Of Mice and Men Essay Example for Free

Of Mice and Men Essay John Steinbeck (1902-1968), born in Salinas, California, came from a family of moderate means. He worked his way through college at Stanford University but never graduated. In 1925, he went to New York, where he tried for a few years to establish himself as a free-lance writer, but he failed and returned to California. After publishing some novels and short stories, Steinbeck first became widely known with Tortilla Flat (1935), a series of humorous stories about Monterey paisanos. Steinbecks novels can all be classified as social novels dealing with the economic problems of rural labour, but there is also a streak of worship of the soil in his books, which does not always agree with his matter-of-fact sociological approach. Throughout high school and college, Steinbeck took summer jobs working as a ranch hand. These jobs were extremely important to his literary career. Memories of his work on ranches would furnish the background for Of Mice and Men. John Steinbeck’s grandparents owned ranches in the King City area and in Hollister. Samuel and Eliza Hamilton, his mother’s parents, owned a ranch in the hills east of King City, the southern part of the Salinas Valley. John Steinbeck spent a part of every summer at this ranch, doing chores, taking care of the animals, and exploring the land. A typical day for ranch children began at 5:00 AM. Certain chores needed to be completed before the family and ranch hands had breakfast, including hauling water from the well, feeding the horses, and collecting wood for the stove. The children then walked to school. Some attended a one-room schoolhouse with a teacher, while others gathered at a neighbouring ranch to be taught by mothers and relatives. The children were at school for about four hours before returning home to work on the ranch. The younger children fed and cared for the chickens, goats, or pigs. Older children, about 14 years or older, worked with the adults to harvest the crops or herd the cows. Older girls usually took care of their younger siblings while the adults worked in the fields or the livestock. Ranch families would travel to the nearest town to purchase supplies and ools, go to church, and visit family members. The frequency of these trips depended on how far away they were from town. For example, ranchers in Big Sur would only go to town once every three to six months, depending on the weather and their needs. For many families, this trip took an entire day or longer. Ranchers also received supplies from travelling salesmen, livestock traders, migrant labour, and veterinarians. There were two types of ranches that existed in the Salinas Valley in the 1920s/30s: these ranches could be distinguished from each other by their location in the valley. The first type was located low on the green fertile valley floor. Hill ranches, the second type, were usually nestled up higher in the rocky and dusty terrain of the foothills of the surrounding mountains. The ranches on the valley floor were characteristically agricultural since they had more water. The rich soil and mild year-round climate lent itself to raising the lettuce and vegetables that the Salinas Valley is famous for. The ranch in The Red Pony was modelled after the second type of ranch, the hill ranch. Hill ranches were primarily interested in the cattle industry. Since there was often a shortage of water at the higher elevations, the hill-ranchers raised cattle instead of the thirsty crops that lined the valley floor. These ranches were usually quite a bit further from town than the valley floor ranches, and this added to the hardships brought on by drought years and supply shortages. The Great Depression was the great economic crisis that is said to have been started because of the U. S. stock-market crash in 1929. The prices on the Wall Street stock market fell a lot from October 24 to October 29, 1929. Many people lost their jobs. By 1932, 25–30% of people lost their jobs. They became homeless and poor. This ended the wealth of the Roaring Twenties. Many people think that the Great Depression started on Black Tuesday, but Black Tuesday was just an underlying problem that would help cause the Depression. From 1929-1932, the depression worsened. Many suspect that increased taxes on American citizens and the increased tariffs (taxes on countries that trade with the United States) worsened it. Economist Milton Friedman said that the Great Depression was worsened because the Federal Reserve printed out less money than usual. When the Great Depression started, Herbert Hoover was the president of the United States, and as a result, he was blamed for it. People voted for a new president in 1932. His name was Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt got the government to pass many new laws and programs to help people who were hurt by the Great Depression. These programs were called the New Deal. One of these programs was the Civilian Conservation Corps or CCC. The CCC put many young men to work in the outdoors. The men were paid 1 dollar a week to work, and they got free food and shelter. Another one of these programs was called Social Security. Social Security gave old people a small income so they had money for things they needed. The Great Depression was really bad, but with everyones help, it would get better. Between 1939 and 1944, more people had jobs again because of World War II, and the Great Depression came to an end. An important reason for the Great Depression was the Treaty of Versailles. The Treaty of Versailles made the United States very rich. Britain and France both gave large amounts of money to the U. S. , and Germany had to pay a great amount of money for the damage they had done in World War I. However, it was this wealth that began the stock market crash. Even after the Wall Street Crash of 1929, people still had hope. John D. Rockefeller said, These are days when many are discouraged. In the 93 years of my life, depressions have come and gone. Prosperity has always returned and will again. But soon the bad effects of the depression grew worse and worse. People lost jobs, money, and homes. There were reports that in Germany and the United States, there was great hunger, disease, and even starvation. In previous depressions, farmers were usually safe from the severe effects of a depression because they could at least feed themselves. Unfortunately, during the Great Depression, the Great Plains were hit hard with both a drought and horrendous dust storms. Years and years of overgrazing combined with the effects of a drought caused the grass to disappear. With just topsoil exposed, high winds picked up the loose dirt and whirled it for miles. The dust storms destroyed everything in their paths, leaving farmers without their crops. Small farmers were hit especially hard. Even before the dust storms hit, the invention of the tractor drastically cut the need for manpower on farms. These small farmers were usually already in debt, borrowing money for seed and paying it back when their crops came in. When the dust storms damaged the crops, not only could the small farmer not feed himself and his family, he could not pay back his debt. If you migrated to California during this decade, you were among some 1. 3 million workers who made the trek, according to the University of California-Davis Rural Migration News from 2003. Not only did the states more hospitable temperatures draw farmers, but California also boasted a more diverse array of crops from cotton and peas to lemons and oranges. Once you reached California, you continued to be transient. This was the case because you basically followed the harvest, travelling from place to place to harvest whatever crop was in season. Earlier in the decade, there was a mentality that workers would be provided with the barest means, such as poor food, and then simply sent on their way, according to UC-Davis. With reform, that changed and migrant worker camps were established; essentially, these were a federally sponsored network of camps that provided shelter as well as health care, work counselling and food. Though these camps mandated that workers volunteer a specified amount of time, you didnt just work; you also had opportunities to play, according to the Library of Congress. It reports that there was a sense of culture that flourished in the camp. Music served as one of the biggest recreational activities; popular among workers were traditional Anglo-Celtic ballads, as well as early country works by the likes of Gene Autry. Music was created during this period by artists like Mary Sullivan and Jack Bryant, who documented what it was like to be a migrant in song. If you were a worker travelling from Mexico during this time, or an American of Mexican ethnic origin, you made far less than your white counterparts on the same job, according to the Oakland Museum of California. That being said, you still earned more in the states than you did in Mexico during this time. Mexican-American migrants patched together shelter from anything they could find, be it burlap, canvas or branches. Though its estimated that in the 1920s, 75% of migrant workers were of Mexican origin, as the country fell into the Great Depression, white workers took over their jobs, leaving many Mexican-Americans unemployed. Your work options expanded with the advent of World War II. For this reason, migrant work became far less necessary and, in turn, far less desirable. Many former migrant workers, according to the Library of Congress, went overseas to serve in the war. Still others supported the war effort stateside, taking on positions at coastal shipyards or at defence plants. The average family income dropped 40 percent between 1929 and 1933, and while men took second jobs or searched for better-paying employment in an oversaturated market, most of their wives stayed home and struggled with what Eleanor Roosevelt called endless little economies and constant anxieties. At the bottom of the middle class, women worried about losing their homes and falling back into the class of renters in Indianapolis, more than half the families with mortgages had defaulted on them by 1934. Those higher on the economic ladder simply had to figure out how to keep up appearances without the help of servants (an ad for bleach showed a pair of elegant hands in a tub of dirty laundry and asked: doing it yourself these days? ) The marriage rate dropped. The nation declared a truce in its war on spinsterhood, and magazines once again ran articles about women who found happiness in life without a husband. Live Alone And Like It was a bestseller. Do you realize how many people in my generation are not married? asked Elsa Ponselle, who was working as a teacher when the Chicago school system ran out of money and started paying its staff in IOUs. Her own boyfriend, a commercial artist, vanished when he was laid off from his job. Societys fight against contraceptives came to a virtual halt as well, partly because of national outcries against women on the dole who continued to have babies. In 1936, the federal court struck down all federal restrictions against birth control, in a case memorably named U. S. v One Package of Japanese Pessaries. The birth rate plunged so low that for the first time in American history the nation was not replacing itself. Bertha Thompson, who called herself Boxcar Bertha’, estimated that 500,000 to 2 million people were hoboes in the 1930s, and that perhaps a tenth of them were women. Most travelled in pairs, Thompson said, either with a man or another woman. But mainly, the women who took to the roads were with their families. Peggy Terry, who travelled as a migrant worker, remembered seeing a Hooverville in Oklahoma. Here were all these people living in old, rusted-out car bodies. I mean that was their home. There were people living in shacks made of orange crates. One family with a whole lot of kids were living in a piano box. This wasnt just a little section: this was maybe ten miles long and ten miles wide. The issue of whether married women should work was chewed over constantly in the newspapers and womens magazines, with the consensus coming down on the side of not. A federal law, passed during the Depression, prohibited the employment of married persons whose spouses also worked for the government. Of the people forced to quit, three quarters were women (Eleanor Roosevelt called the law a very bad and foolish thing government salaries, she argued, were so low, a family needed two incomes just to get along). Legislators in twenty-six states introduce laws completely banning the hiring of married women, although only Louisiana actually passed a law, and it was quickly declared unconstitutional. More than three quarters of the nations public school districts refused to hire married teachers unless they were male. Despite all this, the number of married women who worked continued to increase throughout the decade. Although most of these women struggled to keep poor families above water, a number were middle class and were attempting to preserve the good things they had gotten used to since World War I like electric lights and gas stoves, and the ability to keep their children in school. It was an important cultural shift that sent women into the workforce in larger and larger numbers. And for all the endless debate about whether or not it was good for society, the issue was resolved not by social theorists but by the wives themselves, determined that they and their families would not only survive but also move up. The 1930s were a turbulent time for race relations in America. Despite the decline of such organizations as the Ku Klux Klan (which had enjoyed renewed support during the 1910s and 1920s) racism was as strong as ever in the Southern states. Furthermore, as this picture alludes to, the increased presence of Black Americans in Northern cities (where many had migrated during WWII and especially during the Depression) resulted in increased tension between the races there as well. This image of a drunken African-American passed out in the middle of the city reflects the apprehension, which many rich white New Yorkers felt at the presence of so many blacks in what they considered to be their city. Many New Deal programs gave black Americans opportunities they had often lacked in the past, while also helping to bring their daily struggles to light for Northerners. Such federal programs as The Federal Music Project, Federal Theatre Project, and Federal Writers project enabled black artists to find word during the depression, often times creating art or stories, which portrayed the historic and present situation of blacks in the South. Projects chronicling the lives of former slaves were also begun under the auspices of these programs. At the same time competition for WPA (Works Project Administration) jobs in the South during the thirties also brought to light the persistence of inequality even in the government. Since the WPA required that eligible employees not have refused any private sector jobs at the prevailing wage for such jobs, African-Americans (who were paid less on average than whites in the South) might be refused WPA jobs which whites were eligible for. Such discrimination often extended to Hispanic-Americans in the Southwest as well. Despite such difficulties, WPA head Harry Hopkins worked with NAACP leaders to prevent discrimination whenever possible resulting in general support for the programs (and the government) by the black community. Black Americans also received increased visibility during this decade for less auspicious reasons, resulting in bitter political conflict within the Democratic Party. While the South had been solidly Democratic since the Civil War, the Roosevelt administration actively appealed to African-Americans to join their party, thus alienating many Southerners. The growing divide between Northern and Southern Democrats over the issue of race came to a head in April 1937, when a bitter fight over an anti-lynching bill took place in the House of Representatives. In the wake of a gruesome double lynching in Mississippi (only one of more than a hundred that had taken place since 1930) The House passed the anti-lynching resolution, despite the opposition of all but one Southern member. Declaring that the South had been deserted by the Democrats of the North, former Roosevelt supporters in the Senate carried out a six-week long filibuster that resulted in the withdrawal of the bill in February 1938. This bitter political fight was indicative of the racism and regional conflict still firmly in-trenched in America in the 1930s.

Behavior Towards Fast Food Mcdonalds In Malaysia

Behavior Towards Fast Food Mcdonalds In Malaysia Chapter 1: Introduction Introduction 1.1.1 The Nature of Fast Food From French fries to Big Mac burger, fast food can consider as one of the food types that growing in a fast mode (Goyal et al, 2007). According to Bender and Bender (1995), fast food meant food that has limited choices in the menu which being created under production line technique. Besides, fast food also defined as food likes hamburgers, sandwiches, or pizza which are food that supplier be likely to specialize (Davies et al, 2004). In simple words, fast food also being defined as food purchased by self-service in counter and then take the food to own dining table without any services by waiter (Association NR, 2003). The rise of fast food can be traced back to the early 1900s when Automat opened the first ever fast food restaurant which sell foods and drinks by using machines. Then white castle introduced hamburgers to fast food outlets and this brings the culture until today. After some years, the concept of fast food is so attractive and successful and this attracted many companies such as McDonalds, KFC, Wendys and Burger King joined the fast food industry (Chavadi et al, 2008). Since the early stage of 1970s in US, fast food has become part and partial of Americans and the frequency of eating fast food has rapidly increased (French et al, 2000). Fast food outlets imbued almost every corner in the world, different fast food restaurants is in your eyesight (Jayna et al, 2009). National Restaurant Association claimed that there are three out of ten customers said that eating fast food is their own way of life and it is important for their daily life (National Restaurant Association, 2008). Moreover, fast food successfully dominates away-from-home food expenses during the last few decades (Sharkey et al, 2011). To add more on this, the trend of eating away from home is more and more common and the frequency of visits to fast food outlets even increase rapidly. In 1970, there is about 25% of total spending for away-from-home foods and the spending rocketed up to 53% for the total spending for away-from-home foods (Clauson A, 2000). This showed that more consumers prefer to eat fast food rather than home cook foods. In addition, there are decelerating for the path of the industry when the economy crisis hits the world with a low point of 3.1% two years ago. Nevertheless, there are sign of recovery for the industry when there is expected accelerating of growth rates showed in the forecast period. The fast food market had $201.1billion of total revenue in 2009 which correspond to 4.8% of compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for the year 2005 to 2009. In Europe, the markets raised about 4.7% of (CAGR) while Asias market grew about 6.1% of (CAGR) in 2009. The fast food market of Europe and Asia respectively values about $34.2 billion and $71.6 billion. Furthermore, the market consumption volume is expected to increase to $248.7 billion at the end of 2014. The most profitable in the industry is QSR segment where it earned about $142.6 billion or 70.9% of the markets overall value (Data Monitor, 2010). 1.1.2 History of McDonalds The history of McDonalds began in 1940 when Dick and Mac McDonald started their business by opening McDonalds Bar-B-Que restaurant in California which offered large menu to customers. After that, they closed down the restaurant and reopen another restaurant which is a self service dive in restaurant. This time, they only provide limited choices of foods for customers such as burger, coffee, soft drinks, potato chips and milk. In 1949, the world well-known French fries were introduced and replaced potato chips on the menu. After a year, a salesperson called Ray Kroc met up with McDonald brothers and purchased the franchising right from them and planed to operate the restaurant. Few months later, Kroc opened his first ever McDonalds restaurant in Illinois and the world famous Golden Arches also started to use as the symbol of McDonalds. History was made and new records to be created from time to time since McDonalds started its operation. Today, McDonalds is the world largest organizat ion in the world with more than 32000 fast food outlets in 117 countries which serves more than 60 million customers everyday (About McDonalds.com, 2011; McDonalds Malaysia.com, 2011). McDonalds also the largest buyer of materials such as potatoes and beef (Steyn NP, 2010). The brands mission is to be McDonalds customers favourite place and way to eat. Besides, the company promises to supply Simple Easy Enjoyment to every customer when they visit to the restaurant and let customers enjoy the feel of having meal there as well as like having meal in own sweet home. The company hold tied to the value of serving quality food, giving superior service and cleanliness of environment to delight every customer and hope customers were treated like VIP (McDonalds.com.my, 2011). Furthermore, the annual report of McDonalds for the year of 2010 reported that the company earned about $24,075 million in 2010 which higher 6% of the sales compared to the previous year which earned about $22,745 million. The revenues of the company in US for year 2009 and 2010 are positively increased because of the high achievement in new products, iconic core products and good focus on everyday value of the company. Additionally, the continually increasing of currency exchange in Europe, sales increased in UK, Russia and French, as well as the good expansion achieved in Russia had driven the revenues raised (Annual report, 2010). 1.1.3 McDonalds in Malaysia In December 1980, McDonalds Corporation, USA approved and gave license to Golden Arches Restaurants Sdn Bhd to run McDonalds restaurants in Malaysia. The first ever McDonalds Malaysia restaurants was opened at Jalan Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur which is in the heart of the big city on 29 April 1982. Now, there are 204 restaurants situated nationwide and currently there are about 20 to 25 restaurants will be opened annually as it is expanding steadily. Moreover, McDonalds employed almost 10,000 local citizens in different states to success the restaurants and 120 support staffs at its head office to handle day-to-day operation of the McDonalds business (McDonalds, 2011). So, it is obvious that McDonalds is very successful company and leader in the fast food industry in Malaysia which attracts million of customers visits to the restaurants everyday. Thus, this research is basically about the consumer behavior towards fast food especially McDonalds. Objective of the research: To discover the factors that influence consumer behavior to choose fast food as their meal. Research Question: What are the factors that influence consumers to choose fast food as their meal? Hypothesis 1: There is a relation between service qualities towards consumer behavior. Hypothesis 2: Place factor has relationship towards consumer behavior. Hypothesis 3: Price factor has relationship towards consumer behavior. Chapter 2: Literature Review According the report of Technomic about the status and future of fast food, the perceptions of consumers towards fast food have been changed. Now, consumers think that fast food is no longer limited to quick service, fast food restaurants, or drive-thru restaurants. Instead, there are risen of dual concept which formed the traditional fast food concept and the new concept of food fast which food can be served quickly with a superior quality, flavor, taste and ambiance. The report also claimed that consumers are seeking for faster, convenient, better and quality foods and services from all type of food service organization (Restaurant News Resource, 2010). Moreover, the report findings showed that about 49% among 2000 consumers have visit to fast food restaurant at least once in a week (Technomic, 2010). The new concept of perceptions totally will affect the consumer behavior towards fast food including McDonalds. In addition, Kara and Kucukemiroglu have studied about the consumer perceptions and favorites for fast food restaurants in USA and Canada. The research showed that the young consumers between the age of 12 to 24 hunt for different type of foods, better delivery service, lower price and good location in USA while Canadian teenagers look for novelties and price. Then, for the middle age group of consumers who are 25 to 45 years old, Americans looked for better service and better speed of serving food while Canadian considered quality, service and speed. More to the point, consumers above 46 years old to 55 years old, American preferred taste, cleanliness, quality and nutritional value whereas Canadian adults wanted better services, food quality and speed. Furthermore, young consumers have to be concerned and to be taught of the nutritional awareness and fast food preferences during the teenager years (Brown et al, 2000). In London, Davies and Smith have listed down the importance for t he nutritional value for fast food and fast food companies also printed the information of the value in its restaurants. 2.1 Consumer Behavior Analysis According to Solomon, consumer behavior can be defined as a study of selected consumers either in individuals or groups in buying, using or disposing of products, ideas, services or experience to satisfy own desires and needs. The satisfaction of desires and needs are closely related to hunger, personal status and thirst to love as well as spiritual fulfillment (Solomon, 2007). Consumer behavior has been defined as the the dynamic interaction of affect and cognition, environment, and the behavior from human beings conduct the exchange aspects of their lives (Peter et al, 2008). More on this point, during the consumption processes, the action performed, feeling and thought of own experience by consumers will affect the consumer behavior. Everything that surrounds the consumers and environmental factors such as advertising, product appearance, comments from friends, price information and packaging totally will influence the consumer behavior (Peter et al, 2008). There is for sure that consumer will buy something after they have a good expectation and satisfy towards the product. Nevertheless, researcher has to go deeper and questioning consumer in which circumstances and what reason for buying a product (Blackwell et al, 2001). According to Peter, the consumer behavior consider as dynamic because the changes of perception, feelings and activities of individual purchaser or a group of consumers. There are various type of marketing strategies is the answer to the question of consumers response. This doubt is always being answer by using the stimulus-respond model (Refer to Appendix 1). Furthermore, researchers have to find out from the buyers black box which is the essential point that other actors and companies in the market wants to know (Kotler, 2007). Determinants of Consumer Behavior Analysis Consumers have to analyzed by focusing to three objects which is behavior, environment, affect and cognition and then about their relations between each other. Every single aspect can affect other aspects and all of the aspects must be considered when planning for the marketing strategy (Peter et al, 2008). Consumer affect and cognition represent different type of the mental responses from consumers demonstrate toward particular stimulus and event around them. Affect refers to the feeling of consumers whether they like or hate a product. For example, affect includes strong personal emotion of anger or love, moods of happy or sad and feelings of frustration or satisfaction. As a result, marketers should build up suitable strategies to create positive affect among consumers about their brands and products to become consumer first choice to purchase. On the other hand, cognition is about the thinking of consumers or their belief towards a product. It involved consumers perception, understanding and interpreting the events and stimuli. Consumers gain their knowledge, beliefs and experience from their daily life and this will help them to be more sensitive and alert when buying a product so that it will be a good buying decision (Peter et al, 2008). 2.1.2 Consumer Motivation Solomon claimed that motivation is the processes that bring people to behave themselves when there is a need generated that they hope to satisfy. Consumers will find their way to attempt to decrease or to remove the needs. Once consumers successfully end the desire, then consumers goal is achieved. Consumer behavior is started up by motivation and directs to achieve goals. Normally, a motivated person will be involved more to an activity compared to unmotivated person (Solomon, 2007). 2.1.2.1 Maslow Hierarchy of Needs Moreover, during the last few decades, psychologists have studied about the motivation and its essential towards consumer behavior in different ways. The most famous and familiar ideas is propounded by Abraham Maslow in year 1943 (Kotler, 2007). Maslow initially created this approach is to know about people personal growth and the accomplishment of some difficult tasks. After some time, marketers adapted this theory to understand the consumer motivation. Then, Maslow developed a hierarchy which is the combination of psychogenic and biogenic needs which specifies on different level of needs by people (Solomon, 2007). In the pyramid of needs, there are at least five sets of basic needs which are physiological, safety, social, esteem and self-actualization needs. The order of needs in the pyramid structure is fixed and certain level must be obtained before go for the next. Maslow believed that people is aspire to become self-actualization (Stephens, 2000). The hierarchy is started from physiological drives which are the basic needs of human such as water, food, air or sleep. For instance, a person who is hungry definitely will craving for food much stronger than anything else (Stephens, 2000). After the physiological was fulfilled, the safety needs will be demanded by people. People needs a place that is safe and security for them to have meal, rest or enjoy. When both of the physiological and safety needs are perfectly gratified, the third needs which are social needs to be considered. Social needs are included love, friendship, parents or acceptance by public. Human have to build up their own relationship with others so that their life will be better and successful (Stephens, 2000). Furthermore, everyone hope to have respect and high evaluation from others toward self-esteem. People may seek for self satisfaction when they are promoted higher position in their company, attaining the educational distinction, or being honored by govern ment. This level of needs basically is about people feeling of self-confidence and satisfactoriness. The last needs is self-actualization which is about to know ones potential and this level of need will never be satisfied because there are new challenge and opportunities to come across when people growing up (Stephens, 2000). In addition, physiologist Sigmund Freund claimed that people will not aware of their buying behavior which is formed by own physiology. Everyone have different dream and wishes which are hope to be fulfilled, however, some of the wishes are cause of incited which brought to negative effect. For example, a person said that he enjoy the wind when driving is the main reason that he buys a sport car. On the other hand, in psychological level, he might just want to show off or want to let others respect him (Kotler, 2007). 2.2 Factors that affecting Consumer Behavior 2.2.1 Service Quality In 1984, Gronroos defined service quality as the judgement from consumers evaluation of the service they received. He also proposed that service quality can be divided into technical quality or what is done and functional quality or how it is done. Then, the service quality also being further explained as two dependent variables which are perceived service and expected service. Expect service is referred to the consumers previous experience with a service which might influence the consumer behavior while the perceptions of consumer towards the service itself is called perceived service. In fast food industry, good service quality is very essential for every fast food company because it is one of the fundamental determinants of consumer satisfaction which directly influence the success of the company in the industry (Huam et al, 2011). At the present time, every fast food company has pay more focus on their service quality by different ways in order to boost up the satisfaction level of consumers and then raise the intention of purchasing as well as loyalty towards the fast food restaurant (Qin et al, 2008; Gillbert et al, 2004). Organizations that provide superior services to consumers also achieve the greater level of consumer satisfaction and favorable word-of-mouth (Gillbert et al, 2004). Once the restaurants successfully attain or go beyond the anticipation and expectation of consumers, definitely consumers will be satisfy with the services that provided (Huam et al, 2011). For instance, Fast food giant likes McDonalds, Burger King and KFC are attempting to pres ent exclusive, unique and special services to attract and to keep their consumers. As for many well operating companies, great service quality is a cornerstone to gain competitive advantage in the industry to increase sales. From times to times, the fast food industry had been forced to change from product-centric approach to customer-centric approach due to the high expectation from consumers and competition from other companies (Huam et al, 2011). For example, the fast food companies in Malaysia also experiencing the transformations and challenging from competition (Yap et al. 2007). 2.2.1.1 Measurement of Service Quality (SERVPERF Model) Since the service quality is very crucial for the fast food business, then the service quality measurement has to be done frequently and in a timely manner to obtain an accurate current level of service quality provided by the fast food industry in order to increase the customer satisfaction as well as to encourage the customer purchase intentions towards the restaurants (Gilbert et al, 2004). Besides, Zeithaml and Bitner recommended that consumers judge the service quality based on their own perceptions towards the provided technical outcome, the process of delivering the outcome and the quality of environment by delivering the service. Before this, there are researchers believe that quality is naturally hard to be determined and measure, so there will be better if there is a yardstick for consumer to measure their own service quality for certain things. Then, a standardized and better model called SERVPERF model was developed. Nonetheless, this model is a very wide-ranging concept and its modification is recommended to capture the framework in certain study (Olorunniwo et al, 2006; Andaleeb et al, 2006). Audrey stated that this model is created to give a substitute method to measure the perceived service quality and the important relationship between the service quality, purchase intentions and consumer satisfactions. This instrument contained five dimensions which are: Tangibility The condition of physical parts of the fast food restaurants, the equipments and utensils that serve the consumers as well as the physical environment of the restaurants (Yuksel, 2001). Moreover, it also expressed the arrangement and decoration of the restaurants layout which included the cleanliness of environment, nice design of the facilities, and the convenience offered to consumers (Subhash et al, 2000). Responsiveness According to Fetus et al, responsiveness is meant that willingness and readiness showed by employees to help consumers when there are problems occurred and offer prompt service directly to consumers (Festus et al, 2000). . Reliability The capability and attitude of performing the promises service truthfully and sincerely which can motivate consumer and gain confidence to the fast food restaurant. Furthermore, this also referred to the trustworthiness in business process, trustable, and the efficiency as well as the ability to fix or improve anything that goes the opposite way (Yuksel, 2001). Empathy This dimension is about consumers being cared and individualized attention by employees. This dimension consists of few components which are: (a) Access approachability or friendliness and ease of contact. (b) Communication communicate with customers with languages that they can understand and comfortable with and patiently listen to what consumers express. (c) Understanding Customers: put effort to know, understand and sensitive towards what consumers needs and expectations (Huam et al, 2011). (V) Assurance Defined as the knowledge and courtesy of employees and their skill to convey trust and gain confidence from consumers. Assurance consists of three main components which are: (a) Courtesy kindness, consideration, respect, and friendliness of every employee towards every customer. (b) Credibility Employees show that they are honest, trustable and believable towards every customer. (c) Security Customers feel safe when having meal without any risk of danger or doubt (Festus et al, 2000). Consumer Behavior Satisfaction Service Quality 2.2.2 Product Quality Product quality is a means of advancing peoples life expectancy and cut down the jejunity and mortality rate of society (Iwarere, 2011). As high competition and environmental influences rise internationally, obviously there are a lot of hard work of fast food companies on quality improvement and cost saving in order to satisfy consumers and protecting consumer behavior as well as increasing the organization profit and value (Iwarere, 2010). According to Iwarere, quality management is being judged as competitive weapon which can show the competitive advantages to consumers to attract more business. Product quality totally will influence the company profit since the quality of product mirrored out the reputation of the company (Dominici, 2009). The relationship between product quality and profit of company is that product quality that being enhanced will increase the reliability and production of certain product. Besides, the increasing in product reliability causes the price of the pr oduct being boosted up (Iwarere, 2011). Product quality is very important to a company and this can be showed from a study on brand preference of soft drinks in rural place to determine the factor influencing the rural consumers towards the soft drink. From the study, they found out that the product quality was ranked at the first place and then followed by price (Nandagopal, 2003). There is a group of quality assurance team in the restaurants and at suppliers for every stage of production which in charge in observing and examines the quality of McDonalds products. There is a specific process set by McDonalds to check and make sure every ingredient that they use is high quality and safe. The team will have a tight observation towards supplier manufactures and will take some samples of stock from distribution centers to undergo the quality checking. Every McDonalds outlets will only receive the delivery of materials and ingredients after quality and safety checking by the outlets employees. Every employee will be given complete training in hygiene, quality assurance, food safety, and procedures of food preparation (Vignali, 2001). In McDonalds, they intends to create the standardized the food items which still the same taste in most of the country likes Malaysia, Singapore, South Africa, and most of the Europe country. Although they know that there are considerable cost saving by undergoing the standardization, being able to adapt to the environment and market will ensures success of the company in the country. Obviously, McDonalds has successfully adopted the concept of think globally and act locally into its marketing strategies to (Vignali, 2001). Moreover, there are a lot of reasons for necessity of adaptation such as the taste or preference of local people, local culture and laws as well as local traditions. There are many cases happened in different country where McDonalds change their menu to adopt for the local preferences and laws (Vignali, 2001). For instance, the famous Big Mac was served without cheese in few of their restaurants in Israel and in some of the kosher restaurants, the meat products and dairy products is separately placed. Plus, recently, McDonalds Israel launched a new hamburger which to improve the nutrition and taste of its famous product. The Big Mac in Israel is 30% fewer calories compare to Big Mac in US (Ron Friedman, 2010). In addition, in India, McDonalds serve vegetable McNuggets and a mutton-based Big Mac which called Maharaja Mac. Additionally, in Malaysia and Singapore, McDonalds also put effort on their product which is free of pork products and the outlets must apply for the halal certifica te to run the restaurants, which means is totally out of pork products and acceptable for Muslims consumers. In addition, good product quality also includes the taste of the foods. Every consumers want to eat tasty foods is consider as a general motive to satisfy their needs towards food and increase their appetite. Furthermore, the taste of foods also has to localize to suit the local taste and fulfill the needs of consumers (Gordan Chu, 2009). For instance, the taste and flavor of McDonalds French fries is magnificent and marvelous for a lot of consumers (Schlosser, 2001). There are various other examples of the successful of McDonalds adopted in different countries which has unique and special perspective and culture as well as local taste in order to satisfy the needs and preferences of consumers. For example, beer was sold in Germany as McCroissants, espresso coffee and pasta is on the menu in Italy and there are chilled yogurt drinks in McDonalds Turkey as well as in tropical countries, guava juice was the favorite items in the menu. There are vegetarian hamburgers sold in Netherlands while teriyaki burgers were the famous hamburger in Japan. In Thailand, the most well-known burger in McDonalds was called Samurai Pork Burger which serves with sweet sauce. Moreover, in Norway, grilled salmon sandwich which called McLaks are sold while hamburger with poached egg are top of the menu in Uruguay (Vignali, 2001). So, there are different products being introduced by McDonalds to adopt in the international food market. Some of the products already became the symbolic food of McDonalds for the local people. 2.2.3 Promotion Promotions normally are created by marketers to tell information about their products or service in order to attract consumers to buy them. The promotion strategies normally experienced by consumers which might influence consumer behavior due to the social and physical aspects from the environment factor. Every products and brands become famous and successful because of promotion strategies that developed to generate competitive advantage against competitors while show out the unique of the products and brands. There are four types of promotions which are advertising, publicity, personal selling and sales promotions (Peter et al, 2008; Ivy, 2008). McDonalds always put more effort to promote them as a global image and they concern about the people from the market they are entering. McDonalds has different types of advertising campaigns in different countries and globally to suit the culture and society of people from different background. For example, UK McDonalds appointed England legendary footballer Alan Shearer to promote their products while in French they used French world cup winner goalkeeper Fabien Barthez (Vignali, 2001). Besides, McDonalds also concern about the public relationship with customers which can know and understand more about consumers. For instance, Beijing McDonalds relies greatly on individual interaction with consumers in restaurants. There are at least one public relations employee works in every outlet to help and answer customers questions. Moreover, there are five to ten female staffs being assigned to every outlet to take care of consumers children and to communicate with parents (Vignali, 2001). This can help to improve the service level and to advance the management of customer portfolio (Fjerstad et al, 2003; O Learly et al, 2004). Another example is in 1997, McDonalds had broadcasted that they will corporate with Walt Disney which allowed them to share special marketing rights from food to films for the following ten years. This is the beginning of the producing toys which include in their happy meals for films likes Toy Story, Madagascar, Alvin and the Chipmunks and the lates t is the young justice series of superhero from Marvels. Furthermore, McDonalds, UNESCO and Walt Disney corporate together to launch a program called Millennium Dreamers Global Childrens recognition program which allowed young people from the whole world have the chance to express their dreams, ideas, and plans as well as hopes in the future (Vignali, 2001). 2.2.4 Place According to Kotler, place defined as the location where products and services being distributed for purchase by consumers. It can contain every physical stores and virtual stores on the internet. The choice of place has always an important factor to be considered when operating a store. For instance, fast food restaurants mostly being set up in place where there is a significant in number of moving people (Hossain, 2003). Normally, company location decision depends on few factors such as total cost, supplier, proximity of customers, and infrastructure (Chase, 2004). Currently, there are more than 32000 McDonalds restaurants in 117 countries all over the world. The company effectively manages its capital expends by strategic expansion in every country. Every year, McDonalds operate hundreds of new restaurants globally to undergo strategies that create a gap between its competitors in term of accessibility and convenience to consumers (Jekanowski et al, 2001). In the annual report of the company in year 1994, McDonalds had launched a strategy called in-your-face strategy. In the report stated that McDonalds wants to have a site wherever people live, work, play, or gather. Our Convenience Strategy is to monitor the changing lifestyles of consumers and intercept them at every turn. As we expand customer convenience, we gain market share. (McDonalds USA annual report, 1994). This is because McDonalds understand that consumers prefer to go nearby to buy food for saving time and cost. So, McDonalds wants that there are their outlets everywhere in the w orld which can bring convenience to consumers to buy foods. Moreover, most of the McDonalds outlets operate 24 hours everyday to serve their consumers and people may taste the foods of McDonalds whenever they want to (Jager, 2007). In addition, McDonalds also provide delivery service to consumers home which bring convenience to consumers who do not like to queue up in the crowed restaurants but prefer to eat in home while doing their works (Church et al, 2000). Drive-thru system also being introduced by McDonalds in most of the outlet to serve consumers who plans to take away the food (Fitzgerald, 2004).

The Core Business of Allianz Insurance

The Core Business of Allianz Insurance Allianz is ranked among the top 100 most valuable brands worldwide and is a leading insurance and financial services company. Allianzs core business is Life and Health insurance and property casualty. Allianz is also one of the four active asset managers in the world. The total asset management operations as of 2009 were à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 1,202 billion. The company s business activities in this segment consist of asset management products and services both for third-party investors and for the Allianz Groups insurance operations (Allianz Annual Report, 2009, p.48). Allianz banking operations now comprise of operations in Germany, Italy, France and New Europe. The bank offers a wide range of products for corporate and retail clients. Due to their limited size, banking operations are reported as part of the corporate and other segment. According to a press release on 24 February, 2011; Allianz announced preliminary results for the fiscal year 2010 of total revenues reaching a new high of 106.5 billion euros. Based on this release, Life and Health insurance generates the most revenue reaching a record level of 57.1 billion euros. Growth amounted to 12.5 percent compared to 50.8 billion euros in 2009, and was driven by strong demand for both investment-oriented and traditional life insurance products. Life and Health insurance also generates the most profit with operating profits growing 7.4 percent to 2.9 billion euros, compared to 2.7 billion euros in 2009. This was largely driven by a better expense result, as well as an increase in operating investment income which benefited from significantly lower impairments compared to 2009 (Press release preliminary results 2010, p.1). Life and Health insurance and property casualty will drive growth in the next decade as they have always counted for the main revenue of the Group. Allianz has been performing well and sustainable. Since 2007 it reached à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 97,689 million revenue and in 2008 the global economy was in crisis but the revenue was just went down slightly with à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 92,568 million. In 2009, the economic crisis reached its peak in the first half of 2009 however its revenue still increased up to 5.2% with à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 97,385 million. A newly announced figure for its 2010 revenue has been impressive, with total revenue reaching à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 106.5 billion. These figures have proven that the company has been doing well for the last four years and there is no doubt that the company will be successful in coming years (2009 Allianz Annual Report, p.48). Corporate Responsibility: Allianz responded to the increasing demands of society for greater Corporate Responsibility by adopting a new CSR strategy in 2009. This strategy assures that environmental and social issues are managed, deliver value for the company and that there is a continued benefit for society. The strategy focuses on three themes; managing the companys environmental impact, addressing the risks and opportunities associated with climate change and supporting the communities in which Allianz is operating (Corporate Social Responsibility 2009, p.3). As an international financial services provider, Allianz sees sustainable development as fundamental to its business. Allianz is focusing on finding innovative solutions that address local and global challenges. Allianz also established a strong structure for handling CSR activities. Delivery of the CSR strategy is the responsibility of the Human Resources Director, who is a member of the Allianz Insurance Management Board. CSR issues are included at the monthly Management Board meetings, as well as featuring at the companys annual Director and Management Conferences. The CSR Manager is responsible for setting the overall strategy, implementing initiatives and reporting performance to the HR Director and the Management Board. In addition, a CSR Steering Committee comprising of 11 senior managers from each of the major divisions has been established to ensure the CSR strategy is embedded in the business. The committee meets 2-3 times a year to review progress against the strategy and to identify future risks and opportunities. The Committee is chaired by the HR Director (Corporate Social Responsibility 2009, p.4). Climate Change Allianz sees itself and the insurance industry at the forefront of the fight against climate change. The industry must play a central role in both climate change mitigation and adaptation. Based on this initiative, Allianz has done a wide range of activities in response to Climate Change. Allianz Insurance is a founding member of ClimateWise which was founded by leading insurers in 2006 to respond to the myriad risks and opportunities of climate change, aiming to reduce the overall risks faced by economies and societies (Climatewise.org.uk). As a member of ClimateWise, Allianz must report annually on its performance against the principles and sub-principles. Allianz also supports national and global CO2 emission reduction targets and government action, including regulation that will enhance the resilience and reduce the environmental impact of infrastructure and communities. In 2002 Allianz joined the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), an independent organization now representing 534 institutional investors worldwide with more than US $64 trillion in funds. CDP collects, evaluates, and publishes data on the CO2 emissions from more than 3,000 companies around the world. RCM, a globally active investment company belonging to the Allianz Group, uses the CDP database to compile risk profile lesson companies climate performance (Corporate Social Responsibility 2009, p.9) Furthermore, Allianz remained committed to its carbon reduction plans even when the Copenhagen Summit ended having set no binding global emissions targets and no indication of when emissions should peak. Carbon management has a strong business case it is primarily about reducing energy consumption and costs. Stakeholders In order to understand stakeholders expectations, Allianz is working closely with a range of national and international organizations and doing surveys to discover which topics are most relevant to their stakeholder groups. Every two years Allianz asks its main societal stakeholders which key issues Allianz should deal with and how they should address them. For example, in the 2009 Stakeholder Survey, 131 completed questionnaires were received from stakeholders from the following sectors or groups: Politics, Media, Non-governmental organizations, Science, Companies and Allianz management (Allianz  Sustainable Development Report 2010, p.12). Regarding customers, Allianz is committed to making it easier for its customers to deal confidently with financial topics by maintaining a section on its Group web portal that explains how the financial and economic crisis develop and what its possible consequences for consumers are. Regarding Suppliers, Allianz carries out supplier surveys to learn more about their suppliers businesses and their efforts in the area of sustainable development. Regarding Community, Allianz takes todays challenges as opportunities for action through its local activities, global projects, and the work of Corporate Foundations. A good example is the Foundation for Sustainability and the Allianz Cultural Foundation. Regarding Government Relations, Allianz maintains various partnerships with renowned and trustworthy organizations such as World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF) or the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEPFI) (Allianz  Sustainable Development Report 2010, p.12). Crisis Management Allianz and other financial institutions had to face the global financial and economic crisis which started in mid 2007 with the collapse of the housing market in the United States. The crisis that was initially observed within the banking sector accelerated in 2008 and spilled-over to various other sectors of the financial industry. Serious disruptions in the global financial system led to deteriorating economic conditions and investors became much more risk averse. In September 2008, the global financial system almost collapsed: large financial institutions faltered, leading to changes in business models, failures, mergers and nationalizations. Some economies were even on the verge of national bankruptcy. In consequence, the weak situation in the financial markets that was observable from falling stock markets and volatile credit spreads became even more intense in the fourth quarter of year 2008. The global economic downturn caused a series of collapses or near collapses of giant financial institutions such as Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Washington Mutual, Wachovia, AIG  and Citigroup. However, Allianz has managed successfully in its business operations, particularly its risk management as demonstrated by its impressed revenue: 97,989 billion euros in 2007, 92,567 billion euros in 2008, 97,385 billion euros in 2009 and 106.5 billion euros in 2010. Allianz  emerged from the market turbulence as one of the strongest insurance groups in the industry by solvency and ratings, as evidenced by external rating agencies. The financial strength of Allianz SE was rated by Standard Poors as AA (stable outlook), by A. M. Best as A+ (stable outlook), and by Moodys as Aa3 (stable outlook). As of December 31, 2009, Allianz SE had the best Standard Poors rating among the internationally active primary insurance groups in Europe. Even during the 2008 and 2009 financial crisis, these ratings were confirmed and remained stable (Annual report 2008, p. 41; Annual report 2009, p. 187). Allianz has executed and managed its risk management consistently and focused on three main objectives to secure itself from market turbulence: Protect the  Allianz  Groups capital and solvency position as well as position its investment portfolio for continued market turbulence Protect the value of their Property-Casualty business Focus on sustainable profitability in the Life/Health business Allianz considers risk management to be one of its core competencies. It is an integrated part of its business processes. Based on the risk management framework, these key elements have been focused on: Promotion of a strong risk management culture supported by a robust risk governance structure. Consistent application of an integrated risk capital framework across the Group to protect its capital base and to support effective capital management. Integrate the risk considerations and capital needs into management and decision-making processes through the attribution of risk and allocation of capital to the various segments. This comprehensive framework ensures that risks are properly identified, analyzed and evaluated. Allianz Groups risk appetite is defined by a clear risk strategy and limit structure. Close risk monitoring and reporting allows Allianz to detect deviations from risk tolerance at an early stage (Annual report 2009, p. 179). Strategy Allianz has been doing successfully for many years, even through years of financial market turmoil and global economic contraction by executing its strategy consistently. According to Allianzs announcement in the 2009Annual Report, the Group focuses its strategy in five management priorities: Become the partner of choice for all stakeholders: Allianz believes that the Group can only continue to thrive if Allianz manages to balance the interests of all of their key stakeholders: customers, employees, investors and the public. Drive profitable growth: In property-casualty Allianz will only grow where target margins can be achieved. In life/health insurance Allianz can build on a strong capital position, growing asset base and attractive new business margins. The strategy has served the Group well in asset management where Allianz is diversifying revenues and risks into different asset classes with an overweight in fixed income investments and regions. Strengthen competitiveness: Allianz has been continuing to adapt its business models, products and customer interactions accordingly. Hence Allianz has been focusing on efforts to drive efficiencies, reduce complexity and leverage new web-based technology along the entire value chain in order to achieve productivity benchmarks. Increase market and customer focus: The Group has created the foundations for Allianz to become a customer-centric organization through its customer focus and innovation programs. Going forward they are further strengthening their customer segmentation and the delivery of segment-specific offerings. Maintain capital management discipline: Allianz has strengthened risk management function and de-risked its investment portfolio to appropriately adjust to the rising uncertainty in the real economy (Annual Report 2009, p.63). Allianzs core strength is risk management which has helped the Group protect its net asset value and carefully balance cash generation and investment opportunities. In the 2009Annual Report they state that we are managing the transition to the new Solvency II framework. And we are leveraging this process to place state-of-the-art risk management technology into the hands of our business leaders for even better day-to-day decision making. Based on this, Allianz has performed successfully as the Group usually gets AA rating and the Group has successfully steered through one of the most severe financial crises ever. Allianzs solvency is strong and its capital base grew almost 20 % to more than à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬ 40 billion (Annual Report 2009, p. 179). Allianz is definitely an innovative company as it has a wide range of changes, improvements and strengthening in management, products and customers services. Regarding customer services, the Group always put innovation as its priority. The 2009 Annual Report remarks At all important points of contact, we are measuring the propensity of our customers and distribution partners to recommend our products and services to others. And we have been tying our frontline managers incentives to systematically improving the service experiences of our clients. Furthermore, we are creating a channel architecture which allows customers and distribution partners to experience more targeted value propositions, service offerings and price positions which are easy to understand and consistently delivered. (p.66). Werner Zedelius, Member of the Board of Management of Allianz SE, also confirmed that at Allianz, innovation is a part of an even bigger goal Allianz wants to become a trusted innovator engagem ent (Allianz Group Portal, press, n.d). Mission and Goals: Mission: At Allianz, we strive for exceptional financial performance and growth based on our commitment to the pursuit of a sustainable world through combining long-term economic value, environmental stewardship and social responsibility. Goals: Performance: Maintain sustainable development leadership in the financial services sector Sustainable Development Reporting: Active stakeholder engagement in our materiality assessment Climate Change: Global awareness on CO2  emission reduction concept for 80% of employees Environmental   Management  System: Accomplish an 80% employee coverage Sustainable Investment: Invest an additional à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬150 million in renewable energy projects Micro insurance: Creation of a global Allianz micro insurance strategy to be implemented by a task force Engagement with Society: Launch global employee engagement program Employees: Develop KPIs for employee engagement, trust, feedback, motivation, development and diversity from the strategic HR scorecard. Customer Responsibility: Further strive for our 2010 goal of Loyalty Leadership. Net Promoter Score above market average. How does Allianz motivate employees: Allianz believes that employees are motivated if their work is well recognized and well paid. Therefore the Group created a pay structure that includes a mix of basic pay, performance-related pay and additional benefits to motivate it employees, Incentivizing staff is an important way of encouraging entrepreneurship. We have now adopted evaluation procedures that help assess more clearly how an individual or team has performed, and reward that performance accordingly (Allianz Group Portal, Employee, n.d). Allianz also motivates its employees with the Employee Stock Purchase Plan as approximately 939,000 shares were bought through the scheme. This has not only proved a sound financial strategy but it has also allowed the Group to strengthen employee engagement (Allianz Group Portal, Employee, n.d). In addition, The Group creates a good working environment where employees can maximize their ideas through innovative programs, healthcare program, tale nt development etc. Desirability as an employer Allianz is a good company to work for. Firstly, good performance will receive high payment and the incentives and bonuses of the company are attractive. Secondly, Allianz has a good working environment as a result of their policy to put employees first. Many Allianz companies offer wellness and sickness prevention training and health testing on a voluntary basis; as well as health programs for members of staff and customers. Allianz has a diversified working environment and promotes a diversity theme called Power of All Worlds. This aims to promote diversity and inclusion to reach their business goals, and continues to support Gender, Disability, Generation Mix and international cultures. Thirdly, Allianz is an innovative working place which allows employees to develop and maximise all new ideas. This culture of innovation was turned into reality by the Ideas to Success (i2s) framework launched in April 2006, and has been rolled out to 58 Allianz companies worldwide. It has actively encouraged over 172,000 employees to develop ideas which could improve the way in which Allianz operates on a day to day basis. And so far more than 60,000 ideas have been generated (Allianz Group Portal, Employee, n.d).

The Clash of Civilizations Essay -- Analysis, Samuel P. Huntington

Ernest Hemingway stated that, â€Å"In modern war †¦ you will die like a dog for no good reason†! Even though that is true, experts have gone further by trying to find the â€Å"roots† and explain why conflicts emerge in the first place. Two experts, Samuel P. Huntington and John R. Bowen, present two different approaches towards the cause of conflicts in 21st century. Although there is a difference between their approaches, both of them share the common believe that a conflict may occur when one puts pressure on the other; but the reason why this pressure takes place, varies among the two theories. In his article, â€Å"The Clash of Civilizations†, Huntington points out that in the 21st century, conflicts will not occur based on ideology of a state or civilization, neither on economic power; but they will take place because the differences in cultural and religious identity between civilizations. As the first key point that lies under this theory, is the Western civilization approach towards the Eastern civilization. According to him, the Western Civilization promotes their â€Å"political and economic values, maintain their predominance and protect their interest† through economic and political pressure via Western Institution such as UN and IMF. This Western approach increases the cultural division between Western and Eastern civilization, but also within Western Civilization; between Western Christianity and Orthodox Christianity. This approach can be easily understandable if we take a look at the historical events where Western and Eastern civilization confron ted each other such as in the Gulf War and Bosnian war, where Western used their power to protect countries from a same culture, same civilization. This leads to a reaction from Eastern cou... ...up and swap a part of the region, thus creating Western vs. Eastern conflicts which apparently will lead to war between two complete different ideologies. To conclude, wars have been and will be part of our lives. In some regions, people yet have lack of knowledge, therefore tend to separate people based on language, culture, religion, region and historical background. Yet we didn’t manage to overpass these obstacles that we create towards the minorities, and live in the same land together. Although some countries try to get rid of those issues and live beyond ethnicity borders, there are countries that point the figure at you and remind you that you are â€Å"you†, and because you are who you are â€Å"We hate you†! When we overpass the hate, the ethnic borders, there won’t be any conflicts, wars and articles that are trying to find the way how the conflict occurred!

Gay Parenting Should Not Be Encouraged Essay -- Sociology Same Sex Mar

Gay Parenting Should Not Be Encouraged Statistics from the United States (ACLU Fact sheet, 1999) estimate the there are between 6 and 14 million children being raised in same sex parent families. Whilst some significant advances have been made by the pro gay parenting movement, current legislation is for the most part geared against same sex marriage and adoption, this status quo should be maintained. Gay parents rights group argue that being raised by two parents of the same sex provides a balanced and healthy approach to parenting. This is untrue, being raised by gay parents means that the family unit has an unbalanced ratio of male and female role models in the home environment, you could reasonably expect that this imbalance would spread into the parents circle of friends and the people that the family socialise with on a regular basis. Children look for both a mother and a father and benefit from having both in the home. Ellis (2001) stated, "Gender plays a large role...we may not think these differences are politically correct but, by God, they're developmentally correct. One argument that gay parents have is that children don't need two sex couple role models. Having two parents of the same sex deprives the children of the chance to see how males and females interact in a family situation. Even though gay parents argue the children are exposed to their fair share of traditional male and female relationships, these may be somewhat censored as the visiting child is not part of that family and most families tend to keep certain things within the family. Parents are very strong role models and children are known to mimic what they see. "Men and women parent differently, each contribute different and positive ... ...y.proquest.com">http://gateway.proquest.com Schiffen, L. (2004, 29 Feb). How the judges forced the President's hand. New York Times. Retrieved Jul 30, 2004 from http://gateway.proquest.com Throckmorton, W. (2004). Do gay parents influence the Sexual Preferences of Children?. Retrieved Jul 30, 2004 from http://www.narth.com/docs/influence.html Unknown. (1999, Apr 6). Overview of gay and lesbian parenting, adoption and foster care. Retrieved Jul 30, 2004 from http://archive.aclu.org/issues/gay/parent.html Unknown. (2004). Facts and figures about kids with gay parents. Retrieved Jul 30, 2004 from http://www.colage.org/research/facts.html

Economic Causes of Poverty Essay

Poverty is the deprivation of necessities that that determine the quality of life. These necessities comprises of the basic human needs and better education which directly influences the type of employment and income earned and enable one to fight poverty. In October 2008 World Bank revised the poverty line to 1. 25 US dollar per day from 1 US dollar per day. After revision of the poverty line measure, an estimated 1. 4 billion people were found to live at this poverty line or below (Otlin, 2008). There is an upward poverty trend; for instance in 2004, 984 million people were living on or below the line of measure i. e. 1 US dollar whereas in 1981, 1. 9 million were living on or below the poverty line (Weaver & Park, 2007). Among other causes of poverty, economic causes which include capital flight, unemployment, low income, unfair property laws and unfair trade has really made poverty alleviation in developing countries a complicated issue despite the efforts of these countries to fight against poverty. Rapid flow of money outside a country or any other assets commonly known as capital flight is a major economic cause of poverty. In most cases the movement is due to instability and reduced returns. Investors move their money from one investment to another, either within the same country or to a different country to avoid high inflation and search for stability and increased returns. Capital flight is mostly witnessed in a country with currency instability and sometimes the outflows are intensive thus affecting the whole financial system of the country (Epstein, 2005). The loss of confidence and devaluation of the affected country burdens the citizens and their properties lose the nominal value. This resorts to reduced purchasing power of assets of a country making it very expensive to import goods. Due to devaluation of the economy’s currency, inflation comes in. Consequently, the currency unit can only purchase fewer goods thus accelerating poverty. Capital flight also hampers investment which may reduce economic growth of the developing economies. Unemployment is another economic cause of poverty. It usually occurs when one is ready and able to work but there is no work for him/her. The inadequacies of basic human needs and better education are normally as result of un-employment. A country where there is a higher rate of unemployment, the Growth Domestic Product (GDP) is low since most people are not working. According Epstein (2005), unemployment is a primary cause of temporal poverty. The moment people get job, they supplement their incomes and thus reduce poverty levels. Sounder further says that poverty increases with increase in unemployment duration. People without jobs can be having skill which can improve production, but since they have not been employed, their skills may not be utilized. This can result is low productivity in the country. In other cases, un-employment can be a social cost to the society. Issues like crimes, terrorism and drug abuse which may be as a result of poverty, marginalization and unemployment are costly to eliminate. Money which can be used to alleviate the living standards is used for fighting crimes instead. Unemployment brings income inequality which widens the gap between the rich and the poor. Winefield (2002), points out that unemployment leads to delay in experience gain which reduces productivity. Moreover, in countries which provide job search allowance, the government expenditure goes high because more people are entitled to these allowances. This can force the government to reduce money given to other crucial sectors for example agricultural sector which can be a source of livelihood to the country’s population. Taxes may also increase due to high government expenditure resulting to increase in prices of commodities. Low income means that people will have a limited purchasing power. Winefield (2002) points out that, low income earnings place people near or on at the poverty line. He further argues that, raising the incomes by increasing the wages without dismissing their job opportunities has historically minimized poverty rates. According to his research findings, increasing minimum wage will help reduce poverty levels, however minimal. Small household budgets experience the greatest impacts since they have a limited purchasing power. This has facilitated poverty in developing countries. Increases in food prices and an instant steep rise in agricultural commodities is another economic cause of poverty. The rise in food prices can be attributed to increased demand of staple commodities, higher energy prices especially fuel and electricity which affects transportation and production costs of agricultural products and farm inputs e. g. fertilizer and pesticides. Food prices may also rise due to lack of alternative market outlets for agricultural product and low yields of cereals (Anker, 2006). Competition between industrial commercial organizations is healthy and encouraged by market economies. However, unfair property laws by competitors and use of malicious ways to gain business mileage e. g. making false and direct attack to a competitor may scare away potential investors. At times it happens despite the fact that a code of conduct has been set to guard against this behavior. Unfair competition which comprises of all acts and practices during industrial and commercial transactions which are contrary to honest practices may hamper selling and buying of good and services. Unfair competition may include confusion caused in relation to another enterprise’s products or its activities, acts that are misleading for instance, false implications of a competitor’s product, and damaging the goodwill of the competitors. All this may lead to unfair competition which causes decline in sale of goods or services. Eventually, this will translate increased levels of poverty in the affected economies due reduced sales, exports and other losses that may arise from unfair trade. In conclusion, poverty alleviation is a complex issue to deal with. It requires that all relevant stakeholders get rid of their selfish interest so that they can deal with the root causes of poverty. All causes of poverty ranging from economic, governance, demographic and social factors, environmental factors, if looked into by good governance, transparency in public expenditure, strengthening of management capacity and improvement of the public service delivery will help in promoting a competitive private sector environment for development and trade regime liberalization. This can contribute greatly to poverty alleviation in the world and especially in developing countries in Africa, Latin America and East Asia. A fair trade between developed and developing countries is fundamental if the question of poverty in developing countries is ever to be addressed. For instance, disruption of trade in Africa has greatly affected the process of integration in business. As a result poverty levels have increased undermining and lowering the livelihoods of small scale farmers and producers as well as depriving the young people their rights. References: Anker, R. , (2006); Poverty Lines around the World: A New Methodology and Internationally Comparable Estimates. International Labor Review Journal, Vol. 145 Epstein, G. A. , (2005); Capital Flight and Capital Controls in Developing Countries. ISBN 184376931X, 9781843769316, Edward Elgar Publishing. Otlin, J. , (2008); The Causes of Poverty: Thinking Critically about a Key Economic Issue. Journal of Social Education, Vol. 72 Weaver, C. & Park, S. , (2007); The Role of the World Bank in Poverty Alleviation and Human Development in the Twenty-First Century: An Introduction. Global Governance Journal, Vol. 13 Winefield, A. H, (2002); Unemployment, Underemployment, Occupational Stress and Psychological Well-Being. Australian Journal of Management, Vol. 27

Morphemes

As stated in the video, morphology is the process to understand the words and how they work in a particular language. If we examine this definition, it’s clear that the root of every language is the word; therefore, if we want to truly understand a language we need to understand what a word is. The dictionary defines a word as â€Å"a sound or a combination of sounds, or its representation in writing or printing that symbolizes and communicates a meaning and may consist of a single morpheme or of a combination of morphemes†, simple enough to understand, except for that last part.So, to understand what a word is, we need to know what a morpheme is; here we go: a morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit a word can be broken into. Not so difficult to understand. Let’s try some examples, let’s use the word â€Å"love†. We know what love is, we can feel it, we can see it in someone else’s eyes; so it’s safe to say that the word â€Å"loveà ¢â‚¬  has a meaning on its own, therefore, is a morpheme. What about the word â€Å"trees†? Let’s think this carefully. We know what a tree is; we can walk to a park and see one, but â€Å"trees†?Common sense tells me that this word means more than one tree. So let’s count: if I say, 2 trees, I have one tree and another tree. We can see that the word â€Å"trees† has no meaning; instead it uses the meaning of the word â€Å"tree† to create its own definition as a group of them. Then, we can say that the word â€Å"trees† is formed by: tree + s. We know that â€Å"tree† is a morpheme (same reasoning used for â€Å"love†) and consequently, following the definition of a word; â€Å"s† needs to be a morpheme too. Now we know what a morpheme is but, why is â€Å"s† a morpheme?And that’s the next point we are going to talk about. We have two kinds of morphemes in English. The first one is the free morphem es. They can stand alone as meaningful words; some examples of them are: love, tree, house, cat, dog, fly, butter, cup, etc. We can define these morphemes as they are. The second kind of morphemes is the bound morphemes. They need to be attached to another free or bound morpheme, otherwise, they lack of meaning; some examples of them are: ad-, sub-, un-, -ful, -ness, -less.They are used to change the meaning of a word or to alter some of its attribute. That’s all we need to know about morphemes so let’s go back to the words. To truly understand the words we have to know how they are classified. Following the morpheme approach, we can classify words in three categories: simple words, formed by one morpheme; complex words, formed by a free morpheme and one bound morphemes (dogs, hats, worker, etc. ); and compound words, formed by two free morphemes (butterfly, sunlight, backpack, etc. ).There’s also another approach when classifying words and that’s the tra ditional approach. According to this, words have two classes: content words, which carry the meaning in a sentence (nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs); and function words, which serve to a variety of functions (determiners, quantifiers, auxiliaries, conjunctions, etc. ). We know how words are classified and what are the elements that form them, but we are still missing something: how do we make new words? To form new words we have several processes.The first one we can mention is the Affixation which is no more than adding an affix (suffix or prefix) to a word (predict+able, work+er, in+expensive); we also have the Compounding where we join two words to make a new one (rain+bow, with+out, over+do); Acronyms, formed by taking the initial letters of a phrase (RADAR: RAdio Detecting And Ranging); Blending where we form new words by combining parts of other two (smoke+fog=smog) and Clipping which is the process to form words by shortening parts of longer words (doctor=doc, veterinaria n=vet, dormitory=dorm); among other slightly more difficult to understand processes.New words can also be added by popular consent, for instance, the word â€Å"coke† is used to refer to almost any kind of soda but it’s a trademark of Coca Cola Company, same thing with Band Aid which applies to personal bandages. Finally, we can get new words from other languages like: mosquito(Spanish), dime(French), golf(Dutsch), etc. And that’s it.Now we can be sure we know the entire basis about words, we can begin to analyze them anytime we want. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. Information obtained from: http://www. thefreedictionary. com/word [ 2 ]. For more infomation visit: http://www. ling. ohio-state. edu/~kdk/201/autumn01/slides/morphology-4up. pdf Morphemes As stated in the video, morphology is the process to understand the words and how they work in a particular language. If we examine this definition, it’s clear that the root of every language is the word; therefore, if we want to truly understand a language we need to understand what a word is. The dictionary defines a word as â€Å"a sound or a combination of sounds, or its representation in writing or printing that symbolizes and communicates a meaning and may consist of a single morpheme or of a combination of morphemes†, simple enough to understand, except for that last part.So, to understand what a word is, we need to know what a morpheme is; here we go: a morpheme is the smallest meaningful unit a word can be broken into. Not so difficult to understand. Let’s try some examples, let’s use the word â€Å"love†. We know what love is, we can feel it, we can see it in someone else’s eyes; so it’s safe to say that the word â€Å"loveà ¢â‚¬  has a meaning on its own, therefore, is a morpheme. What about the word â€Å"trees†? Let’s think this carefully. We know what a tree is; we can walk to a park and see one, but â€Å"trees†?Common sense tells me that this word means more than one tree. So let’s count: if I say, 2 trees, I have one tree and another tree. We can see that the word â€Å"trees† has no meaning; instead it uses the meaning of the word â€Å"tree† to create its own definition as a group of them. Then, we can say that the word â€Å"trees† is formed by: tree + s. We know that â€Å"tree† is a morpheme (same reasoning used for â€Å"love†) and consequently, following the definition of a word; â€Å"s† needs to be a morpheme too. Now we know what a morpheme is but, why is â€Å"s† a morpheme?And that’s the next point we are going to talk about. We have two kinds of morphemes in English. The first one is the free morphem es. They can stand alone as meaningful words; some examples of them are: love, tree, house, cat, dog, fly, butter, cup, etc. We can define these morphemes as they are. The second kind of morphemes is the bound morphemes. They need to be attached to another free or bound morpheme, otherwise, they lack of meaning; some examples of them are: ad-, sub-, un-, -ful, -ness, -less.They are used to change the meaning of a word or to alter some of its attribute. That’s all we need to know about morphemes so let’s go back to the words. To truly understand the words we have to know how they are classified. Following the morpheme approach, we can classify words in three categories: simple words, formed by one morpheme; complex words, formed by a free morpheme and one bound morphemes (dogs, hats, worker, etc. ); and compound words, formed by two free morphemes (butterfly, sunlight, backpack, etc. ).There’s also another approach when classifying words and that’s the tra ditional approach. According to this, words have two classes: content words, which carry the meaning in a sentence (nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs); and function words, which serve to a variety of functions (determiners, quantifiers, auxiliaries, conjunctions, etc. ). We know how words are classified and what are the elements that form them, but we are still missing something: how do we make new words? To form new words we have several processes.The first one we can mention is the Affixation which is no more than adding an affix (suffix or prefix) to a word (predict+able, work+er, in+expensive); we also have the Compounding where we join two words to make a new one (rain+bow, with+out, over+do); Acronyms, formed by taking the initial letters of a phrase (RADAR: RAdio Detecting And Ranging); Blending where we form new words by combining parts of other two (smoke+fog=smog) and Clipping which is the process to form words by shortening parts of longer words (doctor=doc, veterinaria n=vet, dormitory=dorm); among other slightly more difficult to understand processes.New words can also be added by popular consent, for instance, the word â€Å"coke† is used to refer to almost any kind of soda but it’s a trademark of Coca Cola Company, same thing with Band Aid which applies to personal bandages. Finally, we can get new words from other languages like: mosquito(Spanish), dime(French), golf(Dutsch), etc. And that’s it.Now we can be sure we know the entire basis about words, we can begin to analyze them anytime we want. ——————————————– [ 1 ]. Information obtained from: http://www. thefreedictionary. com/word [ 2 ]. For more infomation visit: http://www. ling. ohio-state. edu/~kdk/201/autumn01/slides/morphology-4up. pdf