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Book Review
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Introduction
Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela follows the extraordinary story of Nelson Mandela’s life. It is a story about his setbacks, struggles, renewed hope, and ultimate triumph of the globally revered human rights icon. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela is one of the greatest political and moral leaders of his time. Mandela is an international hero who was dedicated to the fight against apartheid in South Africa, an act that won him the title of president of his country and the Nobel Peace Prize (Herzog, & Román, 2015). After his release from a 27- year jail term in 1990, he found himself at the center of inspiring and most compelling political drama in the world. As head of the African National Congress and anti-apartheid policy, he played a pivotal role in steering South Africa towards majority rule and multiracial government. On the other hand, Race, Gender, and Punishment: From Colonialism to the War on Terror documents the disproportionate representation of black Americans within the U. S criminal justice system and the beliefs and entrenched system that shape punishment among other social control forms today. Specifically, the book talks about the cultural and structural forces which continue to influence and further perpetuate racial discrimination. This essay highlights the relationship between race and colonialism, gender and race, social control, and immigration. Further, it examines social punishment on a global scale, Mandela’s message about race, and the promotion of global peace through Mandela’s example.
Racism and Colonialism
The aspects of race and colonialism are evident in the texts. Their interaction has to do with the unequal treatment of particularly the people of color within their respective environments. Notably, in the United States and South Africa, the practices of punishment were not equal. Different races were treated differently, but in most situations, the white people received preferential treatment. This was informed by the notion that white people were better than others because they came to colonize other countries. In South Africa, apartheid had become a norm, with Americans treating the native people, particularly racial minority as outcasts. In the Long Walk to Freedom, we experience Mandela’s brush at the hands of white settlers. In the biography, Mandela’s description of his tenure in prison cells is disheartening. He received a life sentence on charges of inciting people to strike in 1961. Mandela reported that the conditions under which he was living as uninhabitable; he carried out backbreaking labor and slept in tiny cells. All the torture he underwent resulted from the apartheid policies that gained massive support and influence from politicians, including Daniel Malan Francois, who was responsible for implementing the nadir of African freedoms.
How Slavery Highlights Race and Gender
Both texts reveal that there is an interrelationship between slavery and gender and race. This is because, to some extent, the gender and the ethnicity of a person determine their fate. With regard to freedom, Mandela explains that he was convicted of inciting people to strike, but close examination reveals that underlying factors, including his race, fueled the determination of his opponents to convict him. In the 1960s, there was rampant racial discrimination across South Africa. The white colonialist had taken over leadership, and they disregarded the rights of racial minorities such as black people. In fact, at the time, the situation was so critical to the extent that Africans were denied access to some spaces, and they had been confined to living in specific locations while the white settlers who were in authority had the freedom to access and live in places of their choice. This kind of treatment was gendered and discriminative in all forms. Additionally, text from Race, Gender, and Punishment shows that punishment practices in the United States are racist and engendered. Considering the United States’ racist history, it is evident that colonizers shaped the justice systems in a way that is unfair to the subjects, particularly people of color and women, hence subjecting them to slavery. The colonizers had the notion that painted their culture as superior. As a result, the justice system ended up criminalizing and giving people of color and men favorable treatment compared to their counterparts who are not people of color.
Immigration and Social Control
Immigration is related to social control because it shapes the attitudes and perceptions of the people in society, including the community and police. The text from Race, Gender, and Punishment points out that in U. S. policing, factors such as immigration status, race, and ethnicity influence how the law is enforced. With the current populations of immigrant groups on the rise, the legal authorities face the challenge of fully enforcing the law. Worth noting that individuals who identify as minority groups such as African Americans, Hispanics, and others are disproportionately affected by the negative perception and stereotypes. This has to do with the past experiences that law enforces have with these particular groups of people. For instance, there’s the notion that people of color are criminal offenders because they comprise the majority of convicted fellows. Because of their history and these social perceptions, some ethnicities not originally from the U.S are subject to unfair treatment within the justice systems, hence controlling their freedom.
Social Punishment on a Global Scale
On a global scale, social punishment, also referred to as a social sanction, is a mechanism through which individuals within cooperation use some of their resources to punish defectors. Social punishments arise from norms that are found within a give a given society. Within a given society, punishments are used in controlling society. For instance, prisons’ existence is entirely for maintaining law and order where defiant people are punished by being denied freedom. In essence, any sanction is a reaction from one person towards a group or an individual’s behavior. Social punishment is any means by which confirmation of standards that have been socially approved is conformed. Social punishments can be negative and positive. When a person’s action conforms to normative expectations, we are rewarded, and while failure to meet expectations leads to negative sanctions in the form of punishment. It is important to note that different norms carry different sanctions because of their importance in different cultures is not equal. Essentially, rewards and punishments are definite expressions of group approval.
Mandela’s Message on Racism
Concerning the discussion about racism, Mandela brought the message that to be free is not merely to cast one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others (Nokele, 2015). Mandela spent all his life-fighting injustice and racism. Notably, Mandela’s will power and political principle to rebel against white supremacy apartheid in South Africa motivated people struggling for an equal and fair world. He spent 27 years of his life in prison for rebelling against apartheid. This followed his realization that the only way to eliminate white supremacy was by the use of force. He maintained that the lack of dignity that Africans went through was a direct result of white supremacy policies. His struggle represented a true struggle experienced by African people, and it was inspire by suffering and experience. Mandela remained committed to ideals of a free society to the extent that he was prepared to die for this cause if need be.
Peace Promotion Using Mandela as an Example
We can promote global peace by following in Mandela’s footsteps as a dedicated and true advocate of equality and justice. He put his people’s interests before his own and was prepared to even die in his fight against racial discrimination. Like Mandela, we can contribute to the promotion of global peace by forming commissions designed to help violators and victims of human rights violations address their past. Further, we should encourage our governments to be transparent in all their dealings and to keep watch on their actions by calling them out on their wrongs. This way, we will encourage restorative justice for many nations whose past are marred with racial discrimination and injustice.
Conclusion
Issues of racism and differential treatment cut across the history of not South Africa and the United States as contextualized by the two books; they affect many countries. Long Walk to Freedom is about Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, one of the greatest political and moral leaders. He is an international hero who was dedicated to the fight against apartheid in South Africa, an act that won him the title of president of his country and the Nobel Peace Prize. Race, Gender, and Punishment: From Colonialism to the War on Terror follows the disproportionate representation of black Americans within the U. S criminal justice system and the beliefs and entrenched system that shape punishment among other social control forms today. We can borrow a leaf from Nelson Mandela’s legacy in his fight for equal treatment. We need to stand up against discrimination in all its forms because we are all equal, and nobody deserves preferential treatment moreso on the grounds of racism.
References
Nokele, A. B. B. (2015). Translating conceptual metaphor in Mandela’s Long walk to freedom: a cross-cultural comparison (Doctoral dissertation, University of South Africa).
Herzog, B., & Román, E. (2015). Revoking citizenship: expatriation in America from the colonial era to the war on terror (Vol. 9). NYU Press.
Walmart – the Face of Twenty First Century Capitalism
Book Report
Lichtenstein N. Wal-Mart, The Face of Twenty First Century Capitalism: New Press, 2006. Print.
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Wal-Mart – The Face of Twenty First Century Capitalism
Introduction
Wal-Mart – the Face of Twenty First Century Capitalism is edited by one America’s most excellent labor historians. The book marks a determined effort to scrutinize the full scope of Wal-Mart’s operations in business, its effects on the social scene, and its role in the American as well as, the world economy. The book is based on a conference held in 2004 by leading business analysts, labor leaders, historians, and sociologists. The conference immediately drew the interest of national media. Profiles were subsequently drawn in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, as well as the New York Review of Books. Typically, books concerning Wal-Mart either eulogize blindly the budget behemoth or criticize it for its elimination of beneficial legislation in regard to labor practices, along with other things. This book fails to do either.
REVIEW OF WAL-MART – THE FACE OF TWENTY FIRST CENTURY CAPITALISM
The book comprises of twelve selections that are separated into three categories. These include “A Global Corporation,” “Working at Wal-Mart,” and “History, Culture, Capitalism.” The authors include labor and social historians, anthropologists, economists, management specialists, and union leaders. On the whole, the papers are academic in nature and incorporate graphs, charts, tables, as well as footnotes. However, they are interesting and accessible and present insight into the world’s leading company. The book provides scrutiny of the numerous sectors that Wal-Mart occupies in people’s lives as well as the increasingly global economy. The book is extremely recommended for scholastic libraries.
At the beginning of the 21st century, Wal-Mart overtook all its rivals as the world- changing economic institution in contemporary times. Even in a country of shoppers whose chief burning metaphysical objective is to find their stuff, the domination of the big-box retailer that is Wal-Mart is a big astonishment. The enterprise that originated from Arkansas is currently the 30th biggest economy on the planet. It is also China’s 6th biggest export market, the chief customer to Bangladesh, and the biggest private employer in Mexico. It is proven that Wal-Mart’s single day sales surpass the total gross domestic product of approximately 36 nations.
Contributions to the book are an anthology of essays from sociologists and historians who anticipate depicting that this leviathan has thrown the world economy into an innovative hyper-retail quagmire whereby big businesses and conglomerates stalk the world, fighting off regulations as well as, standards of fair labor. Indeed, facts demonstrate that businesses of the scale of Wal-Mart generate their own economic power turfs, consequently reducing wages and twisting market access and manufacturers’ prices wherever they go.
However, an essay by Strasser Susan explains that, Walton’s homegrown empire is actually the most recent in the American custom of merge and squeeze. The genealogy of Wal-Mart is traced to the Frank Woolworth’s innovations of cost control and the Richard Sear’s popularization of mail order in the late 19th century. It is also traced to the 20th century sudden increase of chain stores and discount houses. Even prior to the emergence of retailer gigantism, centrally coordinated enterprises drove off independent merchants and substituted locally based businesses with national corporations. Numerous market analysts have been keen over the collapse of the small-town self-regulating entrepreneur for several generations.
According to Moreton Bethany, the reality of the matter is that, the success of Wal-Mart relies on the managers’ abilities to suckle life out of the convectional red-state ethics. The corporation’s Human Resource practices thrive in exploiting the labor force and employees’ traditional principles, in order to sustain the Wal-Mart family.
The question begs whether Wal-Mart is a curse or a blessing for America. The essayists acknowledge that Wal-Mart has its remarkably positive aspects. Its policy on everyday low prices is alleged to reduce families’ expenditure by approximately $600 per annum. Several analysts credit Wal-Mart sustaining a restraint on the inflation rate of U.S. According to a survey conducted by McKingsley & Co, 25% of the productivity gains in the U.S economy from 1995 through 1999 were attributed to Wal-Mart. The analysts also acknowledge the fact that Wal-Mart employs approximately 1.33 million U.S citizens mainly in the economically miserable communities.
However, the essayists do not predominantly focus on Wal-Mart’s achievements, but rather focus on the costs of its retailing style. The essayists allege that, Wal-Mart holds the American economy at ransom through its paltry health-care coverage, as well as, low wages that throw costs on the American tax payers. While money spent in the Wal-Mart stores by its clients would eventually circulate in the local economy, a great amount of the finances vanish into the international-market stratosphere. The book also highlights how Wal-Mart’s style of retailing damages metropolitan landscapes, disfiguring traditional downtowns as well as increasing the average drive times per household, pollution, and sprawl.
An essay by Rathke Wade proposes a Wal-Mart Workers Association which would campaign extensively for better workplace conditions, through rallying politicians and the public to the cause for equity in labor instead of focusing barely on isolated collective bargaining accords. According to essayist Bell Clement, probably Americans could be influenced into making an alternative choice. For instance, in Germany, the company concurred into improved workplace conditions thereby it is yet to record any tangible profits. This is while shoppers in America continue to take their dollars to the uptown hyper mart, without minding the bona fide costs. Wal-Mart is criticized for its supposedly melancholic obsession with profits, but it is criticized also for practicing a careless process whereby employees are promoted into the senior management positions. While the supporters of the Wal-Mart class action proceedings malign Wal-Mart for its assumed prejudice, none has received above-normal profits through offering employment to the ones against whom Wal-Mart allegedly discriminated.
According to Karjanen, Wal-Mart is a vital component of the forerunner of a social revolution. The essayist alleges that structural and spatial inequalities are increased when mega retailers transforms regional economies. Karjanen asserts that Wal-Mart is a component of a structure that generates an hourglass economy where growth takes place typically at the top and bottom of the wage scale. However, this is intricate to interpret, particularly since another essayist, Hoopes, alleges earlier that little is known concerning the Wal-Mart workforce. Like other essayists, Hoopes, in the book unconditionally believes that remuneration is determined by the munificence of the employer, but not by competitive conditions. According to Hoopes, Wal-Mart is able to employ managerial influence to squeeze labor out of its employees.
Furthermore, the temporal assessments have little to say concerning labor force participation trends. Karjanen criticizes Wal-Mart as a medium in an international supply chain that cannibalizes less important rivals, but a new study by Russell Sobel and Andrea Dean found no statistically vital effect of Wal-Mart’s entry on small-firm employment or self-employment.
Regrettably, economic analysis is this book discharged out of hand. Disregard the economic structure short-circuit discussion and, since the essayists are dealing with unambiguously economic subject matter, it may be compared to restraining language by disregarding some pages in a dictionary. This generates double speak, and it is inappropriate. Regrettably, it seems to be the modus operandi in regard to Wal-Mart criticism. Colorful argumentative literature may be entertaining and useful, but it should not be a substitute for vigilant economic way of thinking.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, the essays are found to be conflicting in their discussions of discrimination and profits. First, the essayists sustain that Wal-Mart is a paranoid profit-maximiser, especially alert to the bottom line. Secondly, they allege that Wal-Mart is blinded by custom and prejudice that it would apparently forgo healthier business practices, and, consequently, profits, with the aim of indulging a taste for prejudice. These observations are contradictory. Wal-Mart can only be seen as either a profit-maximiser, or not. However, there are cases in which prejudice can endure in equilibrium, but this would occur in situations in whereby the clientele are keen to pay more for prejudice. While the book serves as a constructive catalogue of information and a foil for the financially viable mind-set, the valid motivation to criticize Wal-Mart, its aggressive quest of subsidies, are offered little thought, and the political limitations Wal-Mart faces are hardly analyzed. If there is a need to criticize Wal-Mart, it is deficient to allege that Wal-Mart offers low wages and fail to provide more information. It is prudent to demonstrate that the markets whereby Wal-Mart operates in are not aggressive. Therefore, in this regard, if patterns are to be claimed, then such patterns require being clearly identified.
Works Cited
Lichtenstein N. Wal-Mart, The Face of Twenty First Century Capitalism: New Press, 2006. Print.
True because the yield to maturity for bond B is always pre-determined
Bonds
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Question 1
True because the yield to maturity for bond B is always pre-determined and are therefore priced at a premium with lower yield to maturity by pricing them to the call thus depreciating the value of premium.
Question 2
Bond with greater interest risk is a 30 year BB rated bond from Canadian Duck Calls Incorporated because it is highly affected by risks such as inflation unlike a 30 year Canadian Government bond which is very certain and is not much affected because it is governments.
Question 3
Seniority of bonds is accompanied with lower coupon rates due to their less default risk because a company is likely to recover the assets on the most senior bonds compared to the junior bonds which have higher risk and pay rate.
Puttable bonds pay lower interest compared to other bonds without put option because an investor can recover all the investments in case the interest rates rise.
A Canada plus call feature has lower interest rate because an investor may refinance the bond in case the rates go high.
Bonds with deferred call provision normally experience lower interest rates which act as the tradeoff for the bond although the investor receives some stability for their investments in form of less money. This kind of bond protects bondholders from the risk of increasing interest rates.
Protective covenants are designed to protect lenders from issuer actions and a lender has a right to call back the obligations from the borrower. Protective covenants have lower interest rates and are mainly used to lower the risk of bonds. AAA represents a bond with very strong qualities and any investor would prefer investing in suck kind of a bond.
Interest payment on a floater may be lower compared to the rate paid on fixed rate bonds. At times, floaters tied to T-bills may further fall especially during political crisis. The coupon rates on floaters tends to reduce with short term benchmarks and have both high credit risk and sector risks because they are mostly issued by financial institutions.
Question 4
A three year 8% bonds will provide highest possible profits in case of any decrease in market interest rates since the maturity period is very low and is not subject to many risks such as interest risks. The other investments are related to longer periods (10 years) which may be subject to many risks such as inflation and interest rate risks.
Question 5
Companies would rate their bonds to attract more investors especially when their bonds offer better in an industry in terms of interest rates and other factors which may give a company good reputation.
A bond with AAA rating from DBRS would indicate that the bond has very low interest risks because AAA takes into consideration all the financial strengths of a particular company. AAA indicates superiority in financial strengths as well as stability in an organization’s economic environment after taking care of all the interest risks.