International and Area Studies Commons^™

Constructing Cidadania: Shifting Visions Of Citizenship In The Mst Settlement Assentamento 25 De Maio In Ceará, Brazil, Alexis Victoria Cruzzavala

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The social movement known as Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST) was founded in 1984 with the intent of agrarian reform in a newly democratic Brazil. The movement arrived in Northeastern Brazil in the late 1980s and successfully organized a group of landless workers in the interior of Ceará on May 25, 1989 to create the first settlement the state had seen. The citizens of Assentamento 25 de Maio, as the settlement was later named, have undergone a unique social transition from circumstances closely resembling forced servitude and latifúndio to liberation. This transition affected the men and women who …

Bills, Bribery And Brutality: How Rampant Corruption In The Electoral System Has Helped Prevent Democracy In Uganda, Sam Tabachnik

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study looks at the electoral system in Uganda and the corruption and inefficiencies that go with it. In addition, this study delves into the most common electoral crimes and the way they are committed. Going even deeper, the study examines the reasons for bribery pervasiveness, the role of money in politics and the views locals have of their government and its leaders. Crucial institutions such as police, military, judiciary, Electoral Commission and civil society groups were also discussed in how they relate toelections and politics in Uganda.

The research design was qualitative, historical and descriptive. Information was gatheredby in-person …

Have You Restructured For Global Success?, Nirmalya Kumar, Phanish Puranam

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The organizational structures of many multinational corporations are inadequate to the task of capitalizing on opportunities in emerging markets. Locating customer-facing processes in each country-and even using transnational structures that exploit location-specific advantages-just doesn't cut it anymore. So argue Kumar and Puranam, of London Business School. The authors show how the growth of China and India as lead markets and as talent pools, coupled with advances in technology, enable companies to optimize their organizations by segmenting R&D both vertically and horizontally, thereby creating T-shaped structures.The greatest challenge of the T-shaped structure is managing integration across countries. The solution is to …

Examining The Chinese Approach To Crisis Management: Cover-Ups, Saving Face, And Taking The “Upper Level Line”, Lan Ye, Augustine Pang

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

In 2008, the Sanlu Group, a former giant in the Chinese dairy industry and a quintessential Chinese organization, was confronted with the melamine-contaminated milk crisis. Its products were blamed for causing at least six babies' deaths and damaging the kidneys of about 294,000 babies. Sanlu was criticized for its crisis handling, which resulted in its collapse several months later. Using the contingency theory of strategic conflict management and Coombs' typology of crisis communication strategies, this study explored Sanlu's crisis management as a mirror to understanding the Chinese approach to crisis management. Findings showed that influenced by political, social, and cultural …

Diving Into The New Innovation Landscape: The Eastern Current, Arnoud De Meyer

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Thirty years ago, when the business world sought innovation, most eyes looked West – mainly to the OECD countries considered to be the most economically advanced. We focused on technology-based product innovations, which were conceived for Western customers, developed in laboratories close to the headquarters of Western companies, and rolled out in the world’s wealthiest markets: North America, Western Europe and Japan, an honorary member of the Western club. This is no longer the case. Now, when the business world asks where the next innovative product or process will come from, what it will consist of, where it will be …

Family Background And Economic Outcomes In Japan, Ken Yamada

Research Collection School Of Economics

There has been increasing concern about the influence of elements of family background on children’s future outcomes in Japan. This paper empirically examines the long-term impact of family background, including sibling composition and parental attributes, and reveals how these elements of Japanese women’s family backgrounds affect their educational attainment and investment, labor market outcomes, family formation, and spousal characteristics.

U.S. Policy Towards The Horn Of Africa, David Shinn

Distinguished Lectures on Africa

Ambassador David Shinn served for 37 years in the U.S. Foreign Service, with assignments at embassies in Lebanon, Kenya and Tanzania; deputy chief of mission in Mauritania, Cameroon and Sudan; and ambassador to Burkina Faso and Ethiopia. His State Department assignments included assistant desk officer for Ethiopia, desk officer for Somalia, Djibouti, Uganda and Tanzania; coordinator for Somalia during the international intervention in the early 1990s; and director of East African, Horn of Africa and Indian Ocean Island affairs. He writes extensively in academic and policy journals on the Horn of Africa and China-Africa relations and speaks around the world …

The Myth Of Progress In Science: Dialectics, Distortion And Lysenkoism In The Soviet Union, Mark A. Ferguson Jr.

The Hilltop Review

The scientific controversy surrounding Lysenkoism is both unparalleled and well known amongst historians and philosophers of science (Joravsky 1970, McMullin 1987, Pollock 2009, Wolfe 2010). Yet, while this may be true for scholars and students a generation ago, I argue that the controversy of Lysenkoism is not widely known today. Particularly in political science, this historical period and phenomenon in the Soviet Union remains irrelevant or at least, inconsequential to the scientific study of politics.

Jihadis And The Use Of The Terms Terrorism And Terrorist, Aaron Zelin

Re-visioning Terrorism

Previous studies on the usage of the terms terror, terrorist, and terrorism have taken a Western perspective on how these terms should be defined and then deployed, but the viewpoint of the “terrorist” (in this case jihadis) has yet to be examined. This study analyzes how jihadis understand these terms and critically assesses their interpretation based on classical Islamic doctrine. The basis and “proof” for jihadis’ legitimization of using terror is based upon the Qur’anic verse 8:60, but when taken into context and traditional understanding, jihadis miss the mark. Yet, at the same time, when exploring the linguistic root for …

'The Earth Is Crying Out In Pains Of Childbirth': Bauxite Mining And Sustainable Rural Development In The Brazilian Atlantic Forest, Lena R. Connor

Environmental Analysis Program Mellon Student Summer Research Reports

In 2003, residents of the Serra do Brigadeiro Territory, a rural region of Southeastern Brazil in one of the few remaining patches of the Atlantic Forest, learned of a large number of bauxite concessions in their territory given by the federal government to the prominent Companhia Brasileira de Alumínio (CBA), Brazil’s largest aluminum producer. Because the region prides itself on its small-scale agriculture and its lush natural environment, the mining has been the source of much contention in the community. Introduced to the topic by the international conservation non-profit and research center, Iracambi, I spent two months in the territory …

The Un Security Council On Syria: Radical Change Or Continuity?, Thomas Pegram

Human Rights & Human Welfare

The Presidential Statement issued by the UN Security Council on August 3 condemning the widespread violation of human rights by Syrian authorities was hailed by some as signaling the collapse of the pro-Syrian "defiance coalition."

This "defiance coalition," comprised of the so-called "BRICs" (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) along with Lebanon, did indeed relent, begrudgingly, to growing international pressure for action on Syria. However, whether a statement containing little actionable content signals the crumbling of defiance rather than a diplomatic maneuver as calculations are recalibrated in light of developments is another matter.

Hiv And Concurrent Sexual Partnerships: Modelling The Role Of Coital Dilution, Larry Sawers, Alan G. Isaac, Eileen Stillwaggon

Economics Faculty Publications

Background: The concurrency hypothesis asserts that high prevalence of overlapping sexual partnerships explains extraordinarily high HIV levels in sub-Saharan Africa. Earlier simulation models show that the network effect of concurrency can increase HIV incidence, but those models do not account for the coital dilution effect (nonprimary partnerships have lower coital frequency than primary partnerships).

Methods: We modify the model of Eaton et al (AIDS and Behavior, September 2010) to incorporate coital dilution by assigning lower coital frequencies to non-primary partnerships. We parameterize coital dilution based on the empirical work of Morris et al (PLoS ONE, December …

Selling Singaporeans On The Isa, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Assistant Professor of Law Eugene Tan said that allowing judges to review both procedural requirements of preventive detention orders issued under the Internal Security Act would help to bolster public confidence and trust.

A Sentinel To Good Governance, Tan K. B. Eugene

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Assistant Prof Eugene Tan reviews S.R. Nathan's 12-year term as Head of State, and suggests President Nathan played a key role in defining the functions of the Elected Presidency.

The Arab Spring: Endgames As Framing Battle, Colm Campbell

Human Rights & Human Welfare

The narrative of the Arab Spring (including the Syrian uprising) in the mainstream media appears clear and linear: a cruel dictator is challenged in a series of street demonstrations that rapidly coalesce to become a popular uprising. The dictator resorts to increasingly brutal repression, but this fails to end the challenge. Within a relatively short time the dictator is overthrown. Elections within a reasonable period are announced, promising the creation of a democracy that is representative not only of the protest movement, but of society as a whole. Raghida Dergham's Huffington Post article largely reflects this perspective, drawing attention to …

September Roundtable: "The Syrian Spring" And Human Rights, Introduction, Raslan Ibrahim

Human Rights & Human Welfare

An annotation of:

“The UN Security Council's Pro-Syrian 'Defiance Coalition' Crumbles”. By Raghida Dergham. Huffington Post, August 2011.

White Noise, White Heat, Therese O'Donnell

Human Rights & Human Welfare

If, as former British Prime Minister Harold Wilson famously uttered, "A week is a long time in politics," then the Six weeks since Raghida Dergham's article could be a lifetime and the last six months of the "Arab Spring" an aeon.

The Moral International Sphere As A New "Civic Virtue", Claudia Heiss

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Liberal political theory, the predominant paradigm at least since the 1970s, rules out as oppressive the imposition of any substantive notion of a "good way of life" and proposes instead a neutral conception where each individual should have the right to pursue his or her own preferred project of life. This opposition of an ancient "virtue" and a modern "freedom" seems challenged by current debates about morality and the responsibility to protect innocent civilians from massive crimes. The moral outrage of the international community may be interpreted as a signal of a perhaps minimal notion of civic virtue, which translates …

When Does The Socio-Cultural Context Matter? Communal Orientation And Entrepreneurs' Resource Accumulation Efforts In Africa, Jane N. O. Khayesi, Gerard George

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We examined the effect of entrepreneurs’communal orientation and social capital on entrepreneurs’ acquisition of resources, and the cost of raising those resources. Using an errors-in-variables estimation in a sample of 242 Ugandan entrepreneurs from Kampala, we find that shared identity is positively associated with the quantity of resources raised by entrepreneurs, whereas shared identity and communal orientation are associated with a higher cost of raising resources. Further, communal orientation positively moderates the relationship between kin composition and the quantity of resources raised; whereas communal orientation negatively moderates the relationship between trust, shared identity, and resources. In contrast, a high communal …

Effects Of Cultural Ethnicity, Firm Size, And Firm Age On Senior Executives’ Trust In Their Overseas Business Partners: Evidence From China, Crystal X. Jiang, Roy Y. J. Chua, Masaaki Kotabe, Janet Y. Murray

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We investigate trust relationships between senior business executives and their overseas partners. Drawing on the similarity-attraction paradigm, social categorization theory, and the distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust, we argue that executives trust their overseas partners differently, depending on the partners’ cultural ethnicity. In a field survey of 108 Chinese senior executives, we found that these executives have higher affect-based trust in overseas partners of the same cultural ethnicity as themselves; cognition-based trust is associated with affect-based trust differently when overseas partners are of the same or different cultural ethnicity. We also examine the role of relative firm size and …