There are thousands of computer viruses, so the chances of a PC becoming infected is quite high.
Viruses pose a serious threat so companies need to take the necessary precautions to avoid contamination. Some computer viruses are pretty harmless and can easily be removed with standard anti virus software.
Others, however, can be malicious and wreak havoc to data and software. This type of virus can be difficult to get rid of, requiring specialized tools and procedures when cleaning an infected computer.
Computer Virus Protection - Limit the Risk
Companies and individuals alike need to limit the risk of computer virus infection by installing a good anti virus package. There are many software programs available to purchase. There are also some pretty good free anti virus software programs available for those who don't have a big budget.
Another way to limit the risk of computer viruses is to ban users from engaging in risky practices. These risky practices would include things like using removable media sources, browsing porn sites and other dubious sites. Visiting hacking or crack websites will also heighten the risk of computer infection.Read more at Suite101: How to get Rid of Computer Viruses: Risk of Infection and Cleaning Infected PCs with Virus Removal Tools http://security-antivirus-software.suite101.com/article.cfm/how_to_get_rid_of_computer_viruses#ixzz0mU2vHuCT
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Present political situation of Nepal
Introduction
The mass movement of April 2006 in Nepal sought to restore parliament for the democratic process to continue and to initiate a peace process for the end of a ten-year long armed conflict. This required the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) to join democratic competition which in turn necessitated the devising of a constitution to manage root causes of conflicts afflicting the nation. Hence, a Constituent Assembly (CA) election, that would pave the way for an inclusive state responsive of social diversity and sustainable peace, was seen as the compromise solution among all the political forces. A train of processes and events was thus set off resulting in the advent of current Nepalese politics.
A Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) was signed between an alliance of the seven political parties (six after the merger of Nepali Congress and Nepali Congress-Democratic) and the CPN (Maoist) on November 21, 2006. An Interim Constitution drafted and the restored parliament dissolved to pave the way for an interim legislature and interim government that included the CPN (Maoist) in 2007. The ruling seven-party alliance (SPA) announced substantive structural reforms, such as declaration of the country secular, federal and republican. Civilian control of Nepal Army (NA), nationalization of royal property, empowerment of the Premier as head of state, abolition of the national unification day and substitution of the national anthem were announced as time went by. There were also reform measures such as greater inclusiveness regarding marginalized people in the CA, the bureaucracy and police. However, all these measures have allowed a neo-patrimonial regime to incubate, sapping the political will necessary to alter the policy and strategic development vital to transform the "structural causes of conflicts". This has hindered efforts for cultural, social, economic and political transformation needed to establish a well-organized virtuous state capable of instituting sound democratic governance. The political transition has remained highly turbulent due to the open-ended nature of the conflict system. It is, therefore, hard to say whether Nepal has actually entered a post-conflict phase.
The continuation of high political dynamics in the country now indicates a steady erosion of the writ of state and the low level of constitutional and government's stability. This has resulted in a new bargaining environment for armed non-state actors and movement-oriented ethno- regional forces thus further limiting the scope for complex reforms, both involving long-term institutional restructuring and short-term policy interventions. The weakness of state institutions has further spoiled efforts to promote relief to vulnerable sections of the population and address conflict residues. Social movements of marginalized groups-- women, Dalits (untouchable underclass), Janajatis (ethnic groups), Aadibasis (indigenous groups) and Madhesis (people living in the southern plains) -- for identity, proportional representation, federalism and self-determination and insurrectionary activities of two-dozen non-state armed actors have upset the coherence of state-society relations in an unprecedented manner. While the mainstream parties have interest in restructuring the state, the social forces favor restructuring political parties to expand the social base of politics.
As a result, the SPA has missed three deadlines (June 14 and 20 and November 22) for the CA elections to draft a new constitution. It was forced to amend the Interim Constitution three times in eight months-(May 9, June 14 and December 18) to give in to rising demands that the political process was exacting and to give in to the voice of various agitating groups. Among the provisions included in the amendments the more significant ones empower the parliament to abolish the monarchy, if found plotting against the CA elections, and declare the country a federal democratic republic, subject to ratification by the elected CA, or even before that by a two-thirds legislators if the King poses a threat to the elections. Despite voices emerging for a space for monarchy and efforts of CPN (Maoist), NC and CPN-UML to woo its supporters, King Gynendra remains aloof from the power struggle. All this has not changed the political dynamics for the better. The Madhesi People's Rights Forum (MPRF), a group which organized violent protests in the Tarai where scores of people were killed last year, is demanding a fourth revision of the constitution to address the grievances of the Madhesis.
The peace process kept in limbo by the political events appears to have been finally taken up with the 23-point accord reached among the SPA constituents on 23 December. It finally decided that it would establish a high level Peace Council and the six basic pillars of peace within a month. Accordingly, the National Human Rights Commission of Nepal has been assigned to probe into rights violations during past emergency rule, managing cantonments and providing remuneration to Maoist combatants, return of illegally seized public property, end to forced donation by Maoists, etc. It vows to hold the CA elections by April 10, 2008, has increased the number of seats for CA from 497 to 601 and began a common process of electoral socialization through joint mass meetings. The process is marred by mutual accusations. On January 16, Minister for Peace and Reconstruction R. C. Paudel, made a public call on all the agitating groups for dialogue and facilitate CA elections. He has to be more strategic with the ability to strike a balance between achieving the human rights protection objective and responding to changing narratives of discourse, contexts, actors, issues, rules and political priorities.
Constituent Assembly Elections
The Election Commission (EC) has already published the CA election schedule and enforced the election code of conduct from January 16. The parties contesting it will have to submit their closed list of candidates for proportional representation system by February 22, registration of candidature for direct voting will be opened from February 22 to 25 and the candidates will be given election symbols on March 2. The Interim Constitution recognizes the SPA but says that anyone else willing to register a new political party must submit 10,000 signatures to EC.
Many opposition parties - MPRF (Yadav), MPRF (Bishwas), Rastriy Prajatantra Party (RPP)-Nepal, Rastriya Janashakti Party (RJP), RPP, Nepal Sadbhava Party and Tarai-Madhesh Loktantrik Party (TMLP) have depicted the SPA as undemocratic in spirit and attitude and argued that setting the date for elections without creating a proper security and political environment is meaningless. The MPRF and TMLP blaming the deployment of Special Task Force "for creating terror in Tarai and helping the Maoist-affiliated Young Communist League (YCL), have threatened to stage a decisive agitation if their demands are not addressed by January 18. Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (NEFIN), a coalition of 54 ethnic groups, has put its dilemma this way: if it wages its movement, the SPA will be demolished; if not, the SPA refuses to implement the 20-pint accord it signed with the government.
The meeting of the high level seven-party coordinating committee, a SPA coordination mechanism, is currently discussing the possibility of conducting elections in two phases, keeping in mind the security situation in the Tarai. It decided to request the EC to postpone the implementation of the code of conduct for 15 days so that local bodies can be constituted. Finance Minister R. S. Mahat has requested Nepal's international development partners to extend an additional assistance of $4.76 million to implement the 23-point accord among the SPA and to hold the elections. At the same time, an influential section of NC has warned of "Tarai disintegration" if election takes place in two phases. The decision of the government to distribute $15,870 to each legislator for the development of their constituency also stoked the fire of protest in the civil society. The pre-election perk out of the government coffer does not make the election competitive process. It is such controversies that overturned the election apple-cart in the past. A badly designed election can easily foment social divisions, fragment the political sphere, institutionalize sub-national conflicts and embroil the nation into the centrifugal pressure of regional geopolitics.
Tarai's Geopolitics
Twenty-two districts in Nepal's southern plains bordering India constitute the Terai or Madhesh. It is fertile area and is linked to Nepal's major supply routes to hills. After the declaration of secular state and talk about redistributive land reforms, the glue that bind hill and Tarai communities got lost. The Madhesi movement spearheaded by the MPRF wants the declaration of the Madhesh as an autonomous region, talks with armed Madhesi groups, balanced distribution of state revenue and income to Madhesh, proportional representation in all the governance institutions including the NA, appointment of chief administrators in Madhesh from the Madhesi communities, return weapons captured by Maoists to the concerned people and declaration of those killed during the Madhesh movement as martyrs including compensation for their families. The TMLP has expressed its desire to have its own state organs for the plains. The two radical components of Janatantrik Tarai Mukti Morcha (JTMM) demand international mediators like the UN to resolve their issues and a separate independent state. India's assertion that "Tarai's demands should be addressed," has provoked a prickly reaction from various political forces. Premier Koirala who had earlier assertion that the "Tarai problem can be resolved within a minute with India's cooperation" has led to suspicions about an 'Indian hand' in the unrest. India's main opposition, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, criticizes the Indian government for remaining silent on the collusion of Indian and Nepali communists for creating turmoil in both countries and quashing of the symbols of Nepal's stability and unity-Hindu state and monarchy. An open border with India, existence of co-ethnics across the border and affiliation of each group and political party with like-minded ones in India create a context in which resolution of conflict requires confidence-building measures from both sides.
The violent conflict in the Tarai has forced the hill people to migrate to safe places and create their own mechanisms in the area, like the Chure Bhavar Unity Society (CBUS) that positions itself in the foothills bordering the Terai and the mountains, for autonomy and self-defense. The autonomy movement in the Madhesh has snowballed into ethnic Tharus, Rais, Limbus, Tamangs, Gurungs, Magars, Dalits and Newars also demanding autonomous federal states based on the right to self-determination. But, there is no unity among Madhesi groups due to their multiple caste, language, religious and ethnic identities. For example, TMLP leadership is dominated by high caste groups, MPRF by intermediary caste groups and JTMM by lower caste groups. The government's Special Task Force (STF), deployed in Kathmandu and eight Terai districts, has failed to penetrate, divide and destroy criminal networks and create public security for local governance to operate. Nepal's problems cannot be tackled without taking this regionalism into account and identifying ways to address it. No matter how one looks at this problem, it seems obvious that there is no military solution. The political package must create a situation favorable to all groups where they see they have more to gain through peace than violence. An election in a security and authority vacuum will neither have legitimacy nor ability to institutionalize democratic polity.
Law and Order
The Nepalese army has expressed its commitment to democracy and a nationally-owned security sector reforms. But, Chief of Army Staff, Gen. R. Katawal clearly said "No" to integrate the CPN (Maoist) combatants. The UN has verified 19,602 politically indoctrinated People's Liberation Army (PLA) out of its total force of over 32,000. Premier G. P Koirala agrees with the army's viewpoint and has given options to Maoists- to integrate the PLA into industrial security groups or give them priority in foreign employment. Nepal's total strength of security forces stands at 165,000-- NA (92,000), the civilian police (48,000) and Armed Police Force (25,000). The NA is holed up inside barracks as per the peace accord. The existence of these two adversarial structures does not provide any incentive for confidence building and to pursue a viable peace process for the future. Similarly, without disarming all autonomous armed groups and improving civil-military relations, the chances of free and fair elections remain fragile.
Erosion of state monopoly on power, taxation and loyalty of citizens, growth of competitive violence and failure of statehood in governance have confiscated the state's capacity to provide security in the country. As a result the ability of the political system to maintain balance of power between different governance organs is severely undermined which is telling on its capacity to enforce rule of law, provide service delivery and resolve the multi-layered conflict. SPA's control over the legislature, the executive control over the judiciary and a lack of legitimate opposition have established monopoly rule. There is an absence of institutions protecting property rights and promotion of collective goods.
Nepal has a very weak middle class and poor mediating agencies to protect the rights and welfare of the poor. Tax contributes 12 percent to GDP and the contribution of public sector output to GDP is only about 7 percent. Foreign aid constitutes 70 percent of development outlays. Domestic revenue raising capacity is very poor. Easy borrowing from international institutions has established the government's autonomy from their tax paying citizens. As a result, the government is less concerned with institutional capacity of the state to deliver governance goals. The substantial contribution of remittance to GDP (17 percent) too has detrimental effect on the accountability of government. GDP growth rate of 2.3 percent hardly balances out the population growth of 2.2 percent. The daily per capita income of $ 1 puts Nepal's human security condition at the bottom of world development statistics. Feudalism, caste hierarchy and patriarchy have suppressed social mobility of the underclass. This lack of social and economic security has made Nepal's politics highly inflammable amidst radical appeals and growing frustration.
Nepal's bureaucracy, police and public institutions are highly politicized along partisan lines, de-motivated, show poor esprit de corps and weak to enforce rule of law and deliver essential public services. "The rulers have no trust in the constitution, leading to its failure," Chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee, Laxman Aryal said on January 15. To him, the constitution emerged as a compromise among SPA constituents for the transition politics until the CA election is conducted. It, therefore, does not hold the principles of constitutionalism. He added, "We saw nothing during its first year, but chaos and deterioration of law and order." This condition has made national integrity system ineffective in controlling crime, corruption and impunity. Public institutions and enterprises are still monopolized by ruling parties. Sense of public trust in the authority, assuming that the government is trustworthy and acting in the public interest, is sharply declining. Lack of a boundary between leaders' personal and institutional interests has given birth to a political culture of clientalism although new social movements of women, youth, Dalits, indigenous people and ethnic groups are increasingly challenging the position of authority fixed at birth, lineage and patronage. They are seeking to remold the pre-modern political culture of mutual distrust, betrayal and revenge and into post-conflict modern culture of a shared future based on social justice, democracy and peace.
Voice and Participation of Marginalized
The struggle for human rights in Nepal for liberation, entitlements and social opportunities still remains unfinished. Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of Nepal (NHRC) K. N. Upadhaya stresses the need for joint efforts among the human rights organizations and individuals to mitigate human rights violations in an effective manner. The government's presence is felt to some extent only in Kathmandu and some urban nodes. Killing, kidnapping, extortion, strikes, food shortages, rocketing prices, shrinking job opportunities and growing fear have deteriorated human rights conditions in the periphery. Last year, 130 civilians got killed by various forces.
Seventy-two political parties have applied in the EC for registration. This number represents asymmetry and diversity in Nepalese social life. A number of social groups are struggling for social, gender and inter-generational justice in the party structure of mainstream parties. Internal party democracy is essential to make political power proportional to its representativeness and end the fissiparous tendencies that have sapped their social integration potential. The country has 102 ethnic groups and more than 82 languages. No single group claims more than 18 percent of the population. This means it is a country of minorities and there is no institutional mechanism to prevent the minority from becoming a majority. Civil society groups are columnized along partisan lines. This condition has marred the possibilities for cooperative action for public service. Despite the legislation of the Right to Information Act, the media is unevenly distributed just like the per capita income and, therefore, people of backward and remote areas have no access to the public sphere in shaping the agenda.
In contrast, the apex body of media persons, Nepal Federation of Journalists, revealed the condition of media freedom this way: Between April 24, 2006 to December 1, 2007 one journalist was killed, one disappeared, 74 detained and 128 threatened. There were 203 attacks on media houses, 129 journalists lost their jobs and 55 media houses were shut down.
Engagement of the International Community
For an international community caught in a fluid political climate, it will be hard to enlarge the development space as agreed in the Basic Operating Guidelines (BOG), other than relief and humanitarian supplies. The presence of the international community in Nepal acts as a deterrence against excessive use of violence and abuse of human rights. Japan has put Nepal in the category of a "fragile state." By definition, a fragile state creates a situation for humanitarian intervention owing to anarchy of free wills, poor governance and failure to enforce rule of law. India has often insisted that elections to the CA must take place on time at any cost, but remained silent when the SPA failed to create a favorable security and law and order situation. The European Union and the US are insisting that the security situation in Nepal must improve for a credible, free and fair election. On January 18, the US Ambassador to Nepal, Nancy J. Powell suggesting the government and political parties to fulfill earlier commitments made in the peace accord said, "The CA polls will not guarantee sustainable peace in Nepal. What is necessary for the sustainable peace is loyalty to the nation."
On January 11, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon submitted his report to the UN Security Council proposing a six-month extension of UNMIN's mandate to support Nepal's peace process through CA elections. He has advised against downscaling the UN's presence, emphasizing that it could imperil prospects for a successful election, except in the cases of technical assistance which has already been provided. The UN too favors a credible CA election with improved security, government's engagement in a dialogue with disgruntled groups and abolition of the culture of impunity. Unlike the EU, however, India, the US and China have geopolitical priorities. India's role in bringing the SPA together against the 'monarchy' in November 2005 and their joint struggle forced King Gyanendra to hand over power to the political parties. As the SPA established their monopoly over power and resources but failed to maintain security and rule of law, it evoked the security concern of neighbors. China has voiced against "any foreign intervention in Nepal," showed interest to actively involve itself in Nepal's peace process, expressed anxiety about the events taking place in the Tarai and asked the Nepalese leaders to take independent decisions depending less on outside forces.
Aid coordination and coordination of government-donor practices have become particularly important in Nepal, especially to engage both sides in abolishing the historical practice of clientalism and paternalism, building trust on each other's role and engaging in multi-dimensional aspects of the peace-process, such as state-building, support to constitution-making, transport, communication, energy development, education, agriculture, rural development, water supply, finance, health and sanitation and sustainable development. Conflict mitigation projects should involve rehabilitation of the damaged infrastructure and internally displaced people, rural reconstruction and eradication of the root causes of mal-development which, in the first place, triggered the cycle of conflict.
Expectation of People at the Grassroots Level
The media and the political leaders have generated unrealistic expectations among the population that the CA is the panacea that will fulfill all their needs and desires. It was important to cast the message that CA is meant to frame a draft of the constitution and the necessary laws for governance. People at the grassroots level are expecting informed and reason-based knowledge about the constitution-making process, the suitability of the election system, improvement in security and are concerned about political stability, cooperation from outside, avoidance of unnecessary foreign intervention, knowledge about the modern state, functions of political systems, government, political parties and leadership, enfranchisement of citizens and their stake-holding in public institutions, social cohesion, support in education, health and economic activities and social justice. Minorities are increasingly questioning about their human rights in a majority dominated federal state. They want to know about their role in the multi-staged negotiation with the CA, suitability of federalism, concept of a republic and the vision of a New Nepal. Ordinary people also ask about the mixed election system that has been adopted and which presents a new challenge- what with the twin-ballot paper for voters and administration.
FES training series on civic education has created a synergy as demands for such activities from various quarters have increased, advocacy documents have been utilized by all sides, resource persons interviewed by the media and published in the local papers. They were even involved in non-partners' activities with the same advocacy resources. In general, our programs have strengthened the civic competence of citizens as they can debate on equal terms with their leaders and contest their view points. In many conflict-hit places, our activities provided space for dialogue among heterogeneous participants and directly contributed to building public opinion, democratic will-formation and reconciliation. We also tried to encourage participants to speak up and share their views rather than just receiving top-down dissemination of knowledge and information. In many places, they suggested to us to provide training to central level leadership and demanded more seminars in the districts and villages so that dialogues across diverse communities can build trust between conflict-torn societal groups and improve their relations with the state.
Road Ahead
A credible, free and fair election depends on the ability of the political parties to create a secure environment for political actors and voters, cross-party consensus on security plans in the Tarai, engagement of movement-oriented and armed non-state actors opposed to the elections in constructive dialogues to address their outstanding grievances, dispelling the threat of pro-monarchy forces through inclusive measures and a common process of socialization and goal-orientation towards democratic peace. What happens if elections do not take place on April 10?
In case the CA election does not take place as scheduled, then this constitution, parliament and government will suffer from legitimacy deficit. The first scenario is well articulated by Minister without Portfolio Sujata Korala, "The constitution of 1991 will return." This will satisfy the traditional forces and its resistance to change. But, there will be a dangerous polarization between the radical and the conservative forces.
The second scenario is the creation of a civilian government with the backing of NA. A CPN (Maoist) ideologue calls it a "democratic coup," because civilian politicians, not the King, will be utilized. A lot of things depend on the move of the international community because Nepal is an aid-dependent country and its policy, power and legitimacy flow from it. Similarly, it requires to win the confidence of India, the US and China as they are geo-strategically enmeshed in Nepal's internal developments.
A group of civil society and opposition parties are opting for a broad-based national government to hold elections. The third scenario seems optimally satisfactory if the major insurgent groups are engaged in dialogue and national consensus. Civil society groups should serve as a mediating ground for all political perspectives and mobilize national and global public opinion for it.
The mass movement of April 2006 in Nepal sought to restore parliament for the democratic process to continue and to initiate a peace process for the end of a ten-year long armed conflict. This required the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) to join democratic competition which in turn necessitated the devising of a constitution to manage root causes of conflicts afflicting the nation. Hence, a Constituent Assembly (CA) election, that would pave the way for an inclusive state responsive of social diversity and sustainable peace, was seen as the compromise solution among all the political forces. A train of processes and events was thus set off resulting in the advent of current Nepalese politics.
A Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) was signed between an alliance of the seven political parties (six after the merger of Nepali Congress and Nepali Congress-Democratic) and the CPN (Maoist) on November 21, 2006. An Interim Constitution drafted and the restored parliament dissolved to pave the way for an interim legislature and interim government that included the CPN (Maoist) in 2007. The ruling seven-party alliance (SPA) announced substantive structural reforms, such as declaration of the country secular, federal and republican. Civilian control of Nepal Army (NA), nationalization of royal property, empowerment of the Premier as head of state, abolition of the national unification day and substitution of the national anthem were announced as time went by. There were also reform measures such as greater inclusiveness regarding marginalized people in the CA, the bureaucracy and police. However, all these measures have allowed a neo-patrimonial regime to incubate, sapping the political will necessary to alter the policy and strategic development vital to transform the "structural causes of conflicts". This has hindered efforts for cultural, social, economic and political transformation needed to establish a well-organized virtuous state capable of instituting sound democratic governance. The political transition has remained highly turbulent due to the open-ended nature of the conflict system. It is, therefore, hard to say whether Nepal has actually entered a post-conflict phase.
The continuation of high political dynamics in the country now indicates a steady erosion of the writ of state and the low level of constitutional and government's stability. This has resulted in a new bargaining environment for armed non-state actors and movement-oriented ethno- regional forces thus further limiting the scope for complex reforms, both involving long-term institutional restructuring and short-term policy interventions. The weakness of state institutions has further spoiled efforts to promote relief to vulnerable sections of the population and address conflict residues. Social movements of marginalized groups-- women, Dalits (untouchable underclass), Janajatis (ethnic groups), Aadibasis (indigenous groups) and Madhesis (people living in the southern plains) -- for identity, proportional representation, federalism and self-determination and insurrectionary activities of two-dozen non-state armed actors have upset the coherence of state-society relations in an unprecedented manner. While the mainstream parties have interest in restructuring the state, the social forces favor restructuring political parties to expand the social base of politics.
As a result, the SPA has missed three deadlines (June 14 and 20 and November 22) for the CA elections to draft a new constitution. It was forced to amend the Interim Constitution three times in eight months-(May 9, June 14 and December 18) to give in to rising demands that the political process was exacting and to give in to the voice of various agitating groups. Among the provisions included in the amendments the more significant ones empower the parliament to abolish the monarchy, if found plotting against the CA elections, and declare the country a federal democratic republic, subject to ratification by the elected CA, or even before that by a two-thirds legislators if the King poses a threat to the elections. Despite voices emerging for a space for monarchy and efforts of CPN (Maoist), NC and CPN-UML to woo its supporters, King Gynendra remains aloof from the power struggle. All this has not changed the political dynamics for the better. The Madhesi People's Rights Forum (MPRF), a group which organized violent protests in the Tarai where scores of people were killed last year, is demanding a fourth revision of the constitution to address the grievances of the Madhesis.
The peace process kept in limbo by the political events appears to have been finally taken up with the 23-point accord reached among the SPA constituents on 23 December. It finally decided that it would establish a high level Peace Council and the six basic pillars of peace within a month. Accordingly, the National Human Rights Commission of Nepal has been assigned to probe into rights violations during past emergency rule, managing cantonments and providing remuneration to Maoist combatants, return of illegally seized public property, end to forced donation by Maoists, etc. It vows to hold the CA elections by April 10, 2008, has increased the number of seats for CA from 497 to 601 and began a common process of electoral socialization through joint mass meetings. The process is marred by mutual accusations. On January 16, Minister for Peace and Reconstruction R. C. Paudel, made a public call on all the agitating groups for dialogue and facilitate CA elections. He has to be more strategic with the ability to strike a balance between achieving the human rights protection objective and responding to changing narratives of discourse, contexts, actors, issues, rules and political priorities.
Constituent Assembly Elections
The Election Commission (EC) has already published the CA election schedule and enforced the election code of conduct from January 16. The parties contesting it will have to submit their closed list of candidates for proportional representation system by February 22, registration of candidature for direct voting will be opened from February 22 to 25 and the candidates will be given election symbols on March 2. The Interim Constitution recognizes the SPA but says that anyone else willing to register a new political party must submit 10,000 signatures to EC.
Many opposition parties - MPRF (Yadav), MPRF (Bishwas), Rastriy Prajatantra Party (RPP)-Nepal, Rastriya Janashakti Party (RJP), RPP, Nepal Sadbhava Party and Tarai-Madhesh Loktantrik Party (TMLP) have depicted the SPA as undemocratic in spirit and attitude and argued that setting the date for elections without creating a proper security and political environment is meaningless. The MPRF and TMLP blaming the deployment of Special Task Force "for creating terror in Tarai and helping the Maoist-affiliated Young Communist League (YCL), have threatened to stage a decisive agitation if their demands are not addressed by January 18. Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (NEFIN), a coalition of 54 ethnic groups, has put its dilemma this way: if it wages its movement, the SPA will be demolished; if not, the SPA refuses to implement the 20-pint accord it signed with the government.
The meeting of the high level seven-party coordinating committee, a SPA coordination mechanism, is currently discussing the possibility of conducting elections in two phases, keeping in mind the security situation in the Tarai. It decided to request the EC to postpone the implementation of the code of conduct for 15 days so that local bodies can be constituted. Finance Minister R. S. Mahat has requested Nepal's international development partners to extend an additional assistance of $4.76 million to implement the 23-point accord among the SPA and to hold the elections. At the same time, an influential section of NC has warned of "Tarai disintegration" if election takes place in two phases. The decision of the government to distribute $15,870 to each legislator for the development of their constituency also stoked the fire of protest in the civil society. The pre-election perk out of the government coffer does not make the election competitive process. It is such controversies that overturned the election apple-cart in the past. A badly designed election can easily foment social divisions, fragment the political sphere, institutionalize sub-national conflicts and embroil the nation into the centrifugal pressure of regional geopolitics.
Tarai's Geopolitics
Twenty-two districts in Nepal's southern plains bordering India constitute the Terai or Madhesh. It is fertile area and is linked to Nepal's major supply routes to hills. After the declaration of secular state and talk about redistributive land reforms, the glue that bind hill and Tarai communities got lost. The Madhesi movement spearheaded by the MPRF wants the declaration of the Madhesh as an autonomous region, talks with armed Madhesi groups, balanced distribution of state revenue and income to Madhesh, proportional representation in all the governance institutions including the NA, appointment of chief administrators in Madhesh from the Madhesi communities, return weapons captured by Maoists to the concerned people and declaration of those killed during the Madhesh movement as martyrs including compensation for their families. The TMLP has expressed its desire to have its own state organs for the plains. The two radical components of Janatantrik Tarai Mukti Morcha (JTMM) demand international mediators like the UN to resolve their issues and a separate independent state. India's assertion that "Tarai's demands should be addressed," has provoked a prickly reaction from various political forces. Premier Koirala who had earlier assertion that the "Tarai problem can be resolved within a minute with India's cooperation" has led to suspicions about an 'Indian hand' in the unrest. India's main opposition, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, criticizes the Indian government for remaining silent on the collusion of Indian and Nepali communists for creating turmoil in both countries and quashing of the symbols of Nepal's stability and unity-Hindu state and monarchy. An open border with India, existence of co-ethnics across the border and affiliation of each group and political party with like-minded ones in India create a context in which resolution of conflict requires confidence-building measures from both sides.
The violent conflict in the Tarai has forced the hill people to migrate to safe places and create their own mechanisms in the area, like the Chure Bhavar Unity Society (CBUS) that positions itself in the foothills bordering the Terai and the mountains, for autonomy and self-defense. The autonomy movement in the Madhesh has snowballed into ethnic Tharus, Rais, Limbus, Tamangs, Gurungs, Magars, Dalits and Newars also demanding autonomous federal states based on the right to self-determination. But, there is no unity among Madhesi groups due to their multiple caste, language, religious and ethnic identities. For example, TMLP leadership is dominated by high caste groups, MPRF by intermediary caste groups and JTMM by lower caste groups. The government's Special Task Force (STF), deployed in Kathmandu and eight Terai districts, has failed to penetrate, divide and destroy criminal networks and create public security for local governance to operate. Nepal's problems cannot be tackled without taking this regionalism into account and identifying ways to address it. No matter how one looks at this problem, it seems obvious that there is no military solution. The political package must create a situation favorable to all groups where they see they have more to gain through peace than violence. An election in a security and authority vacuum will neither have legitimacy nor ability to institutionalize democratic polity.
Law and Order
The Nepalese army has expressed its commitment to democracy and a nationally-owned security sector reforms. But, Chief of Army Staff, Gen. R. Katawal clearly said "No" to integrate the CPN (Maoist) combatants. The UN has verified 19,602 politically indoctrinated People's Liberation Army (PLA) out of its total force of over 32,000. Premier G. P Koirala agrees with the army's viewpoint and has given options to Maoists- to integrate the PLA into industrial security groups or give them priority in foreign employment. Nepal's total strength of security forces stands at 165,000-- NA (92,000), the civilian police (48,000) and Armed Police Force (25,000). The NA is holed up inside barracks as per the peace accord. The existence of these two adversarial structures does not provide any incentive for confidence building and to pursue a viable peace process for the future. Similarly, without disarming all autonomous armed groups and improving civil-military relations, the chances of free and fair elections remain fragile.
Erosion of state monopoly on power, taxation and loyalty of citizens, growth of competitive violence and failure of statehood in governance have confiscated the state's capacity to provide security in the country. As a result the ability of the political system to maintain balance of power between different governance organs is severely undermined which is telling on its capacity to enforce rule of law, provide service delivery and resolve the multi-layered conflict. SPA's control over the legislature, the executive control over the judiciary and a lack of legitimate opposition have established monopoly rule. There is an absence of institutions protecting property rights and promotion of collective goods.
Nepal has a very weak middle class and poor mediating agencies to protect the rights and welfare of the poor. Tax contributes 12 percent to GDP and the contribution of public sector output to GDP is only about 7 percent. Foreign aid constitutes 70 percent of development outlays. Domestic revenue raising capacity is very poor. Easy borrowing from international institutions has established the government's autonomy from their tax paying citizens. As a result, the government is less concerned with institutional capacity of the state to deliver governance goals. The substantial contribution of remittance to GDP (17 percent) too has detrimental effect on the accountability of government. GDP growth rate of 2.3 percent hardly balances out the population growth of 2.2 percent. The daily per capita income of $ 1 puts Nepal's human security condition at the bottom of world development statistics. Feudalism, caste hierarchy and patriarchy have suppressed social mobility of the underclass. This lack of social and economic security has made Nepal's politics highly inflammable amidst radical appeals and growing frustration.
Nepal's bureaucracy, police and public institutions are highly politicized along partisan lines, de-motivated, show poor esprit de corps and weak to enforce rule of law and deliver essential public services. "The rulers have no trust in the constitution, leading to its failure," Chairman of the Constitution Drafting Committee, Laxman Aryal said on January 15. To him, the constitution emerged as a compromise among SPA constituents for the transition politics until the CA election is conducted. It, therefore, does not hold the principles of constitutionalism. He added, "We saw nothing during its first year, but chaos and deterioration of law and order." This condition has made national integrity system ineffective in controlling crime, corruption and impunity. Public institutions and enterprises are still monopolized by ruling parties. Sense of public trust in the authority, assuming that the government is trustworthy and acting in the public interest, is sharply declining. Lack of a boundary between leaders' personal and institutional interests has given birth to a political culture of clientalism although new social movements of women, youth, Dalits, indigenous people and ethnic groups are increasingly challenging the position of authority fixed at birth, lineage and patronage. They are seeking to remold the pre-modern political culture of mutual distrust, betrayal and revenge and into post-conflict modern culture of a shared future based on social justice, democracy and peace.
Voice and Participation of Marginalized
The struggle for human rights in Nepal for liberation, entitlements and social opportunities still remains unfinished. Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission of Nepal (NHRC) K. N. Upadhaya stresses the need for joint efforts among the human rights organizations and individuals to mitigate human rights violations in an effective manner. The government's presence is felt to some extent only in Kathmandu and some urban nodes. Killing, kidnapping, extortion, strikes, food shortages, rocketing prices, shrinking job opportunities and growing fear have deteriorated human rights conditions in the periphery. Last year, 130 civilians got killed by various forces.
Seventy-two political parties have applied in the EC for registration. This number represents asymmetry and diversity in Nepalese social life. A number of social groups are struggling for social, gender and inter-generational justice in the party structure of mainstream parties. Internal party democracy is essential to make political power proportional to its representativeness and end the fissiparous tendencies that have sapped their social integration potential. The country has 102 ethnic groups and more than 82 languages. No single group claims more than 18 percent of the population. This means it is a country of minorities and there is no institutional mechanism to prevent the minority from becoming a majority. Civil society groups are columnized along partisan lines. This condition has marred the possibilities for cooperative action for public service. Despite the legislation of the Right to Information Act, the media is unevenly distributed just like the per capita income and, therefore, people of backward and remote areas have no access to the public sphere in shaping the agenda.
In contrast, the apex body of media persons, Nepal Federation of Journalists, revealed the condition of media freedom this way: Between April 24, 2006 to December 1, 2007 one journalist was killed, one disappeared, 74 detained and 128 threatened. There were 203 attacks on media houses, 129 journalists lost their jobs and 55 media houses were shut down.
Engagement of the International Community
For an international community caught in a fluid political climate, it will be hard to enlarge the development space as agreed in the Basic Operating Guidelines (BOG), other than relief and humanitarian supplies. The presence of the international community in Nepal acts as a deterrence against excessive use of violence and abuse of human rights. Japan has put Nepal in the category of a "fragile state." By definition, a fragile state creates a situation for humanitarian intervention owing to anarchy of free wills, poor governance and failure to enforce rule of law. India has often insisted that elections to the CA must take place on time at any cost, but remained silent when the SPA failed to create a favorable security and law and order situation. The European Union and the US are insisting that the security situation in Nepal must improve for a credible, free and fair election. On January 18, the US Ambassador to Nepal, Nancy J. Powell suggesting the government and political parties to fulfill earlier commitments made in the peace accord said, "The CA polls will not guarantee sustainable peace in Nepal. What is necessary for the sustainable peace is loyalty to the nation."
On January 11, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon submitted his report to the UN Security Council proposing a six-month extension of UNMIN's mandate to support Nepal's peace process through CA elections. He has advised against downscaling the UN's presence, emphasizing that it could imperil prospects for a successful election, except in the cases of technical assistance which has already been provided. The UN too favors a credible CA election with improved security, government's engagement in a dialogue with disgruntled groups and abolition of the culture of impunity. Unlike the EU, however, India, the US and China have geopolitical priorities. India's role in bringing the SPA together against the 'monarchy' in November 2005 and their joint struggle forced King Gyanendra to hand over power to the political parties. As the SPA established their monopoly over power and resources but failed to maintain security and rule of law, it evoked the security concern of neighbors. China has voiced against "any foreign intervention in Nepal," showed interest to actively involve itself in Nepal's peace process, expressed anxiety about the events taking place in the Tarai and asked the Nepalese leaders to take independent decisions depending less on outside forces.
Aid coordination and coordination of government-donor practices have become particularly important in Nepal, especially to engage both sides in abolishing the historical practice of clientalism and paternalism, building trust on each other's role and engaging in multi-dimensional aspects of the peace-process, such as state-building, support to constitution-making, transport, communication, energy development, education, agriculture, rural development, water supply, finance, health and sanitation and sustainable development. Conflict mitigation projects should involve rehabilitation of the damaged infrastructure and internally displaced people, rural reconstruction and eradication of the root causes of mal-development which, in the first place, triggered the cycle of conflict.
Expectation of People at the Grassroots Level
The media and the political leaders have generated unrealistic expectations among the population that the CA is the panacea that will fulfill all their needs and desires. It was important to cast the message that CA is meant to frame a draft of the constitution and the necessary laws for governance. People at the grassroots level are expecting informed and reason-based knowledge about the constitution-making process, the suitability of the election system, improvement in security and are concerned about political stability, cooperation from outside, avoidance of unnecessary foreign intervention, knowledge about the modern state, functions of political systems, government, political parties and leadership, enfranchisement of citizens and their stake-holding in public institutions, social cohesion, support in education, health and economic activities and social justice. Minorities are increasingly questioning about their human rights in a majority dominated federal state. They want to know about their role in the multi-staged negotiation with the CA, suitability of federalism, concept of a republic and the vision of a New Nepal. Ordinary people also ask about the mixed election system that has been adopted and which presents a new challenge- what with the twin-ballot paper for voters and administration.
FES training series on civic education has created a synergy as demands for such activities from various quarters have increased, advocacy documents have been utilized by all sides, resource persons interviewed by the media and published in the local papers. They were even involved in non-partners' activities with the same advocacy resources. In general, our programs have strengthened the civic competence of citizens as they can debate on equal terms with their leaders and contest their view points. In many conflict-hit places, our activities provided space for dialogue among heterogeneous participants and directly contributed to building public opinion, democratic will-formation and reconciliation. We also tried to encourage participants to speak up and share their views rather than just receiving top-down dissemination of knowledge and information. In many places, they suggested to us to provide training to central level leadership and demanded more seminars in the districts and villages so that dialogues across diverse communities can build trust between conflict-torn societal groups and improve their relations with the state.
Road Ahead
A credible, free and fair election depends on the ability of the political parties to create a secure environment for political actors and voters, cross-party consensus on security plans in the Tarai, engagement of movement-oriented and armed non-state actors opposed to the elections in constructive dialogues to address their outstanding grievances, dispelling the threat of pro-monarchy forces through inclusive measures and a common process of socialization and goal-orientation towards democratic peace. What happens if elections do not take place on April 10?
In case the CA election does not take place as scheduled, then this constitution, parliament and government will suffer from legitimacy deficit. The first scenario is well articulated by Minister without Portfolio Sujata Korala, "The constitution of 1991 will return." This will satisfy the traditional forces and its resistance to change. But, there will be a dangerous polarization between the radical and the conservative forces.
The second scenario is the creation of a civilian government with the backing of NA. A CPN (Maoist) ideologue calls it a "democratic coup," because civilian politicians, not the King, will be utilized. A lot of things depend on the move of the international community because Nepal is an aid-dependent country and its policy, power and legitimacy flow from it. Similarly, it requires to win the confidence of India, the US and China as they are geo-strategically enmeshed in Nepal's internal developments.
A group of civil society and opposition parties are opting for a broad-based national government to hold elections. The third scenario seems optimally satisfactory if the major insurgent groups are engaged in dialogue and national consensus. Civil society groups should serve as a mediating ground for all political perspectives and mobilize national and global public opinion for it.
Motivation defination and it's importances.
MOTIVATION
Motivation is drive from the word motive. “A motive is an inner state that energizes activates or move and direct or channels behavior toward goals.”Motivation represent an unsatisfied need which creates a state of tension or disequilibrium, causing the individual to move in a goal directed pattern towards restoring a state of equilibrium by satisfying the need. According to the Encyclopedia of management, “ Motivation refers to the degree of readiness of an organization to pursue some designated good and implies the determination of the nature and locus (particulars position, point or place) of the force, including the degree of readiness.”Definition of Motivation:There are many definition\s pf motivation by different management theorists and practitioners. The term motivation is derived from the Latin word MOVERE, which means to move.Stephen P. Robins define motivation as “ The willingness to exert high levels of efforts towards organizational goal, conditions by the efforts ability to satisfy some individual needs.”PROCESS OF MOTIVATIONThe Basic Motivation ProcessNEED DRIVE GOOGDS/INSENTIVIES(DEFICIENCY) (Deficiency with Direction) (Reduction of drives and fulfills deficiencies)NEED: Need is deficiency. Needs are created whenever there is a physiological or physiological imbalance.DRIVE: Drive is a deficiency with direction. They are action oriented and provide and emerging thrust towards goal accomplishment. INCENTIVES: Incentives is anything that will alleviate a need to reduce a drive.MPORTANCE OF MOTIVATION:1. Effective use of resources.2. High efficiency.3. Accomplishment of organizational goals.4. Reduce labor turnover and absenteeism.5. Health industrial relation.6. Improved corporate image.
NEED THEORIES OF MOTIVATION:
Human behavior is basically a need-based phenomenon and it is, therefore, greatly influenced by the needs. These theories are based on the assumption that an individual behaves in a particular manner to satisfy his needs. These theories are also known as “content theories” and focus on inner needs that influence behavior of the individual. So provision to reduce or satisfy their needs would force them to behave in a particular way. Some of important needs of theory are being discussed as under:
NEEDS THEORIES OF MOTIVATIONMOSLOW’S NEED HIERARCHY
This theory of motivation has received more attention from the managers than any other theory. Abraham Maslow, an eminent U.S psychologist as classified human needs in a logical convenient way that has important implications for managers. In this theory he has pointed out and explain how needs influence human behavior. Maslow’s viewed human motivation as a hierarchy of the five needs ranging from most basic psychological needs the highest needs for self-actualization. SelfActualizationNeedsEsteem NeedsSocial Needs Safety and security Needs Physiological NeedsMOSLOW’S NEED HIERARCHYi) Physiological Needs: These are most basic needs including food, shelter, and clothing. These needs are most powerful motivators as individuals can’t survive without them. Psychological needs must be satisfied to some level or these should be partially satisfied. Before the individual moves to satisfy other higher category needs. Maslow observed “that man lives by bread alone, when there is no bread.”ii) Safety Needs: After the satisfaction of physical needs to a relative extent, one feels concerns about safety from future uncertainty, enemies and other threats. These are essential needs of self-preservations. At this stage and individual being to think for future and makes efforts to provide for rainy days. It is concluded by Maslow that employees needs sufficient wage to feed, to take shelter to protect them and their families and a safe working environment before attempting to satisfy other needs to the higher order. iii) Social Needs: After having secured satisfaction for physical needs and safety and protection for future, one focuses next on satisfying needs of love and affection, which are known as social needs. Social needs include the needs to love and beloved and the need to belong and be identified with a group. Though this needs in strongly felt by an individual is respect of family, it also affects work environment. As with the first two levels of needs, relative satisfaction of social needs gives rise to next higher level need.iv) Esteem needs: Employees in the organization who perceive themselves as worthwhile are said to have esteem needs. Self respect a key to such needs. Much of our self respect comes from being accepted and respected by others but esteem needs will emerge only when lower category of needs are satisfied to a relative extent esteem needs included need for self respect and appreciation from others status and prestige in the society etc.v) Self-actualization needs: At the top of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs there lies the need of self-actualization. It is an open ended need; because it relates to the need to become more and more what one is to become everything that one is capable of becoming. It includes need for realization of one’s full potentials of development, maturity and autonomy. On the relative satisfaction of this need an individual become growth oriented, self directed detached and creative. HERZBERG’S TWO-FACTOR THEORY:Herzberg a U.S behavioral scientist has proposed a theory of employee motivation based on satisfaction. His theory advocated that satisfied employee is motivated from within to work harder and dissatisfied employee is not self motivated. Since Herzberg research has discovered two sets of factors associated with satisfaction and dissatisfaction of tea employee therefore it is known as Herzberg’s two-factor theory. The first set of factors known as satisfiers or motivators are responsible for self-motivation of employees. These factors include job, its importance, opportunities it provides for advancement, achievement, recognition and sense of responsibility etc. These factors are known as job content factors and are real motivators because they are capable of providing satisfaction to the employees. These are known as intrinsic factors.The second set of factors called hygiene factors or maintenance facts or dissatisfiers which include working condition job security, salary, quality of supervision, organizational policies. Interpersonal relationships and other factors in the immediate work environment. They are job context and extrinsic to the job. Any deficiency or absence of these factors would simply create dissatisfaction demotivation and low performance but their presence lose not motivate the employees. They have been considered as hygiene factor or maintenance factors because their role is supportive just to maintain healthy and congenial atmosphere in work setting.By identifying and differentiating various factors as dissatisfiers and motivators, Herzberg has encouraged managers to think carefully about what actually motivates the employees. According to Herzberg the opposite of job satisfaction is nil, job dissatisfaction but rather no job satisfaction.
CONCLUSION:Motivation can be defined as a process that is initiated by a psychological or psychological deficiency or need, which triggers a specifics behavior or derive in order to achieve a goal or incentives. It consists of three interacting and inter dependent elements-needs, drives and incentives.Some emerging theories namely control and agency theories have been receiving attention in the recent years. One version of the control theory states that control is basically a cognitive phenomenon and determines people ability to control their lives or their jobs. Another version of this theory focuses on the management function of control. It states that controlling both the inputs and outputs of the organization is important for effective management. The agency theory assumes that an agency relationship exists in most organization. It hives a clear idea as to how the principal i.e, owners, board of directors, or top management can avoid their interests conflicting with those of the agents i.e., subordinates, middle management or shop floor employees.
Motivation is drive from the word motive. “A motive is an inner state that energizes activates or move and direct or channels behavior toward goals.”Motivation represent an unsatisfied need which creates a state of tension or disequilibrium, causing the individual to move in a goal directed pattern towards restoring a state of equilibrium by satisfying the need. According to the Encyclopedia of management, “ Motivation refers to the degree of readiness of an organization to pursue some designated good and implies the determination of the nature and locus (particulars position, point or place) of the force, including the degree of readiness.”Definition of Motivation:There are many definition\s pf motivation by different management theorists and practitioners. The term motivation is derived from the Latin word MOVERE, which means to move.Stephen P. Robins define motivation as “ The willingness to exert high levels of efforts towards organizational goal, conditions by the efforts ability to satisfy some individual needs.”PROCESS OF MOTIVATIONThe Basic Motivation ProcessNEED DRIVE GOOGDS/INSENTIVIES(DEFICIENCY) (Deficiency with Direction) (Reduction of drives and fulfills deficiencies)NEED: Need is deficiency. Needs are created whenever there is a physiological or physiological imbalance.DRIVE: Drive is a deficiency with direction. They are action oriented and provide and emerging thrust towards goal accomplishment. INCENTIVES: Incentives is anything that will alleviate a need to reduce a drive.MPORTANCE OF MOTIVATION:1. Effective use of resources.2. High efficiency.3. Accomplishment of organizational goals.4. Reduce labor turnover and absenteeism.5. Health industrial relation.6. Improved corporate image.
NEED THEORIES OF MOTIVATION:
Human behavior is basically a need-based phenomenon and it is, therefore, greatly influenced by the needs. These theories are based on the assumption that an individual behaves in a particular manner to satisfy his needs. These theories are also known as “content theories” and focus on inner needs that influence behavior of the individual. So provision to reduce or satisfy their needs would force them to behave in a particular way. Some of important needs of theory are being discussed as under:
NEEDS THEORIES OF MOTIVATIONMOSLOW’S NEED HIERARCHY
This theory of motivation has received more attention from the managers than any other theory. Abraham Maslow, an eminent U.S psychologist as classified human needs in a logical convenient way that has important implications for managers. In this theory he has pointed out and explain how needs influence human behavior. Maslow’s viewed human motivation as a hierarchy of the five needs ranging from most basic psychological needs the highest needs for self-actualization. SelfActualizationNeedsEsteem NeedsSocial Needs Safety and security Needs Physiological NeedsMOSLOW’S NEED HIERARCHYi) Physiological Needs: These are most basic needs including food, shelter, and clothing. These needs are most powerful motivators as individuals can’t survive without them. Psychological needs must be satisfied to some level or these should be partially satisfied. Before the individual moves to satisfy other higher category needs. Maslow observed “that man lives by bread alone, when there is no bread.”ii) Safety Needs: After the satisfaction of physical needs to a relative extent, one feels concerns about safety from future uncertainty, enemies and other threats. These are essential needs of self-preservations. At this stage and individual being to think for future and makes efforts to provide for rainy days. It is concluded by Maslow that employees needs sufficient wage to feed, to take shelter to protect them and their families and a safe working environment before attempting to satisfy other needs to the higher order. iii) Social Needs: After having secured satisfaction for physical needs and safety and protection for future, one focuses next on satisfying needs of love and affection, which are known as social needs. Social needs include the needs to love and beloved and the need to belong and be identified with a group. Though this needs in strongly felt by an individual is respect of family, it also affects work environment. As with the first two levels of needs, relative satisfaction of social needs gives rise to next higher level need.iv) Esteem needs: Employees in the organization who perceive themselves as worthwhile are said to have esteem needs. Self respect a key to such needs. Much of our self respect comes from being accepted and respected by others but esteem needs will emerge only when lower category of needs are satisfied to a relative extent esteem needs included need for self respect and appreciation from others status and prestige in the society etc.v) Self-actualization needs: At the top of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs there lies the need of self-actualization. It is an open ended need; because it relates to the need to become more and more what one is to become everything that one is capable of becoming. It includes need for realization of one’s full potentials of development, maturity and autonomy. On the relative satisfaction of this need an individual become growth oriented, self directed detached and creative. HERZBERG’S TWO-FACTOR THEORY:Herzberg a U.S behavioral scientist has proposed a theory of employee motivation based on satisfaction. His theory advocated that satisfied employee is motivated from within to work harder and dissatisfied employee is not self motivated. Since Herzberg research has discovered two sets of factors associated with satisfaction and dissatisfaction of tea employee therefore it is known as Herzberg’s two-factor theory. The first set of factors known as satisfiers or motivators are responsible for self-motivation of employees. These factors include job, its importance, opportunities it provides for advancement, achievement, recognition and sense of responsibility etc. These factors are known as job content factors and are real motivators because they are capable of providing satisfaction to the employees. These are known as intrinsic factors.The second set of factors called hygiene factors or maintenance facts or dissatisfiers which include working condition job security, salary, quality of supervision, organizational policies. Interpersonal relationships and other factors in the immediate work environment. They are job context and extrinsic to the job. Any deficiency or absence of these factors would simply create dissatisfaction demotivation and low performance but their presence lose not motivate the employees. They have been considered as hygiene factor or maintenance factors because their role is supportive just to maintain healthy and congenial atmosphere in work setting.By identifying and differentiating various factors as dissatisfiers and motivators, Herzberg has encouraged managers to think carefully about what actually motivates the employees. According to Herzberg the opposite of job satisfaction is nil, job dissatisfaction but rather no job satisfaction.
CONCLUSION:Motivation can be defined as a process that is initiated by a psychological or psychological deficiency or need, which triggers a specifics behavior or derive in order to achieve a goal or incentives. It consists of three interacting and inter dependent elements-needs, drives and incentives.Some emerging theories namely control and agency theories have been receiving attention in the recent years. One version of the control theory states that control is basically a cognitive phenomenon and determines people ability to control their lives or their jobs. Another version of this theory focuses on the management function of control. It states that controlling both the inputs and outputs of the organization is important for effective management. The agency theory assumes that an agency relationship exists in most organization. It hives a clear idea as to how the principal i.e, owners, board of directors, or top management can avoid their interests conflicting with those of the agents i.e., subordinates, middle management or shop floor employees.
Functionalism and conflict theory
Functionalism and conflict theory
Main articles: Structural functionalism and Conflict theory
Structural functionalism is a broad paradigm, both in sociology and anthropology, which addresses the social structure in terms of the necessary function of its constituent elements. A common analogy (popularized by Herbert Spencer) is to regard norms, values and institutions as 'organs' that work toward the proper-functioning of the entire 'body' of society.The perspective is implicit in the original sociological positivism of Comte, but was theorized in full by Durkheim, again with respect to observable, structural laws. Functionalism shares a history and theoretical affinity with the empirical method (though some of the later functionalists, such as Bronisław Malinowski and Talcott Parsons, can be seen as partially antipositivist.Parsons, in fact, came to view the term as descriptive of a particular stage in the methodological development of the social sciences, rather than a specific school of thought .Whilst functionalism shares an affinity with 'grand theory' (e.g. systems theory in the work of Niklas Luhmann), emphasis may be placed on small units of socialization, such as the nuclear family. It is also simplistic to equate the approach directly with conservative ideologyFunctionalism has been associated with thinkers as diverse as the post-structuralist philosopher Michel Foucault.In the most basic terms functionalism concerns "the effort to impute, as rigorously as possible, to each feature, custom, or practice, its effect on the functioning of a supposedly stable, cohesive system."
Main articles: Structural functionalism and Conflict theory
Structural functionalism is a broad paradigm, both in sociology and anthropology, which addresses the social structure in terms of the necessary function of its constituent elements. A common analogy (popularized by Herbert Spencer) is to regard norms, values and institutions as 'organs' that work toward the proper-functioning of the entire 'body' of society.The perspective is implicit in the original sociological positivism of Comte, but was theorized in full by Durkheim, again with respect to observable, structural laws. Functionalism shares a history and theoretical affinity with the empirical method (though some of the later functionalists, such as Bronisław Malinowski and Talcott Parsons, can be seen as partially antipositivist.Parsons, in fact, came to view the term as descriptive of a particular stage in the methodological development of the social sciences, rather than a specific school of thought .Whilst functionalism shares an affinity with 'grand theory' (e.g. systems theory in the work of Niklas Luhmann), emphasis may be placed on small units of socialization, such as the nuclear family. It is also simplistic to equate the approach directly with conservative ideologyFunctionalism has been associated with thinkers as diverse as the post-structuralist philosopher Michel Foucault.In the most basic terms functionalism concerns "the effort to impute, as rigorously as possible, to each feature, custom, or practice, its effect on the functioning of a supposedly stable, cohesive system."
Sociological reasoning pre-dates the foundation of the discipline. Social analysis has origins in the common stock of Western knowledge and philosophy, and has been carried out from at least as early as the time of Plato. There is evidence of early sociology in medieval Islam. It may be said that the first sociologist was Ibn Khaldun, a 14th century Arab scholar from North Africa, whose Muqaddimah was the first work to advance social-scientific theories of social cohesion and social conflict.
The word sociology (or "sociologie") is derived from the Latin: socius, "companion"; -ology, "the study of", and Greek λόγος, lógos, "word", "knowledge". It was first coined in 1780 by the French essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (1748–1836) in an unpublished manuscript. Sociology was later defined independently by the French philosopher of science, Auguste Comte (1798–1857), in 1838.Comte had earlier used the term "social physics", but that had subsequently been appropriated by others, most notably the Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet. Comte endeavoured to unify history, psychology and economics through the scientific understanding of the social realm. Writing shortly after the malaise of the French Revolution, he proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, an epistemological approach outlined in The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842] and A General View of Positivism (1844). Comte believed a positivist stage would mark the final era, after conjectural theological and metaphysical phases, in the progression of human understanding.
The word sociology (or "sociologie") is derived from the Latin: socius, "companion"; -ology, "the study of", and Greek λόγος, lógos, "word", "knowledge". It was first coined in 1780 by the French essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (1748–1836) in an unpublished manuscript. Sociology was later defined independently by the French philosopher of science, Auguste Comte (1798–1857), in 1838.Comte had earlier used the term "social physics", but that had subsequently been appropriated by others, most notably the Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet. Comte endeavoured to unify history, psychology and economics through the scientific understanding of the social realm. Writing shortly after the malaise of the French Revolution, he proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, an epistemological approach outlined in The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842] and A General View of Positivism (1844). Comte believed a positivist stage would mark the final era, after conjectural theological and metaphysical phases, in the progression of human understanding.
Sociological reasoning pre-dates the foundation of the discipline. Social analysis has origins in the common stock of Western knowledge and philosophy, and has been carried out from at least as early as the time of Plato. There is evidence of early sociology in medieval Islam. It may be said that the first sociologist was Ibn Khaldun, a 14th century Arab scholar from North Africa, whose Muqaddimah was the first work to advance social-scientific theories of social cohesion and social conflict.
The word sociology (or "sociologie") is derived from the Latin: socius, "companion"; -ology, "the study of", and Greek λόγος, lógos, "word", "knowledge". It was first coined in 1780 by the French essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (1748–1836) in an unpublished manuscript. Sociology was later defined independently by the French philosopher of science, Auguste Comte (1798–1857), in 1838.Comte had earlier used the term "social physics", but that had subsequently been appropriated by others, most notably the Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet. Comte endeavoured to unify history, psychology and economics through the scientific understanding of the social realm. Writing shortly after the malaise of the French Revolution, he proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, an epistemological approach outlined in The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842] and A General View of Positivism (1844). Comte believed a positivist stage would mark the final era, after conjectural theological and metaphysical phases, in the progression of human understanding.
The word sociology (or "sociologie") is derived from the Latin: socius, "companion"; -ology, "the study of", and Greek λόγος, lógos, "word", "knowledge". It was first coined in 1780 by the French essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (1748–1836) in an unpublished manuscript. Sociology was later defined independently by the French philosopher of science, Auguste Comte (1798–1857), in 1838.Comte had earlier used the term "social physics", but that had subsequently been appropriated by others, most notably the Belgian statistician Adolphe Quetelet. Comte endeavoured to unify history, psychology and economics through the scientific understanding of the social realm. Writing shortly after the malaise of the French Revolution, he proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, an epistemological approach outlined in The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842] and A General View of Positivism (1844). Comte believed a positivist stage would mark the final era, after conjectural theological and metaphysical phases, in the progression of human understanding.
sociology
Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science (with which it is informally synonymous) that uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop and refine a body of knowledge about human social activity, often with the goal of applying such knowledge to the pursuit of social welfare. Subject matter ranges from the micro level of agency and interaction to the macro level of systems and social structures.
Sociology is both topically and methodologically a very broad discipline. Its traditional focuses have included social stratification (i.e., class relations), religion, secularization, modernity, culture and deviance, and its approaches have included both qualitative and quantitative research techniques. As much of what humans do fits under the category of social structure and agency, sociology has gradually expanded its focus to further subjects, such as medical, military and penal institutions, the internet, and even the role of social activity in the development of scientific knowledge. The range of social scientific methods has also broadly expanded. The linguistic and cultural turns of the mid-20th century led to increasingly interpretative, hermeneutic, and philosophic approaches to the analysis of society. Conversely, recent decades have seen the rise of new mathematically and computationally rigorous techniques, such as agent-based modelling and social network analysis
Sociology is both topically and methodologically a very broad discipline. Its traditional focuses have included social stratification (i.e., class relations), religion, secularization, modernity, culture and deviance, and its approaches have included both qualitative and quantitative research techniques. As much of what humans do fits under the category of social structure and agency, sociology has gradually expanded its focus to further subjects, such as medical, military and penal institutions, the internet, and even the role of social activity in the development of scientific knowledge. The range of social scientific methods has also broadly expanded. The linguistic and cultural turns of the mid-20th century led to increasingly interpretative, hermeneutic, and philosophic approaches to the analysis of society. Conversely, recent decades have seen the rise of new mathematically and computationally rigorous techniques, such as agent-based modelling and social network analysis
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Causes of Drug Addiction
Causes
Comparison of the perceived harm for various psychoactive drugs from a poll among medical psychiatrists specialized in addiction treatment.
Drugs known to cause addiction include illegal drugs as well as prescription or over-the-counter drugs, according to the definition of the American Society of Addiction Medicine.
Stimulants:
Amphetamine and Methamphetamine
Cocaine
Nicotine
Sedatives and Hypnotics:
Alcohol
Barbiturates
Benzodiazepines, particularly flunitrazepam, triazolam, temazepam, and nimetazepam
Methaqualone and the related quinazolinone sedative-hypnotics
Opiate and Opioid analgesics
Morphine and Codeine, the two naturally-occurring opiate analgesics
Semi-synthetic opiates, such as Heroin (Diacetylmorphine), Oxycodone, Hydrocodone, and Hydromorphone
Fully synthetic opioids, such as Fentanyl and its analogs, Meperidine/Pethidine, and Methadone
Addictive drugs also include a large number of substrates that are currently considered to have no medical value and are not available over the counter or by prescription.
An article in The Lancet compared the harm and addiction of 20 drugs, using a scale from 0 to 3 for physical addiction, psychological addiction, and pleasure to create a mean score for addiction. Caffeine was not included in the study. The results can be seen in the chart above.
Addictive potency
The addictive potency of drugs varies from substance to substance, and from individual to individual. Dose, frequency and time are critical factors for developing a drug addiction. The larger the dose, the more often and the longer that this habit of going the greater the risk that consumption becomes an addiction. The time required for developing drug addiction differs greatly between different substances, from a couple of weeks at the intensive use of heroin to 5-10 years of alcohol abuse if the person is middle-aged (shorter time for teenagers) are typical values with many individual exceptions.
Drugs such as codeine or alcohol, for instance, typically require many more exposures to addict their users than drugs such as heroin or cocaine.[citation needed] Likewise, a person who is psychologically or genetically predisposed to addiction is much more likely to suffer from it.
Although dependency on hallucinogens like LSD ("acid") and psilocybin (key hallucinogen in "magic mushrooms") is listed as Substance-Related Disorder in the DSM-IV, most psychologists do not classify them as addictive drugs.
Comparison of the perceived harm for various psychoactive drugs from a poll among medical psychiatrists specialized in addiction treatment.
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Drugs known to cause addiction include illegal drugs as well as prescription or over-the-counter drugs, according to the definition of the American Society of Addiction Medicine.
Stimulants:
Amphetamine and Methamphetamine
Cocaine
Nicotine
Sedatives and Hypnotics:
Alcohol
Barbiturates
Benzodiazepines, particularly flunitrazepam, triazolam, temazepam, and nimetazepam
Methaqualone and the related quinazolinone sedative-hypnotics
Opiate and Opioid analgesics
Morphine and Codeine, the two naturally-occurring opiate analgesics
Semi-synthetic opiates, such as Heroin (Diacetylmorphine), Oxycodone, Hydrocodone, and Hydromorphone
Fully synthetic opioids, such as Fentanyl and its analogs, Meperidine/Pethidine, and Methadone
Addictive drugs also include a large number of substrates that are currently considered to have no medical value and are not available over the counter or by prescription.
An article in The Lancet compared the harm and addiction of 20 drugs, using a scale from 0 to 3 for physical addiction, psychological addiction, and pleasure to create a mean score for addiction. Caffeine was not included in the study. The results can be seen in the chart above.
Addictive potency
The addictive potency of drugs varies from substance to substance, and from individual to individual. Dose, frequency and time are critical factors for developing a drug addiction. The larger the dose, the more often and the longer that this habit of going the greater the risk that consumption becomes an addiction. The time required for developing drug addiction differs greatly between different substances, from a couple of weeks at the intensive use of heroin to 5-10 years of alcohol abuse if the person is middle-aged (shorter time for teenagers) are typical values with many individual exceptions.
Drugs such as codeine or alcohol, for instance, typically require many more exposures to addict their users than drugs such as heroin or cocaine.[citation needed] Likewise, a person who is psychologically or genetically predisposed to addiction is much more likely to suffer from it.
Although dependency on hallucinogens like LSD ("acid") and psilocybin (key hallucinogen in "magic mushrooms") is listed as Substance-Related Disorder in the DSM-IV, most psychologists do not classify them as addictive drugs.
Drug addiction
Drug addiction is a pathological or abnormal condition which arises due to frequent drug use. The disorder of addiction involves the progression of acute drug use to the development of drug-seeking behavior, the vulnerability to relapse, and the decreased, slowed ability to respond to naturally rewarding stimuli. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) has categorized three stages of addiction: preoccupation/anticipation, binge/intoxication, and withdrawal/negative affect. These stages are characterized, respectively, everywhere by constant cravings and preoccupation with obtaining the substance; using more of the substance than necessary to experience the intoxicating effects; and experiencing tolerance, withdrawal symptoms, and decreased motivation for normal life activities. By the American Society of Addiction Medicine definition, drug addiction differs from drug dependence and drug tolerance.
It is, both among scientists and other writers, quite usual to allow the concept of drug addiction to include persons who are not drug abusers according to the definition of the American Society of Addiction Medicine. The term drug addiction is then used as a category which may include the same persons who, under the DSM-IV, can be given the diagnosis of substance dependence or substance abuse.
It is, both among scientists and other writers, quite usual to allow the concept of drug addiction to include persons who are not drug abusers according to the definition of the American Society of Addiction Medicine. The term drug addiction is then used as a category which may include the same persons who, under the DSM-IV, can be given the diagnosis of substance dependence or substance abuse.
Similarities of Sports and the Arts
Are the benefits of sports unique? Many have noted that the arts produce many of the same benefits as sports, for both participant and spectator.
Sports entail all elements of human life-physical, emotional, cognitive, social-but in a simplified, orderly form. Sports boil life down to competition governed by agreed-upon rules. The opponents are known, the goals clear and quantifiable. Athletes practice the skills necessary to excel and gain a sense of control and mastery. Sports are a public performance, which fosters a sense of community among people-participants as well as spectators-who would otherwise be strangers. At their best, they produce a sense of exhilaration.
The arts are the other significant leisure activity that distills life down to simpler forms. The arts simplify life by selecting and arranging certain elements to create a unified, expressive whole. They too are intended for an audience. The performing arts, dance in particular, have much in common with sports: they take place outside of everyday life, the activities are physical and demand practice, and performance can produce exhilaration and a sense of community.
What makes sports different from the arts is that they demand a spontaneous response to surprise. A dance is choreographed; the dancers know what they are to do at every moment. A game has set plays, but the athletes must respond to what their opponents do, or to the unexpected bounce of the ball. The denouement of the game is uncertain, often until its final seconds. This combination of total human exertion with an environment that balances control, spontaneity, and uncertainty leads to the unique excitement and satisfaction of sports, for both athletes and spectators.
*
As with most spheres of human endeavor, the benefits of sports can easily turn into deficits. Moderation is, as the Greeks pointed out, the key to wisdom. Many in the athletic community worry that youth sports have become too serious, and that the win-at-all-costs mentality has become the reality today. Youth sports shouldn't be an obsession that excludes other areas of life (academics, the arts, community service, family life, religious training). Sports should be just one arena of many in which kids have a chance to express themselves and have fun.
When winning is overvalued, the idea of sportsmanship and fair play disappears, as does concern for the whole child. When only a kid's athletic talent is important, her character development, her academic performance and needs, her long-term physical health, the development of her skills at other positions on a team are neglected. The pressure to be a winner may push some young athletes toward unsafe performance-enhancing drugs or body-building supplements. Furthermore, when winning is the prime value, the public nature of sports can turn sour. An athlete who is not playing well or makes a mistake may feel humiliation and shame because she knows everyone is watching.
Being a member of a team can become destructive if the players turn arrogant and fall into an us-them mentality, seeing opponents as the enemy and treating their nonathletic peers as inferior or contemptible. Furthermore, if a teenager overidentifies as an athlete, he will be ignoring other interests at a time when he should be broadening rather than narrowing his horizons.
College and professional sports have become corrupted by the win-at-all-costs mentality, and this corruption is intensified by big-money contracts for winning players, coaches, and organizations. Loyalty, camaraderie, sportsmanship, the joy of mastering skills- these values all too often disappear when "winning is the only thing." If they remain uninfected by the toxins of winning at all costs and instead focus on effort and fair play, youth sports can be beautiful, exciting, and fun. They can provide kids with an extraordinary opportunity to express their talents and their character, to run around screaming and laughing with joy.
The job of parents and coaches of young athletes is to maximize the benefits and minimize the deficits of youth sports by keeping a long-term perspective and helping kids do the same.
Sports entail all elements of human life-physical, emotional, cognitive, social-but in a simplified, orderly form. Sports boil life down to competition governed by agreed-upon rules. The opponents are known, the goals clear and quantifiable. Athletes practice the skills necessary to excel and gain a sense of control and mastery. Sports are a public performance, which fosters a sense of community among people-participants as well as spectators-who would otherwise be strangers. At their best, they produce a sense of exhilaration.
The arts are the other significant leisure activity that distills life down to simpler forms. The arts simplify life by selecting and arranging certain elements to create a unified, expressive whole. They too are intended for an audience. The performing arts, dance in particular, have much in common with sports: they take place outside of everyday life, the activities are physical and demand practice, and performance can produce exhilaration and a sense of community.
What makes sports different from the arts is that they demand a spontaneous response to surprise. A dance is choreographed; the dancers know what they are to do at every moment. A game has set plays, but the athletes must respond to what their opponents do, or to the unexpected bounce of the ball. The denouement of the game is uncertain, often until its final seconds. This combination of total human exertion with an environment that balances control, spontaneity, and uncertainty leads to the unique excitement and satisfaction of sports, for both athletes and spectators.
*
As with most spheres of human endeavor, the benefits of sports can easily turn into deficits. Moderation is, as the Greeks pointed out, the key to wisdom. Many in the athletic community worry that youth sports have become too serious, and that the win-at-all-costs mentality has become the reality today. Youth sports shouldn't be an obsession that excludes other areas of life (academics, the arts, community service, family life, religious training). Sports should be just one arena of many in which kids have a chance to express themselves and have fun.
When winning is overvalued, the idea of sportsmanship and fair play disappears, as does concern for the whole child. When only a kid's athletic talent is important, her character development, her academic performance and needs, her long-term physical health, the development of her skills at other positions on a team are neglected. The pressure to be a winner may push some young athletes toward unsafe performance-enhancing drugs or body-building supplements. Furthermore, when winning is the prime value, the public nature of sports can turn sour. An athlete who is not playing well or makes a mistake may feel humiliation and shame because she knows everyone is watching.
Being a member of a team can become destructive if the players turn arrogant and fall into an us-them mentality, seeing opponents as the enemy and treating their nonathletic peers as inferior or contemptible. Furthermore, if a teenager overidentifies as an athlete, he will be ignoring other interests at a time when he should be broadening rather than narrowing his horizons.
College and professional sports have become corrupted by the win-at-all-costs mentality, and this corruption is intensified by big-money contracts for winning players, coaches, and organizations. Loyalty, camaraderie, sportsmanship, the joy of mastering skills- these values all too often disappear when "winning is the only thing." If they remain uninfected by the toxins of winning at all costs and instead focus on effort and fair play, youth sports can be beautiful, exciting, and fun. They can provide kids with an extraordinary opportunity to express their talents and their character, to run around screaming and laughing with joy.
The job of parents and coaches of young athletes is to maximize the benefits and minimize the deficits of youth sports by keeping a long-term perspective and helping kids do the same.
Highs and Lows of Sports
Sports can actually change the physiology of athletes and fans. Physical exertion can raise the level of pheronemes and endorphins, brain chemicals that cause exhilaration. Exercise can also elevate the serum testosterone level, which makes the heart beat faster. Spectators can feel depressed when their team loses and elated when their team wins. They, too, undergo physiological changes when watching their team: fans of the winning team experience an increase in testosterone, whereas supporters of the losers undergo a decrease in testosterone.
When playing for school or club teams, young athletes are afforded the opportunity to see how grownups and children treat one another and how this treatment has long-term consequences. They can see which adults care about kids, are willing to do their fair share and more, and take a stand for what they believe in. They see which parents are cooperative-pitching in to help with snacks, driving their kids' teammates to games, serving as team treasurer, volunteering to line the fields on cold, rainy mornings. They hear parents screaming at the officials and recognize which ones know the rules and which don't. They see who supports their own children and others, who bullies their children or the officials. They see parents who teach their children to assume they are always right, are better than the other players, and that someone else, anyone else, is always at fault if things go wrong. They also see how the kids in these families emulate or reject their parents' behavior. They think about how they will treat their own children and how they will behave with their friends as members of groups.
One hockey father says, "Part of the benefit of sports is that children observe its complex social dynamic among coaches, parents, players, and officials. There's a wide range of ethics, such as the attitude toward authority. Do you try to abide by the spirit of the rules, get away with what you can, accept what an official says, or do you argue and yell at him, or complain about it? Another major element they encounter is the difference between teammates who are good at communicating and sharing versus those who are out to get what they can for themselves. This is a dichotomy adults face throughout life. Kids involved in sports have to consciously or subconsciously figure out where they fit into those various spectrums."
Participating for years on the same team not only improves the play, because the players learn each other's strengths and weaknesses and where they'll be on the field or court, but it gives kids a wider view of the world and the people in it.
When playing for school or club teams, young athletes are afforded the opportunity to see how grownups and children treat one another and how this treatment has long-term consequences. They can see which adults care about kids, are willing to do their fair share and more, and take a stand for what they believe in. They see which parents are cooperative-pitching in to help with snacks, driving their kids' teammates to games, serving as team treasurer, volunteering to line the fields on cold, rainy mornings. They hear parents screaming at the officials and recognize which ones know the rules and which don't. They see who supports their own children and others, who bullies their children or the officials. They see parents who teach their children to assume they are always right, are better than the other players, and that someone else, anyone else, is always at fault if things go wrong. They also see how the kids in these families emulate or reject their parents' behavior. They think about how they will treat their own children and how they will behave with their friends as members of groups.
One hockey father says, "Part of the benefit of sports is that children observe its complex social dynamic among coaches, parents, players, and officials. There's a wide range of ethics, such as the attitude toward authority. Do you try to abide by the spirit of the rules, get away with what you can, accept what an official says, or do you argue and yell at him, or complain about it? Another major element they encounter is the difference between teammates who are good at communicating and sharing versus those who are out to get what they can for themselves. This is a dichotomy adults face throughout life. Kids involved in sports have to consciously or subconsciously figure out where they fit into those various spectrums."
Participating for years on the same team not only improves the play, because the players learn each other's strengths and weaknesses and where they'll be on the field or court, but it gives kids a wider view of the world and the people in it.
The Benefits of Youth Sports
Amateur sports used to mean varsity and JV teams in high school and college, but today more than thirty million kids play on a wide range of recreational and competitive or select teams at younger and younger ages. Parents want to encourage safe sports for their children, both on the field and off. Whether your athlete is a five-year-old beginner or the star of a varsity team, The Young Athlete provides guidance on everything from working with the coach to preventing and treating sports-related injuries.
Jordan D. Metzl, M.D., co-founder and medical director of The Sports Medicine Institute for Young Athletes and one of America's premier pediatric sports physicians, explains:
How to keep your child athlete healthy in mind and body
How to deal with the coach and other parents and help your child handle team pressure
How to recognize and prevent injuries such as fractures, ligament tears, and repetitive stress injuries
How to recognize when your child is doing "too much"
How to judge the impact of daily physical practice on growing bodies
The Young Athlete provides two kinds of guidelines. First, it helps both you and your child keep a sensible perspective on the benefits of organized sports and avoid a "win at all costs" mentality. Through personal advice and anecdotes from his medical practice, Dr. Metzl, a marathon runner, Ironman triathelete, and former college soccer player, helps parents evaluate real-life situations and decisions. He addresses the concerns of parents who have no experience in sports but want to encourage their children to achieve their utmost potential.
Second, this book focuses on strategies that can help prevent injuries and promote health. Dr. Metzl tells you how to recognize the most common injuries and determine their degree of seriousness. He also discusses the nutritional needs of the developing athlete and the benefits of strength and preventive conditioning before and during the season. The Young Athlete is a comprehensive guide that will enable your young athlete to be the best that he or she can be, both on and off the field.
MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO (A SOUND MIND IN A SOUND BODY)
Sports are for fun, but they also offer benefits and lessons that carryover into all aspects of life.
When kids are asked why they play sports, here's what they say:
To have fun
To improve their skills
To learn new skills
To be with their friends
To make new friends
To succeed or win
To become physically fit
Kids usually get the benefits they seek from sports and more. Kids need attention and respect (in that order), but they have few ways to get them. What is unique about sports is that they offer kids an arena where they can earn attention and respect by exerting their natural abilities. Kids are good at sports because sports are essentially about speed, strength, coordination, vision, creativity, and responsiveness-the necessary physical attributes are the attributes of youth.
Given that athletics involves all aspects of the human being, it is not surprising that participants benefit in all of the areas they mention. According to researchers at the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University, kids who participate in organized sports do better in school, have better interpersonal skills, are more team oriented, and are generally healthier.
Participation in sports provides opportunities for leadership and socialization, as well as the development of skills for handling success and failure.
Moreover, when playing games, children learn how rules work. They see how groups need rules to keep order, that the individual must accept the rules for the good of the group, that rules entail a consideration of the rights of others. They also learn about competition, but within a restricted and safe system where the consequences of losing are minimized.
Benefits for girls have been of particular interest to researchers. The President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports reports many developmental benefits of participating in youth sports for girls, including increased self-esteem and self-confidence, healthier body image, significant experiences of competency and success, as well as reduced risk of chronic disease. Furthermore, female athletes "do better academically and have lower school dropout rates than their nonathletic counterparts."
The Women's Sports Foundation lists many ways that sports specifically benefit female athletes. These include their being less likely to become pregnant as teenagers, less likely to begin smoking, more likely to quit smoking, more likely to do well in science, and more likely to graduate from high school and college than female nonathletes. Female athletes also take greater pride in their physical and social selves than their sedentary peers; they are more active physically as they age; they suffer less depression. There is also some evidence that recreational physical activity decreases a woman's chances of developing breast cancer and helps prevent osteoporosis.
I am convinced that sports offer a unique arena in which children can successfully exert their talents. The arena is unique for two reasons. First, sports engage the child as a complete human being: all facets-not just physical, but also social, cognitive, and psychological-are engaged harmoniously in striving toward peak fulfillment. Second, sports involve youths working in an ongoing community composed of their peers as well as their peers' families. Sports, that is, offer children an exhilarating, satisfying, rewarding way to participate in a larger world not generally accessible to nonathletes.
Physical Benefits
Fitness. Kids who play sports develop general physical fitness in a way that's fun, and they establish lifelong habits for good health. This is particularly important at a time when obesity in the United States has reached epidemic proportions: the incidence of obesity has increased by more than 50 percent among America's children and teens since 1976 and continues to grow at a staggering rate!
Stress relief. Sports allow kids to clear their minds of academic and social pressures, to literally run off the tension that's accumulated in their muscles. In the words of one patient, "If you play really hard, you feel better because playing takes your mind off things that bother you, and afterwards you can concentrate better." Most doctors recognize the positive mental effect of physical exertion, even though we're not sure exactly why this is so. I know that my ability to study in college and medical school was greatly enhanced when I ran during the day, and I'm not the only athlete to find this true. Many athletes get better grades in-season (theories posit the discipline and the need to manage time, along with an increased ability to concentrate). During exams, Duke University opens its gyms twenty-four hours a day to provide stress relief for its students.
Mastery. Sports give kids a satisfying, enjoyable way to develop their own talents: through personal effort they get good at something they're interested in. Doing something well makes them feel good about themselves, but equally important, it teaches them about the process of how to improve and work more effectively. Learning a skill-to dribble left-handed, say, or to execute an effective second serve-entails a recognition that practice is essential and that improvement is incremental. The process of repetition teaches the athlete how to master a move and also how to experiment with different approaches to improve a skill. The feedback in sports is usually immediate and visible-does the ball go into the basket?-so that the athlete can change or repeat what she's doing and figure out how to get better. Not only that, the whole process of seeing practice lead to improvement gives kids a feeling of control, a feeling all too rare in their lives.
Healthy habits. Because sports increase an awareness of one's body and how it responds to different stimuli and circumstances, sports help prevent drug and alcohol abuse. Most athletes value what their bodies can do and want to maintain those abilities. Being an athlete also gives kids an acceptable reason for telling their friends no to drugs, booze, and other high-risk, unhealthy behaviors. (Of course, not all athletes avoid drugs and alcohol.)
Personal Benefits
Valuing preparation. Sports help kids learn to distinguish between effort and ability. Sports increase self-discipline and the awareness of the value of preparation because kids can see the difference in their performance.
Competitive athletes learn the importance of effort, being prepared (mentally and physically), and enlightened risk-taking. They see that raw physical talent is not always sufficient to win the game, but that preparation is essential. This includes mental preparation (staying focused) and physical fitness as well as practicing the plays with their teammates in team sports. They learn to evaluate risk versus reward. Another invaluable lesson is discovering that mistakes are part of learning; they signal that a particular approach is unsuccessful and you must try another. Kids also learn to deal productively with criticism as part of improvement and preparation.
Resilience. Sports provide an unparalleled model for dealing with disappointment and misfortune. Young athletes learn to handle adversity, whether it's picking themselves up after losing a big game or not getting as many minutes as they wanted. They find ways to deal with losing and go on, because there's another big game next week or next year. They figure out what to do to get what they want for themselves. They put in extra time on fitness or work on specific weaknesses in their game (long-ball trapping, hitting to the opposite field, looking the ball into their hands).
Athletes also learn to deal with the physical and psychological effects of injury. I broke my jaw playing soccer and missed most of the season my junior year in high school. I went through the classic stages of grief, from "This can't be true" to ultimate acceptance. Two months of sitting out, waiting to heal, and dealing with physical and emotional pain was devastating. There were times early on when I sat in my bed whimpering from pain. But as time went on and my jaw began to heal, I somehow began to realize what almost all athletes in pain realize: the only person who is going to help you is yourself. You find the limits of what you can ask of yourself and know that you will deliver. This learning to get the best out of yourself carries over into all aspects of life. People can find their internal drive through training and hard work, but adversity really brings it out. In my case, I came back with stronger resolve. In my senior year I became an all-district soccer player and was propelled toward a college soccer career.
Attitude control. Older teens learn that a confident attitude improves their performance, and that they have some control over their attitude. They learn to disregard comparative stats in preparing for an opponent and instead to adopt "attitude enhancers" such as visualization exercises, team or individual rituals, singing specific songs together, or having dinner as a team the night before the game. Some might call these superstitions, others, self-fulfilling prophecies, but they work.
Leadership opportunities. Team sports offer kids a rare opportunity to serve as leaders. Kids can be in a position to assess the strengths and weaknesses of their various teammates and help to exploit their strengths and compensate for their weaknesses. They can minimize conflicts among players. They can reinforce values-such as fair play, teamsmanship, hard work, mental preparation-by speaking up when appropriate and setting a good example. They can also take the initiative in arranging for team dress on game days (football players wear their jerseys to class, female basketball players wear their warm-up pants), organizing team dinners or team movie nights, and inviting teachers and administrators to their games.
Identity and balance. Being part of a group is inordinately important to kids, and sports make kids feel like they belong, whether it's to the group of athletes in general or their team in particular. Sports also contribute to a teenager's sense of a stable identity with particular values. "I'm a football player" is a very different statement than "I play football." People are complicated, however; no individual is just one thing. It's better to encourage children-and adults-not to assume a single identity to the exclusion of all else.
Time management. Young athletes learn to manage their time productively. They know they have to get their homework done, so they learn not to waste time (some of them even quit watching television and hanging out at the mall). They plan ahead, so that big school projects don't catch them by surprise. They even figure out they have to eat well and get a good night's sleep. Countless athletes, in school and the workplace, say that being an athlete taught them discipline that is invaluable in their lives on and off the field.
Long-term thinking. Athletes learn the fundamental lesson of sacrificing immediate gratification for long-term gain. This is the basis for personal success as well as for civilization in general, and no lesson can be more valuable.
Social Benefits
Sports are a social activity. Team sports are obviously done with other people, but even individual sports are often done as a team (tennis, golf, track). All sports, however, are intended to be performed in front of others, and the social ramifications are many. Here are some of them.
Relationships with other kids. Athletes develop relationships with their teammates. For boys, sports are a primary, and unfortunately sometimes the sole, way of socializing with others. In many schools and communities, nonathletic males find it difficult to develop a social network at all. For girls, who according to the feminist theorist Carol Gilligan tend to define themselves through their relationships rather than their achievements, sports offer yet another way to make friends and create an alternate peer group. According to Mike Nerney, a consultant in substance abuse prevention and education, multiple peer groups are always a good idea for teens, who have an intense need for inclusion and belonging, but who can also be volatile, cruel to each other, and foment destructive behavior as a group. Having a refuge when relations go wrong with one group can alleviate a great deal of stress and offer an alternative for kids who feel uncomfortable or frightened by peers who engage in high-risk activities.
Teamwork. On a team, kids learn about cooperation, camaraderie, give-and-take. They learn that while their natural position might be wide receiver, the team needs a cornerback, so they sacrifice their personal desires and play defense. They learn that you don't have to like someone in order to work together toward a common goal. They also discover that you can work for people you don't respect and still be productive, improve your skills, and have fun. A team is a natural environment in which to learn responsibility to others: you can't stay out carousing the night before a game; sometimes you need to pass up a party in order to show up and play well.
Kids learn these lessons from their teammates and, most important, a coach who encourages the good of the team over the needs of an individual player. This attitude is sometimes rare in today's sports climate, where what's glorified is to "be the man." I think the earlier the message is instilled about the good of the larger whole, the better for kids in the long run.
Diversity. Organized sports sponsored by clubs or youth leagues not affiliated with schools offer players an opportunity to meet a variety of kids from different backgrounds. Students from public, private, and parochial schools come together in a common enterprise, crossing socioeconomic and ethnic lines, so that over time all players broaden their sense of how other people live. The genuinely multicultural environment is of tremendous importance in our polarized society. Kids play on the same team, wear the same uniform, share the same objectives and experiences. Sports are a great equalizer: rich or poor, black, brown, or white, are irrelevant. What counts is talent and heart.
Relationships with adults. When coaches, parents, and kids see each other at practice and games week after week, year after year, the adults learn to admire and praise the kids' prowess and progress, even when kids are as young as third graders. This kind of attention helps youngsters learn to balance their own evaluation of their improving skills with the appraisal of others who are not blood relatives; they also begin the lifelong process of figuring out whom to listen to when they hear conflicting advice or assessments. In addition, for young athletes of all ages, attention from interested adults is not only flattering but also helps them overcome shyness and develop poise when talking to relative strangers in social situations. The ability to feel comfortable in a variety of social circumstances will be progressively more valuable in a world of multiple cultures and decreasing numbers of supportive communities.
Sports give kids an opportunity to spend ongoing periods of time with an adult in a shared endeavor. Indeed, kids may spend more time with their coach than with any other adult in their lives, especially if they're on a school team or a club team that practices two or more times a week. Ideally this coach cares about them as whole beings rather than particular talents who can run for touchdowns or block opponents' shots. To thrive, kids need to be with adults who want them to do well in a variety of endeavors, who notice their improvements and hard work, who manifest sound values, and who don't pay attention to them solely because of their contributions to the win column.
The coach-player relationship can be very strong, and even parentlike. Coaches of young athletes take on a tremendous responsibility to set a good example and treat their players respectfully. Thankfully, most coaches take this responsibility very seriously.
Sometimes, the coach-player relationship can even be life-saving. A female coach of a varsity boys' team reported that one of her players came to her saying, "I need to talk to you. I found blood in my urine."
"Let me ask you something," the coach replied. "Have you been having unprotected sex?"
"No, of course not. I can't believe you asked me that," he said. "Well, I need to know what direction to take you in. No matter what happened, you need to see a doctor."
The coach recalled, "This boy was very good looking and very popular. I knew what was going on. The doctor found he had picked up a venereal disease which could have made him infertile. The boy called me from the doctor's office to say thank you."
Participating in a community. Sports foster a sense of community: they give both participants and spectators the experience of belonging to something larger than themselves, the need for which seems to be hard-wired into the human brain. This is why kids love playing for their schools, why high school football games in small cities can draw tens of thousands of spectators week after week, and why adults identify with their college teams years after they have graduated. Playing for an institution or a community gives kids a chance to feel that they are making a genuine contribution to a larger group.
Jordan D. Metzl, M.D., co-founder and medical director of The Sports Medicine Institute for Young Athletes and one of America's premier pediatric sports physicians, explains:
How to keep your child athlete healthy in mind and body
How to deal with the coach and other parents and help your child handle team pressure
How to recognize and prevent injuries such as fractures, ligament tears, and repetitive stress injuries
How to recognize when your child is doing "too much"
How to judge the impact of daily physical practice on growing bodies
The Young Athlete provides two kinds of guidelines. First, it helps both you and your child keep a sensible perspective on the benefits of organized sports and avoid a "win at all costs" mentality. Through personal advice and anecdotes from his medical practice, Dr. Metzl, a marathon runner, Ironman triathelete, and former college soccer player, helps parents evaluate real-life situations and decisions. He addresses the concerns of parents who have no experience in sports but want to encourage their children to achieve their utmost potential.
Second, this book focuses on strategies that can help prevent injuries and promote health. Dr. Metzl tells you how to recognize the most common injuries and determine their degree of seriousness. He also discusses the nutritional needs of the developing athlete and the benefits of strength and preventive conditioning before and during the season. The Young Athlete is a comprehensive guide that will enable your young athlete to be the best that he or she can be, both on and off the field.
MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO (A SOUND MIND IN A SOUND BODY)
Sports are for fun, but they also offer benefits and lessons that carryover into all aspects of life.
When kids are asked why they play sports, here's what they say:
To have fun
To improve their skills
To learn new skills
To be with their friends
To make new friends
To succeed or win
To become physically fit
Kids usually get the benefits they seek from sports and more. Kids need attention and respect (in that order), but they have few ways to get them. What is unique about sports is that they offer kids an arena where they can earn attention and respect by exerting their natural abilities. Kids are good at sports because sports are essentially about speed, strength, coordination, vision, creativity, and responsiveness-the necessary physical attributes are the attributes of youth.
Given that athletics involves all aspects of the human being, it is not surprising that participants benefit in all of the areas they mention. According to researchers at the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University, kids who participate in organized sports do better in school, have better interpersonal skills, are more team oriented, and are generally healthier.
Participation in sports provides opportunities for leadership and socialization, as well as the development of skills for handling success and failure.
Moreover, when playing games, children learn how rules work. They see how groups need rules to keep order, that the individual must accept the rules for the good of the group, that rules entail a consideration of the rights of others. They also learn about competition, but within a restricted and safe system where the consequences of losing are minimized.
Benefits for girls have been of particular interest to researchers. The President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports reports many developmental benefits of participating in youth sports for girls, including increased self-esteem and self-confidence, healthier body image, significant experiences of competency and success, as well as reduced risk of chronic disease. Furthermore, female athletes "do better academically and have lower school dropout rates than their nonathletic counterparts."
The Women's Sports Foundation lists many ways that sports specifically benefit female athletes. These include their being less likely to become pregnant as teenagers, less likely to begin smoking, more likely to quit smoking, more likely to do well in science, and more likely to graduate from high school and college than female nonathletes. Female athletes also take greater pride in their physical and social selves than their sedentary peers; they are more active physically as they age; they suffer less depression. There is also some evidence that recreational physical activity decreases a woman's chances of developing breast cancer and helps prevent osteoporosis.
I am convinced that sports offer a unique arena in which children can successfully exert their talents. The arena is unique for two reasons. First, sports engage the child as a complete human being: all facets-not just physical, but also social, cognitive, and psychological-are engaged harmoniously in striving toward peak fulfillment. Second, sports involve youths working in an ongoing community composed of their peers as well as their peers' families. Sports, that is, offer children an exhilarating, satisfying, rewarding way to participate in a larger world not generally accessible to nonathletes.
Physical Benefits
Fitness. Kids who play sports develop general physical fitness in a way that's fun, and they establish lifelong habits for good health. This is particularly important at a time when obesity in the United States has reached epidemic proportions: the incidence of obesity has increased by more than 50 percent among America's children and teens since 1976 and continues to grow at a staggering rate!
Stress relief. Sports allow kids to clear their minds of academic and social pressures, to literally run off the tension that's accumulated in their muscles. In the words of one patient, "If you play really hard, you feel better because playing takes your mind off things that bother you, and afterwards you can concentrate better." Most doctors recognize the positive mental effect of physical exertion, even though we're not sure exactly why this is so. I know that my ability to study in college and medical school was greatly enhanced when I ran during the day, and I'm not the only athlete to find this true. Many athletes get better grades in-season (theories posit the discipline and the need to manage time, along with an increased ability to concentrate). During exams, Duke University opens its gyms twenty-four hours a day to provide stress relief for its students.
Mastery. Sports give kids a satisfying, enjoyable way to develop their own talents: through personal effort they get good at something they're interested in. Doing something well makes them feel good about themselves, but equally important, it teaches them about the process of how to improve and work more effectively. Learning a skill-to dribble left-handed, say, or to execute an effective second serve-entails a recognition that practice is essential and that improvement is incremental. The process of repetition teaches the athlete how to master a move and also how to experiment with different approaches to improve a skill. The feedback in sports is usually immediate and visible-does the ball go into the basket?-so that the athlete can change or repeat what she's doing and figure out how to get better. Not only that, the whole process of seeing practice lead to improvement gives kids a feeling of control, a feeling all too rare in their lives.
Healthy habits. Because sports increase an awareness of one's body and how it responds to different stimuli and circumstances, sports help prevent drug and alcohol abuse. Most athletes value what their bodies can do and want to maintain those abilities. Being an athlete also gives kids an acceptable reason for telling their friends no to drugs, booze, and other high-risk, unhealthy behaviors. (Of course, not all athletes avoid drugs and alcohol.)
Personal Benefits
Valuing preparation. Sports help kids learn to distinguish between effort and ability. Sports increase self-discipline and the awareness of the value of preparation because kids can see the difference in their performance.
Competitive athletes learn the importance of effort, being prepared (mentally and physically), and enlightened risk-taking. They see that raw physical talent is not always sufficient to win the game, but that preparation is essential. This includes mental preparation (staying focused) and physical fitness as well as practicing the plays with their teammates in team sports. They learn to evaluate risk versus reward. Another invaluable lesson is discovering that mistakes are part of learning; they signal that a particular approach is unsuccessful and you must try another. Kids also learn to deal productively with criticism as part of improvement and preparation.
Resilience. Sports provide an unparalleled model for dealing with disappointment and misfortune. Young athletes learn to handle adversity, whether it's picking themselves up after losing a big game or not getting as many minutes as they wanted. They find ways to deal with losing and go on, because there's another big game next week or next year. They figure out what to do to get what they want for themselves. They put in extra time on fitness or work on specific weaknesses in their game (long-ball trapping, hitting to the opposite field, looking the ball into their hands).
Athletes also learn to deal with the physical and psychological effects of injury. I broke my jaw playing soccer and missed most of the season my junior year in high school. I went through the classic stages of grief, from "This can't be true" to ultimate acceptance. Two months of sitting out, waiting to heal, and dealing with physical and emotional pain was devastating. There were times early on when I sat in my bed whimpering from pain. But as time went on and my jaw began to heal, I somehow began to realize what almost all athletes in pain realize: the only person who is going to help you is yourself. You find the limits of what you can ask of yourself and know that you will deliver. This learning to get the best out of yourself carries over into all aspects of life. People can find their internal drive through training and hard work, but adversity really brings it out. In my case, I came back with stronger resolve. In my senior year I became an all-district soccer player and was propelled toward a college soccer career.
Attitude control. Older teens learn that a confident attitude improves their performance, and that they have some control over their attitude. They learn to disregard comparative stats in preparing for an opponent and instead to adopt "attitude enhancers" such as visualization exercises, team or individual rituals, singing specific songs together, or having dinner as a team the night before the game. Some might call these superstitions, others, self-fulfilling prophecies, but they work.
Leadership opportunities. Team sports offer kids a rare opportunity to serve as leaders. Kids can be in a position to assess the strengths and weaknesses of their various teammates and help to exploit their strengths and compensate for their weaknesses. They can minimize conflicts among players. They can reinforce values-such as fair play, teamsmanship, hard work, mental preparation-by speaking up when appropriate and setting a good example. They can also take the initiative in arranging for team dress on game days (football players wear their jerseys to class, female basketball players wear their warm-up pants), organizing team dinners or team movie nights, and inviting teachers and administrators to their games.
Identity and balance. Being part of a group is inordinately important to kids, and sports make kids feel like they belong, whether it's to the group of athletes in general or their team in particular. Sports also contribute to a teenager's sense of a stable identity with particular values. "I'm a football player" is a very different statement than "I play football." People are complicated, however; no individual is just one thing. It's better to encourage children-and adults-not to assume a single identity to the exclusion of all else.
Time management. Young athletes learn to manage their time productively. They know they have to get their homework done, so they learn not to waste time (some of them even quit watching television and hanging out at the mall). They plan ahead, so that big school projects don't catch them by surprise. They even figure out they have to eat well and get a good night's sleep. Countless athletes, in school and the workplace, say that being an athlete taught them discipline that is invaluable in their lives on and off the field.
Long-term thinking. Athletes learn the fundamental lesson of sacrificing immediate gratification for long-term gain. This is the basis for personal success as well as for civilization in general, and no lesson can be more valuable.
Social Benefits
Sports are a social activity. Team sports are obviously done with other people, but even individual sports are often done as a team (tennis, golf, track). All sports, however, are intended to be performed in front of others, and the social ramifications are many. Here are some of them.
Relationships with other kids. Athletes develop relationships with their teammates. For boys, sports are a primary, and unfortunately sometimes the sole, way of socializing with others. In many schools and communities, nonathletic males find it difficult to develop a social network at all. For girls, who according to the feminist theorist Carol Gilligan tend to define themselves through their relationships rather than their achievements, sports offer yet another way to make friends and create an alternate peer group. According to Mike Nerney, a consultant in substance abuse prevention and education, multiple peer groups are always a good idea for teens, who have an intense need for inclusion and belonging, but who can also be volatile, cruel to each other, and foment destructive behavior as a group. Having a refuge when relations go wrong with one group can alleviate a great deal of stress and offer an alternative for kids who feel uncomfortable or frightened by peers who engage in high-risk activities.
Teamwork. On a team, kids learn about cooperation, camaraderie, give-and-take. They learn that while their natural position might be wide receiver, the team needs a cornerback, so they sacrifice their personal desires and play defense. They learn that you don't have to like someone in order to work together toward a common goal. They also discover that you can work for people you don't respect and still be productive, improve your skills, and have fun. A team is a natural environment in which to learn responsibility to others: you can't stay out carousing the night before a game; sometimes you need to pass up a party in order to show up and play well.
Kids learn these lessons from their teammates and, most important, a coach who encourages the good of the team over the needs of an individual player. This attitude is sometimes rare in today's sports climate, where what's glorified is to "be the man." I think the earlier the message is instilled about the good of the larger whole, the better for kids in the long run.
Diversity. Organized sports sponsored by clubs or youth leagues not affiliated with schools offer players an opportunity to meet a variety of kids from different backgrounds. Students from public, private, and parochial schools come together in a common enterprise, crossing socioeconomic and ethnic lines, so that over time all players broaden their sense of how other people live. The genuinely multicultural environment is of tremendous importance in our polarized society. Kids play on the same team, wear the same uniform, share the same objectives and experiences. Sports are a great equalizer: rich or poor, black, brown, or white, are irrelevant. What counts is talent and heart.
Relationships with adults. When coaches, parents, and kids see each other at practice and games week after week, year after year, the adults learn to admire and praise the kids' prowess and progress, even when kids are as young as third graders. This kind of attention helps youngsters learn to balance their own evaluation of their improving skills with the appraisal of others who are not blood relatives; they also begin the lifelong process of figuring out whom to listen to when they hear conflicting advice or assessments. In addition, for young athletes of all ages, attention from interested adults is not only flattering but also helps them overcome shyness and develop poise when talking to relative strangers in social situations. The ability to feel comfortable in a variety of social circumstances will be progressively more valuable in a world of multiple cultures and decreasing numbers of supportive communities.
Sports give kids an opportunity to spend ongoing periods of time with an adult in a shared endeavor. Indeed, kids may spend more time with their coach than with any other adult in their lives, especially if they're on a school team or a club team that practices two or more times a week. Ideally this coach cares about them as whole beings rather than particular talents who can run for touchdowns or block opponents' shots. To thrive, kids need to be with adults who want them to do well in a variety of endeavors, who notice their improvements and hard work, who manifest sound values, and who don't pay attention to them solely because of their contributions to the win column.
The coach-player relationship can be very strong, and even parentlike. Coaches of young athletes take on a tremendous responsibility to set a good example and treat their players respectfully. Thankfully, most coaches take this responsibility very seriously.
Sometimes, the coach-player relationship can even be life-saving. A female coach of a varsity boys' team reported that one of her players came to her saying, "I need to talk to you. I found blood in my urine."
"Let me ask you something," the coach replied. "Have you been having unprotected sex?"
"No, of course not. I can't believe you asked me that," he said. "Well, I need to know what direction to take you in. No matter what happened, you need to see a doctor."
The coach recalled, "This boy was very good looking and very popular. I knew what was going on. The doctor found he had picked up a venereal disease which could have made him infertile. The boy called me from the doctor's office to say thank you."
Participating in a community. Sports foster a sense of community: they give both participants and spectators the experience of belonging to something larger than themselves, the need for which seems to be hard-wired into the human brain. This is why kids love playing for their schools, why high school football games in small cities can draw tens of thousands of spectators week after week, and why adults identify with their college teams years after they have graduated. Playing for an institution or a community gives kids a chance to feel that they are making a genuine contribution to a larger group.
Advantages of Sports
Advantages Of Sports And Teens
Many teens in high school want to try out for sports. A lot of them try because they think it will make them popular or get them more dates. While this may seem like a silly reason, there are lots of other benefits to sports that your child may overlook. Here are some reasons that you’ll find comforting.
With T.V., movies, computers, and video games becoming more and more popular, it has become so much easier for teens to be by themselves rather than going out with friends. Kids used to go hang out at the mall or drive around town; now they just sit at home. Getting your teen into a sport gives them an opportunity to go out and socialize. While they may not find a new best friend, they will learn how to interact and work as a team; something they’ll find useful later in life.
One of the biggest problems in our society today is obesity, and it’s not just a problem with adults. More and more kids are becoming overweight. Joining a team sport will help your teen get out and get some exercise without feeling pressured to lose weight or get in shape. Plus, if your teen sees that their physical condition is causing them to under-perform, they may be motivated to do other activities to get healthy. By the time your child reaches their teenager year, part of good parenting will be providing them with direction and encouragement and continuing to help them develop a healty style of living.
These days, it’s becoming harder to show your teenagers that you love and support them. A great way to do this is by showing up to their games, helping them practice, and helping with team fundraisers. These are also great ways to spend time your kids and talk to them.
You may think “but my teen isn’t good enough to make their school team”. There are plenty of other places besides school to play team sports. You can always check out the YMCA or other “for-fun” leagues. You could look into more obscure sports that you may not have thought of; did you know that bowling is a NCAA team sports? If you do a little research, you’re sure to find something your teen will enjoy.
Team sports are a great way for your teen to get out of the house, get moving, make friends, and even get a scholarship to college. So why not talk to them about getting into sports today?
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
History of Music
Antiquity
Music was an important part of cultural and social life in Ancient Greece: mixed-gender choruses performed for entertainment, celebration and spiritual ceremonies; musicians and singers had a prominent role in ancient Greek theater. In the 9th century, the Arab scholar al-Farabi wrote a book on music titled Kitab al-Musiqi al-Kabir ("Great Book of Music"). He played and invented a variety of musical instruments and devised the Arab tone system of pitch organisation, which is still used in Arabic music.
Western cultures
During the Medieval music era (500-1400), the only European repertory which has survived from before about 800 is the monophonic liturgical plainsong of the Roman Catholic Church, the central tradition of which was called Gregorian chant. Alongside these traditions of sacred and church music there existed a vibrant tradition of secular song. Examples of composers from this period are Léonin, Pérotin and Guillaume de Machaut. From the Renaissance music era (1400–1600), much of the surviving music of 14th century Europe is secular. By the middle of the 15th century, composers and singers used a smooth polyphony for sacred musical compositions. The introduction of commercial printing helped to disseminate musical styles more quickly and across a larger area. Prominent composers from this era are Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Thomas Morley and Orlande de Lassus.
The era of Baroque music (1600–1750) began when the first operas were written and when contrapuntal music became prevalent. German Baroque composers wrote for small ensembles including strings, brass, and woodwinds, as well as choirs, pipe organ, harpsichord, and clavichord. During the Baroque period, several major music forms were defined that lasted into later periods when they were expanded and evolved further, including the fugue, the invention, the sonata, and the concerto.[11] Composers from the Baroque era include Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann. The music of the Classical period (1750–1800) is characterized by homophonic texture, often featuring a prominent melody with accompaniment. These new melodies tended to be almost voice-like and singable. The now popular instrumental music was dominated by further evolution of musical forms initially defined in the Baroque period: the sonata, and the concerto, with the addition of the new form, the symphony. Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart are among the central figures of the Classical period.
In 1800, the Romantic era (1800-1890s) in music developed, with Ludwig van Beethoven and Franz Schubert as transitional composers who introduced a more dramatic, expressive style. During this era, existing genres, forms, and functions of music were developed, and the emotional and expressive qualities of music came to take precedence over technique and tradition. In Beethoven's case, motifs (developed organically) came to replace melody as the most significant compositional unit. The late 19th century saw a dramatic expansion in the size of the orchestra, and in the role of concerts as part of urban society. Later Romantic composers such as Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Gustav Mahler created complex and often much longer musical works. They used more complex chords and used more dissonance to create dramatic tension.
Non-Western Classical traditions
Indian classical music is one of the oldest musical traditions in the world.[12] The Indus Valley civilization has sculptures which show dance[13] and old musical instruments, like the seven holed flute. Various types of stringed instruments and drums have been recovered from Harrappa and Mohenjo Daro by excavations carried out by Sir Mortimer Wheeler.[14] The Rigveda has elements of present Indian music, with a musical notation to denote the metre and the mode of chanting.[15] Indian classical music (marga) is monophonic, and based on a single melody line or raga rhythmically organized through talas. Carnatic music is largely devotional; the majority of the songs are addressed to the Hindu deities. There are a lot of songs emphasising love and other social issues. Hindustani music was also influenced by the Persian performance practices of the Afghan Mughals.
Asian music covers the music cultures of Arabia, Central Asia, East Asia, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. Chinese classical music, the traditional art or court music of China, has a history stretching over around three thousand years. It has its own unique systems of musical notation, as well as musical tuning and pitch, musical instruments and styles or musical genres. Chinese music is pentatonic-diatonic, having a scale of twelve notes to an octave (5+7 = 12) as does European-influenced music. Persian music is the music of Persia and Persian language countries: musiqi, the science and art of music, and muzik, the sound and performance of music (Sakata 1983). See also: Music of Iran, Music of Afghanistan, Music of Tajikistan, Music of Uzbekistan.
The music of Greece was a major part of ancient Greek theater. In Ancient Greece, mixed-gender choruses performed for entertainment, celebration and spiritual reasons. Instruments included the double-reed aulos and the plucked string instrument, the lyre, especially the special kind called a kithara. Music was an important part of education in ancient Greece, and boys were taught music starting at age six. Greek musical literacy created a flowering of development; Greek music theory included the Greek musical modes, eventually became the basis for Western religious music and classical music. Later, influences from the Roman Empire, Eastern Europe and the Byzantine Empire changed Greek music.
20th and 21st century music
With 20th century music, there was a vast increase in music listening as the radio gained popularity and phonographs were used to replay and distribute music. The focus of art music was characterized by exploration of new rhythms, styles, and sounds. Igor Stravinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, and John Cage were all influential composers in 20th century art music.
Jazz evolved and became a significant genre of music over the course of the 20th century, and during the second half of that century, rock music did the same. Jazz is an American musical art form which originated in the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions. The style's West African pedigree is evident in its use of blue notes, improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation, and the swung note.[16] From its early development until the present, jazz has also incorporated music from 19th and 20th century American popular music. Jazz has, from its early 20th century inception, spawned a variety of subgenres, ranging from New Orleans Dixieland (1910s) to 1970s and 1980s-era jazz-rock fusion.
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed in the 1960s from 1950s rock and roll, rockabilly, blues, and country music. The sound of rock often revolves around the electric guitar or acoustic guitar, and it uses a strong back beat laid down by a rhythm section of electric bass guitar, drums, and keyboard instruments such as organ, piano, or, since the 1970s, digital synthesizers. Along with the guitar or keyboards, saxophone and blues-style harmonica are used as soloing instruments. In its "purest form", it "has three chords, a strong, insistent back beat, and a catchy melody." In the late 1960s and early 1970s, rock music branched out into different subgenres, ranging from blues rock and jazz-rock fusion to heavy metal and punk rock, as well as the more classical influenced genre of progressive rockHistory of Music
References in the Bible
Main article: History of music in the biblical period
c. 960, Constantinople
Music and theatre scholars studying the history and anthropology of Semitic and early Judeo-Christian culture, have also discovered common links between theatrical and musical activity in the classical cultures of the Hebrews with those of the later cultures of the Greeks and Romans. The common area of performance is found in a "social phenomenon called litany," a form of prayer consisting of a series of invocations or supplications. The Journal of Religion and Theatre notes that among the earliest forms of litany, "Hebrew litany was accompanied by a rich musical tradition:"
- "While Genesis 4.21 identifies Jubal as the “father of all such as handle the harp and pipe,” the Pentateuch is nearly silent about the practice and instruction of music in the early life of Israel. Then, in I Samuel 10 and the texts which follow, a curious thing happens. “One finds in the biblical text,” writes Alfred Sendrey, “a sudden and unexplained upsurge of large choirs and orchestras, consisting of thoroughly organized and trained musical groups, which would be virtually inconceivable without lengthy, methodical preparation.” This has led some scholars to believe that the prophet Samuel was the patriarch of a school which taught not only prophets and holy men, but also sacred-rite musicians. This public music school, perhaps the earliest in recorded history, was not restricted to a priestly class--which is how the shepherd boy David appears on the scene as a minstrel to King Saul."
Antiquity
History of Music
Prehistoric eras
Ancient music can only be imagined by scholars, based on findings from a range of paleolithic sites, such as bones in which lateral holes have been pierced: these are usually identified as flutes,blown at one end like the Japanese shakuhachi. Instruments, such as the seven-holed flute and various types of stringed instruments have been recovered from the Indus Valley Civilization archaeological sites. India has one of the oldest musical traditions in the world—references to Indian classical music (marga) can be found in the ancient scriptures of the Hindu tradition, the Vedas. The earliest and largest collection of prehistoric musical instruments was found in China and dates back to between 7000 and 6600 BC.
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound. Common elements of music are pitch (which governs melody and harmony), rhythm (and its associated concepts tempo, meter, and articulation), dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture. The word derives from Greek μουσική (mousike), "(art) of the Muses".
The creation, performance, significance, and even the definition of music vary according to culture and social context. Music ranges from strictly organized compositions (and their recreation in performance), through improvisational music to aleatoric forms. Music can be divided into genres and subgenres, although the dividing lines and relationships between music genres are often subtle, sometimes open to individual interpretation, and occasionally controversial. Within "the arts", music may be classified as a performing art, a fine art, and auditory art.
To many people in many cultures music is an important part of their way of life. Greek philosophers and ancient Indian philosophers defined music as tones ordered horizontally as melodies and vertically as harmonies. Common sayings such as "the harmony of the spheres" and "it is music to my ears" point to the notion that music is often ordered and pleasant to listen to. However, 20th-century composer John Cage thought that any sound can be music, saying, for example, "There is no noise, only sound."According to musicologist Jean-Jacques Nattiez, "the border between music and noise is always culturally defined—which implies that, even within a single society, this border does not always pass through the same place; in short, there is rarely a consensus.... By all accounts there is no single and intercultural universal concept defining what music might be, except that it is 'sound through time.Salvos Youth & Music Project
The project
The project operates in 15 bushfire affected areas, providing high school aged youth with a safe place to vent and process their emotions, as well as a forum to tell their story. The project, proudly supported by Sony Foundation, aims to create a sense of inclusion in the bushfire recovery process, using music and visual arts as the tool to engage young people in these areas.
- Music: young people are encouraged to write and record their own songs. All equipment is provided, along with coaching from music consultants.
- Visual arts: opportunities are provided for youth to design album and CD cover artwork that will accompany the music, as well as banners for festival performances.
- Performance: at the conclusion of the program, youth will perform their songs at high schools or local community festivals. Finally, all groups will feature in a final festival performance, bringing together the community to showcase the achievements of these youth.
Secondary Colleges
- Secondary school Principals and music teachers will work with youth workers to identify potential participants.
- Location for a ‘safe place’ will be established in cooperation with schools however; the location will not necessarily be at the schoole.
- Project activities will be conducted during school hours.
- A performance will be planned in the New Year.
- The youth and music project will be established in 15 bushfire affected areas across Victoria, including; Bendigo, Seymour, Broadford, Whittlesea and Kinglake
David Barker, Bushfire Recovery Manager
The Salvation Army - 0407 855 099
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