Human Rights Act 1998 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Human Rights Act 1998 - Essay Example In 1998,Parliament enacted the Human Rights Act,which had expressly given effect to Convention rights. Previously, Convention rights under the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms had only indirect application in the UK, when courts voluntarily refer them in their decisions, but domestic courts are not obliged to abide by them. This is because the UK is only bound by the Convention under international law, but not domestically. With the passage of the HRA 1998 however, Convention rights have been domesticated and become part of English law to which courts are obligated to legally defer to in their decisions. Despite the negative reviews that some quarters gave the law, particularly right-leaning groups who think that it impeded the efforts to go after terrorists and politicians who perceived it as fostering the politicisation of the judiciary, the HRA 1998 has a considerable impact on certain aspects of the English legal system. This is particularly true with respect to statutory interpretation and the law on privacy rights. The law has expressly given the judiciary the prerogative to subject legislations to scrutiny to determine if they are consistent with Convention rights, which seems a dilution of the parliamentary sovereignty doctrine. In addition, the HRA 1988 has helped in the development of the common law right to privacy, which was once declared to be absent from the English legal system.... aw, a state can bring an action against another on behalf of its citizen, but a citizen can also bring an action against his own government in the ECHR Court located in Strasbourg. This right was acknowledged by the UK in 1966 (Miles et al 438). Nonetheless, it would take a lot of procedural snags for a UK citizen to hurdle before being allowed to pursue an action at the Strasbourg Court. For one, a UK citizen must exhaust all remedies available to him under domestic laws before a case can be pursued at the ECHR Court. Moreover, an ECHR Court decision favourable to him is not really binding domestically because of sovereignty issues. As a matter of fact the ECHR has limited application domestically and only in the following conditions: to aid the interpretation of domestic laws in cases they are not clear; to guide the judiciary in the exercise of its judicial discretion, and; to establish the extent of common law (Miles et al 438). All of the aforementioned conditions were establish ed in the cases of R v Secretary State for the Home Department, ex parte Brind [1991] AC 696, Attorney General v Guardian Newspaper Ltd [1987] 1 WLR 1248 and Derbyshire County Council v Times Newspapers Ltd [1992] QB 770. In R v Secretary, a group of journalists challenged the Home Secretary’s directive prohibiting the publication of speeches of terrorists. The Court held that the Convention is not part of UK law and can be resorted only when a domestic legislation is ambiguous. On the other hand, in Attorney General v Guardian, which was about the publication of the memoirs of a retired secret service employee, the Court held that the judiciary could look to the ECHR for guidance in the use of its discretionary duty to decide on matters such as duty of confidence. Finally, in the

Holocaust Museum Essay Example for Free

Holocaust Museum Essay The scary and historical holocaust museum in the United States gives a memorable and unforgettable lesson in the fragility of freedom. During World War II,where the time of which the Nazi Germany operate and murdered all European Jews because of their sense of racial inferiority. The word holocaust derived from the Greek word meaning sacrifice by fire. In January 1933, the Nazis came to lead the Germany. And they used different terms to hide the true nature of their crimes. Moble killing units also called Einsatzqruppen operated mass murder to European words,Roma and Soviet state and communist party officials through mass shootings. The wars ending Europe with the unconditional surrender of German armed forces in 1945. Holocaust museum prevent mass killing, promotes leaders, and strengthen democracy. It is used for educational activities and global outreach program. which headed and supported by pubic partnership and federal support. Holocaust museum with its unique power and authenticity its educate millions of people regarding the dangers of very strong dislike and the need to prevent mass killing. It encourage to act and develop a sense of moral responsibility among every citizens so that they will react to the monumental challenges to face the world. The horror of Holocaust was the unforgettable memory of American people. The site of Auschwitz,Dachau ground wet because of the rain and other death camps,shards of bone and layers of ash work their way to the surface. This process is at work in the memory of the Holocaust. The national institution condition in a well known location near to the National Mall in Washington, DC is the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. It is supported by the government of United States by giving funds for the constructiion of the building and for the continous operations of the museum. Jewish movie director Steven Speilberg contribute lot for the museum. It is located in the Raoul Wallenberg Place, after the Swedish diplomat who saved 100,000 Jews in Hungary during World War II. The land which the museum was build was owned by the United States Department of Agriculture and which the two of the three annex buildings of this prosperity was demolished in order to build a museum whose design was patterned or more about holocaust. Progressively more, discriminatory measures in Nazi Germany led many Jews and others targeted by the Nazis to try to leave their country. Between the 1933, Nazi party lead and 1939, more than 300,000 Jews migrated from Austria and Germany. However, for many, finding a safe haven proved difficult. Western nations feared an influx of refugees, especially in the wake of the Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass, November 9-10, 1938) pogroms. Although 85,000 Jewish refugees reached the United States between March 1938 and September 1939, due to American immigration Evian \ Conference restrictions on the number of immigrants this level of immigration was far below the number seeking refuge. At the 32-country convened in 1938 to consider the plight of refugees, no country except the Dominican Republic was prepared to increase immigration quotas. In 1939, both Cuba and the United States refused to admit over 900 Jewish refugees who had sailed from Hamburg, Germany, on the St. Louis. The ship was Progressively more, discriminatory measures in Nazi Germany led many Jews and others targeted by the Nazis to try to leave their country. Between the 1933, Nazi party lead and 1939, more than 300,000 Jews migrated from Austria and Germany. However, for many, finding a safe haven proved difficult. Western nations feared an influx of refugees, especially in the wake of the Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass, November 9-10, 1938) pogroms. Although 85,000 Jewish refugees reached the United States between March 1938 and September 1939, due to American immigration Evian Conference restrictions on the number of immigrants this level of immigration was far below the number seeking refuge. At the 32-country convened in 1938 to consider the plight of refugees, no country except the Dominican Republic was prepared to increase immigration quotas. In 1939, both Cuba and the United States refused to admit over 900 Jewish refugees who had sailed from Hamburg, Germany, on the St. Louis. The ship was forced to return to Europe where, ultimately, many of the passengers putrefied in concentration camps or killing centers forced to return to Europe where, ultimately, many of the passengers putrefied in concentration camps or killing centers. EXPERIENCE IN THE MUSEUM As I went in on the museum ,I felt so emotional because I cant believe that in the old generation,they can kill as many people as they want I felt sympathy to the Jews. I cant understand why they have to kill the people, because for me as a Christian believes that God our creator is the only one who have the right to get back our lives. I was also impressed because as the years passed by ,many historical buildings can be take care and supported by the government and the citizens of our community. And as I went out of that museum,theres a hope that as a new generation comes,life would be meaningful and all of the people would respect the life of each other . It will serve a big lesson to each and everyone who think negative to others. It shows how it was happened and the unjusticed action of Nazi for the Jews. Because of this,it helps individuals realized that there is no good effect in having a negative perception to other people it may caused war and violations . Always think positive ,communicate well to others and avoid any inferiorities. In preventing Holocaust museum in the present time gives a big contribution specially in the teen agers mind, they can avoid violence and know how to show kindness to other people. It can build a harmonious relationship to each other. And they can act as good human beings ,with fear to GOD and concern to the feelings of others. This historical museum is a very good symbol to end wars and to avoid violence. It is very impressive that American government support the funding for the museum in order to preserve ths documentary and historical event that is very useful in showing to people the importance of human relationship and useful value of this Holocaust museum. It is a very good place to visit by different schools for their educatinal activities and their outreach programs. BIBLIOGRAPHY Shandler Jeffrey,1999 While America Watches: Televising the Holocaust,New York Saidel,Rochelle G. ,1996 Never Too Late to Remember: The Politics behind New York Citys Holocaust Museum, New York

View on History :: essays research papers

  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  When studying a subject such as American history one can easily define the importance it has in schools. Not only is it an amazingly interesting subject, it also outlines our future. History easily aids in predicting the future, and most importantly, allows us to look at the past 100 or so years, as a whole and not year by year. This is an advantage in learning our mistakes and making sure history doesn't repreat itself. American history is very important in schools because it shows students what life was like where we live only a few generations ago. It helps me to understand what it was like for my grandpa growing up, and depending on the source can change my opinion on a certain subject entirely. On example of this is the J.F.K. assasination, before taking this class my opinion on the assasination was completely different. I believed strongly in Oswald's guilt, but after taking a bit of a history lesson, I have leaned my opinion more toward governmental involv ement.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Another great thing about history is how it can show a change in opinion by the United States public over time. One example of this is during the Vietnam War people in the United States due to ignorance, had no idea what our soldiers were going through, therefore the public opinion of an American soldier was bad. On the other hand now that time has passed, more people's eyes are opened to the hardships and innerchanges that a war such as Vietnam could cause. History shows this change in opinion very adequately.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  To me, things don't change, people do. History is a third person look at the way the people who were in charge at the time, ran our country. To me each president ran the country differently than the next. History allows me to look back at exactly the way things were when each president was in office.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  One disadventage history allows for, is the fact that history can be slanted by the reporter of the news. For example, four eyewitnesses to an occurance could have seen four different things. The reason this is such an amazing disadvantage is because this allows for bias in something that should be completely unbiased; a history book. So in all honesty I think this small factor could change any account of history, however as long as the main idea isn't lost, history is still one of the most imporatant tools to a human being.

Elderly in the Netherlands Essay

Nowadays, the elderly is a serious issue around the world; nearly all industrial countries are facing enormous pressure about the coming of aging society. As one of the most advanced countries in the world, how about the situation of elderly in the Netherlands ? Can Dutch society provide the best care to the Baby Boomer? Aging society, the Netherlands is on the way â€Å"For the Netherlands, the aged society did already make its entrance.† said Mr. Martin Smalbrugge Who is head of the training center for residents in elderly care medicine (GERION) of the Department of Nursing Home Medicine. This is true; in 1990 12.8% of the Dutch population was over 65, while in 2000 this was 13.6 %, which is an increase of 250,000 elderly people. (College, 2003)Obviously, the Netherlands have become an aged society country. Furthermore, the Dutch aging population will increase dramatically in the future, it is expected that the percentage of people of over 65 will increase to 14.8% in 2010 and to 22.9% in 2040. (Elderly) Aging society causes many challenges for Dutch economic and society. The first challenge is ageing society creates social and political pressures on social support systems, due to dramatic increase in the older retired population relative to the shrinking population of working ages. This would decrease the quantity of labor and investment in the Netherlands, and directly influence the increase of Dutch economy. The other one is the prevalence of disability, frailty, and chronic diseases (Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, etc.) are expected to increase dramatically. As a result, there would be a  huge burden for the Dutch society. For example, just the National Care for Elderly Program – Better quality of life for frail elderly persons through better quality of care which is tailored to the needs of the elderly persons, costs 80 million Euros. (The National Care for the Elderly Programme) Such a big amount of money into elderly care is like an invisible hand is impeding the increase of Dutch economy. Although many challenges in the Netherlands are caused by the aging society, elderly people are not abandoned by society. Actually, The Netherlands is one of the best countries to live for aged people around the world. There are efficient welfare and healthcare systems, high quality medical equipment, and a number of special services for elderly. How the Netherlands take care of Elderly The Netherlands has a rounded care and welfare system, this system satisfies the need for care for every citizen, and there are specific aims to different groups. For elderly, the nation policy’s main goal in the National Background Report for The Netherlands is to let people in all circumstances and phases of life were independent and self-reliant as long as possible. It was essential to offer people who need care, such as the elderly, optimum choices and to improve the quality of their life (Knipscheer, 2004). In order to achieve this goal, the Dutch government has made various efforts to set up an excellent elderly care system since 1900. However, in the early of 20 century It was unfair for aging people who are from lower social class in care and welfare system. For example, during that period it was hard for aging people from lower social class to get better health care, and find new job. In order to solved this problem, former government introduced reforms within the existing system of relief for both the poor and the elderly people which were 1912 Poor Law, and 1913 Old Age Pensions Act (College, 2003). Nevertheless, now the Netherlands has constructed the best and most effective elderly care and welfare system in the world. The basic elderly care system  in the Netherlands is the Traditional Three-Level-System. It includes three levels which are residential homes for the elderly, nursing homes, and extramural care system (as opposed to the intramural care in institutional homes). (Senior citizens, 2011)Besides the Traditional Three-Level-System, Dutch society also developed many new measures to satisfy the increase for the need of elderly care. For example, †Umbrella care†, which means †care given by children, relatives and neighbors† (College, 2003). It is convenient to the huge number of elderly who live alone to get better life. Moreover, according to a research by European Union, 37% of Dutch people younger than 45 prefer their parents to stay and receive visits, this number is just lower than Sweden. (Harbers, 2008) †Umbrella care† is a perfect project to the elderly who live alone. Furthermore, comparing with other European countries, the Netherlands is one of the best countries in health care service. Specifically, the Netherlands has a large percentage of aging people are vaccinated against influenza each year.in 2005, this percentage was 75%, and it has the largest influenza vaccination rate in the elderly in the EU. (Harbers, 2008) In addition, the Netherlands is also the first country that legalized Euthanasia around the world. This gives elderly who are suffering from serious diseases, such as cancer, right to die to get rid of agony from diseases. Even if some people hold the belief that the legalization of euthanasia is inhumane, it gives one option to elderly who get serious diseases and could not live any more to finish their agony. Just like Mr. Martin Smalbrugge said:† If you are very old, or in a very bad condition, I think people should be able to decide for themselves if they want to end their lives or continue.† Elderly care, still long way for the Netherlands the Netherlands is definitely an excellent model of elderly’s care and welfare system for other countries in the world to study, whereas for the Netherlands, this is not enough. Many drawbacks still exist in Dutch society for elderly people. On the one hand, like other European countries, due to the dramatic increase of elderly and economic recession, the situation of Infrastructures for elderly is still rigorous. For example, the Number of hospital beds in the Netherlands is below EU average, it was 438 hospital beds per 10,000 inhabitants. . (Harbers, 2008) This number is continuing decreasing in recent years. On the other hand, the baby boomers become more major group of elderly gradually, they are healthier and wealthier than former generations, and they need higher service quality. However, consequently there is still some space for Dutch elderly housing care; for example, like Mr. Martin Smalbrugge said that there has to be more staff and he think it would be a good idea to take more care at people at their own houses. People are happier in their own houses, get their own attention. Not only the Netherlands are facing the challenges of an aging society, but also almost advanced industry countries even some developing countries ,like China have the same problem. The efforts of the Netherlands is not enough to solve this global issue. This problem needs international cooperation, and international cooperate is a good platform for countries to share and study their experience about elderly care system each other. In order to give better life for elderly now and also for ourselves life in the future , we still need to do more! Bibliography College, D. V. (2003). Care Work with Older People. Older People in The Netherlands,1,3, 4 5.Ritrived from http://hesotenet.edu.hel.fi/english/etm2/Carework%20with%20older%20people/Netherlands_Elders.pdf Elderly. (n.d.). Retrieved Feburary 23, 2012, from the Netherlands institute for social research: http://www.scp.nl/english/Topics/A_E/Elderly Harbers, M. (2008). Dare to Compare! Houten: The National Institute for Public Health and the Environment. Harmsen, J. G. (12. July 2011). Elderly people live independently to increasingly older ages. Retrieved feburary 23, 2012 from Satistics Netherlands: http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2011/2011-3434-wm.htm Knipscheer, G. V.-J. (2004). National Background Report. Hamburg. Senior citizens. (2011, November 15). Retrieved March 13, 2012, from Government of Netherlands: http://www.government.nl/issues/health-issues/senior-citizens Sittig, H. (8. feburary 2012). â€Å"I won’t put my dad in a nursing home†. Retrieved feburary 23, 2012 from radio Netherlands worldwide: http://www.rnw.nl/english/article/i-wont-put-my-dad-a-nursing-home STEVERINK, N. (2001). Ageing and Society 21. the United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. The National Care for the Elderly Programme. (n.d.). Retrieved March 23, 2012, from national programm ounderenzorg: http://www.nationaalprogrammaouderenzorg.nl/english/the-national-care-for-the-elderly-programme/ Zwijnenburg, W. (n.d.). The Netherlands: Government withdrawal from long-term care. Retrieved April 12, 2012, from The MUHC ISAI’s Health Innovation Forum: http://www.healthinnovationforum.org/2009/nov/01/netherlands-government-withdrawal-long-term-care/

I’M Black You’Re White Who’s Innocent Essay

Summary: This paper is based on an article called â€Å"I’m Black You’re White Who’s innocent† by Shelby Steel. The article takes a position that is against affirmative action because it takes the independence away from people of color. The article â€Å"I’m Black, You’re White, Who’s Innocent?’ is an analysis of the black and white racist situation that America has been facing. It is a claim to the fact that both the groups have created the racist situation. Some whites accept that the racist attitude that enforced slavery was due to the fact that whites in ‘innocence’ felt they were superior to blacks. The pursuit of power-convinced them they were entitled to it. Once convinced it was easy to believed in innocence. Conversely, they were morally secure in their actions which led to centuries of subjugation. Their power was derived from the innocence, and that is why Steele called it ‘innocence is power.’ Thus, racial struggle becomes the struggle of innocence. In the 1960’s more whites began to realized they were not so innocent and so began the loss of power. With that realization there seem to be a transfer of power to black people, as they became the ‘innocents’. Guilt, shame, innocence, and power all became integrated to leaving behind the factor we call racism’. Shelby Steele is an English professor and widely read author who taught at San Jose State University for 20 years before taking a position as a fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Steele claims that affirmative action is a double-cross of black Americans and he loathes affirmative action. Affirmative action presents a sense humiliation; a Faustian bargain presented to minorities, for the hypocrisy and shameless self-congratulation it brings out in its white supporters. Steel believes the victimized self-image of blacks, slows individualism, initiative, and diminishes one’s sense of possibility, while contributing to the demoralization of this ethnic group. In many ways Shelby Steele, makes a strong case against affirmative action . One testament of this, according to Steele is the good will of the whites towards the blacks whose effect can’t be seen until years later when it shows to be more harmful than beneficial. In the 1960s, whites were confronted with their racial guilt and blacks for the first time blacks felt empowered. In this stormy time, white absolution and black power coalesced into virtual mandates in the law. In the later 60s and early 70s these mandates escalated from simple anti-discrimination enforcement to social engineering by means of quotas, goals, timetables, set-asides, and other forms of preferential treatment. This shift was due to the white mandate to achieve a new racial innocence and the black mandate to gain power. In my opinion I believe Steel was saying that whites were trying to clear their guilt by repairing the damages from the past by allowing black the appearance of more access to white societies basics rights†¦ such as being able to get a good job , better educa tion and better housing. Conversely, many years later it allowed racism to fester within society causing more harm than good. One example Shelby Steele used was the rate of job advancement. He attributes the differences between black rates of advance and those of other minority groups to white folks’ pampering. Most blacks, Steele claims, make it on their own as voluntary immigrants have done–were they not held back by devitalizing programs that presented a picture of one’s self as as somehow dissimilar to and weaker than other Americans. The claim remains that progress depends upon recognition of black-white sameness. Steele argues, black America has adopted a model of morals in which it preserves the legacy of slavery and segregation in order to keep white America feeling guilty. I completely disagree with that comment because I feel that black people only want those would be oppressors to understand that it has been a struggle and by remembering where we have been will prevent things from going back that way. The oppression of blacks in the United States was the worst case of oppression in human history, and not discounting the American Indian. At the end of such a period, the formerly oppressed get busy building a new nation, and they develop a nation-building ethic. Those ethics value individuals who sacrifice for the good of the group and work hard to develop the talent and skills necessary to close the achievement gaps that naturally exists at first between the liberated groups and their former oppressors. Unlike other historical cases, blacks remain in the same society with their former oppressors. As white America faces past inequalities, they buffer it by making promises to eradicate poverty through large-scale federal programs. Steele does not dismiss the legacy of slavery and persecution, and the economic and social subordination of black people as a responsible force leading to affirmative action in the first place. If anything, he argues that affirmative action, is society’s repayment. Steele argues loudly that over the long run policies based on racial preference serve only to prolong the social and economic disparity between whites and minorities. His position is that blacks will have to lift themselves out of poverty by dint of hard work, perseverance, and patience. Some blacks would disagree with that comment, but I for one believe that is the only way. reveling in self- pity will get you nothing and nowhere fast. In his essay he states that today, most racism exists in the heads of people. They perceive themselves such that they become the perception. A white man sees a black and is immediately reminded of his guilt. The black remembers his innocence and the two combine to form a relationship that is ‘perceived’. Actions are based on imaginary perceptions prolonging the condition. The ‘victimization’ criteria that the blacks are so fond of is not an escape, rather, it is a bargain made that has recuperations that no one ever thought possible. The blacks in their victimization have become slaves to the guilt of the whites and thus, are still oppressed. The bargain they made was a necessary one at the time yet, today it chains the two segments of society in bonds of slavery making the bargain one that Steele calls ‘Faustian’. Seemingly powerful, it actually takes from them the power to be independent. It makes them lack the initiative to aim for something more than that which is handed out by the whites. I’m black, you’re white, who’s innocent? Race and power in an era of blame By Shelby Steele Retrieved June 1, 2012 http://www.harpers.org/archive/1988/06/0023431

Article Summary And Critique The WritePass Journal

Article Summary And Critique Abstract Article Summary And Critique . What impact might mitigation of diffuse nitrate pollution have on river water quality in a rural catchmentCritiqueReferencesRelated Abstract This paper is going to summarise an articles that relate to environmental management and ecological modeling. It will also include a critique of the article in order to ascertain whether it has logical arguments.The critique will also involve an assessment of whether there was conclusive evidence in the article. In this paper, additional literature will be used in order to make personal opinions on the conclusions made by the authors of this article. Summary: Hutchins, M. G., 2012. What impact might mitigation of diffuse nitrate pollution have on river water quality in a rural catchment The article entitled â€Å"What impact might mitigation of diffuse nitrate pollution have on river water quality in a rural catchment?† by Michael Hutchins, studied the role played by nitrate loads in freshwater. The investigator carried out the study by evaluating how phytoplankton growth is affected by nutrient and light concentration. On one hand, the assessment of nutrients concentration was done by the measurement of annual mean concentration sourced from periodic regulatory monitoring. On the other hand, the effect of light was assessed using data sourced from solar radiation and sediment monitoring data. The investigator went further and assessed areas in the river under study that had sufficient calm water that could facilitate the growth of phytoplankton. This was done using hydraulic data collected from river network model applications. The researcher then went further and developed an analysis of the effect of the changes on land management in the nitrate concentrat ions in the river. This was carried out using estimations from NALTRACES, a nitrate model. An analysis using NALTRACES concluded that as much as agriculture contributes to increased levels of nitrates in the river water, its effect on the growth and concentration of phytoplankton is negligible. The study also found out that the growth of phytoplankton is regulated by the amount of sunlight that is able to infiltrate the water. In fact, areas that allow maximum light infiltration into the water promote extensive growth of Phytoplankton even if the levels of nitrates in the water are very low. Therefore, the investigation concluded that nitrate concentration is not one of the conditions that determine the growth of phytoplankton in the river water. The investigation concluded that developing a means of regulating the amount of light reaching the water is an effective way of regulating the growth of phytoplankton. It also suggested the establishment of a riparian tree cover as one of the ways that can be used in the regulation of light availability in the river water. Data was gathered and analyzed using a variety of simple modeling approaches to arrive at the conclusion that an effective way of mitigating phytoplankton growth is by minimizing illumination on the water surface. Critique The article by Hutchins is researched well, and the conclusions developed from the findings are well founded and backed by a good number of previous investigations. The conclusions are well founded because they are derived from the collected data. In addition, the conclusions are achieved after the collected data is critically analyzed and evaluated. The methodology applied in the investigation is effective enough to provide an explanation to the research issue. This is because it involves the collection of primary data as well as secondary data (Hutchins, 2012), which assists in explaining terms used in this research. The investigation applied a correlation analysis of nutrient level and phytoplankton growth, resulting to the development of a conclusion that had enough evidences that backed it. The evidence was derived from the data in the correlation analysis. In fact, the data used in the research acted as evidence for the conclusions made. Furthermore, data regarding sunlight ill umination and phytoplankton growth was used in the development of a sound analysis. From this analysis, it was concluded that it is one main factor that if controlled, the growth of phytoplankton can be fully regulated. On examining the sources used in this review, we notice that all sources are academic and written by well-known authors and published in credible journals. In fact, most of the studies referenced in the investigation were conducted between the years 2003 and 2012. Therefore, the sources cited in this article are the latest with respect to information portrayed in the article. However, the article has provided a stand that contradicts many recent investigations that link phytoplankton bloom to increased nutrient levels in water. Xu et al (2010) proposes an approach of regulating phytoplankton bloom in Lake Taihu that basically involves an approach aimed at lowering the lake waters nutritional levels. From their study, it was evident that phytoplankton bloom in the lake is directly associated with increased leaching of nutrients into the lake waters. On the other hand, Hutchins (2012) argues that nutrient levels have no form of association with phytoplankton bloom. This assertion is not founded since effects of human activities lead to unnatural forms of occasions. The sun is always constant, and its effects with relation to phytoplankton bloom are directly proportional to the levels of nutrients available in the waters to effect growth. As much as his conclusion links the reduction of illumination in the river as an approach towards managing the growth of phytoplankton, the application of this approach is quite limited and time consuming. In most cases, it might take several years to manage the problem by developing a means of regulating sunlight. According to a study by Lewis and Wurtsbaugh (2008), the phytoplankton growth limiting effect of nitrates is not universal. It is common in waters found in the high altitude tropic regions, which are not the case of the location of the river analysed in the study. The author also mentions phosphorus as a mineral that has no effect on the concentration of Phytoplankton; this stand contradicts a study by Sylvan and his colleagues (2006), which provided an inverse proportionality of the concentration of phosphorus to the concentration of phytoplankton. Therefore, the assumption adopted by Hutchins (2012), in his investigation required a deeper clarification on the approach adopted on arriving at the conclusion of delinking mineral concentrations to phytoplankton growth in the river. For the case of this river, I think a study that specifically analyses the extent to which nutrients affect the growth of phytoplankton is the best approach that will provide practical and applicable findings and recommendations. An in-depth analysis of the impacts of each nutrient to the growth of phytoplankton is necessary. Furthermore, this article is limited in its approach to developing a recommendation that aims at limiting the sunlight accessing the water in the river. As much as he assures the reader of the effectiveness of that approach, it is less viable due to several issues, including cost and time factor. In conclusion, as much as this article enriches the available level of understanding on management of Phytoplankton, its limitation in terms of applicability of the findings limits the effectiveness of the study with relation to the topic of the paper. References Hutchins, M. G., 2012. What impact might mitigation of diffuse nitrate pollution have on river water quality in a rural catchment? Journal of Environmental Management, 109, 19-26. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2012.04.045 Lewis, W. M., Wurtsbaugh A. W., 2008. Control of lacustrine phytoplankton by nutrients: Erosion of the phosphorus paradigm. Internat. Rev. Hydrobiol. 93, 446–465. Retrieved from http://ciresweb.colorado.edu/limnology/pubs/pdfs/Pub190.pdf Sylvan, J. B., Dortch Q.,Nelson, D.M.,MaierbrownA.F.,Morrison W., Ammerman, J. W., 2006. Phosphorus limits phytoplankton growth on the Louisiana shelf during the period of hypoxia formation. Environ. Sci. Technol. 40, 7548–7553. Retrieved from researchgate.net/publication/6548676_Phosphorus_limits_phytoplankton_growth_on_the_Louisiana_shelf_during_the_period_of_hypoxia_formation/file/d912f51017f64c452b.pdf Xu, H., Paerl, H.W., Qin B., Zhu G., Gao, G., 2010. Nitrogen and phosphorus inputs control phytoplankton growth in eutrophic Lake Taihu, China, Limnol. Oceanogr., 55(1), 420–432. Retrieved from jlakes.org/web/Xu%20et%20al.-LO2010.pdf

The Goddess Demeter †Greek History Essay

The Goddess Demeter – Greek History Essay Free Online Research Papers The Goddess Demeter Greek History Essay Have you ever thought about how it would be if we lived in a world where there was a god for everything? Very long ago, Greeks strongly believed in different kind of gods and goddesses. One of these goddesses was Demeter who provided fertility. â€Å"Demeter provides all nutrition on the earth, allowing her to be considered a vital source of survival† (A.L. Davidson, The Greek Goddess Demeter). Some of her main symbols include poppy seeds, and corn, which of course have to do with agriculture; and some colors, which represent her, are pink, brown, green, and yellow. She also taught mankind the art of sowing and sloughing. â€Å"She can also cross dimensional barriers between worlds and alter her form to appear as an elderly woman† (marvunapp.com/Appendix/demeterc.htm). She did not have many enemies, but only disliked the ones who did not help her when she was in search of her daughter Persephone, and also those who ate sacred plants. Demeter was an influential goddess with many characteristics, and a unique history. Demeter had many personality traits and only few flaws. She was the most generous of all goddesses and was very understanding and respectful. That is why she gained the sympathy and favor of the other Olympian gods. Not only she had the their sympathy but beyond that she also had the ability to truly sympathize with humans. In addition Demeter was very modest and shy. One of her flaws is her ability to invoke curses. For instance, â€Å"she cursed King Erysichton with insatiable hunger and endow mystical ability in sorcerers and mystics that know how to call upon her such as Clea† (marvunapp.com/Appendix/demeterc.htm). Although Demeter is a goddess, she has a family background. Demeter is the daughter of Cronus and Rhea; also sister of Zeus, Poseidon, Pluto, Hera and Hestia. â€Å"She never married† (theoi.com/Summary/Demeter.html), but was lovers with her brother Zeus. She had many children but her daughter Persephone was the most known one because of the famous myth. Haides fell in love with Persephone and Zeus helped him to kidnap her from her mother and take her to the Underworld. When Demeter found out that Haides had kidnapped her beloved daughter she became very angry. She searched everywhere for her and even brought â€Å"deadly starvation down upon mankind until Zeus agreed to let her return† (theoi.com/Summary/Demeter.html). Unfortunately when Hermes was sent to the Underworld in search of Persephone, he gave her a pomegranate and Persephone ate it. As a consequence of this, Persephone was forced to stay with Hades for a third of the year. â€Å"Only when Persephone is with her, Demeter lets things grow† (Micha F. Lindemans, Demeter.) Since agriculture played an important role in Greek history, Demeter was worshipped in many different ways. Particularly, she was worshipped in agricultural societies. Furthermore, the first loaf of bread from the harvest was sacrificed in her honor. Also, Demeter was often portrayed as a solemn woman, often wearing a wreath of braided ears of corn. Some regions were she was worshipped at were Attika, Messenia, and Ena. Demeter’s primary festival was the Athenian Thesmophoria. It celebrates the half of the year when Demeter didnt work as the goddess of the harvest; she spent this half of the year with her daughter. If we had lived in the ancient Greek times, then Demeter would have been very significant in our lives. Demeter taught humans how to grow, preserve, and prepare grain. Again, earth could not produce without her allowing it. The Greeks experienced that themselves when Persephone was taken away from her mother. Her history is very unique, not only her search for Persephone and the consequences that followed, but also many other myths.Above that. she is the mother of earth itself and is â€Å"invoked as the bringer of the seasons† (Micha F. Lindemans, Demeter.) Research Papers on The Goddess Demeter - Greek History EssayCanaanite Influence on the Early Israelite ReligionMind TravelBook Review on The Autobiography of Malcolm XHarry Potter and the Deathly Hallows EssayComparison: Letter from Birmingham and CritoHonest Iagos Truth through DeceptionWhere Wild and West MeetThe Masque of the Red Death Room meaningsGenetic EngineeringInfluences of Socio-Economic Status of Married Males

Passive Voice Definition and Examples

Passive Voice Definition and Examples In traditional grammar, the term passive voice refers to a type of sentence or clause in which the subject receives the action of the verb. For example, A good time was had by all. Contrast with active voice. The most common form of the passive in English is the short passive or agentless passive: a construction in which the agent (that is, the performer of an action) is not identified. For example, Mistakes were made. (In a long passive, the object of the verb in an active sentence becomes the subject.) See the discussion of the passive gradient in Examples and Observations below. Often the passive voice is formed by using the appropriate form of the verb to be (for example, is) and a past participle (for example, formed). However, passive constructions arent always made up of be and a past participle. For example, see the discussion of the get-passive. Though many style guides discourage use of the passive, the construction can be quite useful, especially when the performer of an action is unknown or unimportant. Passive constructions can also enhance cohesion. Examples and Observations Last week our dogwood tree was struck by lightning.Pandora, from Greek mythology, was given a box with all the worlds evils in it.(Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture, 2008)It is believed that in the elementary school a class of fifteen pupils for one teacher gives better results than either a class of three or a class of thirty.(Psychological Foundations of Educational Technology, ed. by W.C. Trow and E.E. Haddan, 1976)[Fern] found an old milking stool that had been discarded, and she placed the stool in the sheepfold next to Wilburs pen.(E.B. White, Charlottes Web, 1952)America was discovered accidentally by a great seaman who was looking for something else . . .. America was named after a man who discovered no part of the New World. History is like that, very chancy.(Samuel Eliot Morison, The Oxford History of the American People, 1965)Her bones were foundround thirty years laterwhen they razedher building toput up a parking lot.(Maya Angelou, Chicken-Licken. Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well, 1975) In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.(Douglas Adams, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, 1979)Fiction was invented the day Jonas arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale.(attributed to Gabriel Garcia Marquez)The young gentleman was later seen by me in front of the gare Saint-Lazare.(Raymond Queneau, Passive. Exercises in Style, 1947) In Defense of the Passive Voice The proportion of passive verbs varies with the type of prose: scientific prose, for instance, may show far more passives than narrative prose. But to point this out is not to denigrate scientific writing. The difference merely reflects the different natures of content, purpose, and audience. . . . Not only is the passive voice a significantly frequent option in modern prose, but it is also often the clearest and briefest way to convey information. . . . Indiscriminate slandering of the passive voice ought to be stopped. The passive should be recognized as a quite decent and respectable structure of English grammar, neither better nor worse than other structures. When it is properly chosen, wordiness and obscurity are no more increased than when the active voice is properly chosen. Its effective and appropriate use can be taught. (Jane R. Walpole, Why Must the Passive Be Damned? College Composition and Communication, 1979) True Passives, Semi-Passives, and the Passive Gradient The statistic from corpus analyses that four-fifths of passive sentences in texts occur without the agentive by-phrase makes a nonsense out of deriving passives from actives. In the active subjects are obligatory; there can be no active sentences without a subject. So where do all these passives with no agent come from whereby the agent is unknown? Not from an underlying active, obviously. It is common practice to assume a dummy subject in such cases, equivalent to someone, i.e. underlying My house was burgled is the sentence Someone burgled my house. But that is stretching a point beyond credibility. . . . [Randolph] Quirk et al. [in A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, 1985] attempt to get over this problem by presenting a passive gradient and the notion of semi-passive, exemplified by the following sentences: (33) This violin was made by my father.(34) This conclusion is hardly justified by the results.(35) Coal has been replaced by oil.(36) This difficulty can be avoided in several ways.- - - - - - - - - - -(37) We are encouraged to go on with the project.(38) Leonard was interested in linguistics.(39) The building is already demolished.(40) The modern world is getting more highly industrialized and mechanized.(41) My uncle was/got/seemed tired. The dotted line indicates the break between real passives and semi-passives. Those above the line are real passives, those below the line are increasingly remote from the ideal passive with a unique active paraphrase, and are not real passives at allthey are semi-passives. (Christopher Beedham, Language And Meaning: The Structural Creation of Reality. John Benjamins, 2005) Rise of the Get-Passive The passive in English is usually formed with the verb to be, yielding they were fired or the tourist was robbed. But we also have the get passive, giving us they got fired and the tourist got robbed. The get-passive goes back at least 300 years, but it has been on a rapid rise during the past 50 years. It is strongly associated with situations which are bad news for the subject- getting fired, getting robbed- but also situations that give some kind of benefit. (They got promoted. The tourist got paid.) However, the restrictions on its use may be relaxing over time and get-passives could get a whole lot bigger. (Arika Okrent, Four Changes to English So Subtle We Hardly Notice Theyre Happening. The Week, June 27, 2013) When to Use the Passive Voice in Journalistic Writing Lauren Kessler and Duncan McDonald [in When Words Collide, 8th ed., Wadsworth, 2012] offer two situations in which the passive voice must be used. First, passive voice is justified if the receiver of the action is more important than the creator of the action. They use this example: A priceless Rembrandt painting was stolen from the Metropolitan Museum of Art yesterday by three men posing as janitors. In this case, the Rembrandt should remain the subject of the sentence even though it receives the action. The painting is obviously more importantmore newsworthythan the three men who stole it.Kessler and McDonalds second reason for using passive voice is if the writer has no choice. Thats when the writer does not know who what the actor, or the creator of the action, is. The example they use: The cargo was damaged during the trans-Atlantic flight. Air turbulence? Sabotage? Was the cargo strapped in properly? The writer doesnt know, so the voice must be passive. (Robert M. Knight, A Journalistic Approach to Good Writing: The Craft of Clarity, 2nd ed. Iowa State Press, 2003) Evasive Uses of the Passive Voice: Mistakes Were Made [W]hen [New Jersey Governor Chris Christie] said mistakes were made, did he know he was quoting Nixon press secretary Ron Ziegler, or did that particular obfuscatory use of the passive voice just pop into his head? (Katha Pollitt, Christie: A Bully’s Bully. The Nation, February 3, 2014)Mistakes were made. I didnt make them. (Chief of Staff and later Secretary of State Alexander Haig, Jr., on the Watergate scandals, January 1981)We did not achieve what we wished, and serious mistakes were made in trying to do so. (President Ronald Reagan, regarding the Iran-Contra affair, January 1987)Clearly, no one regrets more than I do the appearance of impropriety. Obviously, some mistakes were made.† (Chief of Staff John Sununu, when caught using government military aircraft for personal trips, December 1991)Mistakes were made here by people who either did it deliberately or inadvertently. (President Bill Clinton, when it was discovered that he had invited the countrys senior bankin g regulator to a meeting with the Democratic Party’s senior fund-raiser, January 1997) I acknowledge that mistakes were made here. (Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, regarding the firing of eight U.S. attorneys, March 2007)We have not passed that subtle line between childhood and adulthood until we move from the passive voice to the active voicethat is, until we have stopped saying It got lost, and say, I lost it. (Sidney J. Harris, On the Contrary, 1962)

SAB 361 UNIT 9 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

SAB 361 UNIT 9 - Essay Example Active participation in sports and other leisure activities contribute positively to the total educational process through the development of skills essential for everyday life† (University of Memphis par. 4). has time and again demonstrated a strong and positive correlation between high school sports participation and academic achievement† (3). Hartmann (2008) likewise cited other research studies that supported the contention that involvement in high school or college sports contribute positively to the educational process, to wit: â€Å"developmental theorists have long talked about the character-building and socializing impacts of sport, based upon a correlation between skills and habits required for success in the classroom, sports arena, and daily life†¦ Even more recently, sociologists have begun to explore the role that sports participation plays in community involvement and the cultivation of social capital more generally† (8). These validates that sports contribute positively to the educational process of the institution, as a whole. Hartmann, Douglas. "High School Sports Participation and Educational Attainment: Recognizing, Assessing and Utilizing the Relationship." 2008. LA84 Foundation. 8 April 2012

Analysis of the operations management activities of zara Essay

Analysis of the operations management activities of zara - Essay Example The organisation that has managed to pull this off is Zara, the Spanish fashion retail chain. Not only has Zara continued to record rising profits in a stagnant market, but is increasing the pace of store openings to almost one per day in the current year. Currently there are 758 Zara stores throughout the world in 58 countries, but by 2009, there are planned to be 4000. (Kane 2005). The company is not just a European phenomenon, but a global force and in many ways could be considered a leader in the retailing revolution that is sweeping the fashion world. Zara is a company within the Inditex holding group also founded by the creator of Zara. Before looking in depth at the successful business model that Zara operates and how it was developed it is worth looking at the overall fashion scene in order to gauge the field and to further show how different Zara is and how it became and remains so successful. Without doubt, there is a fashion revolution underway in the High Street. This revolution underscores a fashion retailing war that can only be described as cut throat and it reflects a huge change in the underlying cause of fashion expectations amongst the shoppers - the huge reduction in cost of high fashion items which has been pioneered by such fashion retailers as H&M of Sweden, Top Shop of the UK and especially Zara of pain. The war has had many casualties which have been mortally wounded amongst them C&A and M&S which catered for the wrong people at the wrong time and ended up with millions in unwanted unsaleable stock. Other companies struggled through the bad patches and are fighting back to remain in the high street realising belatedly that shoppers all over Europe and indeed the rest of the world want to dress like the rich and wealthy and the stars of stage and screen. Fashion retailers are rushing to satisfy this demand and shops like Top Shop, gap, Zara and others are b attling it out to get ahead and stay on top in this cutthroat and swiftly changing business. The market in Britain alone is worth 27 billion pounds and decisions made by company and group managements right down to store managers together with their chosen business models make the companies sink or swim. A BBC report on the subject (BBC News 2003), noted that shoppers had become obsessed with the way that celebrities dressed because those clothes have become so much more accessible in both price and availability. Stores are becoming that much better at including items that celebrities wear and reproducing them very quickly. The same report quotes Top shop director Jane Shepherdson as saying that customers want to be able to buy into the trends that they've seen from the catwalk as soon as possible. Top shop wasn't always able to accommodate this because of its inflexible business plan that operated separate summer and winter collections which often had lead times built into the system of up to 18 months. By observing another rival on the high street scene, Gap, it can be seen that by relying on previous problems were due to a mistaken strategy of targeting the teenage market with its Old Navy stores. The Swedish firm H&M was one of the leaders in changing that by appointing young designers to make high fashion as swiftly and as cheaply as possible, but initially the quality

Islam in America Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Islam in America - Research Paper Example In 2005, nearly 96,000 people from various Islamic countries were accepted as legal permanent United States residents. According to a 2009 Gallup poll, American Muslims are identified to be a significant racially diverse religious group in the United States. This paper will discuss the way Muslims are perceived after the World Trade Center attack of 11 September, and the factors that contribute to the numerous issues with regard to stereotyping Muslim community. It will also put forward some thoughts and strategies to address those issues. II. Causes of Stereotyping Muslims A. Radical Muslims and Extremists While analyzing Islamism in a religious, social, and political context, the acts of some of the Islamic extremists seem to be the major cause of stereotyping Muslims. The PBS television program â€Å"Jihad in America† and the popular movie â€Å"True Lies† depicting the terrorist group â€Å"Crimson Jihad† caused the Muslims to get a negative image in the Amer ican society (â€Å"Struggling against stereotypes†). Recently, the use of the term â€Å"Jihad† is found to be the central issue of Muslims stereotyping. According to the Prophet Muhammad, the extreme form of jihad is one’s personal struggle to make himself a better Muslim. On the contrary, today some Islamic extremists link the term â€Å"Jihad† to â€Å"Holy war†. Evidently, interest groups that intend to preserve their subversive ideas on the strength of religious beliefs negatively affect the Muslim community as a whole. B. 9/11 Attacks According to Ghazali, the September 11 World Trade Center attacks by al-Qaeda, which caused the death of nearly 3000 people turned to be the major cause of Muslims stereotyping in the United States. Although al-Qaeda is not an affiliate of Islam religion, most of the people believe that the whole Muslims had interest behind the attack. The attack raised dreadful socio-economic challenges to the nation, that the government adopted a strict approach toward the Muslim immigration. This shift in governmental stance also placed the Muslim community under suspicion. In addition, the al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden had delivered a set of religious sensitive speeches followed by the attack, which also added to stereotyping Muslims. C. The Media showing Muslims as Terrorists One cannot undermine the role of media in growing Muslim stereotyping since the event of September 11. For instance, newspaper headlines regularly use the words ‘fanatic’, ‘militant’, ‘fundamentalist’, and ‘terrorist’ as next to the terms ‘Islam’ and ‘Muslim’. To illustrate; in 1995, the British newspaper Today (reported by Fatoohi) published heart-touching picture that depicted a fireman carrying burnt remains of a killed infant from the wreckage of a severe explosion. This picture was published along with a sensational headline: â€Å"In the name of Islam†. In addition, events such as Saddam Hussein’s wartime rhetoric and World Trade Center Bombing attained enormous media coverage as evidence of â€Å"Islamic fundamentalism† (â€Å"Struggling against stereotypes†). Media seem to have given intentional coverage to Islamic terrorism while ignoring rebellious activities of other religious groups. And, attacks against Muslim community often go unreported. Edward,

Critique of a Political Speech Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Critique of a Political Speech - Essay Example For the first appeal, or Ethos, it is usually utilized for the description of the speaker’s credibility or authority in the subject he is talking on. It presents the questions, what authority does the speaker to talk on the topic or â€Å"is the speaker knowledgeable enough?† Ethos also pertains to the charisma of the speaker, on whether he has captured or garnered the respect of his audience for them to listen to what he has to convey. In the speech of Obama, it is clear that the element or appeal of Ethos is present. Since it is Obama’s inaugural speech as the 44th President of the United States, he obviously has the authority, charisma, and trust of the audience. In his speech, he reminds the audience of his inauguration as the 44th President of the United States, offers his thanks and gratefulness for his victory and at the same time, and recognizes the enormous responsibility he is to undertake from his predecessors. Typical to many political speeches, ethos is established during the introduction where a speaker attempts to garner the trust and confidence of his audience. He posits in the initial paragraphs of his Inaugural speech, â€Å"Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.† What can be appreciated from Obama’s speech with regard to ethos would be that Obama presented his authority and charisma in a very humble manner. He did not appear to boast that he is now the latest President of the United States, but instead conveyed an aura of humility. He begins by saying, â€Å"My fellow citizens†, where he at tempts to present himself as another ordinary American citizen, and he again mentions, â€Å"I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.† Obama even sought to praise the achievements of then-President George W. Bush, which would have to a certain extent, healed wounded political scars in the recent elections. He stated, â€Å"I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.† For the second appeal, Logos, it is the employment of reason and logic to persuade the audience. Through the use of facts, statistics, and researches as evidence, the speaker convinces the audience of the truth and validity of his claim. As expected of a prominent lawyer, a former Senator, and the new President of the United States, Obama is well-informed, well-researched, and well-versed with political developments . In his speech, Obama presents the current problems of the United States. He states in paragraph 4, â€Å"That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our

Different Forms of Political Systems Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Different Forms of Political Systems - Essay Example The present research has identified that direct democracy refers to democracy where each resident in a state has an equivalent right to participate in the government’s workings. However, in a representative democracy, the citizens elect their representatives who then make the laws. In a democracy, both the leaders and the citizens have power in running the government. The leader (representative) of a state has the power of making major decisions that are cultivated by the citizens. Citizens have the power of electing a representative of their choice and airing their views, opinions, and wishes for the implementation of the constitution and other government workings. There is no person with absolute power in democracy as the leaders and the citizens have almost the same rights in power. The citizens can nullify the election if a leader is deemed unfit by filing a petition in a court of law to stop him or her from leading. Thus, representatives in a democratic political system d o not have full power over citizens. On the other hand, totalitarianism refers to a political system where the government has total authority over its citizens in a state and controls their public and private lives where possible. The ruler of a state also has absolute power over his or her citizens. He or she tends to impose full authority and administration in every aspect of the citizen’s lives. The government in such a political system controls the citizens by using propaganda, terror and technological means to track down unsuspecting citizens to abide by the demands of the government. Totalitarianism is divided into two categories: right-wing and left-wing totalitarianism. â€Å"Nazism† and â€Å"Fascism† evolved from right-wing totalitarianism whereas â€Å"Communism† evolved from left-right totalitarianism. Right-wing totalitarianism draws its support mainly from middle classes to seek the maintenance of the economic and social status quo. However, left-wing totalitarianism has developed from working-class movements to seek elimination of class distinctions. In essence, right-wing totalitarianism propagates the private ownership of industrial wealth by supporting the middle class.

Critique of a Political Speech Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Critique of a Political Speech - Essay Example For the first appeal, or Ethos, it is usually utilized for the description of the speaker’s credibility or authority in the subject he is talking on. It presents the questions, what authority does the speaker to talk on the topic or â€Å"is the speaker knowledgeable enough?† Ethos also pertains to the charisma of the speaker, on whether he has captured or garnered the respect of his audience for them to listen to what he has to convey. In the speech of Obama, it is clear that the element or appeal of Ethos is present. Since it is Obama’s inaugural speech as the 44th President of the United States, he obviously has the authority, charisma, and trust of the audience. In his speech, he reminds the audience of his inauguration as the 44th President of the United States, offers his thanks and gratefulness for his victory and at the same time, and recognizes the enormous responsibility he is to undertake from his predecessors. Typical to many political speeches, ethos is established during the introduction where a speaker attempts to garner the trust and confidence of his audience. He posits in the initial paragraphs of his Inaugural speech, â€Å"Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.† What can be appreciated from Obama’s speech with regard to ethos would be that Obama presented his authority and charisma in a very humble manner. He did not appear to boast that he is now the latest President of the United States, but instead conveyed an aura of humility. He begins by saying, â€Å"My fellow citizens†, where he at tempts to present himself as another ordinary American citizen, and he again mentions, â€Å"I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors.† Obama even sought to praise the achievements of then-President George W. Bush, which would have to a certain extent, healed wounded political scars in the recent elections. He stated, â€Å"I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.† For the second appeal, Logos, it is the employment of reason and logic to persuade the audience. Through the use of facts, statistics, and researches as evidence, the speaker convinces the audience of the truth and validity of his claim. As expected of a prominent lawyer, a former Senator, and the new President of the United States, Obama is well-informed, well-researched, and well-versed with political developments . In his speech, Obama presents the current problems of the United States. He states in paragraph 4, â€Å"That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our

Econ of Arts and Entertainment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Econ of Arts and Entertainment - Essay Example An example of such issues is the labor market issue. Using the sports industry as an example of an art related industry, this paper aims at discussing the labor market issues in the sports industry. One of the main things that attract spectators to sports is the fact that they will be able to experience some aspects of struggles that are common in human lives in a dramatic and stark way. However, economists can be attracted to sports for reasons that are different from those of the spectators. To economists they see sports as an industry with the ability to illustrate the economic principles in an attractive and interesting way. Over the years the labor aspect of the sports industry has gradually grown to become more and more complex (Burk 173). It has gotten to a place when been involved in professional sports without commercializing it is no longer attractive. This trend can be illustrated by the way soccer teams globally have to spend more on their players in order to make sure that they attract more fans which will result to more income. If a team chooses not to spend more in order to hire the best players in the market, they will be competitively disadvantaged making them less attractive. Supply and demand of labor are aspects that should be keenly observed in any industry, especially during these days of economic hardships and uncertainty. This applies to the sports industry. It is important to note that the demand for labor in the sports industry can influence that rate of payment for human labor. The payment can also vary in terms of individual mobility, racial discrimination, personal productivity, and availability of substitutes. Property rights can affect the supply of sports talent. Collective agreements like payroll caps, reverse order drafts, and revenue sharing can be used to control such forces (Rosner and Shropshire 137). Under normal

Investigation and prevention of child abuse Essay Example for Free

Investigation and prevention of child abuse Essay Child abuse is one of the most common human right violations in the human community. According to UNCEF reports, at least one child dies every day as a result of child abuse. Nevertheless, the exact number of child deaths as a result of chilled abuse is hindered by the fact that most cases of child deaths in the communities goes without investigation. Still, an estimated over 30, 000 child in America are put under protection registers annually (American Prosecution Research Institute 12). The world is approximated to have over 100 million abused children most of whom are from the developing nations. However, these are just but a few of child abuse cases which are reported. There are numerous types of child abuse practices in the society. They range from infant shaking, to child battering, to child negligence, to child sexual abuse (Perona, Bottoms, and Vieth 42). Such practices are blamed for having a negative impact on the psychological, physical, and social development of the child. The process of preventing child abuse effectively dictates for the participation of all members of the community in ensuring early identification of such problems (Perona, Bottoms, and Vieth 51). Creating awareness among children as well as other members of the community on the rights of children plays an instrumental role in mitigating child abuse in the community. Investigation of child abuse for legal charges involves numerous methods depending on the type and magnitude of the act. For instance, Physical sexual abuse on kids can either be self evident or call for medical procedures to qualify (Myers 46). The history of family relations plays a crucial role in child abuse investigation practices by law enforcement. This paper seeks to give a detailed discussion on the prevention and investigation of child abuse. Prevention of child abuse The realization of effective child abuse prevention entails the creation of awareness on the forms and how to identify child abuse as well as engaging efforts in mitigating risk factors to child abuse in the community (Perona, Bottoms, and Vieth 51). The problem of child abuse in the community is increased by lack of awareness by the public. According to available statistics for example, child sexual abuse incidences in the American society has its peak between the onset of puberty and adolescence (American Prosecution Research Institute 67). At this age, most of the victims have mental capability to identify and avoid being victims of sexual abuse. Based on this reasoning, creating adequate awareness among the child can greatly aid in mitigating child abuse practice in the community. In this pursuit, since 1983, the American nation has set April as Child Abuse Prevention Month. In addition, the government funds child-abuse prevention initiatives through its Community-Based Grants for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (CBCAP) (American Prosecution Research Institute 71). Still on awareness, society cohesion factor plays an important role in preventing child (Myers 102). Just as is the case with other forms of crime prevention practices, the local community members find much advantage in the early identification and thus controlling of child abuse in their neighborhoods. This is because; they are the ones living close to the sources of child abuse; the family unit. Therefore, encouraging communal living among members of the community is instrumental in preventing child abuse. Another common practice of preventing child abuse is enforcing zero tolerance policies on domestic violence. According to numerous research findings, it is established that families marked with couple violence have a higher prevalence of child abuse; both physically and emotionally (Myers 112). There are numerous risk factors identified for causing child abuse practices. Such include the social and economic position of the family and the local community and the effectiveness of the law enforcement and criminal justice system in addressing child abuse cases (Myers 108). It has been sufficiently claimed that poverty in the in family plays an instrumental factor in perpetuating child abuse practices such as neglect. Financial constrains in the family also serves to cause stress and depression among parent, a factor that negatively impacts on the parent-child relationship. Still, an idle mind is the devils workshop. Therefore, the sustainable prevention of child abuse dictates for resolving eminent economic problems that affecting members of the local community. Also found to influence the level of child abuse is the character and gender of the child. Statistical evidence indicates that most mentally or physically disabled children are found to be at risk of child abuse (Perona, Bottoms, and Vieth 61). The statistics also establish substantial evidence connecting gender classification as a clear cause of child abuse in the community. In particular, the girl child is prone to child abuse and neglect. In some countries, the girl child is rarely provided with equal education as the boy child. This is a denial of the children right to education. In addition, girls are common victims to forced marriages as well as prostitution. On the other hand, the boy child is commonly marked with forced labor. They are also the main victims of corporal punishment compared to girls. These are the reasons behind the enactment and enforcement of numerous laws mitigating practices such as child pornography and prostitution and child labor (American Prosecution Research Institute 61). Many nations across the globe including the United States have banned corporal punishment of children both in the schools and in the family. This serves the purpose of limiting inhuman punishments on children. It is worth noting that the United Nations initiative on providing basic education to all children has taken cause in many countries across the globe. This initiative is quite instrumental in influencing prevention of anti-girl child education practices in the nation as much of its emphasis is on the girl child. Such an initiative is supported by numerous community based non-governmental organization. The war on drug abuse in the community is an important tool in mitigating child abuse. According to numerous research findings, drug abuse like alcoholism is among the leading causes of domestic violence as well as child sexual abuse in the community (Myers 121). This claim has been evidently supported by the fact that drugs function in compromising the reasoning and judgmental ability of an individual. Such can also be explained by the fact that drugs enhance aggression and temper of the victim. In a move to mitigate this practice of drug abuse as a potential cause for child abuse, the American nation is found to spend billions of dollars on the war against drugs in the society. Investigation of child abuse The process of investigating child abuse is heavily dependent on the availability of claimed evidence of physical, emotional, and/or sexual abuse. According to the available legal provisions; some forms of child abuse such as child labor neglect, and failure to provide education as well as some forms physical abuse of are self evident (Myers 132). Therefore, the investigation of such practices is mainly based on reported evidence rather than dictating for medical procedures. Also commonly involved in the investigation practices is identifying the history of a child abuse problem. According to psychological principles, human problems such as emotional stress and depression are a direct result of long term abuse in children. Based on this, the period over which such abuse on a particular child should be provided as qualifying evidence against the defendants charged with child abuse (Myers 136). As per the requirements of the law, this evidence can be self proclaimed by the victim, given by a member of the local community or from a doctor. The doctor should conduct an extensive diagnosis on the subject matter to give admissible evidence. Such might cover but not limited to the extent of physical or emotional damage impacted on the child. However, the laws protecting children against abuse prohibit against even the slightest form of action against a child that can compromise their social, emotional, academic and physical development. Conclusion Despite the numerous efforts by governments and other community-based non-governmental organizations, child abuse remains a major problem in the global community. There are various causes of child abuse in the community. Such include; domestic violence, cultural beliefs, economic status, and social practices in the community. The problem is further complicated by failure by the victims or members of the community to reports such cases to the relevant authorities for legal action against the perpetrators. Therefore, effective child abuse prevention strategies must take into account the need for creating public awareness on the problem. It should also devote much emphasis on resolving the main social and economic factors which promote child abuse. It is only through consulted cooperation among all stakeholders in the community that the war against child abuse can be successful.

Analysis of QoS Parameters

Analysis of QoS Parameters Chapter 3 3. Analysis of QoS Parameters 3.1 Introduction A Number of QoS [11] of parameters can be measured and monitored to determine whether a service level offered or received is being achieved. These parameters consist of the following 1. Network availability 2. Bandwidth 3. Delay 4. Jitter 5. Loss 3.1.1 Network Availability Network availability can have a consequential effect on QoS. Simply put, if the network is not available, even during short periods of time, the user or application may achieve unpredictable or undesirable performance (QoS) [11]. Network availability is the summation of the availability of many items that are used to create a network. These include network device redundancy, e.g. redundant interfaces, processor cards or power supplies in routers and switches, resilient networking protocols, multiple physical connections, e.g. fiber or copper, backup power sources etc. Network operators can increase their networks availability by implementing varying degrees of each item. 3.1.2 Bandwidth Bandwidth is one of the most important QoS parameter. It can be divided in to two types 1. Guaranteed bandwidth 2. Available bandwidth 3.1.2.1 Guaranteed bandwidth Network operators offer a service that provides minimum BW and burst BW in the SLA. Because the guaranteed BW the service costs higher as compare to the available BW service. So the service providers must ensure the special treatment to the subscribers who have got the guaranteed BW service. The network operator separates the subscribers by different physical or logical networks in some cases, e.g., VLANs, Virtual Circuits, etc. In some cases, the guaranteed BW service traffic may share the same network infrastructure with available BW service traffic. We often use to see the case at location where network connections are expensive or the bandwidth is leased from another service provider. When subscribers share the same network infrastructure, the subscribers of the guaranteed BW service must get the priority over the available BW subscribers traffic so that in times of networks congestion the guaranteed BW subscribers SLAs are met. Burst BW can be specified in terms of amount and du ration of excess BW (burst) above the guaranteed minimum. QoS mechanism may be activated to avoid or discard traffic that use consistently above the guaranteed minimum BW that the subscriber agreed to in the SLA. 3.1.2.2 Available bandwidth As we know network operators have fixed Bandwidth, but to get more return on the investment of their network infrastructure, they oversubscribe the BW. By oversubscribing the BW a user is subscribed to be no always available to them. This allows users to compete for available BW. They get more or less BW it depends upon the amount of traffic form other users on the network at any given time. Available bandwidth is a technique commonly used over consumer ADSL networks, e.g., a customer signs up for a 384-kbps service that provides no QoS (BW) guarantee in the SLA. The SLA points out that the 384-kbps is standard but does not make any guarantees. Under lightly loaded conditions, the 384-kbps BW will be available to the users but upon network loaded condition, this BW will not be available consistently. It can be noticed during certain times of the day when number of users access the network. 3.1.3 Delay Network delay is the transit time an application experiences from the ingress (entering) point to the egress (exit) point of the network. Delay can cause significant QoS issues with application such as Video conferencing and fax transmission that simply time-out and final under excessive delay conditions. Some applications can compensate for small amounts of delay but once a certain amount is exceeded, the QoS becomes compromised. For example some networking equipment can spoof an SNA session on a host by providing local acknowledgements when the network delay would cause the SNA session to time out. Similarly, VoIP gateways and phones provide some local buffering to compensate for network delay. There can be both fixed and variable delays. Examples of fixed delays are: Application based delay, e.g., voice codec processing time and IP packet creation time by the TCP/IP software stack Data transmission (queuing delay) over the physical network media at each network hop. Propagation delay across the network based on transmission distance Examples of variable delays are: †¢ Ingress queuing delay for traffic entering a network node †¢ Contention with other traffic at each network node †¢ Egress queuing delay for traffic exiting a network node 3.1.4 Jitter (Delay Variation) Jitter is the difference in delay presented by different packets that are part of the same traffic flow. High frequency delay variation is known as jitter and the low frequency delay variation is known as wander. Primary cause of jitter is basically the differences in queue wait times for consecutive packets in a flow and this is the most significant issue for QoS. Traffic types especially real time traffic such as video conferencing can not tolerate jitter. Differences in packet arrival times cause in the voice. All transport system exhibit some jitter. As long as jitter limits below the defined tolerance level, it does not affect service quality. 3.1.5 Loss Loss either bit errors or packet drops has a significant impact on VoIP services as compare to the data services. During the transmission of the voice, loss of multiple packets may cause an audible pop that will become irritating to the user. Now as compare to the voice transmission, in data transmission loss of single bit or multiple packets of information will not effect the whole communication and is almost never noticed by users. In case of real time video conferencing, consecutive packet loss may cause a momentary glitch (defect) on the screen, but the video then proceeds as before. However, if packet drops get increase, then the quality of the transmission degrades. For minimum quality rate of packet loss must be less than 5% and less then 1% for toll quality. When the network node will be congested, it will drop the packets and by this the loss will occur. TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) is one of the networking protocols that offer packets loss protection by the retransmission of packets that may have been dropped by the network. When network congestion will be increased, more packets will be dropped and hence there will be more TCP transmission. If congestion continues the network performance will obviously degrade because much of the BW is being used for the retransmission of dropped packets. TCP will eventually reduce its transmission window size, due to this reduction in window size smaller packets will be transmitted; this will eventually reduce congestion, resulting in fewer packets being dropped. Because congestion has a direct influence on packet loss, congestion avoidance mechanism is often deployed. One such mechanism is called Random Early Discard (RED). RED algorithms randomly and intentionally drop packets once the traff ic reaches one or more configured threshold. RED provides more efficient congestion management for TCP-based flows. 3.1.5.1 Emission priorities It determines the order in which traffic is transmitted as it exits a network node. Traffic with higher emission priority is transmitted a head of traffic with a lower emission priority. Emission priorities also determine the amount of latency introduced to the traffic by the network nodes queuing mechanism. For example, email which is a delay tolerant application will get the lower emission priority as compare to the delay sensitive real time applications such as voice or video. These delay sensitive applications can not be buffered but are being transmitted while the delay tolerant applications may be buffered. In a simple way we can say that emission priorities use a simple transmit priority scheme whereby higher emission priority traffic is always transmitted ahead of lower emission priority traffic. This is typically accomplished using strict priority scheduling (queuing) the downside of this approach is that low emission priority queues may never get services (starved) it there is always higher emission priority traffic with no BW rate limiting. A more detailed scheme provides a weighted scheduling approach to the transmission of the traffic to improve fairness, i.e., the lower emission priority traffic is transmitted. Finally, some emission priority schemes provide a mixture of both priority and weighted schedulers. 3.1.5.2 Discarded priorities Are used to determine the order in which traffic gets discarded. Due to the network congestion packets may be get dropped i.e., the traffic exceeds its prescribed amount of BW for some period of time. When the network will be congested, traffic with a higher discard priority will get drop as compare to the traffic with a lower discard priority. Traffic with similar QoS performance can be sub divided using discard priorities. This allows the traffic to receive the same performance when the network node is not congested. However, when the network node gets congested, the discard priority is used to drop the more suitable traffic first. Discard priorities also allow traffic with the same emission priority to be discarded when the traffic is out of profile. With out discard priorities traffic would need to be separated into different queues in a network node to provide service differentiation. This can be expensive since only a limited number of hardware queues (typically eight or less) are available on networking devices. Some devices may have software based queues but as these are increasingly used, network node performance is typically reduced. With discard priorities, traffic can be placed in the same queue but in effect the queue is sub divided into virtual queues, each with a different discard priority. For example if a product supports three discard priorities, then one hardware queues in effect provides three QoS Levels. Performance Dimension Application Bandwidth Sensitivity to Delay Jitter Loss VoIP Low High High Medium Video Conf High High High Medium Streaming Video on Demand High Medium Medium Medium Streaming Audio Low Medium Medium Medium Client Server Transaction Medium Medium Low High Email Low Low Low High File Transfer Medium Low Low High Table 3.1: Application performance dimensions (use histogram) Table 3.1 illustrates the QoS performance dimensions required by some common applications. Applications can have very different QoS requirements. As these are mixed over a common IP transport network, without applying QoS the network traffic will experience unpredictable behavior. 3.2 Categorizing Applications Networked applications can be categorized based on end user application requirements. Some applications are between people while other applications are a person and a networked device application, e.g., a PC and web server. Finally, some networking devices, e.g., router-to-router. Table 3.2 categorizes applications into four different traffic categories: 1. Network Control 2. Responsive 3. Interactive 4. Timely Traffic Category Example Application Network Control Critical Alarm, routing, billing ETC. Responsive Streaming Audio/Video, Client/Server Transaction Interactive VoIP, Interactive gaming, Video Conferencing Timely Email, Non Critical Table 3.2: Application Categorization 3.2.1 Network Control Applications Some applications are used to control the operations and administration of the network. Such application include network routing protocols, billing applications and QoS monitoring and measuring for SLAs. These applications can be subdivided into those required for critical and standard network operating conditions. To create high availability networks, network control applications require priority over end user applications because if the network is not operating properly, end user application performance will suffer. 3.2.2 Responsive applications Some applications are between a person and networked devices applications to be responsive so a quick response back to the sender (source) is required when the request is being sent to the networking device. Sometimes these applications are referred to as being near real time. These near real time applications require relatively low packet delay, jitter and loss. However QoS requirements for the responsive applications are not as stringent as real time, interactive application requirements. This category includes streaming media and client server web based applications. Streaming media application includes Internet radio and audio / video broadcasts (news, training, education and motion pictures). Streaming applications e.g. videos require the network to be responsive when they are initiated so the user doesnt wait for long time before the media begins playing. For certain types of signaling these applications require the network to be responsive also. For example with movie on deman d when a user changes channels or forward, rewinds or pause the media user expects the application to react similarly to the response time of there remote control. The Client / server web applications typically involve the user selecting a hyperlink to jump from one page to another or submit a request etc. These applications also require the network to be responsive such that once the hyperlink to be responsive such that once the hyperlink is selected, a response. This can be achieved over a best effort network with the help of broadband internet connection as compare to dial up. Financial transaction may be included in these types of application, e.g., place credit card order and quickly provide feedback to the user indicating that either the transaction has completed or not. Otherwise the user may be unsure to initiate a duplicate order. Alternatively the user may assume that the order was placed correctly but it may not have. In either case the user will not be satisfied with the network or applications performance. Responsive applications can use either UDP or TCP based transport. Streaming media applications typically use UDP because in UDP it would not be fruitful to retransmit the data. Web based applications are based on the hypertext transport protocol and always use TCP, for web based application packet loss can be managed by transmission control protocol (TCP) which retransmit lost packets. In case of retransmission of lost streaming media is sufficiently buffered. If not then the lost packets are discarded. This results in the form of distortion in media. 3.2.3 Interactive Applications Some applications are interactive whereby two or more people communicate or participate actively. The participants expect the real time response from the networked applications. In this context real time means that there is minimal delay (latency) and delay variations (jitter) between the sender and receiver. Some interactive applications, such as a telephone call, have operated in real time over the telephone companies circuit switched networks for over 100 years. The QoS expectations for voice applications have been set and therefore must also be achieved for packetized voice such as VoIP. Other interactive applications include video conferencing and interactive gaming. Since the interactive applications operate in real time, packet loss must be minimized. Interactive applications typically are UDP based (Universal Datagram Protocol) and hence cannot retransmit lost or dropped packets as with TCP based applications. However it would not be beneficial to retransmit the packets because interactive applications are time based. For example if a voice packet was lost. It doesnt make sense to retransmit the packet because the conservations between the sender and receiver have already progressed and the lost packet might be from part of the conversation that has already passed in time. 3.2.4 Timely Applications There are some applications which do not require real time performance between a person and networked devices application but do require the information to be delivered in a timely manner. Such example includes save and send or forward email applications and file transfer. The relative importance of these applications is based on their business priorities. These applications require that packets arrive with abounded amount of delay. For example, if an email takes few minutes to arrive at its destination, this is acceptable. However if we consider it in a business environment, if an email takes 10 minutes to arrive at its destination, this will often not acceptable. The same bounded delay applies to file transfer. Once a file transfer is initiated, delay and jitter are illogical because file transfer often take minutes to complete. It is important to note that timely applications use TCP based transport instead of UDP based transport and therefore packet loss is managed by TCP which r etransmit any lost packets resulting in no packet loss. By summarizing above paragraph we can say that timely applications expect the network QoS to provide packets with a bounded amount of delay not more than that. Jitter has a negligible effect on these types of applications. Loss is reduced to zero due to TCPs retransmission mechanism. 3.3 QoS Management Architecture We can divide QoS management architecture of VoIP into two planes: data plane and control plane. Packet classification, shaping, policing, buffer management, scheduling, loss recovery, and error concealment are involved in the mechanism of data plane. They implement the actions the network needs to take on user packets, in order to enforce different class services. Mechanisms which come in control plane are resource provisioning, traffic engineering, admission control, resource reservation and connection management etc. 3.3.1 Data Plane 3.3.1.1 Packet Forwarding It consists of Classifier, Marker, Meter, Shaper / Dropper. When a packet is received, a packet classifier is used to determine which flow or class the packet belongs to. Those packets belong to the same flow/class obey a predefined rule and are processed in an alike manner. The basic criteria of classification for VoIP applications could be IP address, TCP/UDP port, IP precedence, protocol, input port, DiffServ code points (DSCP), or Ethernet 802.1p class of service (CoS). Cisco supports several additional criteria such as access list and traffic profile. The purpose of the meter is to decide whether the packet is in traffic profile or not. The Shaper/Dropper drops the packets which crossed the limits of traffic profile to bring in conformance to current network load. A marker is used to mark the certain field in the packet, such as DS field, to label the packet type for differential treatment later. After the traffic conditioner, buffer is used for packet storage that waits for transmission. 3.3.1.2 Buffer Management and Scheduling Active queue management (RED) drops packets before the repletion of the queue can avoid the problem of unfair resource usage. Predictable queuing delay and bandwidth sharing can be achieved by putting the flows into different queues and treating individually. Schedulers of this type can not be scaled as overhead increases as the number of on-going traffic increases. Solution is class-based schedulers such as Constraint Based WFQ and static Priority which schedule traffic in a class-basis fashion. But for the individual flow it would be difficult to get the predictable delay and bandwidth sharing. So care must be taken to apply this to voice application which has strict delay requirements. 3.3.1.3 Loss Recovery We can classify loss recovery into two ways one is Active recovery and the other is Passive recovery. We have retransmission in Active recovery and Forward Error Correction (Adding redundancy) in passive recovery. Retransmission may not be suitable for VoIP because of it latency of packets increases. 3.3.2 Control Plane 3.3.2.1 Resource provisioning and Traffic Engineering Refers to the configuration of resources for applications in the network. In industry, main approach of resource provisioning is over provisioning, abundantly providing resources. Factors that make this attractive are cost of bandwidth and network planning, cost of bandwidth in the backbone is decreasing day by day and network planning is becoming simpler. 3.3.2.2Traffic Engineering It mainly focuses to keep the control on network means to minimize the over-utilization of a particular portion of the network while the capacity is available elsewhere in the network. The two methods used to provide powerful tools for traffic engineering are Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) and Constraint Based Routing (CBR). These are the mechanisms through which a certain amount of network resources can be reserved for the potential voice traffic along the paths which are determined by Constraint Based Routing or other shortest path routing algorithms. 3.3.2.3 Admission Control Admission control is used to limit the resource usage of voice traffic within the amount of the specified resources. There is no provision of admission control in IP networks so it can offer only best effort service. Parameter based Admission Control provides delay guaranteed service to applications which can be accurately described, such as VoIP. In case of bursty traffic, it is difficult to describe traffic characteristics which makes this type to overbook network resources and therefore lowers network utilization. To limit the amount of traffic over any period it uses explicit traffic descriptors (typical example is token bucket). Different algorithms used in parameter based admission control are: Æ’ËÅ" Ciscos resource reservation based (RSVP). Æ’ËÅ" Utilization based (compares with a threshold, based on utilization value at runtime it decides to admit or reject). Æ’ËÅ" Per-flow end-to-end guaranteed delay service (Computes bandwidth requirements and compares with available resource to make decision). Æ’ËÅ" Class-based admission control. 3.4 Performance Evaluation in VoIP applications 3.4.1 End-To-End Delay When End to End delay exceeds a certain value, the interactive ness becomes more like a half-duplex communication. There can be of two type of delay: 1) Delays due to processing and transmission of speech 2) Network delay (delay that is the result of processing with in the system) Network delay = Fixed part + variable part Fixed part depends upon the performance of the network nodes on the transmission path, transmission and propagation delay and the capacity of links between the nodes. Variable part is the time spent in the queues which depends on the network load. Queuing delay can be minimized by using the advanced scheduling mechanisms e.g. Priority queuing. IP packet delay can be reduced by sending shorter packets instead of longer packets. Useful technique for voice delay reduction on WAN is link fragmentation and interleaving. Fragment the lower packet into smaller packets and between those small packets VOICE packets are sent. 3.4.2 Delay Jitter Delay variation, also known as jitter, creates hurdle in the proper reconstruction of voice packets in their original sequential form. It is defined as difference in total end-to-end delay of two consecutive packets in the flow. In order to remove jitter, it requires collecting and storing packets long enough to permit the slowest packets to arrive in order to be played in the correct sequence. Solution is to employ a play out buffer at the receiver to absorb the jitter before outputting the audio stream. Packets are buffered until their scheduled play out time arrives. Scheduling a later deadline increases the possibility of playing out more packets and results in lower loss rate, but at the cost of higher buffering delay. Techniques for Jitter Absorption †¢ Setting the same play out time for all the packets for entire session or for the duration of each session. †¢ Adaptive adjusting of play out time during silence periods regarding to current network †¢ Constantly adapting the play out time for each packet, this requires the scaling of voice packets to maintain continued play out. 3.4.3 Frame Eraser (F.E) It actually happens at that time when the IP packet carrying speech frame does not arrive at the receiver side in time. There may be loss of single frame or a block of frames. Techniques used to encounter the frame erasure †¢ Forward Error Correction (requires additional processing) depends on the rate and distribution of the losses. †¢ Loss concealment (replaces lost frames by playing the last successfully received frame) effective only at low loss rate of a single frame. High F.E and delays can become troublesome because it can lead to a longer period of corrupt voice. The speech quality perceived by the listener is based on F.E levels that occur on the exit from the jitter buffer after the Forward Error Correction has been employed. To reduce levels of frame loss, Assured forwarding service helps to reduce network packet loss that occur because of full queues in network nodes. 3.4.4 Out of Order Packet Delivery This type of problem occurs in the complex topology where number of paths exists between the sender and the receiver. At the receiving end the receiving system must rearrange received packets in the correct order to reconstruct the original speech signal. Techniques for OUT-OF-ORDER PACKET DELIVERY It is also done by Jitter buffer whose functionality now became †¢ Re-ordering out of order packets ( based on sequence number) †¢ Elimination of Jitter Analysis of QoS Parameters Analysis of QoS Parameters Chapter 3 3. Analysis of QoS Parameters 3.1 Introduction A Number of QoS [11] of parameters can be measured and monitored to determine whether a service level offered or received is being achieved. These parameters consist of the following 1. Network availability 2. Bandwidth 3. Delay 4. Jitter 5. Loss 3.1.1 Network Availability Network availability can have a consequential effect on QoS. Simply put, if the network is not available, even during short periods of time, the user or application may achieve unpredictable or undesirable performance (QoS) [11]. Network availability is the summation of the availability of many items that are used to create a network. These include network device redundancy, e.g. redundant interfaces, processor cards or power supplies in routers and switches, resilient networking protocols, multiple physical connections, e.g. fiber or copper, backup power sources etc. Network operators can increase their networks availability by implementing varying degrees of each item. 3.1.2 Bandwidth Bandwidth is one of the most important QoS parameter. It can be divided in to two types 1. Guaranteed bandwidth 2. Available bandwidth 3.1.2.1 Guaranteed bandwidth Network operators offer a service that provides minimum BW and burst BW in the SLA. Because the guaranteed BW the service costs higher as compare to the available BW service. So the service providers must ensure the special treatment to the subscribers who have got the guaranteed BW service. The network operator separates the subscribers by different physical or logical networks in some cases, e.g., VLANs, Virtual Circuits, etc. In some cases, the guaranteed BW service traffic may share the same network infrastructure with available BW service traffic. We often use to see the case at location where network connections are expensive or the bandwidth is leased from another service provider. When subscribers share the same network infrastructure, the subscribers of the guaranteed BW service must get the priority over the available BW subscribers traffic so that in times of networks congestion the guaranteed BW subscribers SLAs are met. Burst BW can be specified in terms of amount and du ration of excess BW (burst) above the guaranteed minimum. QoS mechanism may be activated to avoid or discard traffic that use consistently above the guaranteed minimum BW that the subscriber agreed to in the SLA. 3.1.2.2 Available bandwidth As we know network operators have fixed Bandwidth, but to get more return on the investment of their network infrastructure, they oversubscribe the BW. By oversubscribing the BW a user is subscribed to be no always available to them. This allows users to compete for available BW. They get more or less BW it depends upon the amount of traffic form other users on the network at any given time. Available bandwidth is a technique commonly used over consumer ADSL networks, e.g., a customer signs up for a 384-kbps service that provides no QoS (BW) guarantee in the SLA. The SLA points out that the 384-kbps is standard but does not make any guarantees. Under lightly loaded conditions, the 384-kbps BW will be available to the users but upon network loaded condition, this BW will not be available consistently. It can be noticed during certain times of the day when number of users access the network. 3.1.3 Delay Network delay is the transit time an application experiences from the ingress (entering) point to the egress (exit) point of the network. Delay can cause significant QoS issues with application such as Video conferencing and fax transmission that simply time-out and final under excessive delay conditions. Some applications can compensate for small amounts of delay but once a certain amount is exceeded, the QoS becomes compromised. For example some networking equipment can spoof an SNA session on a host by providing local acknowledgements when the network delay would cause the SNA session to time out. Similarly, VoIP gateways and phones provide some local buffering to compensate for network delay. There can be both fixed and variable delays. Examples of fixed delays are: Application based delay, e.g., voice codec processing time and IP packet creation time by the TCP/IP software stack Data transmission (queuing delay) over the physical network media at each network hop. Propagation delay across the network based on transmission distance Examples of variable delays are: †¢ Ingress queuing delay for traffic entering a network node †¢ Contention with other traffic at each network node †¢ Egress queuing delay for traffic exiting a network node 3.1.4 Jitter (Delay Variation) Jitter is the difference in delay presented by different packets that are part of the same traffic flow. High frequency delay variation is known as jitter and the low frequency delay variation is known as wander. Primary cause of jitter is basically the differences in queue wait times for consecutive packets in a flow and this is the most significant issue for QoS. Traffic types especially real time traffic such as video conferencing can not tolerate jitter. Differences in packet arrival times cause in the voice. All transport system exhibit some jitter. As long as jitter limits below the defined tolerance level, it does not affect service quality. 3.1.5 Loss Loss either bit errors or packet drops has a significant impact on VoIP services as compare to the data services. During the transmission of the voice, loss of multiple packets may cause an audible pop that will become irritating to the user. Now as compare to the voice transmission, in data transmission loss of single bit or multiple packets of information will not effect the whole communication and is almost never noticed by users. In case of real time video conferencing, consecutive packet loss may cause a momentary glitch (defect) on the screen, but the video then proceeds as before. However, if packet drops get increase, then the quality of the transmission degrades. For minimum quality rate of packet loss must be less than 5% and less then 1% for toll quality. When the network node will be congested, it will drop the packets and by this the loss will occur. TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) is one of the networking protocols that offer packets loss protection by the retransmission of packets that may have been dropped by the network. When network congestion will be increased, more packets will be dropped and hence there will be more TCP transmission. If congestion continues the network performance will obviously degrade because much of the BW is being used for the retransmission of dropped packets. TCP will eventually reduce its transmission window size, due to this reduction in window size smaller packets will be transmitted; this will eventually reduce congestion, resulting in fewer packets being dropped. Because congestion has a direct influence on packet loss, congestion avoidance mechanism is often deployed. One such mechanism is called Random Early Discard (RED). RED algorithms randomly and intentionally drop packets once the traff ic reaches one or more configured threshold. RED provides more efficient congestion management for TCP-based flows. 3.1.5.1 Emission priorities It determines the order in which traffic is transmitted as it exits a network node. Traffic with higher emission priority is transmitted a head of traffic with a lower emission priority. Emission priorities also determine the amount of latency introduced to the traffic by the network nodes queuing mechanism. For example, email which is a delay tolerant application will get the lower emission priority as compare to the delay sensitive real time applications such as voice or video. These delay sensitive applications can not be buffered but are being transmitted while the delay tolerant applications may be buffered. In a simple way we can say that emission priorities use a simple transmit priority scheme whereby higher emission priority traffic is always transmitted ahead of lower emission priority traffic. This is typically accomplished using strict priority scheduling (queuing) the downside of this approach is that low emission priority queues may never get services (starved) it there is always higher emission priority traffic with no BW rate limiting. A more detailed scheme provides a weighted scheduling approach to the transmission of the traffic to improve fairness, i.e., the lower emission priority traffic is transmitted. Finally, some emission priority schemes provide a mixture of both priority and weighted schedulers. 3.1.5.2 Discarded priorities Are used to determine the order in which traffic gets discarded. Due to the network congestion packets may be get dropped i.e., the traffic exceeds its prescribed amount of BW for some period of time. When the network will be congested, traffic with a higher discard priority will get drop as compare to the traffic with a lower discard priority. Traffic with similar QoS performance can be sub divided using discard priorities. This allows the traffic to receive the same performance when the network node is not congested. However, when the network node gets congested, the discard priority is used to drop the more suitable traffic first. Discard priorities also allow traffic with the same emission priority to be discarded when the traffic is out of profile. With out discard priorities traffic would need to be separated into different queues in a network node to provide service differentiation. This can be expensive since only a limited number of hardware queues (typically eight or less) are available on networking devices. Some devices may have software based queues but as these are increasingly used, network node performance is typically reduced. With discard priorities, traffic can be placed in the same queue but in effect the queue is sub divided into virtual queues, each with a different discard priority. For example if a product supports three discard priorities, then one hardware queues in effect provides three QoS Levels. Performance Dimension Application Bandwidth Sensitivity to Delay Jitter Loss VoIP Low High High Medium Video Conf High High High Medium Streaming Video on Demand High Medium Medium Medium Streaming Audio Low Medium Medium Medium Client Server Transaction Medium Medium Low High Email Low Low Low High File Transfer Medium Low Low High Table 3.1: Application performance dimensions (use histogram) Table 3.1 illustrates the QoS performance dimensions required by some common applications. Applications can have very different QoS requirements. As these are mixed over a common IP transport network, without applying QoS the network traffic will experience unpredictable behavior. 3.2 Categorizing Applications Networked applications can be categorized based on end user application requirements. Some applications are between people while other applications are a person and a networked device application, e.g., a PC and web server. Finally, some networking devices, e.g., router-to-router. Table 3.2 categorizes applications into four different traffic categories: 1. Network Control 2. Responsive 3. Interactive 4. Timely Traffic Category Example Application Network Control Critical Alarm, routing, billing ETC. Responsive Streaming Audio/Video, Client/Server Transaction Interactive VoIP, Interactive gaming, Video Conferencing Timely Email, Non Critical Table 3.2: Application Categorization 3.2.1 Network Control Applications Some applications are used to control the operations and administration of the network. Such application include network routing protocols, billing applications and QoS monitoring and measuring for SLAs. These applications can be subdivided into those required for critical and standard network operating conditions. To create high availability networks, network control applications require priority over end user applications because if the network is not operating properly, end user application performance will suffer. 3.2.2 Responsive applications Some applications are between a person and networked devices applications to be responsive so a quick response back to the sender (source) is required when the request is being sent to the networking device. Sometimes these applications are referred to as being near real time. These near real time applications require relatively low packet delay, jitter and loss. However QoS requirements for the responsive applications are not as stringent as real time, interactive application requirements. This category includes streaming media and client server web based applications. Streaming media application includes Internet radio and audio / video broadcasts (news, training, education and motion pictures). Streaming applications e.g. videos require the network to be responsive when they are initiated so the user doesnt wait for long time before the media begins playing. For certain types of signaling these applications require the network to be responsive also. For example with movie on deman d when a user changes channels or forward, rewinds or pause the media user expects the application to react similarly to the response time of there remote control. The Client / server web applications typically involve the user selecting a hyperlink to jump from one page to another or submit a request etc. These applications also require the network to be responsive such that once the hyperlink to be responsive such that once the hyperlink is selected, a response. This can be achieved over a best effort network with the help of broadband internet connection as compare to dial up. Financial transaction may be included in these types of application, e.g., place credit card order and quickly provide feedback to the user indicating that either the transaction has completed or not. Otherwise the user may be unsure to initiate a duplicate order. Alternatively the user may assume that the order was placed correctly but it may not have. In either case the user will not be satisfied with the network or applications performance. Responsive applications can use either UDP or TCP based transport. Streaming media applications typically use UDP because in UDP it would not be fruitful to retransmit the data. Web based applications are based on the hypertext transport protocol and always use TCP, for web based application packet loss can be managed by transmission control protocol (TCP) which retransmit lost packets. In case of retransmission of lost streaming media is sufficiently buffered. If not then the lost packets are discarded. This results in the form of distortion in media. 3.2.3 Interactive Applications Some applications are interactive whereby two or more people communicate or participate actively. The participants expect the real time response from the networked applications. In this context real time means that there is minimal delay (latency) and delay variations (jitter) between the sender and receiver. Some interactive applications, such as a telephone call, have operated in real time over the telephone companies circuit switched networks for over 100 years. The QoS expectations for voice applications have been set and therefore must also be achieved for packetized voice such as VoIP. Other interactive applications include video conferencing and interactive gaming. Since the interactive applications operate in real time, packet loss must be minimized. Interactive applications typically are UDP based (Universal Datagram Protocol) and hence cannot retransmit lost or dropped packets as with TCP based applications. However it would not be beneficial to retransmit the packets because interactive applications are time based. For example if a voice packet was lost. It doesnt make sense to retransmit the packet because the conservations between the sender and receiver have already progressed and the lost packet might be from part of the conversation that has already passed in time. 3.2.4 Timely Applications There are some applications which do not require real time performance between a person and networked devices application but do require the information to be delivered in a timely manner. Such example includes save and send or forward email applications and file transfer. The relative importance of these applications is based on their business priorities. These applications require that packets arrive with abounded amount of delay. For example, if an email takes few minutes to arrive at its destination, this is acceptable. However if we consider it in a business environment, if an email takes 10 minutes to arrive at its destination, this will often not acceptable. The same bounded delay applies to file transfer. Once a file transfer is initiated, delay and jitter are illogical because file transfer often take minutes to complete. It is important to note that timely applications use TCP based transport instead of UDP based transport and therefore packet loss is managed by TCP which r etransmit any lost packets resulting in no packet loss. By summarizing above paragraph we can say that timely applications expect the network QoS to provide packets with a bounded amount of delay not more than that. Jitter has a negligible effect on these types of applications. Loss is reduced to zero due to TCPs retransmission mechanism. 3.3 QoS Management Architecture We can divide QoS management architecture of VoIP into two planes: data plane and control plane. Packet classification, shaping, policing, buffer management, scheduling, loss recovery, and error concealment are involved in the mechanism of data plane. They implement the actions the network needs to take on user packets, in order to enforce different class services. Mechanisms which come in control plane are resource provisioning, traffic engineering, admission control, resource reservation and connection management etc. 3.3.1 Data Plane 3.3.1.1 Packet Forwarding It consists of Classifier, Marker, Meter, Shaper / Dropper. When a packet is received, a packet classifier is used to determine which flow or class the packet belongs to. Those packets belong to the same flow/class obey a predefined rule and are processed in an alike manner. The basic criteria of classification for VoIP applications could be IP address, TCP/UDP port, IP precedence, protocol, input port, DiffServ code points (DSCP), or Ethernet 802.1p class of service (CoS). Cisco supports several additional criteria such as access list and traffic profile. The purpose of the meter is to decide whether the packet is in traffic profile or not. The Shaper/Dropper drops the packets which crossed the limits of traffic profile to bring in conformance to current network load. A marker is used to mark the certain field in the packet, such as DS field, to label the packet type for differential treatment later. After the traffic conditioner, buffer is used for packet storage that waits for transmission. 3.3.1.2 Buffer Management and Scheduling Active queue management (RED) drops packets before the repletion of the queue can avoid the problem of unfair resource usage. Predictable queuing delay and bandwidth sharing can be achieved by putting the flows into different queues and treating individually. Schedulers of this type can not be scaled as overhead increases as the number of on-going traffic increases. Solution is class-based schedulers such as Constraint Based WFQ and static Priority which schedule traffic in a class-basis fashion. But for the individual flow it would be difficult to get the predictable delay and bandwidth sharing. So care must be taken to apply this to voice application which has strict delay requirements. 3.3.1.3 Loss Recovery We can classify loss recovery into two ways one is Active recovery and the other is Passive recovery. We have retransmission in Active recovery and Forward Error Correction (Adding redundancy) in passive recovery. Retransmission may not be suitable for VoIP because of it latency of packets increases. 3.3.2 Control Plane 3.3.2.1 Resource provisioning and Traffic Engineering Refers to the configuration of resources for applications in the network. In industry, main approach of resource provisioning is over provisioning, abundantly providing resources. Factors that make this attractive are cost of bandwidth and network planning, cost of bandwidth in the backbone is decreasing day by day and network planning is becoming simpler. 3.3.2.2Traffic Engineering It mainly focuses to keep the control on network means to minimize the over-utilization of a particular portion of the network while the capacity is available elsewhere in the network. The two methods used to provide powerful tools for traffic engineering are Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) and Constraint Based Routing (CBR). These are the mechanisms through which a certain amount of network resources can be reserved for the potential voice traffic along the paths which are determined by Constraint Based Routing or other shortest path routing algorithms. 3.3.2.3 Admission Control Admission control is used to limit the resource usage of voice traffic within the amount of the specified resources. There is no provision of admission control in IP networks so it can offer only best effort service. Parameter based Admission Control provides delay guaranteed service to applications which can be accurately described, such as VoIP. In case of bursty traffic, it is difficult to describe traffic characteristics which makes this type to overbook network resources and therefore lowers network utilization. To limit the amount of traffic over any period it uses explicit traffic descriptors (typical example is token bucket). Different algorithms used in parameter based admission control are: Æ’ËÅ" Ciscos resource reservation based (RSVP). Æ’ËÅ" Utilization based (compares with a threshold, based on utilization value at runtime it decides to admit or reject). Æ’ËÅ" Per-flow end-to-end guaranteed delay service (Computes bandwidth requirements and compares with available resource to make decision). Æ’ËÅ" Class-based admission control. 3.4 Performance Evaluation in VoIP applications 3.4.1 End-To-End Delay When End to End delay exceeds a certain value, the interactive ness becomes more like a half-duplex communication. There can be of two type of delay: 1) Delays due to processing and transmission of speech 2) Network delay (delay that is the result of processing with in the system) Network delay = Fixed part + variable part Fixed part depends upon the performance of the network nodes on the transmission path, transmission and propagation delay and the capacity of links between the nodes. Variable part is the time spent in the queues which depends on the network load. Queuing delay can be minimized by using the advanced scheduling mechanisms e.g. Priority queuing. IP packet delay can be reduced by sending shorter packets instead of longer packets. Useful technique for voice delay reduction on WAN is link fragmentation and interleaving. Fragment the lower packet into smaller packets and between those small packets VOICE packets are sent. 3.4.2 Delay Jitter Delay variation, also known as jitter, creates hurdle in the proper reconstruction of voice packets in their original sequential form. It is defined as difference in total end-to-end delay of two consecutive packets in the flow. In order to remove jitter, it requires collecting and storing packets long enough to permit the slowest packets to arrive in order to be played in the correct sequence. Solution is to employ a play out buffer at the receiver to absorb the jitter before outputting the audio stream. Packets are buffered until their scheduled play out time arrives. Scheduling a later deadline increases the possibility of playing out more packets and results in lower loss rate, but at the cost of higher buffering delay. Techniques for Jitter Absorption †¢ Setting the same play out time for all the packets for entire session or for the duration of each session. †¢ Adaptive adjusting of play out time during silence periods regarding to current network †¢ Constantly adapting the play out time for each packet, this requires the scaling of voice packets to maintain continued play out. 3.4.3 Frame Eraser (F.E) It actually happens at that time when the IP packet carrying speech frame does not arrive at the receiver side in time. There may be loss of single frame or a block of frames. Techniques used to encounter the frame erasure †¢ Forward Error Correction (requires additional processing) depends on the rate and distribution of the losses. †¢ Loss concealment (replaces lost frames by playing the last successfully received frame) effective only at low loss rate of a single frame. High F.E and delays can become troublesome because it can lead to a longer period of corrupt voice. The speech quality perceived by the listener is based on F.E levels that occur on the exit from the jitter buffer after the Forward Error Correction has been employed. To reduce levels of frame loss, Assured forwarding service helps to reduce network packet loss that occur because of full queues in network nodes. 3.4.4 Out of Order Packet Delivery This type of problem occurs in the complex topology where number of paths exists between the sender and the receiver. At the receiving end the receiving system must rearrange received packets in the correct order to reconstruct the original speech signal. Techniques for OUT-OF-ORDER PACKET DELIVERY It is also done by Jitter buffer whose functionality now became †¢ Re-ordering out of order packets ( based on sequence number) †¢ Elimination of Jitter