Archive for Septembrie 2, 2010
Why Does Everyone Talk About the Importance of Education but Few Do Something to Improve It?
Hypothetically, imagine the situation in Brazil after receiving two atomic bombs in any war. Imagine further, that all the pride of the country has been devastated, like its infrastructure and economic and social development. Compounding this scenario of pure imagination, imagine that Brazil has no wealth of natural resources (anything from the Amazon or Atlantic Forest) or the mineral wealth we now have.
In this imaginative exercise think now that the geographical area of that country was composed of volcanic islands vulnerable to earthquakes in the last degree on the Richter scale.
Imagined? It would be chaos, right?
If you think this is one of the world’s worst case scenarios, be surprised to learn that in the last century, after the Second World War (after 1945), Japan had all these features described above, with the exception of natural resources in large scale.
However, even given all these constraints of structural and economic orders, this oriental country managed to overcome them with massive investments in a policy of long-term development, focusing on reconstruction of infrastructure and especially in the appreciation of education as an element of transformation. The Japanese educational policy focused specifically on the creation of technical courses supported by a policy of innovation applied at the base. Copy the best products, surpass them in quality, and the proposed goal was achieved by the Japanese. Result? In the 1980s, the then U.S. president Ronald Reagan (1911-2004), had to ask the Japanese Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita (1924-2000), that companies of his country, especially the automotive sector, stop selling cars in the U.S. market, since such action could cause the fall of General Motors (GM).
Not very long after these events, in the 1960s, South Korea sought a model of economic development to be able to move forward with South Korean companies. The socioeconomic indicators of the country were below the Brazilians, not counting the tiny home market. At the same time, Brazil was experiencing the fruits of the process via Import Substitution Industrialization (ISI), which was basically to protect the domestic market from international competition, thus ensuring a space for companies which were within the country (both domestic and multinationals). Such a practice would lead to a competitive process capable of making local businesses replace imported products, ensuring, in essence, a consistent and promising industrialization.
Korea, it is important to note, copied this model with some variations: 1) protected its industry while at the same time promoting competition in the world order, 2) as its domestic market was small, they opted to sell their products to the world, which obliged it, therefore, to make its industries take measured efforts with international leaders, particularly on issues of innovation and competitiveness, 3) conducted an extensive and symptomatic revolution in its education system.
The last demonstration in which this took place? Radical changes occurred in schools through the university level. Substantial investments in basic education have made South Korea think big, as the ruling class believed that education needed structural change. From there a culture of meritocracy was implanted to encourage education, increasing the number of hours of study. Today, after a decade of the new century, the South Koreans study twice as many hours as compared to Brazilian children.
South Korea emphasized specific points: improved teacher salaries, increased partnerships with the private sector in order to raise funds for education and promotion of technological innovation and, ultimately, involved the nuclear family in responsibility (co-participation) in the process of teaching and learning. They applied the sermon that together (government, families, businesses, students and teachers) all become stronger.
The figures underpin this statement: The budget for education in South Korea rose from 2.5% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 1951 to 22% in 1980 - in less than thirty years, a jump of more than 750% . The result was predictable: South Korea was the only country that managed to develop economically in a well structured form over the last quarter of the twentieth century.
Education: the key variable
In the examples cited, education appears as a decisive variable for the development of countries (Japan and Korea), and currently it is being worked in a cohesive manner for countries growing at considerable rates such as India and China.
This “variable” called education, was also the object of study by economist Theodore Schultz (1902-1998). Following the war, Schultz wondered why Germany and Japan, which were defeated countries physically ravaged by the crudity of bombs, recovered so quickly. Schultz’s conclusion was that the speed of recovery of these countries was due explicitly to a healthy and highly educated population. He said a good combination of these two variables - health and education - we prefer to call it sentiment, would significantly increase the productivity and competitiveness of these and other countries who transited through these paths.
It was in this way - which was already highly familiar to many - that Schultz introduced a new key element for economic development: the Education Capital, which would later be identified as Human Capital. In essence, the know-how (savoir-faire) that Schultz prioritizes as a lever for development.
The work of Schultz, besides influential, particularly in the allocation of resources from developed countries (say Korea whose lesson was well learned and applied) was also on a list of staff development policies recommended by institutions like the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the UN itself, in its various reports and studies.
All these situations are well known and some are part of public domain. It is not through ignorance that, in some places, the promotion of education does not become a priority. Certainly the reasons for the neglect are different, with multiple facets.
History is replete with good examples. Examples of development guided by appropriate educational policies are also illustrative. Exiled in Chile during the 1840s, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (1811-1888) was commissioned to improve the Chilean educational system. On his return to Argentina, Sarmiento became the ninth president of the Republic (1868-74). During this period, he converted the Argentine educational system into a model of excellence. Soon the number of public schools doubled and more than 100 qualitatively unique public libraries were built. Even up to now, Argentines reap the fruits of this system. Not at random, five of our brothers have won the Nobel Prize, three focused on science, including physiology and medicine in 1947.
As for Brazil, the ones who put their feet first to colonize these lands have always wanted this to be a simple place, capable of producing and supplying useful items for metropolitan trade. By the end of the colonial period, this was the goal of the Portuguese empire. It follows that education came to be treated, on Brazilian territory, with mere negligence.
Education work sponsored by the Society of Jesus was removed from Brazilian reality. The first letters were not taught to the simple people, but the sons of the elite (children of the plantation owners). For the simplest (Indians and children of the settlers), teaching was in charge of converting them to the dictates of the Church. Thus, education in Brazil was born with an elitist paint, and continues today - just pay attention to the qualitative distance education for the deprived with the elevated who pay private monthly tuition payments and the still higher educational level and compare them with what is learned in public schools that lack chalk, chairs and, often, teachers are threatened with death in the peripheries.
The first university in Brazil and the five centuries of neglect
Of equal amount, the first university in Brazil was not born with a project to bring liberating and inclusive education, but only to flatter the European elite, granting the King of Belgium the title of Doctor Honoris Causa, in 1920, on account of his visit to the country. This is the seminal history of the current Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), originally known as University of Brazil (UB). What led to this? The continued collapse of public power, begun with the Portuguese, for teaching in Brazil. Today, through the years that are running in the XXI century, we reap the bitter fruit of those badly-initiated public administrations in the sixteenth century. There are five centuries of neglect. Currently, the Brazilian educational system is highly inefficient to promote a break with the status quo and to promote, through knowledge, a policy of valuing the individual.
In Brazil, coming from the world of politics, being a politician with a refined Administrative vision, remains the banner unfurled by Cristovam Buarque. The “Revolution in Education” advocated by the current senator, unfortunately, has not yet reached the ears of the deaf central executive power. As few revolutionaries are within the meaning of the term utopian, Cristovam Buarque is a catapult for those feelings for a better world led by chalk and slate. With this, is packed a world of ideas guided by quality in education. Like him, there is Paulo Freire (1921-1997), Teixeira (1900-1971), Lourenço Filho (1897-1970) and Fernando de Azevedo (1894-1974). And yet, it remains to ask: how many of us know who they were and what they did?
Some day we will repent bitterly for the neglect with which we treat education. We will never be able to build a cohesive nation. And the gateway to this construction is well known: quality education, not quantity of education, merely for convenience.
Maybe that’s why Celso Furtado (1920-2004), our most brilliant economist, rightly said that “we never developed, only modernized” because, in my view, development, through the lens of economics, implies a situation where there is an improvement in the state of life for those who compose the most simple strata of society. This leads us to say this is one of the few countries where the wealthy class seems to dislike the fact that the poor and simpler citizens may have the ability to study. It seems that “they” do not want everyone in a better intellectual condition.
Not coincidentally, we have diametrically opposing social classes - from one side the “luxury,” the other the “rubbish.” Perhaps that is why we still have (as a nation) a mania about the times of slave society, since there are many who still consider manual labor a thing for little people without merit. A country that wishes to be classified as serious needs politicians to return back to the school bench, to make the first of the most basic lessons the development of the alphabet: to eradicate illiteracy, to qualify the individual and give them the opportunity to thrive in life. And that is not done with a mere 4.3 years of study that, on average, each Brazilian is sitting on a bench at school.
Finally, we must point out here that we seek only understanding of history. Is up to you, distinguished reader, to “discover” who are the guilty culprits for the neglect of education and, more importantly, understand why everyone talks about the importance of education, especially at election time, but few are they that do something to improve it. After all, as the Frenchman Bachelard would say, “the truth is the daughter of discussion.” So let’s provoke more than discussion. The time is ripe.
Hugo Eduardo Meza Pinto
Marcus Eduardo de Oliveira
Translated from the Portuguese version by: Lisa KARPOVA
sursa: PRAVDA.Ru
„Bula aurului“ – precursoarea unei noi crize globale
Preţul metalului preţios creşte neîntrerupt şi este aşteptat să crească indiferent de recăderea în recesiune sau de creşterea viguroasă a economiei, ceea ce indică o bulă speculativă pe care magnatul american George Soros a prezis-o de la începutul anului, dar a cărei “spargere” poate arunca lumea în haos Goana după aur a investitorilor din toată lumea - care a dus la stabilirea de noi şi noi recorduri de preţ, de-a lungul lui 2010 - indică faptul că bursele din întreaga lume sunt prinse într-o bulă nouă speculativă. Prezisă cel puţin de la începutul lui 2010 de magnatul american George Soros, “bula aurului” va continua “umflarea” anul viitor, dar o “spargere” este inevitabilă.
În portofoliul cumpărătorilor se află deja suficiente tone de aur pentru a umple de două ori toate seifurile din Elveţia şi preţul metalului se află în cel de-al zecelea an consecutiv de creştere, respectiv în cea mai lungă asemenea perioadă din ultimii 90 de ani, notează Bloomberg.com. Toată lumea cumpără şi se poate lăuda că a făcut “o afacere bună”, văzând preţurile şi mai mari peste câteva luni.
De-a lungul lui 2010, investitorii au achiziţionat 278 tone de aur, a căror valoare ar fi de 10,4 miliarde USD, la preţul mediu din primele opt luni ale anului. Anul viitor, cei care au cumpărat în 2010 vor fi invidiaţi de cei care se vor fi prins mai târziu de cât de profitabil este să investească în aur.
În decembrie 2009, aurul a atins un maxim istoric de 1.227 USD uncia (28,47 grame), pentru ca, la 21 iunie 2010, noul record absolut să fie de 1.266 USD uncia. Însă scăderea preţului cu circa 20-25 USD faţă de iunie nu este decât temporară, iar creşterea preţului nu se va opri anul acesta.
Din aprecierile a 29 de analişti, fir me de investiţii şi cumpărători de aur, agenţia Bloomberg a ajuns la concluzia că toţi se aşteaptă la stabilirea unui nou record în cursul anului viitor. Uncia de aur ar urma să se vândă cu circa 1.500 USD în 2011, ceea ce ar însemna o creştere de 21% faţă de nivelul ultimelor zile din august 2010 (1.240-1.250 USD).
La Bursa de mărfuri din New York (Comex) s-au înregistrat opţiuni de cum părare a aurului în schimbul a 1.500 USD uncia, în noiembrie 2010. La 1.550 USD pe uncie estimează preţul aurului, până la finalul anului în curs, un analist de la filiala din Londra a Deutsche Bank.
Aur galben pentru zile negre
Oamenii “se tem de o nouă criză”, ceea ce îi determină să îşi păstreze averea în aur, crede Thorsten Proettel, alt analist citat de Bloomberg, de la Landesbank BW din Stuttgart (Germania). Totuşi, Proettel nu vede preţul din 2011 mai mare de 1.350 USD, în timp ce la BNP Paribas estimarea este de 1.370 USD. “Fie o revenire economică rapidă, fie o prelungire a performanţelor slabe, ambele vor aduce noi cumpărători pe piaţa aurului”, consideră Eugen Weinberg, analist la Commerzbank AG (Frankfurt).
“O economie mai puter nică va crea o cerere de aur pentru biju terii. Dacă economia rămâne sla bă ori se înrăutăţeşte, investitorii vor căuta un refugiu” în aur, afirmă Weinberg.
Cele 1.901 tone de aur puse deoparte “pentru zile negre” de către investitori, în 2009, au depăşit, pentru prima oară în trei decenii, consumul de 1.759 tone din care s-au fabricat bijuterii. Situaţia este de aşteptat să fie identică şi în 2010, în timp ce cantitatea de aur achiziţionat ca “investiţie” să crească. Primul cumpărător mondial de aur, India, a cumpărat 480-485 tone în 2009 şi îşi propune să mai aducă în vistierie 600-625 tone, în 2010. De avansul economic al Indiei şi Chinei, unde se înmulţesc bogaţii, îşi leagă speranţele şi producătorii de bijuterii de aur, după ce 2009 a fost al 21-lea an consecutiv de diminuare a cererii pentru astfel de bunuri de lux.
Cine câştigă: speculanţi precum Soros
“A cumpăra la începutul bulei este raţional”, spunea George Soros la începutul lui 2010, ceea ce compania sa de investiţii (Soros Fund Management LLC) facea încă de la sfârşitul lui 2009. În ultimul trimestru, numărul acţiunilor deţinute de compania lui la SPDR Gold Trust (cel mai mare fond de investiţii în aur) crescuse cu 152%, pentru ca, recent, să-şi reducă participaţiile.
La 16 august, Soros Fund Manage ment LLC şi-a vândut 341.20 de acţiuni la fondul respectiv şi a rămas cu 5,24 milioane acţiuni, echivalente cu 16 tone de aur. Soros nu a comentat tranzacţia, astfel încât analiştii se întreabă dacă cumva el presimte că se apropie “spargerea” bulei. Din declaraţiile sale anterioare, reieşea că bula se va “umfla” până la 2.000 USD uncia.
Cine poate pierde: toată lumea
În afara celor care extrag aur şi au avut venituri în creştere (cu 47% în cazul Newmont Mining Corp, cel mai mare producător din SUA), la “spargerea” bulei vor fi afectaţi toţi cei care au mizat pe păstrarea economiilor în acest metal. Cei “prudenţi” au ieşit deja din tranzacţiile cu aur.
Nu doar Soros, ci şi altă firmă de investiţii din SUA, Astor Asset Management LLC, a renunţat la aur încă de la finele lui 2010, deşi 10% din activele sale de 570 milioane USD erau legate de acest metal. “Aurul este prea riscant pentru că prea mulţi oameni pariază pe el”, crede directorul companiei, Bryan Novak, care se teme de ziua când, în goană după bani gheaţă, nenumăraţi investitori vor vinde aurul din ce în ce mai ieftin.
Bogdan MUNTEANU
sursa: gandul.info
Infractiunea de a fi cinstit in Romania
Domnule presedinte, permiteti-mi sa ma predau. Sunt un infractor de drept comun si va aduc la cunostinta faptul ca recunosc asta fiindca am indraznit sa folosesc in tara mea, Romania, in mod constant: cinstea, bunul simt, corectitudinea si politetea.
Acestea, dupa cum stim, constituie infractiuni, pe ale noastre minunate plaiuri mioritice, pentru ca pot afecta grav relatiile intre oameni si pot aduce reale prejudicii in calea dezvoltarii prabusirii tarii noastre. Pentru ca, in aceste momente, cand Romania se afla pe marginea prapastiei, noi trebuie sa facem doar un pas inainte.
Asta este politica d-voastra si noi trebuie sa o sustinem. Stiu ca cinstea, bunul simt, disciplina si respectul fata de copii, batrani sau bolnavi sunt cuvinte si practici invechite, care ar trebui scoase si din DEX, iar minciuna, frauda, coruptia, nesimtirea, hotia, mitocania, maniere pe care d-voastra le promovati cu tact si indemanare, ar trebui sa le invete si copiii de la gradinita.
Recunosc, domnule presedinte faptele mele “ilegale” pe care le-am savarsit in viata mea pana acum si probabil, pentru ele, voi fi aspru pedepsit. Bunaoara, am absolvit o universitate fara sa dau nicio spaga, am toate platile la stat achitate la zi, mi-am deschis o societate comerciala cu care, la fel, sunt cu platile la zi, am doi copii pe care i-am invatat de mici sa respecte varstnicii, sa salute, sa citeasca si sa nu arunce gunoaie pe strada. In timpul liber ascult muzica clasica, joc sah si nu fac politica. Ma multumesc cu o leafa de 700 de lei lunar, nu intru pe rosu cu masina si nu scuip pe strada.
Pentru toate aceste “infractiuni” pe care le-am comis si le mai comit in tara mea, va rog, domnule presedinte sa imi spuneti ce pedeapsa ar trebui sa ispasesc.
Sau sa promit ca ma schimb si sa ma fac baiat cuminte? Adica sa devin: hot, smecher, mitocan, spagar, nesimtit, ipocrit, lingau, ca sa ne putem da mana ca intre “frati”?
Niciodata! Accept pedeapsa maxima pentru infractiunea de a fi cinstit in Romania.
sursa: ziare.com
