Tu ________________ i giornali. (leggere)Io ________________ due aspirine. (prendere)Noi non ________________ la storia. (credere)Voi ________________ ogni sera. (correre)Anna Maria ________________ sempre le chiavi! (perdere)Roberta e Fabrizio ________________ volentieri delle lettere. (scrivere) Present Tense: Third-Conjugation Regular Verbs C. Complete the following sentences with the correct form of the indicated verb. Loro ________________ il campanello. (sentire)Il cuoco ________________ le patate. (bollire)Franco ________________ la scatola. (aprire)Io ________________ il caffà © alle amiche. (offrire)Voi ________________ la verit. (scoprire)Noi ________________ la finestra. (aprire)Marcantonio ________________ bene. (vestire)Tu ________________ il pericolo. (sfuggire)Voi ________________ oggi. (partire)Io ________________ le bevande. (servire)

Take Home Final Exam Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Take Home Final Exam - Case Study Example Conversely, â€Å"Public Law 94-192† mandated providing opportunities to the students having disabilities in participating in varied programs of school athletic. Finally, â€Å"Amateur Sports Act of 1978† emphasized introducing facilities along with programs for meeting the needs of the athletes having disabilities. In relation to the above context, while renovating a facility such as Morey Courts, certain specific concerned areas need to be considered by a planning committee. One of such areas would be creating a barrier less place. This will support in making better movement of the people within the area in a safer manner and also prevent from chances of falls as well as physical injuries. The other concerned area will be constructing toilets as well as other amenities in adherence with the respective special needs of the individuals who would visit the facility after being renovated. Apart from these, a planning committee should also consider introducing quality programs as well as facilities that would meet the needs of the disabled athletes and support them with addressing their practicing needs. Moreover, using flanks along with other facilities so that the movements within the facility centre do not get restricted will be the other specific concerned area for a planning committee to cons ider for renovation of a facility. Finally, a planning committee may prepare certain priority lists that would help in renovating the facility as per the desired standards, resulting into attracting the individuals to visit the facility periodically. Soft costs in the context of planning a new facility refer to such costs that are not directly engaged with the same. These generally involve the expenses that are incurred with the payments made in terms of fees and financing other needs. On a further note, soft costs comprise a huge portion of construction costs that are traditionally regarded as non-seen items. Moreover, these sports of costs are duly considered as the initial

Examine a global supply chain of clothing industries emphasizing Essay

Examine a global supply chain of clothing industries emphasizing relations of power among main actors - Essay Example The first one was the Multi-Fibre Arrangement (MFA) a regulatory framework that created preferential tariffs and quotas on the apparel industry on the commodities that imported by the developed nations such as U.S., EU states and Canada (Gereffi, & Frederick, 2010). However, in the period 1995-2005, the MFA quotas and tariffs were replaced by the World Trade Organisation’ (WTO) agreement on clothing and textile (Brambilla, Khandelwal, & Schott, 2010). The second crisis was the financial crisis of 2008, which hit the apparel industry resulting in the unemployment, increased social unrests and factory shutdowns due to decreased demand in the developed economies. Zara is one of the giant global retailers in the fast fashion industry incepted in 1975. The company is an entity of the Spanish group Inditex. By 1990, Zara had expanded globally into a number of states including New York, U.S., Paris, France and Oporto in Portugal. Currently, the company operates over 1830 outlets in 82 nations globally, located in Africa, America, Europe and Asia (Inditex, 2011). Zara considers itself as fast fashion retail chain rather than a high fashion brand, which has enabled it to expand and achieve high growth levels. Zara unlike other brands in the apparel industry uses a vertical integration model that encompasses just-in-time, design, sales and marketing (The Economist, 2001). For this reason, the company can respond to consumers demands in a prompt way, and this has been the key driving force for the accelerated growth of the company in the industry. Labour Intensive-This is because it requires a large number of labour forces to produce its goods or services. The degree of labour intensity is measured in proportion to the amount of capital required to produce goods or services; the higher the proportion of labour costs required, the more labour intensive the business (Bartley, 2005). The clothing

IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge Essay Example for Free

IKEA’s Global Sourcing Challenge Essay Indian Rugs and Child Labor (A) In May 1995, Marianne Barner faced a tough decision. After just two years with IKEA, the world’s largest furniture retailer, and less than a year into her job as business area manager for carpets, she was faced with the decision of cutting off one of the company’s major suppliers of Indian rugs. While such a move would disrupt supply and affect sales, she found the reasons to do so quite compelling. A German TV station had just broadcast an investigative report naming the supplier as one that used child labor in the production of rugs made for IKEA. What frustrated Barner was that, like all other IKEA suppliers, this large, well-regarded company had recently signed an addendum to its supply contract explicitly forbidding the use of child labor on pain of termination. Even more difficult than this short-term decision was the long-term action Barner knew IKEA must take on this issue. On one hand, she was being urged to sign up to an industry-wide response to growing concerns about the use of child labor in the Indian carpet industry. A recently formed partnership of manufacturers, importers, retailers, and Indian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) was proposing to issue and monitor the use of â€Å"Rugmark,† a label to be put on carpets certifying that they were made without child labor. Simultaneously, Barner had been conversing with people at the Swedish Save the Children organization who were urging IKEA to ensure that its response to the situation was â€Å"in the best interest of the child†Ã¢â‚¬â€whatever that might imply. Finally, there were some who wondered if IKEA should not just leave this hornet’s nest. Indian rugs accounted for a tiny part of IKEA’s turnover, and to these observers, the time, cost, and reputation risk posed by continuing this product line seemed not worth the profit potential. The Birth and Maturing of a Global Company1   Certain details have been disguised. Cases are not intended to serve as endorsements, sources of primary data, or illustrations of effective or ineffective management. Copyright  © 2006 President and Fellows of Harvard College. To order copies or request permission to reproduce materials, call 1-800-545-7685, write Harvard Business School Publishing, Boston, MA 02163, or go to http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the permission of Harvard Business School. Working out of the family kitchen, he sold goods such as fountain pens, cigarette lighters, and binders he purchased from low-priced sources and then advertised in a newsletter to local shopkeepers. When Kamprad matched his competitors by adding furniture to his newsletter in 1948, the immediate success of the new line led him to give up the small items. In 1951, to reduce product returns, he opened a display store in  nearby Älmhult village to allow customers to inspect products before buying. It was an immediate success, with customers traveling seven hours from the capital Stockholm by train to visit. Based on the store’s success, IKEA stopped accepting mail orders. Later Kamprad reflected, â€Å"The basis of the modern IKEA concept was created [at this time] and in principle it still applies. First and foremost, we use a catalog to tempt people to visit an exhibition, which today is our store. . . . Then, catalog in hand, customers can see simple interiors for themselves, touch the furniture they want to buy and then write out an order.†2 As Kamprad developed and refined his furniture retailing business model he became increasingly frustrated with the way a tightly knit cartel of furniture manufacturers controlled the Swedish industry to keep prices high. He began to view the situation not just as a business opportunity but also as an unacceptable social problem that he wanted to correct. Foreshadowing a vision for IKEA that would later be articulated as â€Å"creating a better life for the many people,† he wrote: â€Å"A disproportionately large part of all resources is used to satisfy a small part of the population. . . . IKEA’s aim is to change this situation. We shall offer a wide range of home furnishing items of good design and function at prices so low that the majority of people can afford to buy them. . . . We have great ambitions.†3 The small newsletter soon expanded into a full catalog. The 1953 issue introduced what would become another key IKEA feature: self-assembled furniture. Instead of buying complete pieces of furniture, customers bought them in flat packages and put them together themselves at home. Soon, the â€Å"knockdown† concept was fully systemized, saving transport and storage costs. In typical fashion, Kamprad turned the savings into still lower prices for his customers, gaining an even larger following among young postwar householders looking for well-designed but inexpensive furniture. Between 1953 and 1955, the company’s sales doubled from SEK 3 million to SEK 6 million.4 Managing Suppliers: Developing Sourcing Principles As its sales took off in the late 1950s, IKEA’s radically new concepts began to encounter stiff opposition from Sweden’s large furniture retailers. So  threatened were they that when IKEA began exhibiting at trade fairs, they colluded to stop the company from taking orders at the fairs and eventually even from showing its prices. The cartel also pressured manufacturers not to sell to IKEA, and the few that continued to do so often made their deliveries at night in unmarked vans. Unable to meet demand with such constrained local supply, Kamprad was forced to look abroad for new sources. In 1961, he contracted with several furniture factories in Poland, a country still in the Communist eastern bloc. To assure quality output and reliable delivery, IKEA brought its knowhow, taught its processes, and even provided machinery to the new suppliers, revitalizing Poland’s furniture industry as it did so. Poland soon became IKEA’s largest source and, to Kamprad’s delight, at much lower costs—once again allowing him to reduce his prices. Following its success in Poland, IKEA adopted a general procurement principle that it should not own its means of production but should seek to develop close ties by supporting its suppliers in a long-term relationship.a Beyond supply contracts and technology transfer, the relationship led IKEA to make loans to its suppliers at reasonable rates, repayable through future shipments. â€Å"Our objective is to develop long-term business partners,† explained a senior purchasing manager. â€Å"We commit to doing a ll we can to keep them competitive—as long as they remain equally committed to us. We are in this for the long run.† Although the relationship between IKEA and its suppliers was often described as one of mutual dependency, suppliers also knew that they had to remain competitive to keep their contract. From the outset they understood that if a more cost-effective alternative appeared, IKEA would try to help them respond, but if they could not do so, it would move production. In its constant quest to lower prices, the company developed an unusual way of  identifying new sources. As a veteran IKEA manager explained: â€Å"We do not buy products from our suppliers. We buy unused production capacity.† It was a philosophy that often led its purchasing managers to seek out seasonal manufacturers with spare off-season capacity. There were many classic examples of how IKEA matched products to supplier capabilities: they had sail makers make seat cushions, window factories produce table frames, and ski manufacturers build chairs in their off-season. The manager added, â€Å"We’ve always worr ied more about finding the right management at our suppliers than finding high-tech facilities. We will always help good management to develop their capacity.† Growing Retail: Expanding Abroad Building on the success of his first store, Kamprad self-financed a store in Stockholm in 1965. Recognizing a growing use of automobiles in Sweden, he bucked the practice of having a downtown showroom and opted for a suburban location with ample parking space. When customers drove home with their furniture in flat packed boxes, they assumed two of the costliest parts of traditional furniture retailing—home delivery and assembly. In 1963, even before the Stockholm store had opened, IKEA had expanded into Oslo, Norway. A decade later, Switzerland became its first non-Scandinavian market, and in 1974 IKEA entered Germany, which soon became its largest market. (See Exhibit 1 for IKEA’s worldwide expansion.) At each new store the same simple Scandinavian-design products were backed up with a catalog and offbeat advertising, presenting the company as â€Å"those impossible Swedes with strange ideas.† And reflecting the company’s conservative values, each new entry was financed by previous successes.b During this expansion, the IKEA concept evolved and became increasingly formalized. (Exhibit 2 summarizes important events in IKEA’s corporate history.) It still built large, suburban stores with knockdown furniture in flat packages the customers brought home to assemble themselves. But as the concept was refined, the company required that each store follow a predetermined design, set up to maximize customers’ exposure to the product range. The concept mandated, for instance, that the living room interiors should follow immediately after the entrance. IKEA also serviced customers with features  such as a playroom for children, a low-priced restaurant, and a â€Å"Sweden Shop† for groceries that had made IKEA Sweden’s leading food exporter. At the same time, the range gradually aThis policy was modified after a number of East European suppliers broke their contracts with IKEA after the fall of the Berlin Wall opened new markets for them. IKEA’s subsequent supply chain problems and loss of substantial investments led management to develop an internal production company, Swedwood, to ensure delivery stability. However, it was decided that only a limited amount of IKEA’s purchases (perhaps 10%) should be sourced from Swedwood. b By 2005, company lore had it that IKEA had only taken one bank loan in its corporate history—which it had paid back as soon as the cash flow allowed. The Emerging Culture and Values5 As Kamprad’s evolving business philosophy was formalized into the IKEA vision statement, â€Å"To create a better everyday life for the many people,† it became the foundation of the company’s strategy of selling affordable, good-quality furniture to mass-market consumers around the world. The cultural norms and values that developed to support the strategy’s implementation were also, in many ways, an extension of Kamprad’s personal beliefs and style. â€Å"The true IKEA spirit,† he remarked, â€Å"is founded on our enthusiasm, our constant will to renew, on our cost-consciousness, on our willingness to assume responsibility and to help, on our humbleness before the task, and on the simplicity of our behavior.† As well as a summary of his aspiration for the  company’s behavioral norms, it was also a good statement of Kamprad’s own personal management style. Over the years a very distinct organizational culture and management style emerged in IKEA reflecting these values. For example, the company operated very informally as evidenced by the open-plan office landscape, where even the CEO did not have a separate office, and the familiar and personal way all employees addressed one another. But that informality often masked an intensity that derived from the organization’s high self-imposed standards. As one senior executive explained, â€Å"Because there is no security available behind status or closed doors, this environment actually puts pressure on people to perform.† The IKEA management process also stressed simplicity and attention to detail. â€Å"Complicated rules paralyze!† said Kamprad. The company organized â€Å"anti-bureaucrat week† every year, requiring all managers to spend time working in a store to reestablish contact with the front line and the consumer. The workpace was such that executives joked that IKEA believed in â€Å"management by running around.† Cost consciousness was another strong part of the management culture. â€Å"Waste of resources,† said Kamprad, â€Å"is a mortal sin at IKEA. Expensive solutions are often signs of mediocrity, and an idea without a price tag is never acceptable.† Although cost consciousness extended into all aspects of the operation, travel and entertainment expenses were particularly sensitive. â€Å"We do not set any price on time,† remarked an executive, recalling that he had once phoned Kamprad to get approval to fly first class. He explained that economy class was full and that he had an urgent appointment to keep. â€Å"There is no first class in IKEA,† Kamprad had replied. â€Å"Perhaps you should go by car.† The executive completed the 350-mile trip by taxi. The search for creative solutions was also highly prized with IKEA. Kamprad had written, â€Å"Only while sleeping one makes no mistakes. The fear of making mistakes is the root of bureaucracy and the enemy of all evolution.† Though planning for the future was encouraged, overanalysis was not. â€Å"Exaggerated planning can be fatal,† Kamprad advised his executives. â€Å"Let simplicity and common sense characterize your planning.† In 1976, Kamprad felt the need to commit to paper the values that had developed in IKEA during the previous decades. His thesis, Testament of a Furniture Dealer, became an important means for spreading the IKEA philosophy, particularly during its period of rapid international expansion. (Extracts of the Testament are given in Exhibit 3.) Specially trained â€Å"IKEA ambassadors† were assigned to key positions in all units to spread the company’s philosophy and values by educating their subordinates and by acting as role models. In 1986, when Kamprad stepped down, Anders Moberg, a company veteran who had once been Kamprad’s personal assistant, took over as president and CEO. But Kamprad remained intimately involved as chairman, and his influence extended well beyond the ongoing daily operations: he was the self-appointed guardian of IKEA’s deeply embedded culture and values. Waking up to Environmental and Social Issues By the mid-1990s, IKEA was the worlds largest specialized furniture retailer. Sales for the IKEA Group for the financial year ending August 1994 totaled SEK 35 billion (about $4.5 billion). In the previous year, more than 116 million people had visited one of the 98 IKEA stores in 17 countries, most of them drawn there by the company’s product catalog, which was printed yearly in 72 million copies in 34 languages. The privately held company did not report profit levels, but one estimate put its net margin at 8.4% in 1994, yielding a net profit of SEK 2.9 billion (about $375 million). 6 After decades of seeking new sources, in the mid-1990s IKEA worked with almost 2,300 suppliers in 70 countries, sourcing a range of around 11,200 products. Its relationship with its suppliers was dominated by commercial issues, and its 24 trading service offices in 19 countries primarily monitored  production, tested new product ideas, negotiated prices, and checked quality. (See Exhibit 4 for selected IKEA figures in 1994.) That relationship began to change during the 1980s, however, when environmental problems emerged with some of its products. And it was even more severely challenged in the mid-1990s when accusations of IKEA suppliers using child labor surfaced. The Environmental Wake-Up: Formaldehyde In the early 1980s, Danish authorities passed regulations to define limits for formaldehyde emissions permissible in building products. The chemical compound was used as binding glue in materials such as plywood and particleboard and often seeped out as gas. At concentrations above 0.1 mg/kg in air, it could cause watery eyes, headaches, a burning sensation in the throat, and difficulty breathing. With IKEA’s profile as a leading local furniture retailer using particleboard in many of its products, it became a prime target for regulators wanting to publicize the new standards. So when tests showed that some IKEA products emitted more formaldehyde than was allowed by legislation, the case was widely publicized and the company was fined. More significantly—and the real lesson for IKEA—was that due to the publicity, its sales dropped 20% in Denmark. In response to this situation, the company quickly established stringent requirements regarding formaldehyde emissions but soon found that suppliers were failing to meet its standards. The problem was that most of its suppliers bought from subsuppliers, who in turn bought the binding materials from glue manufacturers. Eventually, IKEA decided it would have to work directly with the glue-producing chemical companies and, with the collaboration of companies such as ICI and BASF, soon found ways to reduce the formaldehyde off-gassing in its products.7 A decade later, however, the formaldehyde problem returned. In 1992, an investigative team from a large German newspaper and TV company found that IKEA’s best-selling bookcase series, Billy, had emissions higher than German legislation allowed. This time, however, the source of the problem was not the glue but the lacquer on the bookshelves. In the wake of headlines describing â€Å"deadly poisoned bookshelves,† IKEA immediately stopped both the production and sales of Billy bookcases worldwide and corrected the problem before resuming  distribution. Not counting the cost of lost sales and production or the damage to goodwill, the Billy incident was estimated to have cost IKEA $6 million to $7 million.8 These events prompted IKEA to address broader environmental concerns more directly. Since wood was the principal material in about half of all IKEA products, forestry became a natural starting point. Following discussions with both Greenpeace and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF, formerly World Wildlife Fund) and using standards set by the Forest Stewardship Council, IKEA established a forestry policy stating that IKEA would not accept any timber, veneer, plywood, or layer-glued wood from intact natural forests or from forests with a high conservation value. This meant that IKEA had to be willing to take on the task of tracing all wood used in IKEA products back to its source. 9 To monitor compliance, the company appointed forest managers to carry out random checks of wood suppliers and run projects on responsible forestry around the world. In addition to forestry, IKEA identified four other areas where environmental criteria were to be applied to its business operations: adapting the product range; working with suppliers; transport and distribution; and ensuring environmentally conscious stores. For instance, in 1992, the company began using chlorine-free recycled paper in its catalogs; it redesigned the best-selling OGLA chair— originally manufactured from beech—so it could be made using waste material from yogurt cup production; and it redefined its packaging principles to eliminate any use of PVC. The company also maintained its partnership with WWF, resulting in numerous projects on global conservation, and funded a global forest watch program to map intact natural forests worldwide. In addition, it engaged in an ongoing dialogue with Gr eenpeace on forestry.10 The Social Wake-Up: Child Labor In 1994, as IKEA was still working to resolve the formaldehyde problems, a Swedish television documentary showed children in Pakistan working at weaving looms. Among the several Swedish companies mentioned in the film as importers of carpets from Pakistan, IKEA was the only highprofile name on the list. Just two months into her job as business area manager for carpets, Marianne Barner recalled the shockwaves that the TV program sent through the company: The use of child labor was not a high-profile public issue at the time. In fact, the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child had only been published in December 1989. So, media attention like this TV program had an important role to play in raising awareness on a topic not well known and understood—including at IKEA. . . . We were caught completely unaware. It was not something we had been paying attention to. For example, I had spent a couple of months in India learning about trading but got no exposure to child labor. Our buyers met suppliers in their city offices and rarely got out to where production took place. . . . Our immediate response to the program was to apologize for our ignorance and acknowledge that we were not in full control of this problem. But we also committed to do something about it. As part of its response, IKEA sent a legal team to Geneva to seek input and advice from the International Labor Organization (ILO) on how to deal with the problem. They learned that Convention 138, adopted by the ILO in 1973 and ratified by 120 countries, committed ratifying countries to working for the abolition of labor by children under 15 or the age of compulsory schooling in that country. India, Pakistan, and Nepal were not signatories to the convention.11 Following these discussions with the ILO, IKEA added a clause to all supply contracts—a â€Å"black-andwhite† clause, as Barner put it—stating simply that if the supplier employed children under legal working age, the contract would be cancelled.

The Patriot Essay -- essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Patriot was a very accurate movie. It has gone to great lengths to have the most accurate information and to tell the real story, but still make it interesting. The movie itself contains tents, ammunition boxes, medical kits, campaign furniture, uniforms, weapons, battle formation and more that were made completely flawless with help from museums and the Smithsonian Institute (Revolutionary War experts). Also too some amazement, the movie has very accurate weather details. One of the main things that isn’t accurate but was put in the movie to show significance, was the old flag that was ripped but Gabriel sowed it back together and at the end of the movie Benjamin Martin leads the militia with it.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The Theme is about freedom, but it is a different freedom then you are thinking of. It’s the freedom for Benjamin Martin trying to live his life in peace and not be bothered by war. Benjamin Martin is a well known war hero from the French Indian war. After that war all he wants to do is be peaceful and live a happy life with his family. He is shortly dragged into the war because the English army comes to his farm and kills his son, so he gets his revenge and returns into another mental state of mind. Martin wants his life back the way it was with his family on his farm and being peaceful, so for this he forms a militia and fights for his freedom against the English army.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  &...

Narrative essay Essay

Since I had started school and writing composition, I have had experiences that either was good or bad. But at the end these experience helped me through my next and future years of school and college. One of the incidents that most marked my writing experience was in sophomore year. The prompt was doing a resume for college, and I actually did or tried my best, but then again the result wasn’t so good. The resume was almost completely marked by red writings, of my grammar. All though the professor gave us many opportunities to make it right, every time I got it back it seems as if nothing had change. And it was then that I realized I haven’t had done some things right. I learned two things not to stress and always have my ideas on the same topic. Through this experience what has helped me the most in other assignments was not to over stress. When I remember back to that event, I see myself over reacting and stressing out, thinking whether that resume was making sense. I would stress so much, to the point that I would spend hours just thinking of how to start my first paragraph. When knew I should have start by thinking of my ideas, writing them in paper, and then modifying them in a paragraph. It showed me that by doing these I wrote faster my paragraphs, ending my work faster. These knowledge improve my way of writing a resume and any other type of writing work. 　　　 　Another skill these experience taught me was to never let my ideas go off topic. I remember that resume had side notes saying that my ideas were not connected and were off topic. So since that day I tried to keep my writing on the same topic . My resume didn’t make sense because I sometimes got my ideas mixed and wrote them in the wrong order. Which most of the time made my resume to not make sense. This experience also taught me to always sound myself and not try to hard using fancy words, which as a result let to paragraphs without any meaning. Some of these intellectual words were hard to find when writing and knowing what kind of audience was going to read my resume. 　　　　 In all these bad experiences as someones will say, taught me that we are not always going to have a perfect paragraph. That we need practice and patience to do our best on the writings assignments. These experience also showed me to be more confident on how I write and on what I’m trying to say. At the end either good or bad this experience taught me a lesson that I know will help me all this years to come. And after this lesson learned was something is going to be on my mind and I will know what to do on the next

Quality Television Program Essay

As the channels available on America’s cable programs exceed a thousand and as television becomes more readily available through mobile electronic devices, the criteria for what makes for a quality television program has certainly become more intricate and competitive. There are many different genres of television programs that appeal to a certain type of audience. As a huge fan of drama movies and television, I will be evaluating the recently new spin-off television show 90210 which is currently aired on CW. The American teen drama series revolves around a series of characters attending a fictional high school in Beverly Hills. The program seems to attempt to capture many of the same audiences that enjoy shows such as Gossip Girl and The Vampire Diaries which are also popular TV programs on CW. To evaluate and determine the quality level of 90210 I will be looking at a set of criteria that includes the appeal that the characters bring to the show, how realistic the show is, and a look at the development of plots throughout the last few seasons. To shed some light on the television program I will introduce some of the main characters that have been present in the four seasons the show has been airing. Lori Loughlin and Rob Hestes play Harry and Debbie Wilson as mother and father of daughter Annie Wilson and adopted son, Dixon Wilson. After a move from Kansas, the family of four enters season one as a new family to Beverly Hills and with Harry as the principal of Annie and Dixon’s new high school. Jessica Stroup plays Erin ‘Silver’ Silver who has a bipolar disorder and tends to hang out with some of the less popular of those at Beverly Hills High. Annalynne McCord plays the infamous Naomi Clark who is the most popular, gorgeous, untouchable girl available at her school. Then there is Michael Steger who plays Navid Shirazi who in the first season plays as role as Dixon’s quirky sidekick and then slowly falls into a leading role as he gets involved in a relationship with Jessica Lowndes who plays Adrianna Tate-Duncan. And it certainly would not be a teen drama without the good looking guy, Matt Lanter playing Liam Court who soon gets together with Annie Wilson. As far as criteria is concerned for evaluating the show’s characters I want to look at how engaging the characters are for the audience, how unique and identifiable they are, and what the relationships between the characters are like. After watching all four seasons of the show, they did a great job of picking actors/actresses that fit their different roles. With that said, each of the characters definitely has their own unique characteristics and personalities.

Lowering the drinking age essays

Lowering the drinking age essays Since the increase of the drinking age to 21 has taken effect in New York state, the argument for lowering that limit has been heated. The current age for the consumption of alcohol in the United States is 21 ("Consequences"). Just as it is stated in the following quote, age limits for minors are inconsistent. " Why is it that 18 year old U.S. citizens can legally obtain a driver's license, register to vote, be forced into jury duty or a draft, can be tried as an adult and even put to death, but cannot buy and consume alcoholic beverages?"("Drinking"). The following quote deals specifically with the problem of underage drinking. "88% of drinking drivers aged 16-20 who where involved in fatal crashes in 1993 were determined to have CAUSED the crash" ("Consequences"). Logically, if parents could teach young adults the responsibilities of alcohol at a younger age, then this frightening statistic would probably be cut in half. As Jeff Roberts* put it in his interview, " I believe that one of the factors that drives young adults to drinking, if not the biggest reason, is that it is illegal. That is where the peer pressure and the glamour of it all comes in. Young adults see the older adults handling alcohol and say well I want to act older so I can do that too. It also makes the young adult feel dangerous and alive. They are getting away with something that is illegal." It is conceivable that if a parent were given the chance to teach his or her child the responsibilities of drinking at a younger age, that child may grow up understanding and respecting the responsibilities of drinking ("Drinking"). Fasier* responded "I am a firm believer in the idea. It is logical, it is the way it should be taught , Laurent 2 and it is right there along with the Constitution and freedom of choice, which is what this nation ...

Facts About Milk and Whats Wrong With Milk

Facts About Milk and Whats Wrong With Milk It may be difficult to understand, at first, why vegans abstain from drinking milk. It’s supposedly wholesome and healthy, and if the advertising is to be believed, comes from â€Å"happy cows.† If you look beyond the image and examine the facts, you’ll find that the objections range from animal rights to the environment to health concerns. Animal Rights Because cows are sentient and capable of suffering and feeling pain, they have a right to be free of use and abuse by human. No matter how well the animal is cared for, taking breast milk from another animal violates that right to be free, even if cows were allowed to live out their lives on idyllic green pastures. Factory Farming Many believe that drinking milk is fine as long as the cows are treated humanely, but modern factory farming practices mean that cows do not live out their lives on idyllic green pastures. Gone are the days when farmhands just used their hands and a milk pail. Cows are now milked with milking machines, which cause mastitis. They are artificially inseminated as soon as they are old enough to become pregnant, give birth and produce milk. After two cycles of pregnancy and birth, when they are about four or five years old, they are slaughtered because they are considered â€Å"spent† and no longer profitable. When they are sent to slaughter, approximately 10% of them are so weak, they cannot stand on their own. These cows would normally live about 25 years. Cows today are also bred and raised to produce more milk than in past decades. PETA explains: On any given day, there are more than 8 million cows on U.S. dairy farms- about 14 million fewer than there were in 1950. Yet milk production has continued to increase, from 116 billion pounds of milk per year in 1950 to 170 billion pounds in 2004.(6,7) Normally, these animals would produce only enough milk to meet the needs of their calves (around 16 pounds per day), but genetic manipulation, antibiotics, and hormones are used to force each cow to produce more than 18,000 pounds of milk each year (an average of 50 pounds per day). Part of the increased milk production is due to breeding, and part of it is due to unnatural husbandry practices, such as feeding meat to the cows and giving rBGH to cows. Environment Animal agriculture is a very inefficient use of resources and is damaging to the environment. Water, fertilizer, pesticides and land are required to grow crops to feed to cows. Energy is needed to harvest the crops, turn the crops into feed, and then transport the feed to farms. The cows must also be given water to drink. The waste and methane from factory farms are also an environmental hazard. The US Environmental Protection Agency states, â€Å"In the U.S., cattle emit about 5.5 million metric tons of methane per year into the atmosphere, accounting for 20% of U.S. methane emissions.† Veal Another concern is veal. Approximately three quarters of the calves born in the dairy industry are turned into veal, because they are not needed or useful for milk production, and are the wrong breed of cattle for beef production. What About â€Å"Happy Cows†? Even on farms where the cows are not constantly confined, the female cows are slaughtered when their milk production drops and three-quarters of the calves are turned into veal. Don’t We Need Milk? Milk is not necessary for human health, and may be a health risk. Except for domesticated animals to whom we feed milk, humans are the only species that drinks the breast milk of another species, and the only species that continues to drink breast milk into adulthood. Furthermore, dairy consumption raises certain health concerns, such as cancer, heart disease, hormones and contaminants.

American History Since 1900 assignment four Essay

American History Since 1900 assignment four - Essay Example This of course leads to abuses against due process that is guaranteed in the constitution. The idea that someone is innocent until proven guilty was perverted by the weight of congressional hearings during the McCarthy Era. If a person chose to refuse to incriminate himself or herself by claiming their 5th amendment rights, they would be viewed as guilty. On the other hand, if they chose to testify on their own behalf, then they could be forced to incriminate others. This placed citizens accused of un-American activities in an unjust situation. One Hollywood personality that chose to testify was Edward Dmytryk. He naively thought that if he testified, the public would back him and the left-leaning friends he had would come to his rescue. He attempted to testify and he was made to appear guilty. He lost many friends and his job as a result. Lillian Hillman refused to testify by invoking her 5th amendment rights. Many thought this would only serve to make her appear guilty, but she rep orts hearing individuals in the audience making positive comments about her willingness to stand-up to the congressional committee. Vietnam was another country in Asia that was under pressure to become a Communist country. President Kennedy described the countries falling in Asia as dominoes. If one falls then another will follow. America tried to create a government in the south to withstand Communist pressure from the north. This failed so the United States chose to escalate the war through a campaign of bombing. Ground troops were added but proved largely ineffective. America divided between supporters and protestors of the war in Vietnam. President Nixon finally got the Vietcong to come to the peace table. The war was a defeat for America. With the election of President Reagan in 1980, America took a large turn towards becoming a more conservative nation. President Reagan worked hard to incorporate a new conservative agenda into domestic policy. Government funding of abortions t hrough Medicaid was banned. Many gains for gays and lesbians at the local lever were overturned and the overall size of government was reduced. Taxes were cut because Reagan believed that free enterprise was the best way to grow an economy. Spending on the military was increased in an effort to out-produce the Soviet Union. This resulted in the Soviet Union failing eventually, but also made government deficits. Richard Nixon’s political strategy reflected the racial and radicalism of his era in several ways. He ran on a strong platform of law and order. He wanted to show America that the hippies and their kind were actually the minority of people in America, not the majority. The complete chaos created by rioting minorities in urban areas and the debacle of the Democratic convention in Chicago played into Nixon’s hand. Many Americans actually expressed their view that the students at Kent State deserved to get shot. This need for law and order is what Nixon was able to tap into. He was easily elected as President. The main causes of the Watergate Scandal were the illegal and unethical methods that the Nixon administration were employing to find out about their Democratic challenger’s strategy. They hired individuals to steal secrets and the thieves were caught. What added to the scandal was the fact that Nixon denied that

Personal and Professional Development Research Paper

Personal and Professional Development - Research Paper Example In these regards, it is my hope to secure a professional position with advancement opportunities that fully maximizes my human potential. In this way I will be able to go to worth with energy and passion, knowing that there is no better professional situation on Earth for my skills.There are many external factors that could potentially facilitate or hinder my quest to achieve my goals. In terms of professional goals I recognize that I would eventually like to attain a graduate degree in accounting. While my parents have generously aided me in attending college to attain my undergraduate degree, I recognize that attain a graduate degree will require me to take on increased financial responsibility. This will then pose a challenge for me to overcome. Another external challenge is the need to attain a job after graduating from college. I also recognize that I will have to be able to register for the necessary classes and get the necessary professors that will be educate me and point me in the right path on my journey. While there are a number of years before I will enter the job market, I recognize that the current economic climate is highly challenged. The United States is in a recession and subsequently jobs are limited. This will subsequently place a great challenge on me.