This paper examines the strategies outlined in "Banishing Bureaucracy: The Five Strategies For Reinventing Government," that should be considered when attempting to improve the effectiveness in various areas including: Business, government and education.
Abstract The writer of this paper discusses the obvious lack of efficiency in governmental departments which are a result of a lack of adherence to strict rules and regulations. This paper explores the effectiveness of the five areas of action outlined in "Banishing Bureaucracy: The Five Strategies For Reinventing Government" by Osborn & Plastrik. The authors describe these five actions as 'levers of change' which should be considered when attempting to improve productivity and efficiency in different field such as education, business and government. One strategy is the consequence strategy which when applied correctly to the classroom setting has been shown to improve both the teacher's performance as well as the students' test results. This same consequence strategy can also be implemented into any working environment, however results may vary resulting in certain unwanted behaviors and outcomes. This paper describes the five strategies in details as well as their effectiveness or ineffectiveness.
From the Paper "Conventionally, organizations have been designed in a hierarchical manner because most people believe that this type of system is easier to manage. However in reality, most organizations find that the hierarchical structure neither facilitates management, nor improves production results. This is primarily because they are adhering to the idealistic theories that a bureaucracy is supposed to represent rather than adjusting to, or correcting the defects. Professional development of teachers and improvement of their competencies and their students' competencies can in many ways rely on the structure of the organization's rewards and disciplines achievement strategies."
Tags: applied, practice, theory, education, government, business
This paper reviews "Banishing Bureaucracy" by David Osborne and Peter Plastrik which focuses on the importance of cultural change as one of the five strategic components needed in making various bureaucracies and military organizations more efficient.
741 words (approx. 3 pages), 0 sources, 2006, $ 26.95
Abstract This paper focuses on the opinions of authors David Osborne and Peter Plastrik who both contend that it's imperative to change the existing culture of a bureaucratic or military organization in order to make it more efficient and systematic. In Osborne and Plastrik's book "Banishing Bureaucracy," the authors stress the need to replace old habits with new commitments in order to improve both productivity and output in any bureaucratic organization. The authors detail the manner in which these changes are to be implemented in order to achieve maximum success. Two examples of cultural change detailed in this paper include that of dress requirements in the military, followed closely by protocols of behavior. The underlying values of loyalty, faithfulness and unselfishness to the point of self-sacrifice are intangible aspects of the military's culture that have a very pervasive influence on the environment of the organization.
From the Paper "It is important to analyze an organization's culture when attempting to make any changes in the organization in order for the changes to be successful. This is especially true if the focus is being changed to be in line with an entrepreneurial organization that is customer driven. Core parts of the culture would need to be manifested in the new organization. Secondary components of the culture must then be changed in order to match with the changing organization. You cannot change an organization in opposition to its culture. Either components must be carried over and incorporated appropriately into the new organization or else the culture must change. For instance, the power structure of the military is an integral part of its hierarchy and success."
Abstract This paper looks at the story of Oedipus. It follows his life from the savior of ancient Greece to a banished outcast. The paper also discusses unwritten moral codes in society showing how the ancient Greeks were a peace-loving society with a strong sense that the Gods would guide them and this, the author proposes, is a reason for having no written law, just generally accepted practice.
From the paper;
"Every society has its own laws and the people within that society have morals by which the laws are created. No matter where one goes he or she gets a sense of the people who live there and their moral obligations. Whether the laws are written or not there are always standards by which to live. In ancient Greece the Grecians had no written laws and had no set in stone code of conduct; they did not have one god either. Instead the Grecians lived knowing that the gods were always around them in everything and that if they were to do something wrong the gods would punish them, so in short their moral code was their religion. A Grecian man's wish would have been to have the gods leave him alone for just a moment because for the Grecians it was the gods who held them to such high standards and therefore they did not need a written moral code or law. Oedipus Rex served to illustrate these unwritten unspoken moral codes of conduct by breaking them and thus being banished from the land."
This paper discusses the meaning of life and death, using the Bible and Greek mythology to explain and support the argument that there is life after death.
2,250 words (approx. 9 pages), 3 sources, 2002, $ 69.95
Abstract This paper discusses the meaning of life and death, using the Bible and Greek mythology to explain and support the argument that there is life after death. The author examines the meaning of God, and spirituality, and how God has put us on earth for a purpose, and that purpose does not just end when we die.
From the paper:
"Another reason that I believe that we are supposed to end up in union with God is all the instances in literature that say the same thing. For instance, in Genesis, man is originally depicted as living in union with God while living in the Garden of Eden, and eventually man would be transformed into an even more unified being with God. However, this original union is broken by Eve's eating of the apple and Adam doing the same. This resulted in mankind being banished from the Garden, and having to live a life of struggle and pain. However, the possibility remains that man can once again be reunited with God in Heaven."
Abstract This paper discusses the history of early Canada. It explains how the Loyalists who were banished from the United States, fled to Canada and how they became the core of the future English speaking population. It looks at the history of this act and the impact on the future of Canadian nationalism.
From the Paper "More than two centuries ago, people living in the Thirteen Colonies, the origins of the United States of America, were forced to choose between the newly independent country of America or loyalty to the old country, England. During the American Revolution, more than 50 provincial corps of loyal Americans opposed the rebellion. The Loyalist corps were raised in all thirteen colonies and fought with the British throughout the war. They lost and were driven into exile by persecution, confiscation of their properties and threats upon their lives. At the end of the war, Sir Guy Carleton, later Lord Dorchester, was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the British forces and was responsible for the evacuation of the troops and Loyalists remaining in New York City. "
Abstract This paper follows the life of Winnie Mandela, born into an affluent black family in South Africa. The paper traces her education and her growing awareness of the injustice of the apartheid system in her work as a social worker in one of Johannesburg's poorest hospitals. The paper follows her career as an activist in the African National Congress, her arrests as a political prisoner, and the formation of the ANC's Women's League. The paper ends with the reasons for Winnie Mandela's downfall in the Stompie case where she was accused of the murder of a fourteen year old boy and her banishment from the South African political arena.
From the Paper "While many of her followers turned on her in light of these new revelations, there were others who understood how she came to condone and order murder. They point to the fact that she spent year being afraid and paranoid because of the various government and political factions that wanted her dead. She had to constantly hide, and when she was in public she was forced to present a face of defiance so that her followers would remain strong and calm in the fight against apartheid. If she displayed fear or weakness then the followers may have believed they had no hope of winning. After years of having to hold her head up while being handcuffed and jailed, years of being away from her children in the name of equality and years of hearing rumors that there were plans to kill her and stop her leadership for good she had to develop a hard shell of protection. This caused her to be able to rationalize to herself that whatever actions were needed to further the cause of freedom were actions well worth taking."
Abstract This paper examines "Romeo and Juliet", written by William Shakespeare, which is set in Verona Italy, where two feuding families, the Montagues and the Capulets, produce a pair of "star-crossed lovers". It looks at how within the play there are five events that drastically change the course of Romeo and Juliet's love: Romeo and Juliet's meeting; their marriage; the death of Tybalt and Romeo's banishment; Friar John being detained with the letter allowing Balthasar to inform Romeo of Juliet's death; and Romeo killing himself before Juliet awakens. It attempts to show how these events could be classified as the direct results of a character's action, an act of fate, or a combination of both.
From the Paper "Romeo and Juliet's first meeting is completely due to fate. Their families? hate for one another would have made it impossible for them ever to meet unless there was another force at work. Romeo was originally infatuated with Rosaline, a woman who did not belong to either the Capulet or Montague family, and who would have nothing to do with Romeo. If the Serving Man of the Capulets had not approached Romeo to read the list of guests he was to ask to the party, Romeo would never have been aware that Rosaline was invited, which is the reason that induced him to enter the home of his enemy. This string of events and coincidences could not occur in a situation without fate, which sets up the rest of the play around the delicate relationship of Romeo and Juliet that under normal circumstances would not exist."
Abstract This paper discusses how all individuals do dream on a nightly basis, how sleeping is a necessity, and dreaming is inevitable and unavoidable. It examines Sigmund Freud's theory that certain life experiences, traumatic memories, and taboo desires are sufficiently threatening that special mental processes permanently banish them from the active, daily, waking consciousness. It also looks at other, more biologically-based explanations for why human beings dream, including lucid dreaming and hallucinations.
From the Paper "Biologically speaking, for instance, insomnia can often produce hallucinations, after an individual has been subject to too much stimulation, either of a chemical or environmentally induced kind. Jet lag and shift work can stimulate a disruption of the body's natural circadian rhythms one's natural arousal levels, metabolism, heart rate, body temperature, and hormonal activities as they respond to light and dark and other external pressures and life patterns?that disrupt the ebb and flow or the "ticking" of the dreamer's internal clock and disrupt a comfortable sense of consciousness during dreamtime, thus producing unpleasant dreams such as the "underwear" exposure dream delineated above."
Abstract This paper argues that the death penalty is a barbaric practice that all too often results in the execution of the innocent. The paper uses arguments based on the U.S. Constitution, recent legal rulings, and examples of other countries to make its point that capital punishment should be banished.
From the Paper "Haag, as others believe that due to the finality of the death penalty, it is more feared than imprisonment, and thus deters some prospective murderers who would not be deterred by the thought of imprisonment (Haag pp). Therefore, if the death penalty practice deters even a few murders and spares the life of even one victim, then it is justified and a value to society (Haag pp).
According to Haag, punishment, regardless of motivation, "is not intended to revenge, offset or compensate for the victim's suffering, or to be measured by it, but is to vindicate the law and the social order undermined by the crime" (Haag pp). This, says Haag, is why a kidnapper's imprisonment is not limited to the period for which he imprisoned his victim, nor is a burglar's confinement meant to offset the suffering and harm he caused his victim nor offset the advantage he gained."
Abstract Kate Chopin's "The Awakening" has been publicly ridiculed for years due to its "liberal" ideologies of the rights of women. After having the publication of the novel halted for indecency in the late 19th century, Chopin's work was revived in 1960 as a classic depiction of women's roles of the era. This essay explores the reasoning behind the negative criticisms and forms of banishment that were placed on Chopin's work.
From the Paper "At a time when the ideals of women's rights were emerging, it only seemed natural that the literary world would follow suit. As early as 1820 through 1830, women began to advocate their rights in a previously patriarchal society discussing the options of birth control and liberal divorce through radical journals of civil rights. In 1869, the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) was formed in Boston, and by 1870 several journals such as Women's Journal and The Woman Voter (New York) emerged supporting women's right to vote. Despite the fight for equality, upon the publication of Kate Chopin's The Awakening critics abhorred the novelette and gawked at the thought of a woman fighting for her individuality through sexuality and art. It is through these short-lived attempts to stifle Chopin's second, and last novel that invariably ascended the literary piece to its future claim in the history of classical American literature as "[o]ne of the most often taught of all American novels" (Bernard Koloski)."
Abstract This paper uses examples from two of Nathanial Hawthorne's greatest works, "The Scarlett Letter" and "Young Goodman Brown" to demonstrate how these works use symbolism to represent sin and morality.
From the Paper "Hawthorne, being of Puritan heritage, sets his "Scarlet Letter" in the seventeenth-century Puritan settlement of Boston. The protagonist of his story, Hester, is forced to wear the scarlet letter "A" on her breast to symbolize her sin of infidelity, of which resulted in a daughter, Pearl. Then when town officials try to take the child away, a young minister comes to the aid of the mother and child, enabling them to stay together. In this story, man is sinful and moreover, human maladies are essentially punishments from God. Although Hawthorne portrays the young minister as compassionate and just, he also depicts him with physical and psychological symptoms that are taken to represent an unhealthy mind and spirit and thus, are basically are the result of guilt. Hawthorne writes, "Most of the spectators testified to having seen, on the breast of the unhappy minister, a SCARLET LETTER - the very semblance of that worn by Hester Prynne -imprinted in the flesh" (Scarlet pp)."
Abstract This paper explains that Baruch Spinoza, the first Jewish pantheist, rejected the monopoly held by the clergy over the political power in the Jewish community, was a champion of intellectual freedom and had followers including members of the Islamic community. The author points out that Spinoza was one of the first philosophers to marry Jewish thought with the emerging ideas of the Enlightenment and was more receptive to contemporary Western thought than any Jewish philosopher since Maimonides. The paper relates that Spinoza went to Constantinople, where Jews were emancipated; the community in Constantinople contributed to Spinoza's ideas of intellectual freedom and, in 1664, Spinoza published the "Treatise on God, Man and his Well-Being" marrying Jewish scripture to contemporary philosophy.
From the Paper "However controversial, Spinoza's viewpoint on God was not unprecedented. Spinoza's version of God was firmly planted in Mediaeval Jewish mysticism, which was closely allied to the Neo-Platonic philosophical tradition of Late Antiquity, as it had been developed during the 9th Century intellectual development of Islam. "The fundamental thing to keep in mind when thinking about Spinoza is one simple, striking, and paradoxical proposition: God is the only thing that exists." The idea is not that God is everything, but that nothing can exist independently from God. While reductionists may want to claim Spinoza as their own, Spinoza envisioned a thinking God. In addition, "although Spinoza was condemned by his community for the heresy of saying that God has a body," he actually believed that God was much more than a body."
An analysis two of the more famous versions of the Indian epic "Ramayana": the "Rama Charita Manasa" or "Tulasi Ramayana" by Talsi Das and the "Valmiki Rmayana" by Valmiki.
Abstract As the author explains, the "Ramayana" is an epic story about King Rama's banishment from his kingdom, which has been transmitted orally for centuries in India. This paper examines two of the more famous versions, particularly in relevance to the artwork of Orissa, the northern Indian state in which the story is told. The author analyzes the artwork in order to demonstrate historical flexibilities in the story, which he maintains is a result of the nature of oral tradition.
From the Paper "The Ramayana is an epic poem that derives it dynamic nature from its history as an orally transmitted piece 1. These changes can be seen in any art from one area over time. Here, Orissan art from the early and late 20th centuries were used. In classic oral tradition, minor plot details can change, but the general theme of the work remains the same. The minute details change in order to customize the poem to a region and a time, so as to make it more accessible to those in need of it. Tulsi Das wrote his Ramayana in order to appeal to those who could not understand the older version of Valmiki's. Contrarily, Valmiki's version has resurfaced recently in Orissa because its moral structure allows a more direct relationship with the audience."
Tags: India, oral, tradition, artwork, sanscript, Hindu, Islam, Maya, Sita
Abstract This paper studies Ayn Rand's dystopian novel "Anthem". The book is written as the journal of Equality 7 2521, a man struggling with his individuality, his will and his concepts of good and evil. The paper details the book's plot line, which is based on Equality's long and arduous -- though ultimately triumphant -- journey of self discovery. The paper shows how Equality overcame guilt, deprivation, punishment, banishment and betrayal and in the process formulated his own definitions of truth, freedom and love.
From the Paper "Ayn Rand's Anthem is a dystopian story written in the form of a journal kept by Equality 7 2521, a man born to an oppressive, backwards collective state set in a bleak unnamed place and time. This society, whose most recent technological advance is candlelight encourages conformity and drudgery and suppresses individuality and progress. Here, friendship and love, curiosity and creativity, and any display of self will or preference is punishable in the Palace of Corrective Detention. The punishment for swiping candles, alone, is ten years detention. In this world, there is no encouragement or even concept of self. "There is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone." Individuals refer to themselves as "we" and to other individuals as "they." In fact, the word "I," is not known to most, and to speak this word is the worst possible transgression. "There is no crime punished by death in this world, save this one crime of speaking the Unspeakable Word.'"
Abstract This paper examines the relationship between Sam Houston, U.S. congressman and governor of Tennessee and the Cherokee Tribe. The paper examines how Houston influenced the the rights of the Native Americans and took their side when other Texas and national leaders would have banished them westward, or worse, had them exterminated. The paper argues that Houston was not merely seeking political support in trying to reach out to these Native Americans.
From the Paper "Although, today, many of Houston's prime initiatives to help the Native Americans have been pushed through the loop hole into the endless depths of Congressional lobbying, his influence is still felt through his mannerisms of treating those who are different. An ideology of tolerance may have evolved before Sam Houston, but the main importance of Houston's tolerance stemmed for those who were originally inhibiting the Americas in the beginning. Today, we as "invaders" of the Americas can finally realize our wrongs and our vices in dealing with the Native American heritage because of people like Houston."
