IT Business Outsourcing Essay Example for Free

IT Business Outsourcing Essay Outsourcing basically means a process of constricting to another party. It is done at the outsourcing client’s location under their supervision. There are many essential factors which are needed to decide whether to outsource the information process or not. First major factor is the activity or the process itself. Main concern should be the process, whether it’s really needed to be outsourced (Loh et. al, 1992). If it is core job to that organization, then its better not to outsource it. If the task really requires highly efficient skills which is not available in your organization, then it’s better to outsource it. Second most important factor is the financial strategy. While deciding whether to outsource, main goal of company is to save money. It’s essential to verify, what will be the total cost in both the cases, if the task to be performed within the organization or outside. Hence, the main factors for deciding why to outsource are outsourcers cost, their capabilities and the potential end product which ultimately will reduce the risk and increase organization profit. Influence of Risk Assessment on the decision making process when seeking to outsource information processes Risk is always associated with the process of outsourcing. Many organizations who went for outsourcing, failed and few of the reasons are like cultural misalignment, end product not as per the quality and deadlines or delivery times missed. There are mainly two types of risk associated with the process of outsourcing: external risk and internal risk. Read more:Â  Essay on Business Process Outsourcing External risks are those risks which occur outside the organization and upon which organization do not have any control. these risks includes a search of outsourcer who will offer the required skills in a cost effective manner, an exchange rate fluctuation that can impact the cost savings, lack of ability to guard organization intellectual protection property and physical location of outsourcer which includes economic and political risk as well (Aubert, 1998). Internal risks are those risks which occur inside the organization while outsourcing. Language is the most targeted risk if outsourcing happen between two different countries where English is not the primary language and the ability of communicating to outsourcers in a remote location where technology is not so updated. Influence of change management requirements on the decision making process when seeking to outsource information processes One of the key factors for a successful outsourcing is the organizations effective change management policy. Organizations who failed to manage the changes effectively suffer a lot. Within an organization, the most important change management program is to create such a reliable communication strategy, so that the employees don’t feel scared about the job security. There should be proper redeployment and retention plans for all employees to make them feel secure. Proper training should be provided to make them understand how to deal with outsourcers. Few change management factors during this process are good leadership quality, crystal clear procedures, strategy safeguarding stakeholder’s interests, communication strategy and a change-over course of action for every step (Wullenweber et al, 2008). Inclusion of different entities by business when making decisions on the processes to outsource and the third party entity to outsource to Businesses include entities when time comes to decide whether to go for outsourcing or not. When an organization needs a process to be outsourced, decision of top level (CEO or a Director) is essential. Without their confirmation, company can’t think of moving ahead. After the confirmation, now its middle management turns to check whether all the important factors are going in favor of outsourcing or not. Here come different entities like finance, Hr, marketing, quality and third party. Finance department will check outsourcing in terms of cost saving, while HR will check if the company really needs outsourcing staff or it has its own (DiRomualdo et. al. , 1998). Marketing people will do a survey to acquire a list of best outsourcing companies and quality will judge whether the decision is anywhere hampering the quality and how to improve it in future. Third party will also play a vital role as their location, cost of doing outsourcing and few other factors will also effect the decision (W. McFarlan et. al, 1995).

The effects of child labor in India

The effects of child labor in India Child labor has been a constant menace plaguing Indian society for centuries. As the Indian economy develops at a dramatic pace to become one of the worlds future economic superpowers, it is becoming extremely important to protect the future generation of this country, which are undoubtedly the children. Child labor holds a disgusting picture in todays India. India tops the list in the world of having the highest number of child laborers, under the age of 14, of about 100-150 million out of which at least 44 million are engaged in hazardous jobs (Larson, 2004). Even though the Indian Constitution prohibits children younger than 14 to be employed in any occupation or hazardous environment, child labor exists in this country (Ram, 2009). They often work for long hours in hazardous and unhygienic environment and receive meager pay (Forastieri, 2002). These young children deserve to be educated and benefit from their childhood rather than work at early age and face abuse. The Indian gove rnment should enforce their law of prohibiting child labor to eliminate this problem. It is extremely important to tackle this menace if childrens rights are to be protected and a vibrant, mentally strong and educated youth is to be ensured for the future. To begin with, child labor is a gross violation of human rights. Firstly, it violates the constitutional law of India (Ram, 2009). Secondly, it also violates the UNICEFS 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child whose article 32 include[s] the childs right to freedom from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the childs education, or to be harmful to the childs health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development (UNICEF, 2001, p. 6). Moreover, the International Labour Organisation (ILO)s Convention number 182 also aims at eliminating child labor (Fyfe, 2007). Due to the lack of enforcement of law by the Indian government, the 100 to 150 million children are not getting the national and universal human rights they are entitled to. When the thought of childhood comes to our mind, images like children playing and running around in school uniforms emerge. However for child laborers in India, its images of factory smoke, wounded fingers, and abuse that emerge. These children work for long hours inhaling smoke, working with dangerous machines, and facing abusive employers. The labor market in which these children work, the [labor] supply exceeds demand, and, therefore, they lack bargaining power with the balance always tilted in favor of the employers leading to exploitation (Mishra, 2000, p. 56). Also, since children are more vulnerable compared to adults and in weaker positions to negotiate, they face further mistreatment, abuse and get paid less. Some are even abducted, sold into labor and are forced into servitude with no hope of getting out (Schmitz, Traver, Larson, 2004). When children start working at such a young age and undergo through the above mentioned abuses and economic exploitation, it negatively affects their emotional and physical capabilities (Larson, 2004). In one case, a 10 year-old girl named Mina had her fingers almost worn to the bone because of working many hours rolling cigarettes for a beedi (rolled cigarettes) company (Larson, 2004). In the same beedi industry, another girl narrated that her work was not only hard but it was also painful for her to sit and continue for hours without any break to achieve her target of 3000 beedis per day, for a meager wage of 3 rupees per day. Surprisingly, an adult can hardly make 2500 beedis in the same time (Mishra, 2000). In Child Labour in India, Mishra (2000) mentioned a disheartening case of a 12-year old boy in a matchbox factory. The boy complained that his employer would beat him for minor mistakes and insult his parents in a filthy language which would cause him a lot of pain since it was no fault of theirs. He also said: My employer used to put a match box on my neck in order to bend it down sufficiently to concentrate on the work. This prevented me from raising and turning my head on either side. I was beaten several times by him for having raised and turned my head. The turning of my head was very well indicated by the fall of the match box from my neck. Sometimes he beats me with the help of a wire in an unkind manner. (p. 71) Companies find it profitable to use child labor because it helps them produce at lower costs and the innocent children can be trained to do dangerous work under unsafe and unsatisfactory conditions. Many children in India who are child laborers work in industries such as glass-blowing, matchsticks, fireworks and also the carpet-making industry (Larson, 2004). An example of the terrible working conditions can be seen in the fireworks industry. Factories labeled as D grade are legally binded not to employ more than 22 people in their factory. However, many of such factories employ around 20 to 150 people, including children! The D graded match box factories are legally allowed to produce at most 80 units of matchboxes but they produce upto 100 to 300 units (Mishra, 2000). These firms are breaking legal rules and the Indian government should step in to enforce their laws. Poverty-stricken parents in India who borrow loans often give their children to their debtor so that he can exploit the children by making them work and help in paying off the debt. The meager pay these children receive is not enough to cover up the amount of money to be repaid for the loan. In addition to this, the interest on the loan keeps increasing, which increases the repayment amount, and then the working child takes many years to pay off the debt (Larson, 2004). It is often pointed out that child labor helps pull people out of poverty by offering a source of income and survival for a poor family (Larson, 2004). However, this income comes at a huge cost as they are abused for work which affects their present and future life. An example can be seen above in the way children are abused as collateral for loans. The constant abuse child laborers have to go through in exchange for a small amount of income makes their life not worth living.It does not make much of a difference whether the child is earning money while working in a hazardous job or not, since every type of work involves a degree of stress. Hazardous work cripples the health, psyche, and personality of a child, and non-hazardous work causes forms of deprivation such as denial of access to education and denial of the pleasurable activities associated with childhood (Mishra, 2000, p. 14). Therefore, the child laborer who is working at a young age to earn some amount of income for his fa mily also does not get educated, which makes him unfit to grow up and get a well paid, decent job in the future. Child labor can even start a cycle as an uneducated illiterate parent will also start sending his young child to work as a child laborer, who in turn will also grow up uneducated, and use his child also as a source of income. Therefore, the Indian government should make an effort to enforce their child labor law in order to save these children, break this vicious cycle and protect its future generations. Having a formal education is the birth right of every child in this world. But child labor has stolen this right from these 44 million children. These children in India who are involved in child labor are not able to have time to go to school due to the intense and long working hours. According to the International Labour Organizations report, Child labour leads to reduced primary school enrolment and negatively affects literacy rates among youth (ILO, 2008). The report also found strong evidence that in a situation where school and work was combined, school attendance falls as the number of hours at work increases (ILO, 2008). This goes on to prove that working children in India involved in labor struggle to attend school due to their harsh and exploitive working hours which causes them continuous fatigue. As India has the highest level of child labor in the world, it is due to this reason that Indias rank in the Education Development Index (EDI) is a disappointing 102nd out of the 129 countries in the index (UNESCO, 2009). The EDI measures a countrys performance on universal primary education. High level of child labor in a country is often related with its low and unsatisfactory performance on the index (ILO, 2008). The Indian government should start enforcing their law against child labor so that these children can go to school easily. A working child also often gets deprived of having a bright and lively childhood due to lack of leisure activities. In a research conducted by Dr. D.V.P Raja, Founder and Director of the Madurai Institute of Social Sciences in India, more than 90% of the working children who were interviewed stated that they do not have enough leisure to play and engage in other recreational activities. This startling finding signifies that these children spend virtually all their waking hours working and are thereby totally denied any of the excitement and pleasures of childhood (Mishra, 2000, p. 48). The interviewees also stated that while at work, they did not acquire or learn any new skills. This goes on to say that the impact of child labor on the development and creative side of the child is quite disturbing. These children do not find their work enjoyable but rather than that they find it difficult and boring; but, however, they still continue to stick with these jobs because they dont have a choice nor do they find any other suitable alternative for them (Mishra, 2000). The government of India should now wake up and save these children before more of them become victims of a lost childhood. The problem of child labor has done enough damage to the lives and health of many innocent children in India over centuries by stealing away their many rights. It is now evident that child laborers are heavily losing out on all fronts and are becoming terribly incompetent to live future life as child labor negatively affects their mental, emotional and psychological capabilities .Child labor should be brought to an end now. It is high time that the Indian government starts taking this issue seriously and starts enforcing its own constitutional law against child labor so that Indias present and future generation of young citizens have their rights protected and are able to live their lives healthy and secure.

Marriage and Divorce - Women and the High Cost of Divorce Essay example

Women and the High Cost of Divorce Divorce is commonly recognized as a major problem in our society. Every year there are more divorces in our country and many studies have been dedicated to finding out why. Much media attention has been paid to the court proceedings or the causes leading up to the divorce, but once the matter has lost public appeal, all coverage is dropped. Because of this, there is much that the average citizen does not know about the short-term and long-term effects of divorce. This paper examines the economic effects on all the parties involved and the discrimination in the process of divorce. While divorce was once a relatively rare event, and one to which negative stereotype was attached, it has now become almost as regular as cloudy skies in Binghamton, NY. For the past two decades there have been more than one million divorces per year in the United States and this number is steadily rising (Arendell, 1986). There are several historical factors contributing to this trend. After WWII the service sector of the economy underwent a huge expansion, increasing the demand for women workers. As wages rose, more and more women joined the work force. This increase was often motivated by the fact that it was becoming increasingly more difficult to maintain a household on the strength of only one income. While in 1940 just under 15% of women worked outside the home, workforce participation by females increased to the point by 1960 that 32% of the workers were female. This number soared to 47% by 1992 (Kurz, 1995). This increasing labor force participation led to grea ter chances for self-sufficiency and made it more feasible for women to contemplate divorce. Also, these same incr... ...ionships. Either increased public assistance must be provided, or the father, or absentee parent, must be forced to take a more vested interest in the welfare of their children. Â   Works Cited Arendell, Terry. Mothers and Divorce, Legal Economic and Social Dilemmas. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. Kurz, Demie. For Richer, For Poorer, Mothers Confront Divorce. London: Routledge, 1995. Mason, Mary Ann. The Equality Trap. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988. Morgan, Leslie A. After Marriage Ends, Economic Consequences for Midlife Women. Newbury Park: Sage Publications, 1991. Peterson, Richard R. Women, Work, and Divorce. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989. Weitzman, Lenore J. The Divorce Revolution, The Unexpected Social and Economic Consequences for Women and Children in America. New York: The Free Press, 1985.

Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis Program Essay -- Genetics

Approximately 490,000 babies are born every day worldwide. About 11,000 babies are born each day in the United States alone, which means that at least eight babies are born every minute. Whether a pregnancy is planned for or not, the size, physical characteristics, and intellectual capabilities of a baby are predetermined by the chromosomes that combine in the mother during fertilization. The possibility and probability of a baby having any number of genetic diseases is also determined by genes and the embryo that is fertilized. In 1967, however, a study done by British scientists Robert Edwards and David Gardner paved the way for a life-altering scientific program now known as preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD (Jha, 1). Edwards originally became interested in and began researching about couples with infertility problems while attending the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, in the 1950’s. Previously, studies had proven that it was possible for egg cells from rabbits to be fertilized outside of the body. It was shown that if sperm was mixed with the egg cells in an appropriate environment, then the embryos could develop successfully without the need for another living system. With this knowledge, Edwards took it upon himself to continue the research at the National Institute for Medical Research in London, where he eventually discovered that it was also possible for human eggs to be fertilized outside of the womb. The first human embryo to be fertilized successfully outside of the human body was documented in 1969, followed by the first â€Å"test-tube† baby, Louise Brown, being born in 1978. Just two years later, the world’s first in-vitro fertilization centre, known as the Bou rne Hall Clinic, was founded by Edwards and Eng... ...aby, Please. Blond, Freckles -- Hold the Colic - WSJ.com." Business News & Financial News - The Wall Street Journal - Wsj.com. Web. 18 Nov. 2011. . "PGD - Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD) - Genetic Testing." HFEA - Fertility, Infertility, IVF, Embryo Research - Human Fertilisation & Embryology Authority. Web. 20 Dec. 2011. . Silverman, Rachel Emma. "Designer Babies: Choosing Your Child’s Traits - The Juggle - WSJ." WSJ Blogs - WSJ. Web. 18 Nov. 2011. . Staff, Wsj. "Can Breakfast Cereal Help You Have a Boy? - The Juggle - WSJ." WSJ Blogs - WSJ. Web. 18 Nov. 2011. .

J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye Essay -- Salinger Catcher Rye

J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye "There’s far more to the censorship issue than a ban on sex and four-letter words. I sometimes think that those of us who need to be the most clearheaded about these matters are planting the very trees that obscure our view of the forest," says Dorothy Briley. According to Briley, a vast amount more is needed than simply vulgar language and suggestive material to censor a novel. But this is the very reason why J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is frequently being banned from high schools. To the teenage readers, who are at the transition from childhood to adulthood, the protagonist of The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield, who has not quite reached the brink of manhood, becomes the reader’s hero. The adolescent mind that Salinger portrays so accurately in his novel is one with which most teenagers and readers, at one time or another, could identify. The Catcher in the Rye also contains universal themes that, for teenagers about to shift into adulthood, help young adults better understand the world and other people. Although it does contain abusive language and sexual connotations, The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger should not be censored in high schools because it provides insightful information and relevance to the life of young adults through its realistic situations and themes of acceptance and materialism. The reader can relate to the realistic situations, such as the scene at the Lunts play, present in the ...

Minorities in Film a Biography on John Woo

John Woo, one of Hong Kong's most famous and respected action director, has long been a cult favourite in the United States. John Woo[1] is a Chinese film director known especially for the ballet-like violence in his movies. Woo's films are also often tragic and sentimental, engaging with themes of loyalty and honour and the place of the loner hero in a world full of corruption and violence.Woo was born in Guangzhou, China, in 1946, and moved to Hong Kong with his family at age four. He was educated at Matteo Ricci College and, at age nineteen, began making experimental films. In lieu of film school, Woo sought entry-level positions in the flourishing Hong Kong film industry.It is identified that the bread-and-butter of the film industry is the action movie. Every season audiences can expect to see car chases, gunfights and explosions, and studios can expect to see millions and millions of dollars in return. Though most viewers and critics see these movies as â€Å"fuzz† enter tainment, there is one director, John Woo that puts as much heart and soul into his â€Å"fluff† as any number of talented directors put into their â€Å"serious† movies.He is the best contemporary director of action films working anywhere in the world. One of Woo's most vivid childhood memories was seeing a man killed on his front steps. After his family was aided by a local church (who allowed Woo to attend school there), he envisioned a different kind of path. He wanted to become a priest, but the fathers saw something different in him. John Woo's illustrious career as a filmmaker began in Hong Kong, where he spent over two decades at the centre of a thriving film industry directing nearly 30 feature films. He was known primarily as a comedy specialist until the mid-1980s when he created a series of inspired romantic and violent gangster dramas that broke box-office records.John Woo turned to the movies, which were a refuge for him from his earliest memories. As a t eenager, with borrowed film equipment, Woo and several of his friends began experimenting with the items and by the time he was 22, Woo was making his own movies. In 1969 Woo landed his first â€Å"real† job as a script supervisor at Cathay Studios.In 1971, Woo moved to the prestigious Shaw Bros. studio, where he worked under the well-known martial-arts director Chang Cheh, who taught Woo many things (the most important being editing). By 1973, Woo started working on his first film as director, The Young Dragons, a fairly nondescript martial-arts film that also had a young Jackie Chan working on it (as the fighting coordinator).The film was thought to be too violent and was shelved for two years. Upon release of The Young Dragons and its success at the box office, Woo was hired by Golden Harvest, which, while viewed as a young upstart at the time, would go on to become one of Hong Kong's biggest studios in the mid-1980's.Woo went on to write and direct several more martial-ar ts films, including Hand of Death (1976) which not only starred Woo himself but also reunited him with Jackie Chan (who was in a starring capacity this time out) and featured future Hong Kong superstar Sammo Hung. Hand of Death was an important step in Woo's career and for introducing Woo's ideals about dictators and revolutionaries and brotherhood and loyalty (shown by Chan's character).After his initial kung-fu phase, he made a comedy called The Pilferer's Progress (1977) which became a huge success and gave Woo recognition as a comedy director. The one exception was Heroes Shed No Tears (1983), where Woo escaped from the kung-fu and comedy genres in an ultra-violent tale of mercenaries sent to capture a drug lord deep inside Vietnam. He has called it his â€Å"first real movie†.There is something deeper to the obvious joy Woo finds in filmmaking and the intense bonds fostered on the film set. More important to Woo than being applauded for his maverick style, is the pleasur e in collaboration with his crew and actors, the thrill of making movies and paying tribute to a lost chapter in American historyWoo discussed his own reasons behind making the movie: Comedies and Kung Fu films dominated Hong Kong cinema in the mid-eighties. Other genres rarely got the support of the studio and the audience. And also, right before ‘A Better Tomorrow,' he shot two films in Taiwan, that were commercially unsuccessful; so it seemed quite impossible for him to make the films. He felt that Hong Kong at that time was seriously lacking in moral values. So he wanted to make an uplifting film to highlight the lost traditional values, including the values of family, friendship, tolerance etc.and Hark continued to team together and produced some of the landmark titles of the â€Å"heroic bloodshed† genre, which combined Scoresian-style relationships and themes, such as friendship and loyalty, with Peckinpah-style â€Å"ultraviolence.†ABT† also (probab ly permanently) linked Woo with leading man Chow Yun-Fat. With the success of ABT, He eventually moved on to create Just Heroes (1987) as a sort of benefit project for his aging mentor Chang Cheh.The film, a loose retelling of Shakespeare's King Lear set within a Triad â€Å"family,† was actually a joint project between Woo and his friend Wu Ma (who was having financial troubles at the time). As such, even though it features big Hong Kong stars such as Danny Lee and Woo's now-typical explosive gunfight sequences, the film lacked the focus of ABT and was a disappointment for Woo. He did enjoy some aspects of filming Just Heroes. After Just Heroes, Woo struggled to find another project.He wanted to stay away from ABT, but the film's popularity (teenagers took to dressing like Mark Gor, something which got Woo in trouble with politicians, who accused him of glorifying the Triad lifestyle) and Tsui Hark's constant prodding eventually convinced Woo to do the sequel. â€Å"ABT2â⠂¬  features a high-powered finale with one of the highest body counts per minute recorded on film and was another huge hit for Woo. However, things behind the scenes were not so rosy.Woo felt the characters in ABT were under-developed and were against any changes. Despite its status now as a classic, The Killer (which is Woo's favourite movie, since he feels that the characters are fully developed) flopped in Hong Kong. Many people thought the film is too serious and just not very â€Å"fun† to watch. However, Woo was gaining international recognition. At the age of 44, his contemporaries were calling Woo a â€Å"wunderkind† and he finally started to think of him as a success.After a series of disputes over â€Å"A Better Tomorrow III†, Woo and Hark parted ways. After being virtually blackballed from most of the major studios, Woo eventually formed his own production company with his new business partner Terence Chang.Woo used his new company to produce his ve rsion of the â€Å"ABTIII† script, which he reworked into â€Å"Bullet in the Head†. BITH is, by Woo's own account, his most personal film to date. While BITH is regarded as one of Woo's best films, again the local audience didn't like it.This time, the intense riot scenes were just too much for a people still reeling from the Tiannemen Square Massacre. Woo was forced to shoot another ending only a few official copies of Woo's original vision survive today. Woo's next film was 1991's Once a Thief, a breezy comedy/action/romance.While not a huge hit, Once a Thief did well enough at the box office to gain Woo funding for his next movie, â€Å"Hard-Boiled† (1992). Again though, Hard-Boiled was not popular with the Hong Kong people. Many felt Woo was becoming too dark and over-the-top, however, as with Woo's previous films, Hard-Boiled has become known as a classic in the action genre, both in Hong Kong and around the world.After attracting Hollywood's attention[2], John Woo was invited by Universal to direct the Jean-Claude Van Damme vehicle Hard Target in 1993. Woo clashed with the studio heads many times during the making of the picture, mostly due to the fact that his initial edits failed to produce a â€Å"R† rated picture.Eventually, Hard Target was taken out of Woo's hands and chopped down by the studio itself (after even â€Å"the muscles from Brussels† Van Damme had a shot in editing the film) to produce a â€Å"suitable† cut. In 1996, after receiving CineAsia's prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award, he finished working on Broken Arrow, which teamed him with American pop icon John Travolta.Face/Off (1997), which would go on to surpass the â€Å"hit† mark for American movies film awards, winning the â€Å"Best On-Screen Duo† and â€Å"Best Action Sequence† at the 1997 MTV Movie Awards.   He has directed two pilots for television, John Woo's Once a Thief (based on the Hong Kong movie) and Bla ckjack, and has become an executive producer, lending his name to The Replacement Killers (which was Chow Yun-Fat's American debut) and The Big Hit.The influence of Woo's films is quite easy to see, especially in his native Hong Kong; by 1988. In western countries such as America, the effects were more subtle. For example, the â€Å"mindless killing machine† personified by John Rambo (Sylvester Stallone) in 1985's Rambo.The trend continues today; very rarely do we see a hero in American films such as Clint Eastwood's â€Å"Dirty† Harry Callahan (a virtual icon for 1970's and 80's American action movies) who kill with no remorse.The Killer as one of his favourite movies. In fact, the â€Å"black suits with skinny ties look† popularized by Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction was first used in Woo's A Better Tomorrow II (as an interesting side note, two characters in the Tarantino-scripted film True Romance are watching ABTII on television during one scene in the movie).Woo is also known for the â€Å"Mexican standoff,† where one or more characters have a â€Å"dead lock† on one another. Woo's innovative editing techniques, such as the use of â€Å"wipes† and freeze-frames (which were considered by many American editors to be â€Å"hokey† and â€Å"too TV†) have also become mainstays of American action cinema, as has Woo's use of slow-motion to add dramatics to his action sequences. It is because of all of these influences that many consider John Woo to be an auteur.John Woo, after many years of hard work, has become known as the world's best action film directors. His action sequences have become the stuff of legend and are now the basis from which all other action movies are judged. More importantly, along with the bloodshed, Woo has proven that he can create real characters with real emotions that the audience can sympathize with. Perhaps that is his greatest talent, and perhaps that is why he wil l become known as an auteur in the years to come.References1) Bordwell, David and Thompson, Kristin. Film Art: An Introduction. McGraw-Hill, New York, 1994; pp.492-495.2) Brieglieb, Volker. hardboiled.de. Internet document. Found at: http://www.hardboiled.de/man.Cinema of Vengeance, directed by Toby Russell. Xenon Home Video, England, 1994.3)Gaschler, Thomas. E-mail conversations conducted with the author, September 2000.Hard Boiled, DVD commentary and notes from John Woo and Terence Chang. Criterion, United States, 1998.4)Hoover, Michael and Odham-Stokes, Lisa. City on Fire: Hong Kong Cinema. Verso, New York, 1999; pp. 38-64[1] John Woo's illustrious career as a filmmaker began in Hong Kong, where he spent over two decades at the centre of a thriving film industry directing nearly 30 feature films. He was known primarily as a comedy specialist until the mid-1980s when he created a series of inspired romantic and violent gangster dramas that broke box-office records.[2]   John Woo made his reputation as an action film director in Hong Kong during the 1980s, but since 1992 has worked in Hollywood directing big-budget thrillers such as Face/Off (1997, with John Travolta and Nicolas Cage) and Mission Impossible.

Culture War Essay

Politics play an important role in the overall situation of a country. The political set-up of a state especially in terms of the type of government, political parties, and even the political bickering that exist are vital in creating and implementing laws. This is clearly exemplified in a democratic type of government wherein various parties that have different advocacies, view points and stands on various issues are present. In line with this, the newly elected president of the United States of America, President Barack Obama is trying to pass a bipartisan â€Å"Stimulus Package† in the Congress. Bipartisanship usually takes place in a two-party system wherein two major parties dominate the election in all levels of the government. Bipartisanship also happens when these two major parties put aside their differences and collaborate with each other. In this paper, it will be argued that bipartisanship is dead. This argument is based on three pieces of evidence that give conclusive results that will make it clear that bipartisanship is no longer applicable in the United States. First, according to Patrick Joseph â€Å"Pat† Buchanan, a renowned American political commentator, author, columnist, politician, broadcaster, and senior advisor to three previous U. S. presidents, â€Å"There is a religious war going on in this country [United States], a cultural war as critical to the kind of nation we shall be as the Cold War itself, for this was is for the soul of America. † He delivered this statement during the 1992 Republican National Convention wherein he further explained that this cultural war is a displacement of classic economic conflicts that are caused by newly emergent moral and religious ones. Furthermore, the kind of war that he is referring to is said to be observable in the result of the recent elections wherein there is only a marginal difference of within 2 points. However, this kind of outcome does not give convincing result that there is indeed competitiveness among Americans and that they are for or against one major party. Closely divided votes do not mean deeply divided votes because this does not identify whether a certain group of people hate the other or they are just merely voting out of random. Moreover, it is difficult to identify if Americans only follow two political perspectives that are based on the two major parties that exist in the country. This is due to the fact that the media is not normal in the country. Media incentives are often used in order for those people involved in this field to sensationalize a particular issue. In this sense, not only is it difficult to identify the real stand of the American people when it comes to issues because the media could also influence the people’s way of thinking in order for them to take problems as either black and or in variations. Second, through the article entitled â€Å"From Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America,† the writer Morris P. Fiorina, debunks the observation that Americans are highly polarized especially in terms of cultural or social issues. He also challenges the idea that this polarization has heightened the concept of partisanship in the electorate and Washington by arguing that it is the political elites who are becoming more polarized. Morris stated that due to the fact that political elites, especially the candidates for office, are more polarized in terms of party and ideological lines and they also manipulate the choices available to their voters. As a result, it established a distinction of the electorate, as well as a deceitful appearance that there is indeed polarization in the mass public (Fiorina, 2005). Moreover, in the study conducted by Fiorina, he compared the voting behavior and the position of Americans when it comes to specific issues that define culture war including gun control laws, abortion, sexual orientation, sexual discrimination, and others. He used the blue and red states wherein the blue are the recognized Democrat states and the red are the Republican states. The result of the study shows that states are similar in many instances. This is proven by the data which identified that four out of ten voters in both red and blue states agreed that migration should decrease; as well as seven among the ten deemed that English should be the official language of the United States. Moreover, in terms of issues that are considered part of the culture war, differences are still observable. Nevertheless, results give proof that there is a similarity in the stand of Americans when it comes to these issues. The comparison of the blue and red states show that there is many similarities and some notable differences but very little variation for a culture between states to exist (Fiorina, 2005). Third, a recent survey deals with Obama Ratings by Party Identification that illustrates independent parties and other parties that do not fall as either as a Democrat or Republican parties. The Inauguration Week showed that 90% positive ratings came from the Democrats and also a substantial 67% came from the independent and other parties. On the other hand, only 42. 7% positive ratings came from the Republicans. Similar results is also seen during the post-inauguration week wherein 87. 3% from the Democrats and 61. 3% from independent and other parties have positive remarks for Obama while only 32. 7% from the Republicans feel the same way. In this sense, it can be clearly seen that independent and other parties also have an important role when it comes to supporting any political actions that Obama will make. Moreover, this also signifies that Americans are not simply polarized into two major parties. The discussions above of the three pieces of evidence clearly identifies that bipartisanship is dead in the United States. Bipartisanship is no longer applicable because most Americans have more similarities when it comes to important issues even those that are under the cultural or social realm. The stand point of Americans is no longer identified in just two opposite poles. Rather, the political elite and irresponsible media of the country are the ones responsible for shaping the United States’ society to be such. In reality, states that are often identified as either red or blue do not really have much distinction when it comes to the vital concerns of the country because they have more similar stands than differences. Being the case, bipartisanship is not applicable in a society that is not or no longer polarized. Reference Fiorina, M. P. (2005). Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America. New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.