Health and Social Care Essay

Introduction Social policy refers to the issue of addressing the needs of the society by the state. It takes care of the welfare aspects of the people that are based on some strategies, ideologies, regulation and undertakings. This phenomenon has reached a global scale nowadays. Social policy has now a wider span and has expanded its horizon to enhance the welfare of the general people. Marshall (1950) devised the idea of social citizenship that paved the way to the welfare provisions. These rights were focused on the economic independence and a minimum standard of life for the citizen. Health is now considered something beyond the physical aspect. It has mental, psychological, social implications. Health and welfare are the result of some sophisticated relations of socio-economic issues and the sufficiency of amenities provided (Atkinson et al., 2001). The existing social and health care system was actually established in 1948 the formation of which started before the Second World War. It got a new dimension in the later part of the century where the community took the roles of the institutes and the control shifted to the private sectors. Though it has some loopholes during the course, it has gone through several significant changes. This study will discuss the important landmarks in the history of UK social policy and provisions along with a critical evaluation and the recent achievements in this regard. It will also focus on the factors behind the formation of the policies and their impact on the service users. Task 1 – historical and CONTEMPORARY LANDMARKS in social welfare provision 1.1 historical and CONTEMPORARY LANDMARKS in social policy Prior to and during the Second World War The Poor law was the sole social care facility that was provided prior to the Second World War which basically focused on the senior citizen and the incapacitated. It made it mandatory for each community to give benefit in the form of less charge for the deprived class. This law was later renamed into Public Assistance which was the result of Local Government Act, 1929. Subsequently, the facilities were open for everyone irrespective of disability and were applicable for people who did not have the money to pay for health care. (Pat Thane, 2009) The Disabled Person’s Employment Act, 1944 made it mandatory for the companies to give jobs to people included in Disabled Persons Register which should be minimum three percent of their employment. (Barnes, 1991) The National Association for Mental Health was later established in 1946 which had a movement for improved facility for the mentally disabled patients. National Health Service and the National Assistance Board The Poor law was terminated with the introduction of the National Assistance (NA) Act in 1946 which came into practice two years later. National Assistance Board (NAB) came into existence with the advent of this particular act. National Health Service took the hospitals under them which also came into being in the same year as NAB. NAB was later substituted by the Supplementary Benefits which merged with the Department of Health and Social Security in the year 1968. (Burt et al., 2003) After the Second World War The Mental Health Act came into being in 1959 that targeted to give the mentally disabled people a space in the society. It was the contribution of The National Assistance Act 1948, amended in 1962 that gave incentive to the native authorities to facilitate the senior citizen and people with disability with food, pastime facilities and to chalk out a decade long plan to enable them to stay in their respective residents for a period according to their will. (Pat Thane, 2009) In1968, Health Services and Public Health Act took the services to the senior citizens the and the people with disability to another level by offering extensive services like washing,  stewards, recreation and help in their home. (Bauld et al., 2005) In order to facilitate a social service division in every community, the Local Authority Social Services Act came into being in 1970. This was aimed at establishing a system where there is a collaborative and wide ranging arrangement for the entire social care system that will address the issues of people and give assistance to them who are in need of them. This division was given the duty of domestic aid, housing, food and entertainment facilities. The native authorities were made bound to make a catalogue of the incapacitated people and the services were to be exposed to the common mass. Invalidity Benefit came into existence in 1971which was later modified three years later which had the provision for Invalid Care Allowance In order to provide assistance to the people who wants to take the service of the local provider or a provider of their own choice of healthcare instead of the hospitals, District Health Authorities were given the authority in 1983 to give more finance to those people. In order to take care of the issue of make advancements in the service of the senior citizens and the people with disability, a series of papers addressed these issues to facilitate an improved service to the public. (Pat Thane, 2009) In an attempt to give more effort to the service to the people with disability, Disabled Persons Representation Act, 1986 was introduced so that they are taken into consideration more than before during the policy formulation. It gave the local bodies the duty to evaluate the requirement of the people with disability in terms of the social service and take care of these needs and let them know about the offers and facilities the local bodies are going to provide. (Daunt, 1992) In 1996, the Community Care Act was implemented to facilitate the people in need of social service with the und so that they can pay for the services. There are several another acts that were introduced to enhance the social care to the UK people; they are the following: Carers (Recognition and Services) Act, 1995 Mental Health (Patients in the Community) Act, 1995 Disability Discrimination Act, 1995 Carers and Disabled Children Act 2000 Special Educational Needs and Disability Act, 200 Private Hire Vehicle Act, 2002 Disability Discrimination Act (amended) 2005 Disability Equality Duty (DED), 2006 Welfare Reform Act 2007 1.2 factors influencing the development of policy & legislations The provisions regarding healthcare and welfare are mainly designed to provide the people with the economic assurance in case of any illness, disease, aging or lack of financial crisis due to the lack of a job. There are several types of allowance which is provided when a person is ill or out of job which are backed up by the insurance arrangements of the state. In the period after Second World War the state was more e focused on giving jobs to everyone. It was supported by the free education system and academic allowances. The prime attention of that period was basically the fund to the domestic arena, healthcare all around the country and obviously jobs to everyone. The employers and the government word collaboratively in this regard. task 2 – origins of social policies 2.1 PROCESS in key Health and Social Policy legalization The act is often preceded by a bill. The health related bills are presented in front of the parliament. Health and social policies are basically the activities and steps taken by the state to achieve a certain result in the national health scenario. The entire arrangement and structure of the health sector is deeply influenced by the act and legislation. These procure of formulating the policies may vary in nature. The place for the policy formulation and structure along with the attributes of the strategy has implication in the development of these acts. The whole procedure of policy formulation and implementation needs to be apprehended properly so that it  become convenient to make use of the resources and bring significant modifications in the healthcare provisions. These processes have number of stages. It starts with the design of the policy. In tis frost stage, lots of insights and information regarding the need of the service receivers are received. It takes into consideration the intention and the expected results are determined and according to them the appropriate steps are taken to make sure the required inputs are arranged. Secondly, the designed policy is practically applied by speeding the policy. It takes active measures to execute the policy. The final stage includes assessment and adjustment where the policies are scrutinized and modified according to the need of the situation. 2.2 INFLUENTIAL factors behind a parliamentary act Health and social welfare related issues are fundamentally influence by the people themselves. But the policy and parliamentary act are also affected by the assessment and the understanding and decision of the people concerned with the policy formation. There is also the consideration of the limitation of resources. In addition, the thinking process and the principals have a role to play. These policy makers have their own set of view and philosophies that are influenced by their allegiance to their respective parties (Ungerson, 1997). There are various modes of accomplishing the policies which can be customary or contemporary. There is also pressure from the activists and communities. Unexpected situations and likelihoods of events also play a role in the policy making process in the health care and social policy which may result in a very unscrupulous decisions and polices. (Spanswick, 2003) 2.3 the impact of the Act on service users The health and social care acts have positive effect throughout the UK history. These acts have helped to give people access to their fundamental right of health care, specially the older generation and the disabled people. (Foster et al., 2001) It has given the UK healthcare and welfare a solid structure. Health acre and social care had been two isolated entities, courtesy of the acts. But tis disintegration created a problem of lack of coordination. This disintegration was done in terms of the strategies and control of the bodies but they have been integrated to better serve the people. 2.4 POLITICAL leaders’ contriburion on policies Political leaders have vital contribution in helping the country recover from the adversities and downturn in the economy that resulted from the havoc of the Second World War. They help made the legislations to bring major changes in the social policies that had a foundation that predates the war. These politicians help pass the Health Act 2009 that aimed to take the National health Service to an advanced level to provide better facilities and service to the common mass.. In 2008 they passed Health and Social Care Act that had a vital contribution in revolutionizing and incorporating health and social care. The 2006 Health Act came up with the regulation that prevented public smoking and set the age restriction for smokers that was applicable to the seller of tobacco products. It also took care of the management of the medication and observation of transactions with pharmaceutical goods. (Hochschild, 1995) 2.5 improving the CARE WITH the on-going policy changes The policies that are concerned with the people’s welfare are always vulnerable to adjustments and amendments. Any vital change requires a lot deliberation and it has the risk of producing debate. The Medicare Program, introduced in 1965, has seen much modification since its inception which has helped the public to have access to better services. Further elective packages have been introduced by the authority to add to the convenience of people. (Alber, 1995) Task 3 – impact of social policies on users of health and social care services 3.1: contemporary policy developments and implementation The healthcare authorities and the social care bodies make sure everyone is treated with equality regarding the services. The strategy and regulation is designed in such a way that ensures service receivers get the service  maintaining their freedom and self-esteem. The state does its best to offer the widest range of services. They disseminate information to the public about the heath related issues and they also inform about the nourishing ingredients of a meal. Through the various programs, people are encouraged to maintain a healthy lifestyle and children are imparted education. About the health related issues. There are many joint venture sin the health and social care sector they provide employment along with the measures to improve the social care sector and take care of issues like health discriminations, infant health and adolescence health, health of senior citizens and so on. (Mason and Smith, 2005) 3.2 Measuring the impact of policy initiatives on service users There are lots of evaluation methods that are being followed by the USA government to ensure the effectiveness and the efficiency of providing services to the service users. Evidence based policy making is one of the major force for the best quality policy appraisal in the U.K. This policy making systems require policy maker and implement authority of all of these policy to utilize and use the information from different source including evaluation of the past rules and policy, statistics data, academic report and researches, economics rules and theories, national statistics, consultation with expert or agents etc. even the public expenditure, expending and the taxation also take part in this process. The UK Government has already undertaken, and also they are presently undertaking some random proscribed trials of policy steps. 3.3 the impact of a specific policy At 1999, The NSF or The National Service Framework for the mental health published. It is it is the central element for the working age adults regarding the policy of government. Beside this, this is plan or program for ten years improvement of the metal health care in UK. This NSF also described how this policy, system and the improvement will happen and the evidence relating this also given in NSF (CSIP/NIMHE, 2007). Though NSF is focusing on the decreasing of the smoke rate among people but it is not a  comprehensive or massive activity of improving health care like general health acre. Eight different pilot studies on the subject of improvement of the physical health care have been studied by the public health committee of the English strategy. (Beecham, 2005) 3.4 policies in improving the quality of life Policies can play a virtual role in the improvement of the service user’s quality of the life. Participating interest group like patient organization is very effective in this regard. The focus was later concentrated in the cut down of taxes, the reduction of interference by the government and the reduction in the government expenditure in 1975. But it had to take some portion out of the welfare budget. Currently, the state is more focused on providing people with employment rather than providing them with abundant allowances and benefits. There have been many regulation and law which are introduced to address the issues of labor, healthcare and social care nowadays. (Gulliford and Morgan, 2003) Task 4 – Recent developments in health and social care policy 4.1 recent development in health and social care policy It deals with many different things like voluntary sectors in welfare, the role or the part of religion etc. Also it deals with free worldwide secondary education and many more. Indigence is one of the primary causes of sickness. The poor and broken law authority started to evaluate hospitals for the sick people. Health and social care policy deals with the rules and the policies, system regarding people welfare state. Most of the average report founded on three assumptions which is health services, family allowance and full employment. Beside all of these things current period achievement is the pensions, insurance, tax credits, supplement to the family income etc. All of these this is the implement of current era of time. It also deals with the health and social care initiatives, social and labor inclusions, important legislation initiative, and rights etc. The announcement done by the Peter Lilley will help get the harmony to the benefit system. These mainly decrease the dependenc y of the benefit by helping the person or people in their work. (Judge, and Bauld, 2006) 4.2 the  differences in formation and adaption At this 29th century the social and the health care system policies initiative reached the rural and far areas of the United Kingdom. The main goal of this initiative of the health and social care is to provide the health and social care services to the society for the wellbeing of the society without considering the financial condition of the people. The main goal of this initiative is to provide state edification, pension and the universal health care to the citizen of the country. Similar to Japan the heath care of USA is being dominated and maintained and controlled by the different kind of insurance scheme=where state do not play any part. Social and health care is a contract between the individual citizen and the government in Scotland. But it’s straight forward in English policy where government ensures the commitment to give better health and social service rather than improving the policy itself. So it is more effective for the citizen of the country. This is a genera l contract between the service user or the citizen and the government service providers. Conclsuion The main focus of the healthcare and social care has been the equality of access recently. All the acts and polices are aimed at proving people with the most fundamental services and making sure that no one gets deprived (Exworthy et al.,2003). The undertaking of the major policy matters has been done in collaboration and various bodies across the state and government have put a lot of effort to take the healthcare and social care to a new dimension. Reference Alber, J. (1995). ‘A Framework for the Comparative Study of Social Service’s’, Journal of European Social Policy 5 (2): 131–49. Atkinson, M. et al. (2001) Systematic review of ethnicity and health service access for London. University of Warwick: Warwick. Bauld, L. et al. (2005) Promoting social change: the experience of health action zones in England. Journal of Social Policy 34 (3):427-445. Barnes, C. (1991) Disabled People in Britain and Discrimination: A Case for Anti-Discrimination Legislation, Hurst and Co in association with the British Council of Organizations of Disabled People, London. Beecham, J. (2005) Access to mental health supports in England: crisis resolution teams and day services. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, 28: 574-587. Burt, J. et al. (2003) The relationship between use of NHS Direct and deprivation in southeast London: an ecological analysis. Journal of Public Health Medicine 25 (2):174-176. CSIP/NIMHE (2007) Mental Health: New Ways of Working for Everyone. Progress Report 280692, Department of Health: London. Daunt, P. (1992) Meeting Disability: A European Perspective, Cassell Education, London. Exworthy, M. et al. (2003) Tackling health inequalities in the United Kingdom: the progress and pitfalls of policy. Health Services Research 38(6, pt 2): 1905-1921. Foster, J. et al. (2001) A qualitative study of older people’s views of out-of-hours services. British Journal of General Practice 51 (470): 719-723. Gulliford, M. and Morgan, M. (2003) Access to Health Care. Routledge: London. Hochschild, A. R. (1995). ‘The Culture of Politics: Traditional, Post-modern, Coldmodern, and Warm-modern Ideals of Care’, Social Politics 2 (3): 331–45. Judge, K. and Bauld, L. (2006) Learning from policy failure? Health action zones in England. European Journal of Public Health 16 (4):341-3. Marshall, T. H. (1950) Citizenship and Social Class. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. Mason, A. and Smith, P.C. (2005) Description of the Benefit Basket, England. Report prepared for the HealthBASKET project, funded by the European Commission within the Sixth Framework Research Programme Spanswick, M. (2003) Access to health care: vulnerable groups in society. In: Public Health and Society, Ungerson, C. (ed.) (1997), ‘Social Politics and the Commodification of Care’, Social Politics 4 (3): 362–82 Thane P.(2009). History and Policy. MEMORANDUM SUBMITTED TO THE HOUSE OF COMMONS’ HEALTH COMMITTEE INQUIRY: SOCIAL CARE. 67 (1): 140-145

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The CPA Journal, 80(7), 56-58. http://search.proquest.com/docview/637267174?accountid=35812 BBC News Business. (September 26, 2011). Deloitte Touche sued for $7.6bn in mortgage fraud case. Retrieved from http://bbc.co.uk/news/business-15069976 BBC. (May 17, 2003). The Enron Affair. Retrieved from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/business/2002/enron/default.stm Conroy, S. J., Emerson, T. N. (2006). Changing Ethical Attitudes: The Case of the Enron and ImClone Scandals. Social Science Quarterly, 87(2), 395-410. Liu, C., David, Y. (2011). An Analysis of the Impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act on Earnings Management. Advances In Management, 4(6), 25-31.

Communispace Essay Example for Free

Communispace Essay Communispace offers a unique process for administering market research. It offers a view into the minds of the customers of a brand by building brand-focused online communities in order to enable members to communicate with each other and generate focus groups to discuss the product. A community is built as a long-term project; it continues to produce valuable information for companies over the course of its existence. The business model utilized by Communispace helps to provide facilitation and management powered by technology and innovation. Communispace differentiates itself by focusing on the strategy of building online communities that act as an invaluable resource for testing ideas, generating feedback and exploring customers mindsets. Communispace can begin its analysis within 24 hours of launching an online community as it reaches out to a particular subset of people that would be most interested in commenting on and speaking about a particular product. A Word of Mouth campaign utilizes a different strategy. A targeted community would receive the product in the mail and would then ideally spread word around about the product to friends and neighbors. This campaign, while a beneficial tool for market research, was not a tool that Communispace utilized. There were many competitors that were better at this method. Simmons is a highly recognized FMCG company holding 20 brands that are found in over 95% of US households. Simmons wanted to promote its new organic product for weight conscious consumers via Communispace using word-of-mouth. The business problem being faced by Communispace was that it could not determine whether it would be undermining its strengths and strategy by taking this type of project or whether it would be detrimental to turn such an influential client down. The case states the communities are built on the foundations of sense of trust and the feeling that their contributions are really making a difference for the company. Communispace built its business on a strategy that reached potential customers by building online communities and did not serve the purpose of receiving a free product and talking about it outside the community. As Julie Wittes Schlack, Senior Vice President of Innovation and Design and a cofounder of Communispace points out in the case, the company’s growth depended solely on its core competency. Moreover, due to low entry to barrier into this particular arena of market research, there were many other competitors that had built their competitive advantage on doing word of mouth campaigns. So another problem that Communispace would be to weigh the options of benefits gained by entering into this WOM arena where they have no real advantage versus the damage they might incur by compromising on their core competency. In my opinion, Communispace should focus on the strategy that has defined them and not sacrifice their identity and corporate strategy. From the success and expansion of Communispace it is clear that they have gotten their process for building communities down to a science, thus allowing companies to not only to listen, but learn. Flipping this model on its head not only would completely alter the process in which companies engage in with their community, but it would also make for a far less exact science in what Communispace does? Moreover, word of mouth is something that can’t be manufactured to find success repeatedly, rather it should happen organically and not by force. Hence, making that a core competence for Communispace would prove exceedingly difficult because it is difficult to draw the valuation of a successful WOM and then repeatedly recreate its success. That is how would Communispace measure the effectiveness of the WOM campaigns? In the present scenario, they can provide their clients with reports and analysis on the conversations in the community, but how would they measure how effective their members are outside the community? Though advertising and creative marketing campaigns can spur word of mouth, a community approach would seem as a dishonest approach with a possibility of no results or backfiring on the credibility of the community. This, in turn would hamper the reputation that Communispace enjoys and might be detrimental to its social health in the long run as it would incite distrust amongst its community members which might lead to loss of present clients. The intense competition that Communispace will face, the potential loss of credibility of community members when they understand that the community is only for advertisement and the short-lived nature of WOM campaigns, hence, the campaign-fuelled business can undermine the long-time subscription model are reasons that support the decision to stick to their core services and not digress into an arena that utilises a model that is completely dissimilar to Communispace’s original one.

Brand Perception And Customer Buying Behaviour

Brand Perception And Customer Buying Behaviour In this chapter, concepts, theories and relevant models about branding, brand perception and customer buying behaviour will be discussed in detail. An individual who buys products for personal use and not for manufacture or resale is said to be a consumer. A consumer is someone who can make the decision whether or not to purchase an item at the store, which can be influenced by marketing and advertisements. Each and every consumer is influenced by their own brand perception and buying decisions which depends on various number of factors. 2.2 Branding Brand is the image that consumers have in mind (Aaker, 1991). It is also the unique characteristics that have been developed all the time in order to differentiate actual products from the competitors (Murphy, 1990). In addition, The American Association defines a brand as a name, term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify the goods or services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competitors. A brand is thus a product or service that adds dimensions that differentiate it in some way from other products or services designed to satisfy the same need. These differences may be functional, rational, or emotional or intangible related to what the brand represents. Brand concepts must address customer interests and lifestyles. Factors that affect its brand image and brand perception among marketing communication program that implementing to the public to create brand perception, brand characteristic, brand image and bran d equity. De Chernatony and McDonald (1992) define a brand as an identifiable product, service, person or place, augmented in such a way that the buyer or user perceives relevant, unique added values which match their needs most closely. There have been two basic values identified by de Chernatony (1999) that contribute towards the brand premium. One is the functional value such as the price, technology, design and store layout. This functional value is a distinct attribute that a customer adds to the brand and distinguishes the brand from the rest. The second form of added value comes from emotional value. This value is derived from notions like advertising, internal branding, translating the retail brand into consumer taste, and even the shopping experience itself at the retail outlet. 2.3 Brand Perception Perception is how we see ourselves and the world we live in. However, what ends up being stored inside us doesnt always get there in a direct manner. Often our mental makeup results from information that has been consciously or subconsciously filtered as we experience it, a process we refer to as a perceptual filter. To us this is our reality, though it does not mean it is an accurate reflection on what is real. Thus, perception is the way we filter stimuli (e.g., someone talking to us, reading a newspaper story) and then make sense out of it. Perception has several steps. Exposure sensing a stimuli (e.g. seeing an ad) Attention an effort to recognize the nature of a stimuli (e.g. recognizing it is an ad) Awareness assigning meaning to a stimuli (e.g., humorous ad for particular product) Retention adding the meaning to ones internal makeup (i.e., product has fun ads) Brand perception is consumers ability to identify the brand under different conditions, as reflected by their brand recognition or recall performance (Kotler Lane, 2006). Brand recall refers to consumers ability to retrieve the brand from the memory (Keller, 1993). According to the improvement of measurement for brand equity, consumer-based brand equity was described for four dimensions; brand awareness, brand association, perceived quality, and brand loyalty (Pappu, et al, 2005). Brand awareness was defined as the consumers ability to identify or recognize the brand (Rossiter and Percy, 1987). It refers to the strength of a brand presence in consumers minds. Brand awareness has several levels starting from the less recognition of the brand to dominance (Aaker, 1991). Perceived quality was evaluated and decided by consumers. Perceived quality is another valuation of brand to push the customer to buy products. Brand building has been around for centuries as a means to distinguish the goods of one producer from those of another. The earliest signs of branding in Europe were the medieval guilds requirement that craftspeople put trademarks on their products to protect themselves and consumers against inferior quality. In the fine arts, branding began with artists signing their works. Brands today play a number of important roles that improve consumers lives and enhance the financial value of firms (Kotler Lane, 2006). Brand awareness and brand perceived quality as the significant factors to create and maintain brand equity. There are positive relationship among brand awareness, perceive quality and brand equity (Aker, 1996, Buzzell Gate, 1987). The marketing program has effect to improve the perceive quality of brand for different customers. Brand perception is consumers ability to identify the brand under different conditions, as reflected by their brand recognition or recall performance (Kotler Lane, 2006). Brand recall refers to consumers ability to retrieve the brand from the memory (Keller, 1993). According to the improvement of measurement for brand equity, consumer-based brand equity was described for four dimensions; brand awareness, brand association, perceived quality, and brand loyalty (Pappu, et al, 2005). Brand awareness was defined as the consumers ability to identify or recognize the brand (Rossiter and Percy, 1987). It refers to the strength of a brand presence in consumers minds. Brand awareness has several levels starting from the less recognition of the brand to dominance (Aaker, 1991). Perceived quality was evaluated and decided by consumers. Perceived quality is another valuation of brand to push the customer to buy products. Brand building has been around for centuries as a means to distinguish the goods of one producer from those of another. The earliest signs of branding in Europe were the medieval guilds requirement that craftspeople put trademarks on their products to protect themselves and consumers against inferior quality. In the fine arts, branding began with artists signing their works. Brands today play a number of important roles that improve consumers lives and enhance the financial value of firms (Kotler Lane, 2006). Brand awareness and brand perceived quality as the significant factors to create and maintain brand equity. There are positive relationship among brand awareness, perceive quality and brand equity (Aker, 1996, Buzzell Gate,1987). The marketing program has effect to improve the perceive quality of brand for different customers. 2.4 Brand Equity Source: Aaker, 1991 Brand equity is the added value endowed to products and services. Aaker (1991) defined the brand equity as a set of brand assts and liabilities linked to brand that adds or detracts the product or service value based on the customers perspectives. This value may be reflected in how consumers think, feel and act with respect to the brand that consumers had perceive from marketing programs. Brand equity is an important intangible asset that has psychological and financial value to the firm. The value of brand equity depends on the number of same people who buy regularly (Aaker, 1996). The brand loyalty, brand awareness, and brand perceived quality are necessary to maintain the brand equity (Motameni Shahrokhi, 1998). There are two different perspectives of brand equity; financial and customer based. The first perspective evaluates the asset value of a brand name that creates to the business (Farquhar et al, 1991). Brand equity increased the discounted future cash flows and revenue com paring to the same product did not have the brand name (Motameni Shahrkhi, 1998). According to the second perspective, the premise of customer-based brand equity models is that the power of brand lies in what customers have responded, seen, read, heard, learned, thought and felt about the brand over time. In other words, the power of brand lies in the minds of existing or potential customers and what they have experienced directly and indirectly about the brand. The customer-based brand equity finally drives the financial return to the company (Lassar et al, 1995). The valuation of brand has been studied for different approaches, for example, marketing, premium pricing market value, customer factors, replacement cost perspective. According to the valuation based on consumer factors, the measurement of customers preference and attitude can be used to evaluate the brand equity (Aaker, 1991 and Kapferer, 1992). 2.5 Marketing Communication The marketing communication is considered as the strategic activities for brand managers to build and maintain the brand image of targeted customers (Duncan Mulhern, 2004). It is a significant driver of competitive advantage to create the ability of companies to attract, retain, and leverage customers (Kitchen, Joanne, Tao, 2004). Duncan (2002) explained that marketing communication is a process for managing the customer relationship that affects brand value lastly. Marketing communication programs are not only above the line activities such as advertising and sales promotions but also below the line activities such as public relations. Regarding recent concept of marketing communication, two-way communication as well as one way communication is a key determinant of brand strategies to stimulus the brand orientation process (Aaker, 1996 and Urde, 1994). 2.6 Consumer Behaviour Schiffinan and Kanuk (2004) define Consumer Behaviour as the behaviour that customers display in searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating and disposing of products and services that they expect will satisfy their needs. Consumer buying behaviour incorporates the acts of individuals directly involved in obtaining, using and disposing of economic goods and services including the decision process that precede and determine these acts (Huctings 1995). Lamb, Hair and McDartiel (1992) note that consumer behaviour is a study of the processes the consumer uses to make purchase decisions as well as the use and disposal of the purchased goods and services. It also includes the analysis of factors that influences purchase decisions and goods usage. Further more consumer behaviour is a process and purchase is only one step in that process. Santon,Etzel and Walker (1994) states that consumers are complex in nature and keep changing constantly. So it is a must for the marketers to constantly improve their understanding of consumers and understand what influences the needs of the consumers. In short, the understanding of the buying behavior of existing and potential customers is imperative for marketers (Lancaster 1998). It is also needed for the competitive survival. When the consumer is viewed in the proper perspective, the outcomes could be quite positive for the manufacturer. Lamb,Hair and McDaniel (1992),claim that the knowledge of consumer behavior reduces uncertainty when creating the marketing mix. The field of customer behavior covers a lot of ground: It is the study of the processes involved when individuals or groups select, purchase, use, or dispose of products, services, ideas, or experiences to satisfy needs and desires (Michael, 2003). Earlier, the field was referred to as buyer behavior, which emphasized o n interaction between consumers and producers at the time of purchase. Now marketers feel that consumer behavior is not merely a consumer handing over money in return for a service or good, but it is an ongoing process. The exchange of a transaction in which two or more organizations or people give and receive something of value is an integral part of marketing. 2.7 Consumer Decision Making Mahatoo (1985) defines Consumer Behavior decision making process consisting of a number of steps that begin before the purchase and reaches beyond the buying act. He suggests that marketers have to go beyond the various influences on buyers and develop an understanding of how consumers actually make their buying decisions .The ability to create a good service and to persuade the market to buy this offering instead of its competitors offering depends upon the insight into the consumer purchase decision on the understanding of how the target customers arrive at their purchase decisions. Price is one of the dominating factors when it comes to making a purchase decision. It generally plays a vital role in determining consumers brand choice while selecting a product. Consumers look into the price while taking a buying decision and check whether it is within their affordable limits. This helps them to maximize their immediate utility that they gain from the purchase. The consumers give relative importance to both price and quality, so while choosing a brand they make a choice consistent with the relative importance attached to both attributes (Nor Khasimah Alimana and Md Nor Othman, 2007). It is also known that consumers look upon the additional services and freebies which come along with the product rather than looking on the price factor. Customers were believed to put different weights on every factor when it comes to the evaluation process. Analysis shows that customers who had experienced bad customer service tend to consider more thoroughly all aspects of the serv ice when it comes to choice of product (Tor W. Andreassen and Line L. Olsen, 2008). According to Kotler (2003), there are five roles people play during a purchase. They are Initiator: It is the person who gives the idea of buying the product or service. Influencer: It is the person who reviews or influences the decision. Decider: It is the person who makes the buying decision: what to buy, how to buy, when to buy and where to buy. Buyer: It is the person who actually makes the purchase. User: It is the person who consumes or uses the product or service. 2.8 Buying Behavior Buying behavior is a process in which consumers decide and act accordingly to buy certain products for their use. There are certain aspects which we need to understand. Why do consumers buy what they buy? What are the key factors for influencing consumers to buy the products? What are the changing trends in the society? Consumer buying behavior refers to what consumers buy at a certain point of time which involves their decision making. So it is important for any firm to keenly analyze on consumer buying behaviors as it has a great impact on the firms marketing strategy. It also plays a key role in the success of the firm. It is important for any firm to create a marketing mix that satisfies the customers. 2.9 Types of Consumer Buying Behavior There are few types of buying behaviors based on the type of products which needs to be purchased. Complex buying behavior is where an individual seeks lot of information about a high value branded product before purchasing it. Habitual buying behavior is where the individual buys the product out of habit. Variety seeking buying behavior is where the individual likes to shop around and experiment different products. Consumer buying behavior is determined by level of involvement in the purchase decision (Renjith, June 2004). According to Mahatoo (1985), the nature of the decision process varies depending upon the product and the consumer. The marketers need to determine the kind of decision making behavior that is involved with the particular product in order to understand the behavior of the consumer. Howard (1989) classifies consumer buying decision into three broad categories: Routine Response Programmed Behavior- A consumer generally uses a routine response behavior while frequently buying the low cost goods or services. These goods and services can be called low involvement products as the consumer spends little time on decision making and purchases easily. The consumer is familiar with different brands in this product category, but usually sticks on to one brand. The consumer usually skips many steps in the decision process as he buys the product out of habit. Limited Decision Making Buying product occasionally. When you need to obtain information about an unfamiliar brand in a product category. Requires a moderate amount of time for information gathering as it is compared with various brands. Acquiring information about an unfamiliar product category is called as limited decision making. Examples: books, clothes and cosmetics. Extensive Decision Making Consumers usually spend much time on extensive decision making with high involvement when they purchase an unfamiliar expensive product. This is the most complex type of consumer decision making as the consumers need a great deal of information to compare it with its alternate brands. Examples: cars, computers. Complex buying behavior involves three steps: The consumer develops belief about the product. The consumer develops attitude about the product. The consumer makes a thoughtful choice. Consumers usually engage in complex buying behavior when they are highly involved in a purchase, which usually happens when the product is expensive, risky, and highly self expressive. Many products do not carry features unless the buyer does some research. The marketer of a high involvement product must understand consumers information- gathering and evaluation process. According to this the marketer needs to develop strategies which will assess the buyer in learning about the products attributes and their importance. The marketer also needs to differentiate the brand features, motivate store keepers, and use proper print media to describe the brand and the buyers interaction to influence the brand choice. Dissonance-Reducing buyer behaviour According to Herbert (1965), the consumer sometimes gets highly involved in a purchase but see little differences in brands. The high involvement is due to the fact that the purchase is expensive, infrequent and risky. For this type of purchase the consumer will shop around to learn more about the product but purchase it quickly responding to the primary factors like price or convenience. After the purchase, the consumer might experience dissonance by hearing favourable things about other brands or noticing certain disquieting features. Now the consumer will alert the informants who support his or her decisions. For example, here, the consumer acted first then acquired new beliefs and ended up with a set of attitudes. Marketing communication should supply beliefs and evaluations that help the customer feel good about the brand of his choice. Variety-Seeking Buying Behaviour Henry (1987) states that some buying situations are characterised by low involvement but significant brand differences. Usually consumers do lot of brand switching. Take for example, cookies. The consumer has some knowledge about cookies, chooses them without much evaluation and evaluates the product during consumption. But next time the consumer may reach for another brand according to his taste. Brand switching occurs for the sake of variety rather than dissatisfaction. 3.10 Buying Decision Process The consumers engage in a decision process to deal with the marketing environment and make purchases. The consumer goes through a series of logical stages to arrive at the decision when he faces a problem which could be resolved through a purchase. A typical buying process consists of five stages. (Micheal and Elnora, 2000). 2.10.1 Problem Recognition The purchase process starts where the buyer recognises a problem or need. The need maybe triggered by internal or external stimuli. Marketers need to identify the circumstances that trigger a particular need (Micheal, 2003). People have unsatisfied needs and wants that create tension or discomfort, which can be satisfied by acquiring and consuming goods and services. Hence, the process of deciding what to buy begins when there is a need and it can be satisfied through consumption. Mahatoo (1985), states that when the consumer becomes aware of a discrepancy between the existing state and a desired state, a need is aroused. The existing state is the total situation of a consumer, the current needs, attitudes, motives. The desired state is the situation after the kinds of changes the consumer wishes. Both these states are the functions of consumers motivation, personality and past experience of cultural and social influences. Evans and Burman (1984), defines a stimulus as a cure intended to motivate a person to act. It can be social, commercial or non commercial. Need recognition shows a persons readiness to act by becoming aware of a need but does not guarantee that the decision making process will continue. Kotler (2003), suggests that by gathering information from a number of consumers marketers can identify the most frequent stimuli that triggers an interest in a product category, thereby developing marketing strategies that would create a spark in consumers interest. 2.10.2 Information Search When a consumer needs to gain knowledge about a product or service, he or she would be aroused to search for more information in the product category. Consumer information sources fall under four groups: Personal sources: Family, friends, neighbours Commercial sources: Advertising, sales person, dealers, display boards Public sources: Mass media, consumer-rating organizations Experimental sources: Handling, examining, using the product. The relative amount and influences of these information sources vary with product category and consumer characteristics (Peter, Daniel and Nancy, 1986). Customer decisions are based on a combination of past experiences and marketing information. Past experience is considered as an internal source of information. Greater the past experience, lesser the external information the consumer is likely to seek to make a decision. Baker (2000), states that if there is a sufficiently high level of involvement with the problem, the consumers are likely to engage in a complex and extensive information search. If the involvement level is low, they are likely to use a very simple information search. Kotler (2003), states that by gathering information the consumer learns about competing brands and their features. There will be lot of brands available to the consumer in a product category, in which only a few brands the consumer would be aware of (awareness set). Among these brands, few brands will meet consumers initial buying criteria (consideration set). As the consumer gathers more information only a few brands would remain (choice set). All the brands in the choice set might be acceptable. 2.10.3 Evaluation of Alternatives There is no single evaluation process used by all customers or by one customer in all buying situations. The consumers view each product as a bundle of attributes with varying abilities of delivering the benefits needed to satisfy them. The attributes of interest to buyers vary by product. Consumers will pay most attention to attributes that deliver benefits (Mary, James and John, 1997). Once a choice set has been identified, the consumer evaluates them before making a decision. The evaluation involves establishing some criteria against which each alternative is compared. The criteria that consumers use in the evaluation results from their past experience and feelings towards various brands as well as the opinions of family, friends, etc. (Stanton, Etzel and Walker, 1994). The product related attributes such as quality, durability, price, design, etc. Influence the buying decision of a consumer. A way to narrow down the products in the choice set is to pick an attribute and then excl ude all products in the set that does not possess that attribute (Lamb and McDaniel, 1992). Thus the choice which possesses all the required product related attributes can be selected. 2.10.4 Purchase Decision From the evaluation process discussed about, consumer will reach their final purchase decision which is made up of five purchase sub decisions: Brand decision, Vendor decision, Quantity decision, Timing decision and Payment method decision (Joseph and Howard, 1987). After evaluation, the first thing in mind would be to purchase the product or not. If the decision is to buy, a series of related decisions must be made regarding the features, where and when to make the actual transaction, how to take delivery, a mode of payment and other issues. So a decision to purchase starts an entirely new series of decisions that may be time consuming and difficult. Selecting a source from which a purchase can be made is also a buying decision (Stanton, Etzel and Walker, 1994). A consumers decision to modify, postpone or avoid a purchase decision is heavily influenced by risk. The amount of risk varies with the extent of money at stake, the amount of attribute uncertainty and amount of self confide nce. Marketers must understand the factors that create a feeling of risk in the consumer, thereby providing information and support to reduce the risk (Kotler, 2003). 2.10.5 Post Purchase Behaviour Every customer after buying a product will experience either satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Hence the marketers job does not end when the product is bought; it must be monitored for post purchase satisfaction and post purchase actions. A very important stage of the consumers decision is the impact of current decisions on the future purchasing behaviour. Mahatoo (1985) says that three general outcomes are possible. They are: 2.10.5.1 Satisfaction Satisfaction occurs when a product performs according to expectations. The brand chosen has served to fulfil the customers needs and thus reinforces the response of purchasing the brand, which also means that beliefs and attributes about the brand are positively influenced and the likelihood of repurchase is increased. 2.10.5.2 Dissatisfaction Dissatisfaction occurs in the reverse situation, when the products performance is not up to the expectation it leads to negative belief and attributes about the brand. A dissatisfied customer is not likely to recommend the product to others. The results of satisfaction and dissatisfaction are recorded in long term memory and become inputs to the internal search of the firm. So the marketers must be careful in satisfying the needs and expectations of the customers. 2.10.5.3 Cognitive Dissonance: Cognitive dissonance occurs when the consumer experiences a feeling of doubt or psychological discomfort about the choice made. It is often felt right after the purchase when the consumer begins to have second thoughts about the product chosen. Dissonance is more likely to occur in complex decision making with high involvement purchases. Dissonance can come from a personal source from advertisement or from experience with the product. Post purchase evaluation is important to marketers because positive evaluation increases the probability of repeat purchases and brand loyalty. Negative or doubtful thoughts increase the probability that different alternatives will be considered next time when the need arises (Husted, Varble and Lowry, 1989). 2.11 Factors influencing the behaviour of buyers http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~market/380dir/cbinfluence.jpg Source: (http://blog.oneshotmarketing.com/2010/08/consumer-buying-behavior-the-laws-of-attraction/ accessed on 20/10/10 at 9.15pm) Consumer behaviour is affected by many uncontrollable factors. Culture is one of the factors that influence behaviour. Culture can be defined as our attitudes and beliefs. It is developed along with age in the society. For an individual growing up, a child is influenced by their parents, brothers and sisters. They learn about their religion and culture which helps them to develop opinions, attitudes and beliefs (Richard, 1976). These factors will influence a buying behaviour of the consumer, other factors like friends or people they look up may also influence their choices of purchasing a particular product. Culture is the most basic cause of a persons wants and behaviour. Culture is learned from family, church, school, peers, colleagues. It reflects basic values, perceptions, wants, and behaviours. Cultural shifts create opportunities for new products or may otherwise influence consumer behaviour. Peoples social status plays an important role in the consumer buying behaviour. Social class distinctions allow companies to position their products to appeal to certain social classes. The easiest example is automobiles. Marketing for Mercedes Benz is completely different from the marketing campaign from Honda or Toyota because they target individuals from the upper class. Another powerful and easy factor that companies manipulate in their marketing efforts is the social factor. To be part of a group, or represent a certain lifestyle, you must have certain possessions. Personal and Psychological factors are very specific realms and the target market segment becomes even smaller. That means even less amount of people can use these products. This reflects in higher prices to account for the decrease in volume 2.12 Models of Consumer Behaviour The various models of consumer behaviour as per (Ramasamy and Namakumari, 1990) are stated as follows 2.12.1 The Economic Model According to the economic model of buyer behaviour, the buyer is a rational man and his buying decisions are totally governed by the concept of utility. If the customer has certain amount of purchasing power, a set of needs to be met and a set of products in a very rational manner with the intentions of maximising the utility or benefits. 2.12.2 The Learning Model According to the learning model, buying behaviour can be influenced by manipulating the drivers, stimuli and responses of the buyers. The model rests on mans ability at learning, forgetting and discriminating. 2.12.3 The Psychoanalytical Model According to this model the individual consumer has a complex set of deep stated motives that drive him towards certain buying decisions. The buyer has a private world with all his hidden fears, suppressed desires and totally subjective longings. His buying action can be influenced by appealing to these desires and longings. 2.12.4 The Sociological Model According to the sociological model, the individual buyer is influenced by society, by inmate groups as well as social classes. His buying decisions are not totally governed by utility, he has a desire to emulate, follow, and fit in with his immediate environment. Several of his buying decisions may be governed by societal compulsions. 2.12.5 The Nicosia Model Efforts have been made by marketing scholars to build buyer behaviour models from the marketing mans point of view. The Nicosia model and the Howard and Sheth model are two important models. Both of them belong to the category called the systems model where the human being is analysed as the system with stimuli as the input to the system and behaviour as the output of the system. The Nicosia model tries to establish the link between a firm and its customers, how the activities of the firm influences the consumer and results in the buying decision. The information from the firm influences the consumer towards the product, thereby he develops a certain attitude towards the product causing him to search or

Ballads of Remembrance by Robert Hayden :: Robert Hayden

In 1962 Robert Hayden wrote a collection of poems entitled Ballads of Remembrance. This collection is comprised of 36 poems that are separated into 4 groups. Each group refers to a different focus of remembrance; for example, one group focuses on the struggle of African Americans in terms of finding identity and a sense of transcendence. "Those Winter Sundays" is part of the group of poems that focuses on remembrances of Hayden’s childhood, past, and personal struggles. Hayden had an extremely harsh and conflicted childhood. His parents were divorced at a young age, and his mother left him with a foster family in Detroit whose name, Hayden, he ended up adopting. He grew up in a very poor neighborhood called Paradise Valley, which was not a "paradise" at all. He had separate issues with his foster mother and father, who were both stern people. His father encouraged Robert to gain an education in order to lift himself out of poverty. Yet, at the same time, his father found it difficult to communicate with his foster son, who always had his head in a book or was constantly studying. The lack of verbal communication between his father and himself can be seen in his poem "Those Winter Sundays." The overall impression of the poem is that love can be communicated in other ways than through words; it can be communicated through everyday, mundane actions. For example, in the poem, the father awakens on "Sundays too" to warm the house with a fire and polish his sons shoes. There is a sense of coldness in the beginning of the poem through the lines: Sundays too my father got up early and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold. Hayden’s father is not only bringing physical warmth to him by making the fire; he is also bringing spiritual warmth to him. By the end of the poem, the reader feels an overall sense of warmth as the poet comes to a better understanding of his father’s unappreciated actions. In terms of Romanticism, the idea of transcendence seems to be present in the poem in regard to the fact that the father-son relationship is beyond words. The relationship exists, but it is difficult to articulate. Also the idea that Hayden is rising to a deeper understanding of his relationship with his father is present. There are lines in the poem that state: When the rooms were warm, he’d call, And slowly I would rise and dress.

Tom Clancy rainbow six :: essays research papers

Well it is easy to see that in Tom Clancy’s book rainbow six there are two main groups the first group is of course Rainbow SIX the second is horizon corp. Now for rainbow six they are our heroes they are the Special Forces assault team created and funded by the United States but it consists of members from across the world. The second group is the horizon corp. now these are the evil ones in the book and when I say evil I mean EVIL. But they were evil in the eyes of society but not in their own eyes. . Now what horizon corp. is planning is truly the embodiment of what can be considered a heinous crime what they planed on doing was to release a bacteria called Shiva is a modified version of the Ebola virus the difference Shiva and Ebola you might ask, well Shiva is twice as effective as Ebola is. Now Horizon corp. really doesn’t fall under either overcoming or submitting but it can be seen as trying to destroy society. They believe that society has become too destructive against nature and so in their bid to save the human race they have to destroy all but a selected few they had made the Shiva virus and planned on letting it out during the Olympics so that it could be spread across the world. So instead of trying to conform to society or overcome it they have gone for option number three the destruction of society its self. Ok now for the heroes of the book a group named of course rainbow six. This group has skill and resources much greater then any other counter terrorist organization they travel to any country that requests their aid and well mops up any messes that they might have. The team encounters many different situations on which they are called in to resolve the problem the way a special forces unit would. So it is my feeling that the rainbow six team its self is meant to embody the will, the laws, and the Ideals of society as they are always called in to those who go against the general will and laws of main stream society. Lead by John Clark ex-Navy SEAL the team consisted mainly of those from USA and Britain but there are two guys from other countries I can’t remember exactly what countries but I think it was Germany, Israel, Britain, and the USA.

Cultural Variations in Attachment (Psychology)

Discuss cultural variations in attachments. A culture is a group of people who have their own norms, values and customs. The Kroonenberg study showed that in a study of 8 countries the culture attachments patterns seem to be quite similar. The most common attachment type was a secure attachment. In western countries the dominant attachment type was avoidant and in non-western countries the dominant type was resistant. These results were reached from data from 2000 strange situation studies in 32 different countries.There are many cross-cultural similarities such as in Ainsworth’s Uganda study she observed various universals in attachment behaviour. This study showed that infants in Uganda were similar to infants in the UK and USA because they used their mothers as a secure base for exploration, and mothers of securely attached infants showed more sensitivity towards their infants than those who were insecurely attached. Tronick studied an African tribe who live in extended fam ily groups.The infants are looked after and even breastfed by different women but normally sleep with their mother at night times. Despite the different carers the infants still showed one primary attachment to the mother. Fox studies infants raised on Israeli kibbutzim that spent their time being cared for in a communal. Attachment was tested in the strange situation with either the mother or the metapelet. The infants were equally attached to both of the caregivers except in the reunion behaviour where they showed greater attachment to their mothers.This suggests that the mothers were still the primary caregiver despite the shared care. There are also many cross-cultural differences. Grossmann and Grossmann found that German infants were more commonly insecurely rather than securely attached. This is due to the fact that in German culture they keep some interpersonal distance between the parents and children so that infants do not engage in proximity-seeking behaviour. This caused them to seem insecurely attached in the strange situation.Takahashi used the strange situation to study 60 middle-class Japanese infants and their mothers. It was found that there was a similarity in the rate of securely attached infants to those in the US sample (Ainsworth). However there was no evidence of avoidant attachment but there was high rates of resistant attachment. The Japanese infants were extremely distressed when left alone and 90% of the infants the study had to be stopped with at that point. Once again this is because of the different child care practises in the different cultures.In Japanese culture the infant is rarely apart from the mother which explains why they were so distressed in the strange situation when separated. All of these studies show that despite the cultural variations in the infant care arrangements the strongest attachment formed is still with the child’s mother. The research does show that there are differences in the patterns of attachm ent that can be related to the difference in cultures. Rothbaum argued that attachment theory and research is not relevant to other cultures because it is so rooted in American culture.The sensitivity hypothesis promoted that the secure attachment was related to the caregiver’s responsiveness and sensitivity. Rothbaum argued that this only reflects western ideas or autonomy. In Japan sensitivity is about promoting dependence rather than independence. Sensitivity has the opposite objective in the different cultures. The continuity hypothesis said that infants who are securely attached go on to develop more socially and emotionally competent children and adults. The competence means being able to explore and be independent and be able to regulate ones emotions.In Japan the opposite is true. Once again it has the opposite objective in the different cultures. The secure base hypothesis says that in the west secure attachments are seen as providing the infant with a secure base wh ich they can explore, thus promoting independence. Japan attachment relationships are dependence-orientated. Behaviours associated with insecure ambivalent attachment are more typical of the characteristic amae relationship which may explain why these classifications are higher in Japan.Rothbaum spoke about the behaviour of Japanese mothers and infants. This might be an incorrect generalisation because within Japan there are different subcultures which have different child care practices. The Kroonenberg study found more variation within cultures rather than between them. Kroonenberg suggested that the cross-cultural similarities could be caused due to the fact that the media spread the same ideas about parenting all over the world so they are exposed to similar influences.

Hispanic Cuisine: a Significant Ingredient in Like Water for Chocolate

Hispanic Cuisine: A Significant Ingredient in Like Water for Chocolate Eating is a fundamental activity. Food, itself, is a major component of survival, for without it there would be no life on this earth. Throughout the evolution of man, it has come to have a greater importance with multiple significances to human beings. In fact, it has become a defining factor for families, classes, and cultures all through history. Hispanic societies are no exception. Furthermore, Hispanic women writers have written articles, screenplays, and novels using cuisine as their driving force. A great example is Laura Esquivel’s novel, Like Water For Chocolate. First of all, the title of the novel makes reference to food, but it also has a deeper meaning. Images of heat and fire permeate the novel as expressions of intense emotion. Heat is necessary during the preparation of many foods. In the science of cooking, heat is a force to be used precisely; the novel's title phrase â€Å"like water for chocolate,† refers to the fact that water must be brought to the threshold of boiling and lowered three times before cacao powder can be added to make hot chocolate. However, the many forms of heat involved in the tale cannot be so controlled. Heat is used as a symbol for desire and physical love throughout the narrative. Some example can be found in Gertrudis' rush to the ranch showers then escape from the entire ranch itself, in Pedro's lust for Tita, and the death of Pedro after he and Tita passion is finally realized. This heat is used as a source of power and one of destruction. The epitome of this detail in the novel, where death and desire are paired together, occurs when the love between Tita and Pedro is actualized. Secondly, the recurrence of recipes of Hispanic delicacies throughout Esquivel’s book parallels their importance in Mexican culture. Anne Goldman asserts that â€Å"the very domestic and commonplace quality of cooking makes it an attractive metonym for culture† (Lawless 213). It is no coincidence that the setting of this novel takes place at the same time as the Mexican Revolution. This event was an important modernizing force in Mexican history and is considered to be â€Å"the crucible of social cohesion†¦in modern Mexico† (Pilcher 88). As a result of the revolution, a unifying national identity was desired. Defining cultural cuisines go hand in hand with cultural definitions. Like forming a national identity, or writing a novel, deciding on recipes that will define a nation is a long process. The recipes, that Esquivel ultimately chose to be included, represent the Mexican culture well and show their importance in defining it. Like most nationalities, there are delicacies that the Hispanic culture is known for. As mentioned above, in her novel, Esquivel makes reference to several traditional Hispanic recipes. These recipes introduce each chapter and assist in continuing the novel’s flow. Through these cuisines, the narrator is able to associate another anecdote that forces the tale to carry on. Without the food, the story would be at a stand still because so much of the narrative revolves around the food. Moreover, Esquivel’s usage of magic realism enhances the importance of the mentioned cuisines. Not only does she mention the food, it also has a profound affect on those that consume the entrees. Therefore, they have a profound affect on the entire story itself. One notable example is the Chabela Wedding Cake Tita bakes for the unfortunate union of Pedro and, her sister, Rosaura. The release of her tears in the batter is a release of the immense loss she feels. Because of this added ingredient, the guests who consume the cake are overwhelmed by the same emotion that Tita feels. Making anecdotes, such as this one, in connection with a certain dish, impresses a lasting memory of these dishes in the reader. Also, Hispanic culture places an importance in the transfer of recipes from one generation down to the next. In this narrative, the tradition continues through Nacha, the De La Garzas’ cook, on to Tita. Because Tita’s mother is sinister, unaffectionate, and unable to produce breastmilk for her daughter, Tita is driven into Nacha’s open arms. Maria Elena does not pass down the recipes. Instead, Tita is nourished and educated in the art of cooking through her surrogate mother. Nacha teaches Tita through cultural recipes and secrets of the kitchen. The reader finds that the traditions have been passed down because the omniscient narrator of the tale is Tita’s great-niece. In the tale’s beginning, she introduces a recipe for Christmas rolls. Like a cookbook’s author would, the narrator comments on the onions and how they should be chopped up fine for the Christmas rolls and suggests that a little bit of onion should be placed on the reader’s head to keep from crying when dealing with onion. The trouble with crying over an onion,† she states matter-of-factly, â€Å"is that once the chopping gets you started and the tears begin†¦the next thing you know you just can’t stop. † She adds, â€Å"I was especially sensitive†¦like my great-aunt, Tita† (Esquivel 3). And so the main character is introduced and the s tory can begin. This description is an allusion to Tita’s tear-filled life and her tear-jerking situation. At the story’s end, Tita’s great-niece mentions that as long as someone cooks her recipes, Tita legacy will live on. â€Å"Like a story, a recipe needs†¦a reason to be† (Jaffe 223). For Tita’s descendents, the reason for this narrative is the continued remembrance of Tita. Additionally, this onion description is how the reader is invited to become a part of the tradition. As a professor, Cecelia Lawless has noticed firsthand the effect Esquivel’s novel has on its reader and its â€Å"potential to provide a base for community building. † (215). Her students not only took interest in the story, they also wanted to cook the dishes themselves. They were interested in sharing their own personal recipes they had learned from their family members. Through this Esquivel’s text, which is also considered to be a cookbook, the recipes are sure to be enjoyed for decades. Furthermore, Like Water for Chocolate asserts women as insightful, productive, powerful, sexual, loving individuals through its incorporation of Latino cuisine. In this story, the kitchen is explored as a â€Å"space of creative power [for Hispanic women] rather than merely confinement† as said by the well-known poet, Rosario Castellanos (Jaffe 221). â€Å"It wasn't easy for a person who knew life by way of the kitchen to understand the outside world. This gigantic world which began from the kitchen door toward the inside of the house, because the one that lay adjacent to the back door of the kitchen and that overlooked the patio, the fruit garden, the vegetable garden, yes it belonged completely to her, she controlled it. † (Esquivel 5). Tita uses the culinary arts as a way to express herself and she effectively does so. â€Å"†¦Esquivel subverts tradition by ennobling a ‘domestic’ skill and turning it into an art form† (Glenn 41). For example, at one point in the novel, her love, Pedro presents her with roses to hearten Tita after Nacha’s death and as a symbol of his love for her. Maria Elena immediately sends Tita to throw them away. However, Tita does not want to. Instead, she incorporates her gift into an elaborate dish of quail in rose petal sauce, which turns out to be absolutely divine. She is able to save her present and consummates her love with Pedro through the food she serves. â€Å"That was the way she entered Pedro’s body, hot, voluptuous, perfumed, totally sensuous (Esquivel 48). In addition, this amazing dish sends Gertrudis, Tita’s second sister, running towards the shower outside to cool off. Because she is so hot, the water does not even touch her and the ranch shower is set ablaze. As she runs away, she encounters Juan, a soldier that had been drawn to her scent. Here, Gertrudis exposes her sensuality and courage. She defies social conventions and escapes the oppressive hacienda to pursue what she desires and her independence. And, although, the reader discovers that Gertrudis had run off to a brothel in order to satisfy her desires, she proudly returns, having turned her life around, as Juan’s wife and as a general from the revolution. She informs her family that earned her commission â€Å"by hard work, and fought like mad on the field of battle. Leadership was in her blood† (175). Additionally, Chencha, the ranch maid of the De La Garzas, is shown to possess power through food. An example is Chencha’s soup. Chencha had a firm belief that good soup could cure any illness. In one scene in the story, Tita goes mad after the death of Roberto. She is fed up with her mother, who Tita believes is the reason for Roberto’s death. Tita is sent to stay at Dr. John Brown’s house. Later, Chencha brings Tita the ox-tail soup that she made especially for Tita. With that, Tita returns to her senses. Although, Chencha is in a lower class than the women of the De La Garzas’, Esquivel still empowers this character. Her ability to help Tita is another example of the transformation of an apparent limitation of the kitchen into knowledge, enriched by cooking. The famous Mexican nun, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, describes the importance of the kitchen for Latin American women and the power it provides. But, Madam, what is there for us women to know, if not bits of kitchen philosophy? †¦And I always say, when I see these details: If Aristotle had been a cook, he would have written much more. † (Lawless 217). In conclusion, Esquivel, through Like Water for Chocolate, was effectively able to connect food, culture, and society together. Her decision to portray the novel as if it was also a cookbook energized the tale’s flow, heightened its suspense, a nd conveyed the importance of cuisine in the lives of human beings. Because of her brilliance, it has been internationally acclaimed, and righteously so. Like the tradition of passing down culinary secrets has kept the legacies of families, communities, and cultures alive, so will the study and appreciation of Like Water for Chocolate continue to thrive. Works Cited Esquivel, Laura. Like Water for Chocolate: A Novel in Monthly Installments with Recipes, Romances and Home Remedies. Trans. Christensen Christensen. New York: Double Day, 1992. Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe. Near a Thousand Tables: A History of Food. New York: The Free Press, 2002. Jaffe, Janice. â€Å"Hispanic American Woman Writers’ Novel Recipes and Laura Esquivel’s Como Agua Para Chocolate. † Women’s Studies 22. 2 (1993): 217+. Lawless, Cecelia. â€Å"Cooking, Community, Culture: A Reading of Like Water for Chocolate† Recipes for Reading: Community Cookbooks, Stories, Histories. (1997) 213-21. Pilcher, Jeffrey M. Que vivan los tamales! : Food and the Making of Mexican Identity. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1998. Sceats, Sarah. Food, Consumption and the Body in Contemporary Women’s Fiction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.

Human Rights Essay

Human rights and the concepts concerning the treatment of man have received much publicity since 1948 during the formulation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Protection of human rights goes way back to the early society of humans and continues to evolve with time as a leading factor in revolution and politics of any given government (Symonides 2003 p. 15). Power limitation for most governors based on the concept of human rights, which provided the foundation for judgment of the rulers’ leadership standards. United States also adopted this concept in their Bill of Rights that later developed, and through stress put on the need for international rights for human beings, the Universal Declaration got formulated too( Maddex 2000 p. 60). Currently, the human rights concept closely relates to the political organization of a society and the relationship between the government and its people. This entails the right of the citizens’ participation in politics, freedom that people should be entitled to, responsibility of the government to the people and the preservation of the people’s human rights in the process of practicing contemporary politics. Governments and states owe the people their prime dedication to maintaining and protecting the human rights; which involves their participation, recognition and expansion of the basic rights of people without necessarily infringing on meeting their basic needs. In order for a state to ascertain success in practicing contemporary politics, they need to strategize on the importance of maintaining the human rights of the people in the process of legitimizing their power and command for obedience. This paper aims to analyze the depth of concern that maintenance of human rights should receive in relation to practicing contemporary politics. The international body’s concern on rights issues dwells entirely on the policies that countries develop, their politics and the respect they maintain in regards to the rights of human beings. For instance during the end of antagonism in the East-West the United Nations strengthened their policies and stand on protecting human rights (Eade & Williams 1995 p. 3). In their view of politics, in the contemporary world, they formulated ways to protect such rights; such as offering humanitarian assistance to governing bodies, team inspections in relation to weapon destruction and an effort to fight for the internally displaced citizens. The four duty levels of a state in politics require that they respect the rights regime by protecting, respecting and meeting the rights of the people. Therefore in order to achieve this fundamental objective and obligation to the people, the state needs to resist in interfering with the people’s rights, respect them, allow the freedom of sharing resources, taking part in political action and participating in political autonomy, as well. In respect to the rights of the people, the view on socio-economic rights comes into play because for the political government to be able to dispose the resources equally and satisfy the peoples needs; they face an obligation to respect the people’s rights to free utilization of resources. Regarding a collective group, let’s say the family, an association the governing bodies and the contemporary political leaders need to respect the resources belonging to these groups in relation to their rights to the use of basic resources to satisfy their needs; this is what strengthens the human relations arm of politics in any governing state (Eade & Williams 1995 p. 42). Additionally, in an effort to increase and enhance machinery for rights actualization the state has to ensure they meet their obligation in committing to protect the rights of the people. In contemporary politics, the state has to make sure they put measures in place to protect the rights of the people against political, social or economical interference to avoid cases of political wrangles and conflict between the citizens and the arm of the government. This tertiary duty practicality involves establishing and maintaining a legal framework; by effectively implementing laws and regulations that would give the common man avenues to realize and enjoy their freedom and rights. On the hand, human rights form the pivot of moral doctrine that gives political order to the contemporary practice of politics. Hence the observation of human rights in reference to the international bill of rights determine the direction, scope and content usable in contemporary politics in relation to the moral norms of the people. Maintaining this moral doctrine of the rights of human beings in contemporary politics requires the application of convention measures issued in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to rights of the people to quality health care and fair, legal attention; with the aim of improving lives. While the safest way to secure favourable conditions necessary for people to live exemplary lives still stands out as human rights activism; the public authorities remain best suited to secure those conditions for the people (Carey, Gibney & Poe 2010 p. 32). Therefore, the much needed importance placed on maintaining the doctrine of human rights by most national institutions and international politics; in an effort to primarily avoiding interfering with the interests of the people. Moreover, the human rights doctrine in contemporary politics contributes to the ideological and geo-political order with a clear framework defining the basis of social, political and economic conditions required to lead better lives. Thus, the importance of practically monitoring and maintaining human rights through legal recognition and validation of the doctrine. Additionally, the human rights moral justification defines the sovereignty considerations made by a nation. Since human rights direct the legitimate criteria to be followed by individual nations, any appeals made by through politics should not by any means otherwise deter the nation-states from committing fully to maintaining the basic human rights. Thus, the human rights doctrine should be highly maintained because this determines the effective way of evaluating the contemporary legitimacy of the national and international political authorities (Shawki & Cox 2009 p. 36). Another subject to consider in justifying the importance of maintaining human rights in contemporary politics cuts across the identity role it plays in a community of people. Human rights define the political identity of people living in a certain community; therefore any the political authorities need to be more careful in handling matters bearing the interest of the rights of a people because, in turn this reflects on their moral jurisdiction and legitimacy of order over a sovereign state (Shawki & Cox 2009 p. 0). The morality of logic and justification of the individual rights and the community as a whole adds more weight to the extent of attention paid in maintaining human rights. Authorities in the contemporary politics have an understanding that human rights imposes positively to their control of power and effectiveness in law implementation; hence most of the leaders should formulate legislative laws that grant the people the freedom and the right to universal vision and contr ibution in political issues. Also, in an effort to legitimize authority in current politics, the state will have to stand up and defend the universality and morals of human rights; indicating that their political concern is not entirely based on position and power, but emanates from their primary concern to retain the dignity and rights of the human beings. Considering the legislative role that humanity assumes in politics, the authorities should embrace the concept of human rights doctrine and pursue to promote high maintenance of human rights; to present the people with better living conditions. This is because human rights initiate the orientation and demand certain goods that lack political justification hence guiding the actions undertaken in contemporary politics. Furthermore in the past, human rights took the leading role in revolution activism; the same case applies to contemporary politics whereby the positive the authorities influence put on maintaining human rights the faster they will be able to expand their democratic control and command audience of the people. Therefore, since democracy in politics and human rights directly relate, democratizing the lives of the people and establishing lasting protective measures would go into creating political order and eliminating the ambiguity that politics has on the identity of humans (Neocleous 2006 p. 135). Alternatively, obligation to establishing and maintaining human rights should be emphasized, not just as for upholding the values of the society and mankind but leaders in the contemporary political world need to view human rights as political so that they will continue to defend and formulate new ones in favour of the people they govern. Satisfaction of the people through human rights- oriented politics involves the authorities appreciating the diversity of the peoples culture, understand people’s views, realize the other value of an individual apart from political persuasion and commit to the democracy of the community; allowing them to contribute to the overall contest for political power(Nash 2010 p. 53). The best response and support showed by the people to their political leaders emerges from their willingness to evaluate their own values, their role in the community, listen to the plight of the people, exclude favouritism and exploitation in their political hierarchy and utilize their personal privileges’ in power to improve the lives of the people. This practically justifies how deep the importance of human rights relates to contemporary politics; and so the need to deduce stringent policies that govern the authorities in dispersing their duties in the political setting. The Human Rights council and the International Criminal Court fall under the few international bodies established to direct and penalize the actions of contemporary political leaders; in an effort to maintain the rights of humans. Abuse of human rights results to tension between the authorities and the people; further disrupting the already acknowledge international rights and laws governing the same hence political instability (Baehr 1994 p. 60). Consequently the probing of the ICC, leads to positive change in the doctrine of human rights as the government and political body abusing the rights of man face tough penalties. Despite these changes emanating from negative political conduct, many ascertain their success and relevance in ensuring that people’s protection from greedy and selfish governance; thus ICC has gone further to increase the penalties tied to the practice of politics in the contemporary setting to reduce the political crime against humanity and the common cases of genocide. Despite the cry, for better leadership authorities through contemporary politics continue to violate the rights of humans; leaving humanity the remedy to seal the gap between the political reality and the democracy of a secure future for the people. Addressing the depth of this issue reflecting back to the controversies in United States of the Abu Ghraib Prison and The Guantanamo Bay prisoners (Johari 1991 p. 26); there’s need to address the relevant problems surrounding the fight for human rights and public display of political awareness through varied avenues like websites. Moreover, the common man can initiate the activism to retain the rights of humans through the family unit and the community which ultimately give rise to the leaders in the contemporary world. Direct campaigns on equality and importance of human rights need more boost in creating educative awareness and affirmative action; guiding the conduct of authorities in the modern world politics in relation to protecting the interests of the common helpless man. Since poor humanity directly reflects on global change, there’s need to cultivate the spirit of togetherness between the community and the political structures present in order to improve the living conditions of people and the growing generation(Symonides 2003 p. 8). Other motivating factors that push for the maintenance of human rights arise from the fear of denial from existence. The denial of human rights supports brutality in the regime of contemporary politics, therefore, to counteract this fear from becoming reality there should be incorporation of human rights policies in political debates; in the contemporary politics paired with their respective penalties in case of violation (Baehr 1994 p. 6). Political lea ders in contemporary politics continue to source out dubious avenues to evade observing such rights hence the need for the United Nations Program on human rights to effect change in contemporary politics through legitimate arguments and conferences with the relevant political bodies, humanitarian representatives and authorities. Conclusively, without pressure on appeals made to effect and maintain human rights, authorities, in the democratic political world, would continue to argue and ignore the desirable quality of human existence. Subsequently freedom and equality in terms of speech and sharing of resources respectively, would become less meaningful in comparison to the benefits that human rights induces in politics; hence instead of politics contributing to nation building the result would only push for the eradication of human existence. Therefore, despite the efforts made by international bodies to promote and maintain human rights, the common man also needs to start human rights activism from the grass root level to merge the two(the family or community with the political unit). This will go into fostering a positive political weather and educative awareness of self protection against abuse (Steiner & Alston 2000 p. 55); that ultimately sums up to the minimum efforts towards maintaining human rights to sustain humanity.