The Legacy of World War I in Africa

When World War I broke out, Europe had already colonized much of Africa, but the need for manpower and resources during the war led to the consolidation of colonial power and sowed the seeds for future resistance. Conquest, Conscription, and Resistance When the war began, the European powers already had colonial armies comprised of African soldiers, but conscription demands increased substantially during the war as did resistance to those demands. France conscripted more than a quarter of a million men, while Germany, Belgium, and Britain recruited tens of thousands more for their armies. Resistance to these demands was common. Some men attempted to emigrate within Africa to avoid conscription for armies who in some cases had only recently conquered them. In other regions, conscription demands fueled existing discontent leading to full-scale uprisings. During the war, France and Britain ended up fighting anti-colonial uprisings in the Sudan (near Darfur), Libya, Egypt, Niger, Nigeria, Morocco, Algeria, Malawi, and Egypt, as well as a brief insurrection on the part of Boers in South Africa sympathetic to the Germans. Â   Porters and their families: the forgotten casualties of World War I The British and German governments - and especially the white settler communities in East and South Africa - did not like the idea of encouraging African men to fight Europeans, so they mostly recruited African men as porters. These men were not considered to be veterans, since they did not fight themselves, but they died in scores all the same, especially in East Africa. Subject to harsh conditions, enemy fire, disease, and inadequate rations, at least 90,000 or 20 percent of porters died serving in the African fronts of World War I. Officials acknowledged that the actual number was probably higher. As a point of comparison, approximately 13 percent of mobilized forces died during the War. During the fighting, villages were also burned and food seized for the use of troops. The loss of manpower also affected the economic capacity of many villages, and when the final years of the war coincided with a drought in East Africa, many more men, women, and children died. To the Victors go the Spoils After the war, Germany lost all of its colonies, which in Africa meant it lost the states known today as Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Namibia, Cameroon, and Togo. The League of Nations considered these territories to be unprepared for independence and so divided them up between Britain, France, Belgium, and South Africa, who were supposed to prepare these Mandate territories for independence. In practice, these territories looked little different from colonies, but ideas about imperialism were starting to shift. In the case of Rwanda and Burundi the transfer was doubly tragic. Belgian colonial policies in those states set the stage for the 1994 Rwandan Genocide and the lesser-known, related massacres in Burundi. The war also helped politicize populations, however, and when a Second World War came, the days of colonization in Africa would be numbered. Sources: Edward Paice, Tip and Run: The Untold Tragedy of the Great War in Africa. London: Weidenfeld Nicolson, 2007. Journal of African History. Special Issue: World War I and Africa, 19:1 (1978). PBS, World War I Casualty and Death Tables, (Accessed January 31, 2015).

The Natural Sciences And The Arts - 1179 Words

People often argue about what constitutes progress, and things that some regard as progress other consider to not be progress at all. In my opinion it is the development towards an improved or more advanced condition. However what I perceive something to be could be biased due to my beliefs and value system, this is a limitation which must be considered when discussing progress in reference to the natural sciences and the arts. Reason and imagination play an important role in both understanding and comparing progress in the natural sciences and the arts but, while the imaginative insights of a scientist must ultimately be provable, those of artists need only to be reasonable. The interactions between these ways of knowing vary between the†¦show more content†¦Therefore the title must be approached differently, allowing for the development of the claim that progress in the natural sciences is more beneficial to society than in the arts. It is apparent that the knowledge gaine d from the natural sciences is generally considered to be the more reliable and true area of knowledge, opposed to the arts. Logic and reason are used as its primary ways of knowing which allow for the gathering of information through analysing data and observing experiments. Therefore we make the assumption that by gaining new information, through experimental practices, we are making progress in the development towards an ‘improved’ condition. This type of scientific progress can be classified as methodical (the invention of new methods of research, the refinement of research) and cognitive (increase or advancement of scientific knowledge) progresses. One example of this is the Eliminate Dengue Programme, which aims to develop a natural method to reduce the spread of dengue. The research team have shown that their approach reduces dengue transmission when the Wolbachia bacteria is introduced into mosquitoes in laboratories and affected communities, for example Yorkeys Knob which is where I live. Progress has indeed occurred, where dengue mosquito populations in Yorkeys Knob have been successfully reduced, if not completely removed. However, the counterclaim that progress in the natural sciences can have

Contributions and Drawbacks of Marxism Free Essays

Contributions and Drawbacks of Marxism Marxism is a theoretical system that created by Marx and Engels based on labor movements in the 19th century. Marxism was written upon a materialist interpretation of history. The Marxist theoretical system consists of three parts: Marxist philosophy, Marxist political economy and scientific socialism, which were created on the basis of the German classical philosophy, the British classical political economy and French utopian socialist influence respectively. We will write a custom essay sample on Contributions and Drawbacks of Marxism or any similar topic only for you Order Now In their writing the two most important terms are â€Å"socialist† and â€Å"communist†. When reading them, it is always important to know what the writer means by them. For Marx socialism was the more comprehensive term; communism was an advanced stage of socialism. Socialism would prepare the way by nationalizing the â€Å"means of production† (factories, farms, mines, transportation, etc. ) and putting them under the control of those he viewed as the sole producers of wealth: the workers. He viewed political equality and freedom as incomplete (or even illusory) without economic equality. Therefore this redistribution of economic power was aimed at extending democracy far beyond the limits envisioned by earlier democratic revolutions. Social services like health, education, and housing would be provided free, but people would still be paid wages according to their work. When all nations had developed socialist economies, they would begin to evolve into an international communist society. The vision of communism was very similar to that of anarchism: a stateless society in which central government had â€Å"withered away,† local, ground-up control of all affairs by strictly democratic processes based at the place of work, abolition of the market system (no money, no buying and selling) and its replacement by a system according to which people would voluntarily work for the common good to the extent they were able under the understanding that they could receive whatever they needed for free (â€Å"from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs†). National boundaries and governments having been eliminated, war would cease. Since Marx published the â€Å"Communist Manifesto† in1848, the banner of the communist was high erected, from Europe to the Americas, Asia, hundreds of millions of people struggled to achieve this beautiful ideal. People’s enthusiasm changed from faith to practical action. Communist revolution had continued for more than a century and had significant impact on the world’s modern history: 15 socialist countries were born, two global camps were formed and the conflict of different ideological forms evolved into conflict of international relations. After World War II, socialist practice developed from one country into multi countries. The formation of the socialist camp ended the dominance of capitalism. However, after nearly half century’s development, the Soviet model of socialism did not fully demonstrate its superiority. They became rigid, dogmatic and stagnated. At the same time, capitalist forces gathered together to against the socialist countries, and launched the â€Å"peaceful evolution† plan. Through the economic warfare, political warfare and the culture wars, finally in the 90s, the Soviet Union collapsed and majority of Eastern European Socialist Countries changed to capitalist. Since then the international communist movement entered into a setback stage. There is always a question been asked: if the socialist system is more superior than capitalism system, why most socialist countries failed and the remaining countries haven’t catch up with capitalist country? Because the development of socialist countries and that of capitalist countries lack a comparable basis: First, they have different starting points of economic development. Most socialist countries originally are feudal, colonial or semi-colonial countries. They don’t have any accumulated capital and wealthy like capitalist countries do. Under the control and plunder of western countries for decades, they barely have anything left. The difference between the two kinds of countries is significant. Second, they use different means of economic development. The history of capitalism is a history of bloody fortune. As Marx said, capitalist production process is the process of exploitation. Even today, with the advance of technology and dominant of capital, they are still doing unequal exchange with developing countries, which helps them to grab wealth. But the development of socialist countries mainly relies on people’s hard working. Third, they have different lengths of the economic development. From the establishment of the first socialist countries, only 80 years has past. Most of the socialist countries only have a history of forty or fifty years. They are still in the early stage of development, their economic, political and social operating mechanisms haven’t been fully developed. And they are still on their way searching for proper methods for improvement. But capitalism has three hundred and sixty years of history. It has accumulated a solid capital foundation and rich experience. Even so, among the capitalist countries, only around twenty of them are in the category of â€Å"developed countries†. Especially for those newly independent countries in the 20th century who use capitalist system, none of them is in the â€Å"rich club†. Fourth, the development environment is different. From the establishment of the first socialist state, the world’s capitalist countries start to apply economic blockade, military siege and even the armed aggression, the development environment for socialist countries is very dangerous. However, when the capitalist start developing, the old feudal system are almost collapse thoroughly from a global perspective. The international environment for the development of capitalism is very favorable. From the reasons above, I think it is not fair to compare the development level of socialist countries and capitalist countries. Even socialism did not success in a global point of view, it should be noted some of them have had great achievement. Before the collapse, the Soviet Union maintained an average industrial production growth rate of 21% from 1928 to 1940, ranking first in Europe and second in the world. And they completed in twelve years what capitalist countries achieved in 100 years. From 1951 to 1980, the Soviet major economic indicators are1 to 2 times higher than the U. S. In 1950, the Soviet industrial output is less than 30% of U. S. ’s industrial output, while in 1980 it reached 80%. In addition, the Soviet Union has significant achievement in science and technology, education, culture, military and many other fields. From the development of the Soviet Union, we can see the socialism has certain kinds of advantages. We should also notice that the eighty years of socialist development history has a huge and far-reaching impact on the human social history. The establishment and development of socialism, breaks the operation system of colonialism and imperialism, propels the international political and economic order to a more equal and reasonable direction. The socialism analysis of the conflict between productive forces and production relations also helps with the improvement of the capitalist system. So socialism is conducive to the common progress of human society. But like other theories, Marxism, by the limitations of the era, has a series of shortcomings: The class struggle theory. It is easy for the dogmatists and violence advocates to take advantage of. Some people exaggerate the power of class struggle. They do not realize the probability of class change (proletariat to propertied class) and the class cooperation, so it can lead to widespread violence, legalized terrorism easily. The proletarian dictatorship theory. The starting point of protecting people is good. But if the bad guys control the government, they may suppress people and dissent in the name of proletariat comrades. The theory of surplus value. Marx thinks, in a market economy, the exploitation of surplus value is from production. Surplus value is the value worker created minus the employment expense of that labor. Although this theory of exploitation has a positive side in recognition of exploitation, its bias and extreme part is obvious. Marx’s mistake is that he ignores capitalists’ management of complex operation and the business risk they bear. Capitalists’ income should include their general labor income (he works as a worker), complex management income (he conducts the operation and management, decision-making and other complex activities), capital income (he puts in capital), the risk income (the principle of market economy is the risks and benefits equals; he bears the investment risk, so he should have a higher income). Moreover, Marx does not realize that in the old socialist society, because of high concentration of power in planned economy, some problems will be created: corruption, plunder of resources and people is a more serious exploitation. The plan economy theory. Marx negates the market economy, advocating elimination of private ownership and replace with full ownership. He promotes the idea of â€Å"distribute according to the work contributed†. He encourages eliminating commodity and currency and replacing them with a comprehensive economic plan, distributing consumer goods by needs. Moreover, Marx states that full ownership will become state ownership, the planned economy will be under the control of government, and distribution by work is actually by the length working time. Those policies will certainly leads to unclear property rights, irresponsibility and egalitarianism. There will be no competition and people will have no incentive to work. Some other problems also need our attention: Is public ownership really efficient? Will egalitarian distribution inhibit creativity? Will planned economic encourage bureaucracy, and lead to laziness and waste? And so on. Sources: http://www. douban. com/group/topic/4691689/ http://baike. baidu. com/view/680726. htm http://baike. baidu. com/view/8059. htm http://public. wsu. edu/~brians/hum_303/manifesto. html http://wenda. tianya. cn/wenda/thread? tid=0aa8581c30d4c1ea;hl=vbgood http://www. marxists. org/archive/bukharin/works/1933/teaching/intro. htm How to cite Contributions and Drawbacks of Marxism, Essay examples

Manage Remuneration and Employee Benefits - myassignmenthelp.com

Question: Discuss about theManage Remuneration and Employee Benefits forBonuses. Answer: Remuneration It defines a reward or an amount, which paid to the contractor or employees for working under any organization. It is a form of compensation for employment service. The remuneration can provide according to their hourly wages, fringe benefits and salary benefits. It also includes annual leave, bonuses or incentives, leave without pay, long service leave and share options (Safari et al. 2016). Under the employment remuneration, they get benefits according to the terms and rewards of the organizations. Strategic goals It helps the organization by various concerned structures, which includes: serve the organization with fair purposes always ensure to give good performance The employees will have good opportunities for the best future performance the process not only provide fair salary structure, but it also helps in to describe that the organization is fair for all It helps to achieve the goals of the by obtaining the strategic goals. According to the benefits for the organization, HR always focuses on the tax benefits, which includes Income Tax, Good and Service Tax and Fringe Benefit Tax. Under the Australian taxation system, these tax benefits help in the development of the organisations remuneration strategy. It is necessary to develop on the remuneration polices which helps to achieve a successful management benefits. These should be appropriate with the fair and equitable with the organization (Riaz and Riaz 2016). In the health care industry, the strategies that are applicable in the remuneration process are flexibility, health and wellness. According to the employers choice in the organization, it must concentrate on the ability to the attraction on the high performance. The reputation of the organization is always important along with the environment cultures. It is important to ensure the remuneration policies because it sets the minimum pay rate for the employees, which they get as a reward, registration agreement and other enterprise agreements. The remuneration policies help to pay according to the pay rate, which includes the team meetings, training, working unreasonable trial shifts, opening, and closing the business (Safari et al. 2016). In the strategic plans of incentives, the organization always looks for retain productive employees. Every business always ensure the establishment according to the performance, incentive plans expectations of the behavior of the employees, performance in the given works and loyalty towards the organizations. In the industrial agreement based occupations, it deals with various occupational groups, which includes the managers and administrators, tradespersons and related works, intermediate production and Transport Workers, laborers and related workers and Elementary clerical, sales and service workers. These occupational groups help the organizations to develop their remuneration strategies. The Market Rates defines the actual price or cost of any products, which is fixed or calculated according to the market strategies. It also helps to fix the marketing price, which is operated by the government. For the access in market or salary survey, we can survey in various organizations like any company, bank or shop. The performance management described the development strategies, which helps in the executive performance and comprehensive management. Under the performance management, it always depends on the performances, skills and disciplinary of an employee. It incorporated with the recruitment and selection, training and development, compensations, job design, disciplinary procedures and counseling. In the health care practice, it is necessary that the employees who are involved in such occupation must have an excellent skill in their performance, should have a clear concept about their job role, should have the duties and liabilities towards their job, and the ability to perform according to their job role. Employee minimum entitlements according to organizational policies and legal requirements included that the rate of the minimum payment is sets according to the enterprise agreement or other registered agreement or the national minimum wage. It could be paid according to the working unreasonable trial shifts, in team meetings, training and opening and closing the business. The National Employment Standards has entitled with the 10 minimum employment entitlements, which are the basis rights of the employees. In Australia, the NES and national minimum wage is applicable for the entitlement. Under the entitlements, the included entitlements are annual leave, parental leave, and public holidays and Fair Work Information Statements (Riaz and Riaz 2016). The Salary packages helps to understand about the payment arrangements of the benefits, which are payable and total amount of the remuneration. Under the salary, package the management sets several payment arrangements, which includes fringe benefits, allowances, motor vehicle, salary, superannuation and payroll tax or workers compensation insurance. This is the duty of the HR managers that the remuneration process must not only comply with the organization also helps to operate with minimum standard of the salary packages. The Remuneration system, which set the salary packages, should comply with the organizational policies and legal requirements. The salary packages must included with tax and other superannuation obligations. Incentive describes the economic wage or compensation, which rewarded according to the performance skills in the employments. Incentives always provide to the individual persons who are involved with any organizations. The amount of incentive is set according to the incentive managements structures. It is the aim of the incentives to pay the money and helps to obtain the organizational success. It can provide in different ways, which are moral incentives, remuneration incentive, financial incentives, coercive incentives, natural incentives and intrinsic motivations. In a successful management of any organization, it depends on the productivity of the business and their incentive plans. Incentive plans, which are known as performance incentive plans (PIPs), motivate employees to exceed expectations and grow the business. Such plans promote exceptional behavior during a specific period (Safari et al. 2016). Under the remuneration strategies effectiveness, it processed with the development, investigation and other recommendation stages. Under the implementation stages, it includes the implementation of process with trial group, orientation of key stakeholders those responsible for administration, development of communications strategy, monitor progress, record feedback and opinion on acceptance. This is the duty of the HR managers that the remuneration process must not only comply with the organization also helps to operate with minimum standard of the salary packages. The Remuneration system, which set the salary packages, should comply with the organizational policies and legal requirements. The salary packages must included with tax and other superannuation obligations (Riaz and Riaz 2016). The HR, board authorities, managements and the employees will involve in the remuneration process. Reference Dean, P.J. ed., 2015. Australia 1944-45: Victory in the Pacific. Cambridge University Press. Goodman-Delahunty, J., Brewer, N., Clough, J., Horan, J., Ogloff, J.R., Tait, D. and Pratley, J., 2014. Practices, policies and procedures that influence juror satisfaction in Australia. Riaz, Z. and Riaz, Z., 2016. A hybrid of state regulation and self-regulation for remuneration governance in Australia. Corporate Governance, 16(3), pp.539-563. Safari, M., Cooper, B.J. and Dellaportas, S., 2016. The influence of remuneration structures on financial reporting quality: evidence from Australia. Australian Accounting Review, 26(1), pp.66-75.