Case study Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 41

Case study - Essay Example For Virgin Company, the major resource is Richard, its founder. He portrays strong leadership which very important in developing new capabilities for the company. His carefree adventure and entrepreneurial skills helped him in coming up and implementing his new business ideas. He is very aggressive leader and his devotion to business has resulted in the establishment of other Virgin Companies such as Virgin Cola, Virgin Rail, and Virgin Record and Virgin Atlantics. His leadership role has enabled him to establish a strong corporate culture and also promote the image of the company and the spirit of entrepreneurship. He believes in doing things differently and thus does not advocate for bureaucracy and thus he has become more strategic and charismatic leader and his business dream have been the force behind the success of the Virgin companies (Hellriegel & Slocum, 2010:344). Virgin brand is also another major link (Enz, 2010:345). The names of the brands and the trade marks acts as reputation assets. With the brand the group has been able to create other companies with similar quality since the Virgin brand has instilled confidence in customers (Thorne and Pellant, 2007:234). The brand gives the firm, its competitive advantage in the market and thus helps a lot in safeguarding and attracting a new market share for the company. The companies have also got enough investments and working capital. Richard Branson ensures that all the companies are well funded and the proceeds from one company may be used to invest in another company. This was the case in 1992 when a Virgin record was sold to EMI and the funds realized was used in Virgin Atlantic. This helps to ensure that all the companies are running and thus offering the best opportunities for growth (Plunkett, 2009b:34) Virgin Companies in its growth strategy have diversified into several business

Tattoos and Body Piercing Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Tattoos and Body Piercing - Research Paper Example It might also be acquired to represent the rebellion against the status quo or those in authority for instance teenagers worldwide get tattoos and body piercings to express their disobedience to their parents who are rarely fond of these activities. The modern day tattooing is made a lot easier, thanks to scientific development and new laser technologies. One of the forms of body art, which has descended down from ancient times and successfully transited in the cultures of modern times, is henna art. Made of natural herbs, it is used to decorate hands and feet of women in eastern cultures on their weddings and other occasions marking rites of passage. However, most people, more significantly in the west, have proceeded to tattoo culture to show their rebellion to status quo and express their opinions with more freedom and aggression (Sawyer, 97). However, as easy as it is recent times to get a piercing or tattoo, the hazards it causes to health cannot be over emphasized. First, it be ing a permanent body art, removing a tattoo may be difficult and very expensive since it involves the use of high-tech instruments. Second, the tattoos are highly prone to infections and skin allergies. The red dye used in tattoos usually causes rashes, sometimes years after getting a tattoo. The infections caused by tattoos are mainly bacterial and appear as sores and pus-like forms. Often, granulomas, a bump-like structure, form around the tattoo due to the ink dye used. In addition, and most dangerously of all, tattoos makes the immune system more prone to blood borne diseases i.e. if the tools used for carving the tattoos contains smears of infected blood, then the individual is on a high risk of developing chronic illnesses like... This essay approves that people are now adapting to the new trends and employers are learning to focus on more important things than the body art of contestants such as their expertise, additional skills, and ability to contribute to the mission of organization. This drastic change in the attitudes of people towards these once-judges practices is sometimes attributed to the globalization. The whole world has come together in a form of a global village and people from diverse backgrounds have come to know each other and learn from each other. In times like these, it is difficult to judge others in comparison to ‘self’ and not accept the diversity amongst different types of people. In addition, in such a compact atmosphere it is very likely to trade expertise, inspirations, beliefs, and practices. This report makes a conclusion that the media owes a big credit in this regard. Globalization has more or less just strengthened the bond amongst people from diverse backgrounds. It is the media and its undying influence that brought people together in the first place. The rapid progress in the world of information and technology and more importantly the internet boom is highly responsible in the conditioning of people to accept and regard other people and the differences between them. Those who were too stubborn before to give respect to individuals who had gotten themselves pierced in the tongue or forehead are now beginning to accept the differences and treat them like equals rather than being intimidated or disgusted, as before.

Sports Injuries Essay Example for Free

Sports Injuries Essay I have researched this particular assignment with a strong desire to help in preventing sports injuries. As a sport instructor, I would not allow anyone to play that did not know the rules of the game and had knowledge of the consequences of breaking the rules of the game. In my research, I found that knee injuries were ranked among the second highest most injured body site. Knee injuries are often very costly and involve procedures that require extensive and expensive post surgery rehabilitation and can increase risk of early onset osteoarthritis. Without effective interventions, the burden of knee surgeries and rehabilitation will continue to grow as the number of high school athletes continues to grow. I also learned that illegal sports activity is a much over-looked risk factor for sports related injury. I would punish behaviors that involved illegal activity on the field or at practices. The game would go on, and the player that did whatever it took to win using risky play would not be allowed to participate. As an educator of sports, I have the knowledge and the authority to help these athletes prevent risks to their bodies that may later on foster a sedentary lifestyle which is more harmful to them than playing the game that an injury may occur even if you do not play illegally. I most certainly would not ever put someone on the field knowing the were going to play and break the rules of the game just to WIN. I would enforce the rules and target education about the dangers of illegal activity that lead to many sports injuries. As an instructor, if you dont warm up, understand the rules of the game, engage in team sportsmanship, and follow my requirements;you simply will not play. You can also risk other players when you play in a way that breaks the rules that have been set forth by the sports, referees, and coaches. My philosophy is do it the way you are taught and told to do, or just dont do it at all.

Water Crisis in Peru :: essays research papers

In December of 1915 a huge step for the rights of Peasants in Peru was taken. Juan Pevez was born in Ica, Peru and in 1915 he lead an uprising against the Picasso family who ran the that Pevez worked on. In Water!, an excerpt from Pevez’s autobiography, a dispute over rights to water is described and how the peasants overcame . Southern Peru does not see much rain during the year, so when it does come it is an extremely valued commodity. In December 1915 a very unusual thing happened. The water came much earlier that year and to the peasant's surprise it went unnoticed by the estate owners. In that time the estate owners unlawfully kept the water from the peasants until their own fields were irrigated. The water came that year in the middle of the night so the estate owners were clueless. Unaware that they had the same rights to the water as the estate owners, the farmers were reluctant to open up the Sluice gates that allowed the water to enter their own small canals to irrig ate their land. Juan Pevez, who was enrolled in the School of Agronomy informed the farmers that legally they had a right to the water. Trusting Pevez, they all opened their gates to irrigate their fields unbeknownst to the landowners. Soon, morning came and the â€Å"stolen† water was noticed and a brawl broke out between the serfs and the estate owners. After being broken up the peasants formed a delegation to make a plea to the Technical Commission to state their concern about the unfair distribution of water. The director of the commission, Ezequiel Gago, heard both sides argument. In December 1915 history was made when Gago ruled in favor of the Peasants. That was the first time in the history of the valley that a group of peasants won a case against a powerful landowner like Picasso.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The account of this event is very important for many reasons. First, as I stated before, this was an historical event for the peasant community in Peru as well as the rest of South America. The event that Juan Pevez lead was a landmark event in the history of not only peasants but everyone in South America. It was the beginning of a movement of sorts toward a freer nation. That event had a lasting effect. The delegation that was formed to protest the Water withholding grew and grew and now is still in effect today under the name of the Peruvian Peasant Federation.

Huck Finn Freedom :: essays papers

Huck Finn Freedom It is no surprise that a book that elegantly combines American History, culture, and moral dilemmas along with controversial issues has become a classic novel. This novel’s effects were felt from coast to coast and its presence shaped the nation as no other has ever done. Therefore, it remains no surprise that what many people regard as the first truly American novel, set in the 1840s and written after the American Civil War, should have at its heart the issue that divided the nation, slavery. Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn illustrates a slave’s escape from freedom and a boy’s escape from society’s standards, a plot in which the entire theme of freedom and bondage occurs. Twain utilizes freedom as a main theme in this novel in order to illustrate the constant struggle to escape psychological and social imprisonment. Huck’s initiation into adulthood seems to show his inner struggle with the problem of being free from the grips of society. Huck is stuck in a world that he does not respond to. While in captivation, Huckleberry is not the person who he wants to be. He cannot seem to escape the grips of society. As points out, â€Å"Jim can say as soon as he escapes from Ms. Watson, ‘I owns myself,’ while Huck is still ‘owned’ by the official values supervised by his conscience. Huck is not only imprisoned by society but by the grips of his own mind. Due to the abusive relations of his father, Huck is imprisoned by the idea of survival. A healthy person, as demonstrated by noted psychologist Abraham Maslow, is able to meet self-actualization needs. However, Huck Finn on the table of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is stuck at safety needs. Because of his father’s attitude towards him, Huck needs to take care of his safety needs until he is able to fe el secure. When he finally feels secure, he will move from safety needs to love and belongingness needs. However, in order to fulfill these safety needs, Huck must escape from society but, â€Å"he is a fugitive from society who cannot be alone†(219 ). Clearly, Huck is trapped between existing as a prisoner to society or as a prisoner to his own lonesomeness. â€Å"In lighting out, Huck preserves his independence but also commits himself once more to isolation†.

17th Century Treatment of Woman in Literature Essay

By the Middle Ages, it was commonly accepted that Eve was principally to blame for the disobedience that led to the fall of humanity. Greek ideas had replaced Jewish in Christian thinking, including the notion that the soul was good but the body evil. Heretical though this might have been, it didn’t stop sexuality being regarded as somehow evil. One of the few recorded medieval women writers, the mystic Margery Kempe, aspired to celibacy even within marriage. As it becomes apparent in a few select works representing women in medieval literature, includingThe Book of Margery Kempe, Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and Le Morte Darthur, in the middle ages or medieval period, restrictions placed on women underwent a significant change. At the beginning of this period, women’s roles were very narrowly prescribed and women did not have much to do with life outside of the home. As this age went on, however, women gradually began to express more opinions and have a greater and more equal role in society. Two earlier medieval texts, Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight offer readers two simple categories of women, those who are or are not confined. Later, with the writings of Margery Kempe, the strict duality begins to disappear and the reader is confronted with a woman who is blend of each of these ideas of women. While she is confined by her society, she is unconfined by its conventions such as marriage and traditional gender roles. In general, however, each text presents an example of a â€Å"proper† and confined woman as well as the complete opposite; almost so that the reader can see what evils can occur if a woman is not confined. The women in Beowulf, at least on first glance, might appear to be glorified waitresses and sexual objects, but their role is far more complicated than this. When it is stated in one of the important quotes from â€Å"Beowulf† that, â€Å"A queen should weave peace† As confined in a marriage, women in Beowulf are assigned the role of peace weaver, â€Å"queen and bedmateAll of the human women in Beowulf are queens and adhere to their duties as such with grace and obedience. The only exception to this model of medieval femininity is Grendel’s mother who is technically a woman but is so hideously described that the idea of gender becomes grossly distorted. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight even though it was written some years after Beowulf. In this text, the reader is first confronted with the ideal woman, Guenevere, who is confined and is serving her role as peace weaver and object for the male gaze. â€Å"the goodly queen gay in the midst/ on a dais well-decked and duly arrayed / with costly silk curtains†¦all broidered and bordered with the best gems† Chaucer’s womenAlthough women feature strongly in Chaucer’s earlier works, such as The Boke of the Duchess and Troilus and Criseyde, we only find three women on the pilgrimage described in The Canterbury Tales: * The Wife of Bath * The Prioress * ‘Another nun’ who accompanies her but is hardly mentioned again. The two principal women reflect the only ways that women at the time could achieve independence and status: in the Church or in a trade. The Wife of Bath represents those whose skills, such as weaving, gave them financial independence, though Chaucer’s character seems to have grown wealthy mainly by marrying a series of rich old men. is tempting to see the Wife as a champion of female rights, and her Tale brings out the idea that women should have maistrieover men, but the Wife is of course a character in a story written by a man. She has had five husbands, like the woman of Samariawho is challenged by Jesus (in John 4:17-18), ’withouten oother compaignye in youthe’. Her fifth husband, whom she married for love rather than riches, proved to be less compliant – and very well read. She claims to have put him in his place eventually, but Chaucer enjoys making the Wife recount (and try to refute) all the misogynistic tales with which he has assaulted her.  Women in Renaissance and after: Throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the social standing and the legal and economic rights of women continued to be restrictive, limiting them to the domestic sphereDuring the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century and the resulting Catholic Counter-Reformation, the depiction of women in domestic roles became increasingly important. The social system of patriarchy matured during the early modern period, particularly during the Reformation. The concept of patriarchy involved male control over nearly all facets of society. The assigned works from the English Renaissance primarily portray women unrealistically. Despite a few exceptions, these works depict women as being idealistically beautiful, as having perfect virtue, or, conversely, as exercising hyperbolically negative traits. The few exceptions to this rule do depict women in a more realistic light. For instance, in its first six stanzas, the female speaker of John Donne’s â€Å"The Bait† praises Marlowe’s â€Å"Passionate Shepherd,† but in the final quatrain, she acknowledges how foolish she is for biting at his bait, saying, â€Å"That fish that is not catched thereby, / Alas, is wiser far than I† (1247). William Shakespeare also paints a realistic picture of a woman in Sonnet 130, debunking the florid Petrarchan conventions that elevate women’s beauty almost beyond comprehension but asserting that his mistress is â€Å"as rare† (1041) as any Petrarchan subject nonetheless. Among the male authors, Shakespeare also presents the most substantive and realistic female character of these works with Cordelia in King Lear. Although her honesty at first brings disownment and exile, she emerges as one of the few characters in the play who remain true to their convictions throughout the course of the narrative. Cordelia’s realistic portrayal is rivaled only by the highly personal poetry of the only female author assigned, Katherine Philips. In â€Å"A Married State,† Philips also debunks the popular perspective favoring of marriage, especially with its benefits for women, noting to her audience of young women that the single life yields â€Å"No blustering husbands to create your fears; / No pangs of childbirth to extort your tears; / No children’s cries for to offend your ears† (1679). Another of her poems, â€Å"On the Death of My First and Dearest Child, Hector Philips,† provides an equally realistic yet exponentially more emotional account of the uniquely maternal experience of losing a child. Despite the success of these works in presenting realistic depictions of women, they are the exceptions to the rule, as the majority of the assigned works portray women quite unrealistically. Perhaps the most common of the exaggerated portrayals addresses women’s physical beauty. Sonnet 64 of Edmund Spenser’s Amorettidescribes his subject with the inflated Petrarchan conventions satirized by Shakespeare, likening each detail of her physical appearance to a different flower, and claiming that â€Å"her sweet odour did them all excel† (866)—an obviously impossible feat. The bride of Spenser’s Epithalamion is sung as having similarly cosmic beauty, with â€Å"eyes like stars† (870) or â€Å"Saphyres shining bright† (872). In fact, Spenser describes â€Å"all her body† as â€Å"like a pallace fayre† (872) in a highly exaggerated comparison, the meaning of which almost defies interpretation. Even in a poem addressing the neo-Platonic ideal of finding virtue in beauty, Sir Philip Sidney’s Astrophil still relapses to using the common Petrarchan convention comparing Stella’s eyes to the sun in Sonnet 71 before concluding with the confession that he fails in his attempt to elevate his attention from her physical beauty to her underlying virtue. These last two works also invoke the fallacy of women as having unadulterated virtue. Again, Astrophil lauds the inherent goodness that Stella’s beauty reflects. Not only does she possess this virtue, but she also seeks to improve all with whom she comes in contact: â€Å"And not content to be Perfection’s heir / Thyself, dost strive all minds that way to move, / Who mark in thee what is in thee most fair† (926). Spenser describes one example of the flawless disposition of the bride ofEpithalamion by recounting her humility, even shyness, in the face of the adoring stares of all the guests at her wedding and the unsullied virginity she brings to her marriage bed. In another work, the virtuous Celia of Ben Jonson’s Volpone finds her faith and integrity unrewarded with an attempted affair forced upon her by her husband and a false conviction for allegedly seducing yet another man. Finally, in a highly complex simile, Donne draws a parallel between his love and â€Å"the fixed foot† (1249) of a compass in â€Å"A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning. † The woman he addresses is so constant, so faithful, so flawlessly virtuous, that she is as the tool that produces the circle, the shape of perfection. Just as common as excessively positive characterizations of women are the excessively negative. Two of the assigned plays include women whose primary activity is political scheming: Goneril and Regan in King Lear and Lady Politic Would-Be in Volpone. Goneril and Regan present flattering platitudes to their father, Lear, that do not reflect their true feelings for him. In fact, after receiving their inheritances of half the kingdom each, they want nothing more to do with him and turn him out into the stormy night. Lady Politic also schemes in an effort to increase her social status, leveling false accusations of adulterous seduction against Celia in order to advance her and her husband’s own chances of inheriting Volpone’s fortune. The speaker of Donne’s â€Å"Song† might have been hurt by such women as these, for he denies the existence of any faithful and virtuous woman. If his addressee were to find a seemingly true woman, Donne laments that â€Å"Though she were true when you met her, / . . . / Yet she / Will be / False, ere I come, to two, or three† (1238). Another of Donne’s poems, â€Å"The Flea,† contains another common criticism of women: that they too often deny their suitors. The listener of this dramatic monologue, in killing the flea, casually rejects the speaker’s elaborate analogical argument for a relationship between them, and in response, the speaker insults her honor, which amounts to as much â€Å"as this flea’s death took life from thee† (1236). â€Å"The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd† also counters an elaborate argument, this one an appeal more emotional than rational. Sir Walter Ralegh’s nymph responds to each point from Marlowe’s shepherd with the argument that all his promised goods and pleasures will fade with time, including his own youth and love. This reply to a heartfelt attempt to win her love establishes the nymph as cold and self-centered, as opposed to the devoted and emotionally expressive shepherd. The speaker of Andrew Marvell’s â€Å"To His Coy Mistress† experiences a similar rejection from his intended lover. Rather than praise her beauty and virtue, he mocks them as fleeting and meaningless, respectively, saying, â€Å"Thy beauty shall no more be found, / . . . in thy marble vault . . . † (1691) and â€Å". . . then worms shall try / That long-preserved virginity, / And your quaint honor turn to dust† (1691-92). Perhaps the strongest indictments of women in these works charge them with an opposite sin: the base corruption of formerly virtuous men. Arcasia, in Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, attracts and seduces good men only to turn them into wild beasts doomed to her service. Shakespeare’s Sonnet 144 describes a similar woman, close contact with whom carries damning effects: â€Å"To win me soon to hell, my female evil / Tempteth my better angel from my side, / And would corrupt my saint to be a devil† (1042). The most â€Å"accomplished† female corrupter of these works affects not only the man in her life but all of humankind. John Milton’s Eve, after ignoring the counsel of her wiser husband, inflicts sin upon all her descendents as a result of her inferior reason, virtue, and faith—according to Adam and Milton. The sinful history of humanity to follow owes itself to the weakness of a woman. The enormity of this last example typifies how the unrealistically exaggerated portrayals of women in English Renaissance literature far outweigh the few examples of more realistic and moderate depictions. This subject culminates in the image of Milton’s Eve in the epic poem Paradise Lost. Although Milton’s Eve comes, in the mid-seventeenth century, at the end of the Renaissance in England, her image builds upon, and perpetuates, Renaissance antifeminist commonplaces, while it also questions and undermines them. Milton emphasizes Eve’s subordinate position in his description of Adam and Eve in Book 4: â€Å"For contemplation he and valor formed, /For softness she and sweet attractive grace; /He for God only, she for God in him† (11. 296-299). Eve herself articulates and generalizes that subservience: â€Å"God is thy Law, thou mine; to know no more/Is woman’s happiest knowledge and her praise† (11. 638-639). When she rebels against her secondary position, she separates herself from Adam in their Edenic tasks and thus is vulnerable to Satan’s temptations. When the Renaissance in England was at its height, in Edmund Spenser’s Elizabethan world, the great epic poet of the 1590s presents images of women that contrast with the shadowy or negative women of Milton’s epic poem. While antifeminist views of female nature are embodied in the allegorical Error in Book 1 of Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, other females throughout the epic serve to celebrate women. In part because Spenser’s poem was written in praise of his own Queen Elizabeth, the positive images of women range widely. They include the gentle, yet forceful, Una, whose cry, â€Å"Fie, fie, faint harted knight† (1. x. 465) shocks the feeble Redcrosse Knight into action against the temptations of Despair. In the third book of The Faerie Queene, the virtue of Chastity is exemplified through the woman warrior Britomart. In this portrait, Spenser tells Queen Elizabeth that he is disguising praise of her, his own queen, since explicit celebration would be inadequate: â€Å"But O dred Soveraine/ Thus farre forth pardon, sith that choicest wit/ Cannot your glorious pourtraict figure plaine/ That I in colourd showes may shadow it,/ And antique praises unto present persons fit† (3. . 23-27). Throughout her reign, Queen Elizabeth provided a strong, positive image of a woman, through which poets from Peele’s play, The Arraignment of Paris, through William Shakespeare’s Henry VI, Part 3 found opportunities to create dominant roles for woman. Yet Queen Elizabeth herself perpetuated some of the misogynist stereotypes that haunted her at her accession in 1558, in such tracts as John Knox’s Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of Women. Queen Elizabeth ruled through her own alienation from her womanliness. She ruled as the Virgin Queen, continuing the idea of chastity as the norm and replacing in her still newly Protestant country the lost ideal of the Virgin Mary. The artifice of her costuming and the artfulness of her speeches both contributed to her power. During Elizabeth’s reign from 1558 to 1603, positive images of women include the female characters of Shakespeare’s comedies, like Rosalind of As You Like It and Beatrice of Much Ado about Nothing. After James I’s accession, however, the Jacobean theater explored female characters who achieved tragic, heroic stature, like John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi. In her closet drama, The Tragedy of Mariam, Elizabeth Cary explored the dilemmas facing strong women. In addition, in this later period of the Renaissance, such women writers as Elizabeth Grymeston, the author of the Miscelanea; Lady Mary Wroth, the author of the poetry and prose epic romance Urania; and Amelia Lanier, the author of a poetic defense of Eve, became creators of rich images of women, which we are only now beginning to recover.

Local authorities are better placed to respond to crises and disasters

Local authorities are better placed to respond to crises and disasters Introduction Local and central governments have different roles to play in the response and management of disasters. In this context, disaster means a â€Å"sudden catastrophic event that brings any enormous destruction, damage, loss and/or devastation of property and life† (Taylor 1986, ‘Coordination for Disasters’ p.12).Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Local authorities are better placed to respond to crises and disasters specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More The damages so referred are immeasurable and vary in magnitudes depending on the inflicted region’s geographical location, climatic conditions and earth’s surface degree of vulnerability. During the occurrence of disasters, the social systems of emergency responses remain more often than not rendered disrupted and malfunctioned. Any hazard that causes immense human suffering amounts to a disaster if it is unpredictable occurring in a large enough speed to out power the response systems, characterized by uncertainty, urgency and the posing of intense threat. For any disaster to take place, people must be living in hazardous places for instance near volcanoes that are active, slopes susceptible to slides, or in regions likely to flood. In addition, the hazardous phenomenon must take place, whether it is human or naturally instigated. Finally the occurrence of the â€Å"disastrous phenomenon must cause immeasurable extensive damages especially where preventive measures have not been taken† (Taylor 1986, ‘The Context of British Politics’ p.57). Therefore, as the paper unveils, disasters do not include single incidents of human life losses such as a plane crush but rather entangle widespread human sufferings such as an intense earthquake, financial, outbreak of certain infectious diseases, flooding, or even human instigated disasters such as Chernobyl or sea express spill among others. The essa y will look at the roles of the central government in control and management of disasters as contrasted from the local government’s roles and finally evaluate the combined hands of both governance levels to draw a conclusion on which governance level is best placed to cope with disasters management. However, as is exposes, the reverse of the proposition is the case. Overview of the history and practice of civil defense Various theoretical perspectives have been formulated by different nations to cope with disasters. For instance, in 1991 â€Å"†¦the UK government launched a review of disasters preparations in the nation† (Alexander 2000, p.71). A national aim geared towards enhancement of nationwide emergencies planning agendas was published in 2003.Advertising Looking for essay on public administration? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The agenda focused on putting into place resilience measures fo r the nation to respond to aftermaths of disruptive challenges as opposed to measures of risks reduction via anticipation or alternatively redundancy measures. According to Comfort (1994, p 157), such an approach makes an assumption of â€Å"†¦a capacity to reorganize resources and action to respond to actual danger, after it occurs†. Resilience here entangles specialized protections, which are standardized and centralized methodologies of hazards prediction. According to the civil contingencies bill, all the above mentioned resilient measure are all duties of local governments with an exception of centralization which is a mandate of central governments. â€Å"The general requirement of the bill, as an embodiment of current government thinking, seem to make it clear that central government’s desire is to distance itself from response to local disasters whilst trying to ensure adequate local preparation† (Lupton 1999, p.83). Crucial to note is that disaster s idiosyncrasies are not ardently necessary addressed by putting in place formal ways of disasters preparations. According to Comfort (1994), some of the idiosyncrasies include â€Å"need to be flexible in response and to be prepared to innovate† (p.158). Armed with these idiosyncrasies, any form of disaster response system can be sure to respond to the specific requirement of any new moment. As result â€Å"Central government desires to remain detached from local emergencies can be justified in the context and remains consistent with a theme of appropriate decentralization† (Taylor 1986, ‘The Context of British Politics’ p.56). Historically, differences exist in the manner in which decentralized and centralized nations handle disasters. The centralized governments have â€Å"fewer decision takers and that they are placed at a higher level in the response hierarchy† (Alexander 2000, p.164). The hierarchical and centralized models designed to handle disaster have received enormous critics since they have been perceived as having the capacity to hinder free information flow and consequently posing a tragedy in decision-making.Advertising We will write a custom essay sample on Local authorities are better placed to respond to crises and disasters specifically for you for only $16.05 $11/page Learn More Modern trends however, are based on coming up with remote structures that are adaptable to specific incidents and which posses amicable familiarity with appropriate responding services. As Penning-Roswell (1996) observes, â€Å"†¦at least in the case of natural hazard, although there is tendency to focus disaster response at local level, because of the intimate knowledge of the environment in which the emergency is occurring† (p.123) a broader disciplinary and geographical perspectives makes better insights be realized. Whether the disaster response is well established at local level as opposed to central level of governance is subject to essential requirements such the generic role of the government and the ability to have appropriate leadership during, before and after the occurrence of any disaster both at national and at local levels. Local and central government Leadership and disasters response Leadership encompasses willingness and the availability of good will to act in an appropriate way. Leadership, Prior to occurrence of any disaster, is essential despite the fact that more often than not, it is not easily recognizable. Under normal circumstances, deferring traits are demanded from those occupying authority positions during times of emergencies. Leave alone at local level, the capacity of the leaders at central government level to provide appropriate directive in times of disasters is subject to critics as for example during the hurricane Katrina disaster. Penning-Roswell (1996) noted that â€Å"Mismanagement and lack of preparation in relief effort in respons e to hurricane Katrina and its aftermath: specifically delayed response by federal flood protection to the flooding of New Orleans, Louisiana was attributed to leadership gaps that occurred on occurrence of the disaster† (p.142). This poses a big question on the credibility of the leaders to provide quick directions in times of emergency. Despite the fact that the state and local authorities have primarily responsibility to play in response to disasters with consequences of pointing the finger of blame on governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin, the central government slow response was particularly to be to be noted.Advertising Looking for essay on public administration? Let's see if we can help you! Get your first paper with 15% OFF Learn More The central government has all the essential resources that can be mobilized for quick response to disasters but the beaurocracy to be followed such as the requirement of the financial and assessment of the damages caused before the actual release of state resources to deal with the disasters compounds the problem. Even though the local authorities may be well familiar with the environmental conditions of their localities and hence well positioned to determine the rescue services required much quickly, some disasters exceed their financial allocations or rescue equipments wealth. In most situations, those who are responsible for making urgent decisions on behave of a state are normally at the top hierarchical leadership levels. However, it takes some remarkable time before these leaders are acquainted with magnitude of damages due to the hierarchical established information flow channels with a repercussion of delayed rescue missions. If the local governments were conferred with, th e requisite ability to make quick decisions that can enable them to divert funds that were initially intended for other local government functions to the response of the disasters. It should be noted, â€Å"†¦if a consistently effective response to disasters is to be approved at the local level the realizable approach to the leadership role in time of crises is required† (Penning-Roswell 1996, p.151). According to the work of De Waal (2005) â€Å" rises tend to produce responses that require swift decisions to be made by relatively small groups of senior managers in order to deal with short term threats and that administrative and organizational centralization is a byproduct of this initial response† (Para 7). Small group of decision makers as a result has a capacity to make quick decisions In the event of crisis. Such a scenario is typically to be found in the at local government level if at all they have all the necessary resources to mobilize. A critic to this line of view would argue that, an assumption that the leaders in the central government would assume their acquaintance with unfamiliar environment and release funds to cater for disasters is anticipated. Another obstacle in arguing that the local governments are well positioned to deal with disasters than central governments is their skill-level of diversification required which in most cases not possible. Alexander (2000) says that, â€Å"relying entirely on local lead in the response to a disaster requires that a very substantial number of seniors and middle management officers are appropriately selected and trained for the role, one that might never occur in their careers† (p.88). With the increased pressure on resources allocation, issues confining the local authorities to particular mechanism of arriving at decisions raises questions about local governments ability to make rescue plans independently and if at all they are given this opportunity, would such plans be up t o date and available at the time of disaster occurrence? Research conducted by Pitt (2007, Para. 2) called upon the â€Å"government to show leadership and urgently set out the process and timescale for improving resilience in UK†. In his report, he identified the central government being at the best possible position to solve disastrous problems since it is the one, which has the capacity to make appropriate nationwide binding policies to help curb disasters. Considering two alternatives, for disasters to be dealt with appropriately at local level, some randomness in training of staff is essential. The other way out is to deploy specialists of different disaster response skills management to all local authorities. This evidently is not possible since the nature of disasters is normally random and characterized by infrequent events. An example of such an encounter is the Exxon Valdez oil spillage in Alaska disaster. The communities in Alaska have experienced distinctive histo ric disasters. As Browning and Shetler (1992) note, â€Å"three major disasters have occurred in this region during the twentieth century, each the largest of its kind in north America: Katmai eruption of 1912, the great Alaskan earthquake of 1964 and the Exxon Valdez oil spillage† (p.477). With occurrence of disasters in the same region, local communities acquired noble skills in disaster management accompanied by organizational skills. Browning and Shetler noted in their study of Exxon Valdez oil spillage disaster that, â€Å"†¦creativity, knowledge, energy and organization of local communities are sources that are not adequately tapped under the current contingency planning process† (p.480). However, were the skills reflected in the Exxon Valdez oil spillage, how much did local authorities contribute to the disaster management? From the rapid and swift movement of the central government to contain the Katmai eruption in 1912, it clearly indicates that the centr al government, through appropriate leadership has a better position to contain disasters. This remains possible by provision of funds urgently to aid in the evacuation, resettlement and provision of essential humanitarian services to the victims: what the local governments despite having adequate local environmental knowledge lack. The generic role of the central and local governments The central government has a historic generic responsibility to protect and manage its society to ensure maximum welfare and services delivery. Disaster management is one of such indigenous societal responsibilities that the central government must play. However, in an attempt to save money, it diverts the responsibility to the local authorities while not considering the effectiveness and efficiency of the response. The generic responsibility of the central government to cope with big disasters within a nations surfaces evidently in Pitt’s work on the report of flooding disaster in the united ki ngdom. He pointed out that â€Å"the government should provide local resilience forums with the inundation maps of reservoirs to enable them to assess risks and plan for contingency, warning and evacuation† (Pitt 2007, Para. 5). The local government thus functions under the directives of the central government. It can thus be argued that in case the central government does not respond sufficiently to provide the right and within the right time, the necessary strides that need to be taken by the local authorities to respond to certain disasters, then the whole response process may end up being slowed or unsuccessful altogether. The government must act first in an attempt to lay out the foundation of the response process by ensuring that â€Å"critical infrastructure is as resilient as possible, whilst essential services providers should become considerably more active in local and national emergency preparedness and response† (Pitt 2007, Para. 6). Furthermore, the envir onmental agencies are more often than not under the control of the central government. As a result according to Cabinet Office Strategy Unit (2002), the environment agencies responsibility to â€Å" play their part by providing infrastructure operators with a specialized site-specific flood warning service, offering longer lead times to enable defenses to be set up in time†(p.79) depend on the central government willingness to take up its generic roles. Foucault argues, â€Å"†¦the neo-liberalist tradition of developed western nations shies away from too much state intervention and instead champions individual freedom and rights† (Lupton 1999, p.86). It is now that the local governments should come in, despite their limited capacity to cope with certain disasters sufficiently to aid the central government. According to Pitt (2007), the local governments should play a significant responsibility to facilitate management of risks of local flood by â€Å"taking the l ead in tackling local problems of flooding and co-coordinating all relevant agencies† (Para. 7). He further adds, â€Å"Upper tier authorities should establish oversight and scrutiny committees to review the work undertaken to reduce flood risks and publish annual updates on the work undertaken† (Pitt 2007, Para. 11). However, this is a single noble role of the local government as identified by Pitt, which for its success must depend to large extent on the central government’s responsibility to make and implement facilitating policies. On the other hand, disasters do not just present danger moments but rather the danger process. Managing the entire process is a mandate of the central government as part of its generic roles. Comfort (1994) was to the opinion that â€Å"a good deal of political decision making is now about managing risks-risks which do not originate in the political sphere. Yet have to be politically managed† (p.161). The largest political d ecisions with nationwide impacts are generally more affiliated to the central government than it is to the local governments. The central government via the established political systems has the noble role to ensure political decisions are arrived to such that they contribute to the overall welfare of the society nationally. From a different perspective, politics evolution and the associated impacts on central government generic duties are in a manner that translates the task of risks management to a serious issue that deserves more of central government address than the local government. The central government can be able to adjust certain provisions so that disasters can be managed in a humane way without interfering with the individuals’ stakes. Take for example, the flooding disaster. The central government is capable of relocating flood victims to some certain selected land acquired through revocation of ownership of lands since in many countries; the central government is mandated to regulate and control use of public land by the constitution. On the other hand, the local government only utilizes the land as stipulated by the central government. Responses by local government to disasters are normally received with critics. For instance, the response of sea express spill in UK resulted to the establishment of joint response centre (JRC) to address the problem. As Alexander (2000) notes â€Å" the conflict of normal services versus preparation for major incident manifested itself here in that the planning process that supported the JRC had not taken into account the effects of local government organizations†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (p.121). Again, the express disaster resulted to existence of multiple cells of operation, which were clearly not integrated and lacked robust and clear coordination process. The ability of the local governments to go beyond local issues either at political or operational level remains questionable. Conclusion The essay has made ef forts to show that coordination, leadership and the generic responsibilities attributed to local and the central governments coupled with flexibility and innovation are essential elements of disaster management. These elements draw much of their necessary inputs from the central government so that they become robust and evenly distributed within jurisdiction borders without attracting contrasting or parallelism ideologies and stands. A singly established national disaster response agency cannot pragmatically deal with multiple and widely spread disasters alone. The local governments must thus take up, play ardently their anticipated roles, and support the local communities in times of disasters occurrence. However, a question arises on how reconciliation of numerous established local disasters response agencies routine operational imperatives can be harmonized to ensure a common, efficient and effective effort designed to ensure central objectives of public, environment and society protection from escalation of harm emanating from disastrous occurrences. As a result, central government stands up high being at a better position to respond to crisis and disasters than local governments. References Alexander, C., 2000. Comforting Catastrophe. Harpenden: Terra publishing. Browning, L., Shetler, J., 1992. Communications in Crisis, Communication in Recovery: A Postmodern Commentary on the Exxon Valdez Disaster. International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters, 10 (3), pp. 477-498. Cabinet Office Strategy Unit., 2002. Risk: Improving Government’s Capability to Handle Risk And Uncertainty. London: Cabinet office. Comfort, L., 1994. Risk Resilience: Inter-Organizational Learning Following the Northridge Earthquake of 17 January 1994. Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 2 (3), pp. 157-170. De Waal, A., 2005. An Imperfect Storm: Narratives of Calamity in a Liberal-Technocratic Age. Web. Lupton, D., 1999. Risks. London: Routledge. Penning-Roswe ll, E., 1996. Criteria for the Design of Hazards Mitigation Institutions. (eds). Christopher hood David K.C. Jones. In Accident Design; Contemporary Debates in Risk Management. London: UCL press. Pitt, M., 2007. Learning Lessons from 2007 Floods. Available at https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20100605032704/http://archive.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/pittreview/thepittreview.html . Taylor, A., 1986. Coordination for Disasters. In Disasters, 10(1), pp. 12-45. Taylor, A., 1986. The Context of British Politics. (ed). Jane Franklin. In The Politics of Risk Society. Cambridge: Policy press.