... Downs’ conclusion of his work is that rational voters should almost never bother to vote. At the same time, Downs remains puzzled by this conclusion as it predicts a much lower voter-turnout than what actually occurs. The concept of rational choice voting and collective goods brings forth an interesting evaluation given Downs’ concluding dilemma: could rational choice voting behavior be considered a collective good? Furthermore, could such a rational choice voting behavior be considered a collective good to everyone with similar interest in terms of political parties and ideological positioning? While Downs explains that voters may continue to vote as means to support democracy, he provides no solution to resolve this irreconcilable complication. Democracy cannot survive with no voter-turnout, one could argue that the mere exercise of voting in a duly constituted election provides democratic legitimacy. Despite its self-serving nature, rational voting behavior is, in essence, a collective good as every member of society is able to benefit from it regardless of whether each members duly...
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...other public official whether he is right or wrong. Roosevelt believes that it is patriotic to support the president insofar as he efficiently serves the country. When citizens disagree with the president, Roosevelt states that it is the citizens responsibility to express their thought and belief, so the president can efficiently serve the people. We should embrace the ideological perspective reflected by Theodore Roosevelt because a country requires active citizenship and political participation, such as voting, in order to prosper as a democratic country. Liberalism is a doctrine that stresses individual rights and freedoms, limited government, and respects human rationality and reason. The ideology expressed in the quotation from Roosevelt, embodies liberalism because it is in favour with individual rights and freedoms of citizens. Roosevelt supports political participation, which is citizens getting involved in the political process, such as through voting, running as a candidate, supporting a candidate, attending constituency meetings, speaking out, demonstrating, protesting, or writing letters to elected representatives. In other words Roosevelt believes, that because citizens have the right to express their opinion, they should do so because if not it...
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...In my opinion, the enlightenment movement is still going on and will continue to make changes to this world. It will continue to get more women to advocate and fight for what is right and have the same rights as men. The advances made by the thinkers still remain relevant to human rights today. For example, women rights to voting, getting job equally to name a few. But there are other issues that still need to be looked at like unsafe labor conditions in undeveloped countries, Sexual abuse and violence. But I feel like in the long run, the Enlightenment era; I believe was successful in changing people’s views and helping one another advance. This didn’t just happen in one day, it happen through many years of challenging, fighting, and deaths of many feminist. This is a slow process that continue to improve and hopefully in a couple years all the hard work and dedication done by them works, for everyone to...
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...Compulsory Voting? Not so Fast A critical review of political scholarship regarding compulsory voting Word Count: 1644 Compulsory voting has been a hotly debated topic in the political realm over the past few decades, with supporters on both sides bringing up a wide variety of arguments and beliefs for support. The proposed idea of compulsory voting is the idea that would make voting in a democratic parliamentary election mandatory for all citizens who meet the age requirement; failure to do so will result in a form of minor punishment such as a small fine. The theory behind compulsory voting is that it will increase participation in parliamentary election, thus creating a more legitimate representative democratic system. Current major democratic countries that currently employ an enforced compulsory voting system include Australia, Argentina, and Brazil. This paper will argue that voting should not be made compulsory in Canada, on the principles that there is no proof that increasing voter turnout will legitimize our representational democracy, and that we have the right to abstention. I will prove this argument by examining the political scholarship produced by Sara Birch, Justine Lacroix, and Annabelle Lever. The first academic journal I will be examining will be that of Sara Birch in her 2009 paper The Case for Compulsory Voting. In this paper, Birch is advocating that all democratic countries should implement a compulsory voting system. Birch’s primary point...
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...rationally like sex workers in the prostitution industry, whereby all Rational Choice Theory assumptions are met, the theory explains phenomena exceptionally well. The example of soldiers going into battle clearly contradicts the assumptions necessary for the Rational Choice Theory to hold. By definition, a rational human being would choose the option that gives him the highest level of utility. In deciding to join the military and fight in war, the costs of making this decision heavily outweighs the benefits. Comparatively, this problem resembles the “Voter’s Paradox” in which Anthony Downs explained using a simple mathematic formula R=PB-C, where R=the utility gained/lost from voting, P=Probability that the vote will be pivotal, B=expected benefit the individual gets when the candidate wins, and C=cost of voting. In my soldiers going to battle example, the R=the utility gained/lost from going to battle, P=Probability that the individual going to battle will affect the outcome of the battle,...
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...threatening or dangerous. Political theorists such as Plato and Aristotle viewed democracy as being a system of rule at the expense of wisdom and property. The principle that the will of the majority should prevail over the minority may have negative effects. In Northern Ireland, a very divided religious country, if the 51% get their way, the other 49% will be in outrage. Democracy thus comes down to the rule of the 51%, as French politician Alexis De Tocqueville described it, ‘tyranny of the masses’. Individual and minority can be crushed in the name of the people. Another reason why liberals are wary of democracy is it gives a voice to the uneducated, ignorant and property less. Robert Lowe saw democracy as a potential threat. Linking rationality with education, he wanted to restrict democratic rights to those qualified to use them. This echoes the views of J.S Mills who believed political wisdom was unequally distributed, and so educated people should get more votes. Examples of this was in the UK when up until 1948 certain ‘educated’ people were allowed more than one vote. The Spanish social thinker Ortega y Gass in his book ‘The revolt of the Masses’ warned that the arrival of mass democracy had led to overthrow of civilized society and the moral order, paving the way for authoritarian rulers to come to power by appealing to basest instincts of masses. However it could be argued that democracy is also a means of personal development. The electoral process educates electors...
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...examined in order to establish the illegitimate conclusion ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Jinhan Chen (564 58220 29) page !3 Under the context of Thailand, military coup is defined as the seizure of power. Performed by someone with army forces at that person’s disposal, military coups are a chronic reoccurrence in Thailand due to its precedent history. These incidents include: the 1951 military coup, the 1957 coup on the ouster of Plaek Pibulsonggram, and the 2006 military coup that over threw P.M. Thaksin Shinawatra. The most recent upheaval took place in May, 2014 when Yingluck’s government was overthrown by the Thai army. Accumulatively speaking, a total of 261 coups transpired in-between 1945-2006 (Marinov, 2013). Due to common rationality, a frequent occurrence does not legitimize an illegal action of a government institution. For three reasons, a military coup is illegitimate: military coup is on the contrary of true definition of...
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...Science Research Network Electronic Paper Collection: http://ssrn.com/abstract=860865 Paternalism and Psychology Edward L. Glaeser† Does bounded rationality make paternalism more attractive? This Essay argues that errors will be larger when suppliers have stronger incentives or lower costs of persuasion and when consumers have weaker incentives to learn the truth. These comparative statics suggest that bounded rationality will often increase the costs of government decisionmaking relative to private decisionmaking, because consumers have better incentives to overcome errors than government decisionmakers, consumers have stronger incentives to choose well when they are purchasing than when they are voting and it is more costly to change the beliefs of millions of consumers than a handful of bureaucrats. As such, recognizing the limits of human cognition may strengthen the case for limited government. INTRODUCTION An increasingly large body of evidence documenting bounded rationality and non-standard preferences has led many scholars to question eco1 nomics’ traditional hostility towards paternalism. After all, if individuals have so many cognitive difficulties then it is surely possible that government intervention can improve welfare. As Christine Jolls, Cass Sunstein, and Richard Thaler write: “bounded rationality pushes toward a sort of antiantipaternalism—a skepticism about antipaternalism, but not an affirmative 2 defense of paternalism.” Even if these authors stop...
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...Farm factory This documentary awakens many feelings inside me. I am so concerned about this fact and to have learned and saw how it actually happens, I think that more than one could be saddened about it. Animals feed us, in fact it is their fundamental goal, the reason they are created. I believe we should be thankful and deliver some respect. They are inferior beings but they should not be cruelty treated. They do not have our rationality and cannot defend themselves against us. Besides the fact that they give their meat and derivatives from it, we humans abuse their generosity. They also have the right to live and die decently. I am not voting for becoming vegetarians all the way, but to change the industry for farm animals. Laws should be created in order to follow a certain procedure with a higher quality standard of living for these animals in the factory. Also, to support these farms caring for the lives of animals. In the documentary, we clearly can see that they have feelings and they also can feel the pain and desperation to learn that they are going to be killed. It also hurts us, those that care about them. I am extremely concerned about this issue, it makes me not eat meat anymore but that is not the point. In fact, I have always cared much about animals, sometimes even more than caring about a person. The way I see it’s that animals cannot defend themselves, and somehow humans have the ability to do that, to speak out, but animals do not. I have saved lives of...
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...Session 1 - Chapter 13 * What is the definition of capital market efficiency? An efficient capital market (EMH) is one in which stock prices fully reflect available information (i.e. stock market prices are good estimates of underlying intrinsic value). * What conditions generally lead to market efficiency? * Rationality * Independent Deviations * Arbitrage * What are the three forms of market efficiency? * Weak form * Security prices reflect all information found in past prices and volume. * Implication? * Semi-strong form * Security prices reflect all publicly available information. * Strong form * Security prices reflect all information—public and private. * What are the implications of market efficiency for corporate finance? * The price of a company’s stock cannot be affected by a change in accounting cosmetics, e.g., stock splits. * Financial managers cannot “time” issues of stocks and bonds unless they have special information. * A firm can learn from market reactions to the firm actions. * However, if financial managers have special information, and try to use it, markets will react. This could also suggest that market prices may not always be equal to intrinsic value. * What are the empirical challenges to market efficiency? * Bubbles * Consider the tech stock bubble of the late 1990s...
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...Aristocracy (Greek ἀριστοκρατία aristokratía, from ἄριστος aristos "excellent," and κράτος kratos "power") is a form of government in which a few elite citizens rule.[1] The term derives from the Greek aristokratia, meaning "rule of the best".[2] In origin in Ancient Greece, it was conceived of as rule by the best qualified citizens, and contrasted with monarchy. In later times, aristocracy was usually seen as rule by a privileged group (the aristocratic class), and contrasted withdemocracy.[1] ------------------------------------------------- Concept The concept evolved in Ancient Greece, whereby a council of famous citizens was commonly used and contrasted with direct democracy in which a council of male citizens was appointed as their "senate". The Greeks did not like the concept of monarchy, and as their democratic system fell, aristocracy was upheld.[1] In Rome, the Republic consisted of an aristocracy as well as consuls, a senate, and a tribal assembly. Later, aristocracies primarily consisted of an elitearistocratic class, privileged by birth and often by wealth. Since the French Revolution, aristocracy has generally been contrasted with democracy, in which all citizens hold some form of political power. However this distinction is often oversimplified. In Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes describes an aristocracy as a commonwealth in which the representative of the citizens is an assembly by part. Simply put, a government when only a certain part of the general public can...
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...1. Round 1, Base Camp At first, the team generally discussed about each role’s condition and got to know about the simulation system. One teammate suggested sharing personal goals. After warmly discussion and voting, the team agreed to share personal goals. Soon we realized that there were some conflicts within the team about whether to follow the team goals or personal goals. However, we decided to rely on teamwork to achieve our common goal, Avoid Rescue and furthermore to try our best to reach the summit. Open talk and honestly sharing information helps a team build up trust and deepen personal understanding. However, time is limited when to reach a consensus for most situations. I realized that, my role, the marathoner, is ambitious and energetic, therefore, the character may have strong bias to push the team to the top and willing to take higher risks. In concern of this, I decided to behave the opposite way, listen more to the team and use team wisdom to fairly decide what to do. 2. Round 2, Base Camp 2 At Base Camp 2, we checked team status on heath, weather prediction, frost-bite dangers, supplies, speed and food. We realized that our environmentalist was weak at Camp 2. When asked about what help she needs, she could not analyze (based on information available) about what help she needs. But after a double check round, we found a cure for her. Even though I strongly disagreed to rest just for her, the team decided to take a rest for the further rush, so I had...
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...Abstract This paper will give brief introduction to the deep meaning behind the word groupthink and the extent to which it is prevalent in our society today , at home, work places, institutions, entertainment places and its effect on consumer buying behavior. Then there will be an elaborate discussion on one of the well documented form of Groupthink in behavioral psychology called Bandwagon effect and its contribution in shaping consumer behavior by looking from different aspects of marketing and products. This effect relates to the spread of different beliefs among people even without any strong evidence and affects the psychology and personality of the person. This mainly helps people to identify themselves and categorize into groups which eventually become the reference group for all their behavior , adaptations and decisions. This forms the basis of the formation of groups, societies pertaining to which is a major part of the social psychology. At last but not the least some real life examples can be will be added to give insights from a practical dimension rather than just theoretical perspective to help understand and develop the idea even more. These examples will never occur to us until we try to think in this particular perspective and realize than since childhood we have been a part of them. Introduction Human being is a social animal. We cannot survive alone that is the reason that over the years they have developed thousands of such bonding and relationships...
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...The Women’s Rights Movement: Women’s Suffrage Jamuel Breeze Old Dominion University Abstract Women’s history is still being reclaimed. Women played critical roles in the twentieth-century American life. Women were workers, artists, parents, and women offered in many forms energies, insights, and strengths in periods of crisis and prosperity. Our forefathers wrote that all men were created equal, but growing up as a females has never been easy. When children are young there are not many differences between boys and girls, but as life continues things change. When young girls grow to become women they face discrimination, from the onset, as opposed to their male counterparts. This discrimination comes from society, and can even come from within their household from parents, siblings, and other family members. Women were viewed as only suitable for domestic works and were not given opportunities for advancement nor knowledge of other skills and trades. This essay will cover the route that women took in order to become equal; The Women’s Rights Movement, but more specifically focus on Women’s Suffrage. The Women’s Rights Movement Women’s rights movements are primarily concerned with making the political, social, and economic status of women equal to that of men while establishing legislative safeguards against discrimination on the basis of sex. The Women’s Right Movement began in 1848 with the first women’s rights convention being held in Seneca Falls, New York. Elizabeth...
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...Answer Selected Answer: diversity-consensus dilemma Correct Answer: diversity-consensus dilemma • Question 3 4 out of 4 points __________ is the ability of a team to perform well across a range of tasks. Answer Selected Answer: Collective intelligence Correct Answer: Collective intelligence • Question 4 4 out of 4 points A good size for problem-solving teams is __________. Answer Selected Answer: 5-7 Correct Answer: 5-7 • Question 5 4 out of 4 points Most self-managing teams include between __________ members. Answer Selected Answer: 5 and 15 Correct Answer: 5 and 15 • Question 6 4 out of 4 points When voting is required in problem solving teams, __________. Answer Selected Answer: odd numbers of team members are preferred Correct Answer: odd numbers of team members are preferred • Question 7 4 out of 4 points __________ is the sharing of responsibility for meeting group task and maintenance needs. Answer Selected Answer: Distributed leadership Correct Answer: Distributed leadership • Question 8 4 out of 4 points Wheel communication network and chain communication network are other names for...
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