Realism vs. Liberalism :: essays research papers fc

International Politics Gerard Chretien Professor: Jennifer Dwyer May 2, 2001 The realist perspective on international political economy can be seen in the United States international trade policy with China. The United States being an established world power seeks to further enhance its international role by engaging in trade with another nation, that being China, this reflects the realist main idea that the state occupies center stage in global political affairs.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The United States willingness to engage in the world market signals the idea of self national interest that remind many of the policy followed by European states during the Monarch era. The idea is to maximize your own agenda, at the same token minimize your states possible loss through risky policy engagement. The realist view reflects many of today’s policy regarding international trade with China.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  On the other end of the spectrum, you have the liberals who soundly believe that the state should have a very limited impact in the international political economic arena. They feel that the states interest and their goals change along with the context of the I.P.E. situation. The liberal perspective also offers the idea of cooperation among negotiating states that oppose the realist view that cooperation has an underlining meaning behind it.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The realists’ concepts and views ultimately render a more significant portrayal of U.S.-China international trade in comparison to the liberals’ perspective. It shows that the policy implemented reflects the United States sole interest in relative gains, in comparison with the liberals’ idea of absolute gain. In other words, the United States seeks to benefit from its interaction with China only for the sole purpose of increasing its wealth and power.

The ideas of classical economists

Dry James Anagram Synopsis The purpose of this work is to examine and understand the main thoughts of prominent economists during the classical period, namely Adam Smith, Thomas Malthusian, David Richard, Jeremy Beneath and John Stuart Mill. It is also included the comparison of ideas between these masters and last but not least, the contributions of these Ideas In today's context.At the beginning, the background of the classical period Is provided to ensure that readers have a better understanding of the economist's ideas. Followed by that, each economists ideas will be discussed respectively, and the comparison will be made. The contributions of Adam Smith, David Richard and Thomas Malthusian will be discussed in the last part and conclusion would be drawn. Content Page No.Page number Introduction 4 2 Background 3 The Five Prominent Economists Adam Smith Thomas Malthusian David Richard Jeremy Beneath John Stuart Mill 5 6 7 Comparison of Ideas between the Five Economists 8 Contribut ions of Classical School in Contemporary 9 Conclusion 10 Bibliography 11 Appendices 12 Classical school started during the late 18th century, when Adam Smith published his independent field of study and set forth the development of modern economics. Their ideas such as division of labor and comparative advantages are still discusses and implied in today's world.The work of this paper is to examine the main thoughts of five leading economists of classical period, namely Adam Smith, Thomas Malthusian, David Richard, Jeremy Beneath and John Mill and to compare their thoughts and concepts. Also, the relevance of contributions of their ideas in today's context will be discussed. Background Before classical period there was mercantilism period (1500 – 1776). During that time, manipulations and government intervention in the market is being practiced. Wealth of a nation is weighed in terms of gold and silver that a country possessed.Therefore international trade is discouraged by th e implementation of tariff, in order to prevent wealth flowing to other countries. However, as scientific revolution and industrial revolution take place, it helps to nurture the ideas of classicists. (Refer appendix 1 for influence of scientific revolution) There are a few main features in classical economics thoughts. Firstly, classical economists advocate free trade in rake. Without government intervention, the economy could self-adjust to achieve full employment. Secondly, each party, I. E. He merchants, workers and consumers will each seek self-benefit as it is in the human nature. Hence, harmony of interests will be achieved when the pursuit of self-interest will eventually leads to the best interest of the society. Thirdly, classicists consider all economic resources such as land, labor, capital and entrepreneurship as the nation's wealth and lastly, the classicists made a remarkable contribution to economics by explaining economic horses explicitly. Adam Smith (1723 – 1790) is often regarded as the father of modern political economy.In his life he had written two books, The Theory of Moral Sentiments and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. Moral Sentiments discussed the moral forces that restrain selfishness and bind people together in a workable society; Wealth of Nations assumed the existence of a Just society and showed how the individual is guided and limited by economic forces. (Bruce and Grant, 2007: p. 62) Adam Smith economic ideas are something of a novelty during his time. He introduced the idea of division of labor, which in today's word means specialization.By practicing division of labor, the productivity could be increased as (1) workers' skills are enhanced when they perform only one single task, (2) time for changing work task from one to another is saved, and (3) invention of machines could help increasing productivity once tasks have been simplified and made routine. (Bruce and Grant, 2007). Another i dea being pointed out by Smith is the harmony of interest. When all parties in a economy is seeking their self-interest, the natural order of the oral will eventually channel it to become social good.The key behind this complex mechanism is the concept of competition. Thus, Smith opposed government intervention in the market for the corruption and favoritism will leads to monopoly and competition will fail. This also implies in international trade. Smith thinks that have an advantage in and trades it with other countries. Although Smith is against government involvement in the economy, he did suggest a few roles that government could play in the economy. (Refer to appendix 2) When talk about value, Smith is of he opinion that measurement of value should be labor.The value of any commodity to a person, who possesses it, if he wishes to exchange it for other commodities, is equal to the quantity of labor which it enables him to purchase or command. Labor, therefore, is the real measur e of the exchangeable value of all commodities. (Bruce and Grant, 2007:p. 72) However, Smith did noticed that there are practical and theoretical difficulties in this theory. (Refer appendix 3 for further details) Thomas Malthusian (1766 – 1834) advanced the population theory in his publication An Essay on the Principle of Population.He states that population will increases at a geometric rate when unchecked while subsistence would only increases at best arithmetic rate. He suggested 2 types of checks, first is preventive checks which are those that reduce the birth rate and second, positive checks which are those that increase the death rate, to control population growth. Part of Malthusian ideas were adopted when the Poor Law Amendment of 1834 was passed. In his later work Principles of Political Economy, Malthusian came out with the theory of market gluts. He suggested that insufficient demand would occur due to inequality of distribution of income.Due to that, spending by landlords is important to prevent a glut of goods on the market which would turn into economic stagnation. (Bruce and Grant, 2007) David Richard (1772 – 1823) is a influential figure in the field of economics. He is hailed as the economists' economist for his extraordinary contributions in economics. The man who only had 14 years of formal education addressed economic matters academically. One of his main thoughts is the theory of free trade and from here derived the law of comparative costs, also known as law of comparative advantage.He explained that a person or country should produce goods which they can produce t a lower opportunity cost as compared to their competitors. In doing so, they would be more efficient and when traded with another country that practices the same theory, would achieve mutual benefit. Taking Turbot's concept of diminishing returns in agriculture, Richard used it to develop his theory of rent and introduced the law of diminishing returns. The law says that as the number of factor of production I. E. Labor increases, assuming sisters Paramus, the marginal product will at some point diminish.In the discussion of value, Richard said that a commodity must have use alee if it is to have exchange value. The use value of a commodity is derived from their scarcity and also the quantity of labor requires in obtaining it. Although utility is vital, it is not a measurement of exchange value. Time needed for producing the good and obtaining the raw material to produce the good is the exchange value for a commodity, according to Richard. The minimization of a person's pleasure, advanced the principle of utility.This notion is that people pursue things that provide pleasure and avoid things that produce pain; all individuals seek to maximize their total pleasure. Bruce and Grant, 2007:p. 122) Unlike hedonism, Beneath added the ethical doctrine into utilitarianism that human action should direct to the greatest happiness of the greatest nu mber of people. For that reason, Beneath was very active in social reforms. He supported free education for all, right for women, abolition of slavery and death penalty and many more. The major problem with Bantam's utility theory was that pleasure, a kind of emotion could not be quantify or measure.He tried to measure it using the Felicia Calculus, but he himself acknowledged the flaws in his calculation. John Stuart Mill who attended home schooling had his father, James Mill as his teacher. As a result, he got influenced by Bantam's thoughts of utilitarianism, as his father is a close friend to Jeremy Beneath. He further enhanced the utilitarianism concept, stating that enjoyment ought to be viewed in terms of not only quantity but also quality. (Anagram, 2012) His publication, Principles of Political Economy summarizes and fused all the economic knowledge up to his day.His discussed various issues from production to international trade. His most important and original contributio n is the law of international values. He implied the elasticity of demand for goods in his theory and successfully showed that the real exchange price takes into account not only the domestic costs, but also the elasticity of demand for each product abroad. Comparisons of Ideas between the Five Economists After reading the main thoughts of the five economists, we can see the evolution of economic thoughts in the timeline.The masters each have their own explanation on various topics, sometimes agreeing with each other and other times which they argued. From a bigger picture, we can depict that the ideas during the early period of lassie period varies from ideas of those in the end of classical period. For example, Adam Smith proposed laissez-fairer with minimal government involvement as the invisible hand in the market would eventually move the market to its equilibrium stage. However, Jeremy Beneath, who holds the idea of the greatest happiness for the largest number of people, thin ks that government should overlook the economy and social policy.In international trade issue, Adam Smith explained that export could remove surpluses in market but it could be done only when a country has absolute advantage in producing the particular goods. It was Richard then who argued that country could still benefit from trade even without absolute advantage. He introduced the theory of comparative costs, which is a situation when a country could produce certain goods with relative lower opportunity cost than the other country, and trades between them would still benefit each other.Mill supported Orchard's view of international trade, and further elaborated it by the law of international values. Mill said that the international price of trade is determined by the elasticity of demand of the product. Mill's theory is important as it overcome the economy. On the topic of value, Adam Smith placed his concern in value of exchange. He explained that the measurement of value should be labor and in exchanging commodities, both commodities should have equal quantity of labor to obtain it. As for Richard, he defined exchange value must have use value.The use value of a good is derived from its scarcity and also numbers of labor needed to obtain it. Richard then argued that exchange value of a good rely not only on the time used by labor to produce it, but also the time taken to obtain raw materials and capital goods which s used in the production process. In examining Thomas Malthusian ideas, the work of a very controversial man during his time, we could see that his works are favored by the wealthy landlords and on the other hand, pushed the lower classes – the poor people – into a deeper pit.In his population theory, he states that â€Å"population when unchecked increases geometrically, while subsistence increases at best arithmetically'. Therefore, to control the population growth there is preventive checks and positive checks. Richard, who is a close friend to Malthusian, argued that the theory s untrue and as a matter of fact, as years go by, the increment of food production is higher than increment of population growth. Contributions of the Classical School in Contemporary It is undeniable that the ideas of classical economists are a breakthrough in the mercantilism period and set forth the foundation of modern economic studies.Their works, being influenced by the scientific revolution, seeks experimental evidence to support and verify their ideas thus increase the credibility of their works. Below are three economists that made lasting contributions to the economic until today: 1 . Credited with the title father of modern political economy, Adam Smith indeed had made a huge impact in transformation of economy from mercantilism to free market. The most valuable idea that he leave for us would be the harmony of interest.The key behind the mechanism that brought all self-interest seeking behavior to become a social good, commonly also known as the invisible hand, is the concept of competition. It is because of competition that producers are restrained from making extra profit and hence drives down the price of goods. This theory is still recognized n today's economy. 2. David Richard Richard made a significant contribution with his theory of comparative advantage that served as a cornerstone in today's international trading policies.Although it was later refined by John Mill, nevertheless credits should still be given to this man. 3. Thomas Malthusian Despite being a controversial figure and his theories favor the upper class of the society, Thomas Malthusian still made some contributions to the contemporary economy. It was through his notions that the population growth issue is being concerned and later developed to be a formal study. It was his work regarding market gluts that later catches Keynes attention and expanded it. The classical school of thoughts indeed is an essential period in the his tory of the economical behavior of the society.

Comparing the depiction of Men throughout Charles Dickens Essay

â€Å"Great Expectations† is a pre twentieth century book with â€Å"Cider with Rosie† is a twentieth century book. â€Å"Great Expectations† is about a boy â€Å"Pip† which the book revolves around his life from a young child in the marshy land of Kent to a grown man where he meets Estella the love of his life, which he has not seen for years. This book has a storyline which has leaves you in suspense at the end of chapters. An example of this is at the end of chapter 0ne on page 5, â€Å"I looked round for the horrible young man, and I could see no signs of him. But, now I was frightened again, and I ran home without stopping.† This leaves suspense and you want to read on. Where as â€Å"Cider with Rosie† follows all the happenings of a young boy, Laurie Lee. Really it is a autobiography of Laurie Lee till he is about 14, 15 years of age. Cider with Rosie is a very descriptive book, which will describe things in great detail and in big long lists of running commentary. An example of this great description is on page 11 chapter one â€Å"I crawled about among the ornaments on the unfamiliar floor-the glass fishes, china dogs, shepherdesses, bronze horsemen, stopped clocks, barometers, and photographs of bearded men.† In â€Å"Great Expectations† the main Men I am going to look at are Mr Joe, Mr Wemmick, Herbit Pocket and Magwitch the convict. Magwitch is an escaped convict from the local prison near where pip lives. The first man described in this book is on page 2 of chapter 1, it is Magwitch the convict. Pip meats him in the church yard looking at his mothers tomb stone this is the first encounter of Magwitch for Pip it would be terrifying for the young boy. Magwitch is described in this scene as â€Å"A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with no hat, broken shoes and with an old rag tied round his head†. This shows the first description of a male in â€Å"Great Expectations†. It gives the reader a very clear image of what this convict would have looked like and been like to meet in person. The next description is one of Joe Gargery on page 6 chapter 2 of â€Å"Great Expectations†. Joe is married to Pips sister so he is Pips Brother-in-law but Pips looks up to him as his father as he does not have one. They are very good friends and spend a lot of time together. This is the description of him, â€Å"Joe was a fair man, with curls of flaxen hair on each side of his smooth face, and with eyes of such a very undecided blue that they seemed to have some how got mixed with their whites.† This is from Pips point of view and shows you what Pip thought and sees of his brother-in-law. Joe is Pips father figure, a kind of replacement for Pips Dad, which Pip looks up too. The next male I am going to describe is Mr Wemmick. He is Mr Jaggers clerk and lives and works in the London area. He is a poor man but is happy as he have his small castle to get away from the world and his old Dad who is dependent of him. In â€Å"Great Expectations† Mr Wemmick is frequently is involved in helping Pip in London. A description of Mr Wemmick is on page 165 chapter 21. † Casting my eyes on Mr Wemmick as we went along, to see what he was like in the light of day, I found him to be a dry man, rather short in stature, with a square wooden face, whose expression seemed to have imperfectly chipped out with a dull-edged chisel. There were some marks in it that might have been dimples, if the material had been softer and instrument finer, but which, as it was, were only dints.† This shows what Pip thinks of Mr Wemmick when he first sees him in Mr Jaggers office in London. It is a very depictive description of Mr Wemmick and you can vividly imagine what Mr Wemmick would look like to meet in person. Mr Wemmick is closely involved in what Pip does in London and helps him financially and none-financially. The last male I am going to look at in â€Å"Great Expectations† is Herbert Pocket. Pip first encounter with Herbert Pocket in â€Å"Great Expectations is when they meet at Mrs Havishams after Pip has been round Mrs Havishams playing. When Pip leaves her house he runs into Herbert Pocket in which they have a play fight. This is in chapter 11 page 87, after playing at Mrs Havishams. When Pip see’s Herbert Pocket he is described as a â€Å"pale young gentleman†. Which is what he is described as for a while longer. After the fight Herbert is described as â€Å"not very healthy-having pimples on his face and breaking out of his mouth, these dreadful preparation appalled me†. The next time pip meats Herbert is in London when they a older and about to share a flat together in London. Herbert is now described as â€Å"still a pale young gentleman. He had not a handsome face, but it was better than handsome: but extremely amiable and cheerful. His figure was a little ungainly†. This description of Herbert is more descriptive and is described in a grown-up way instead of the way he was described earlier in the book. This is on page 172 chapter 22. In â€Å"Cider with Rosie† there are not many men in the book as it is a female dominated book and there are very few males in the book as his father deserted him and the rest of his family at an early age of so he dose not have many males in his life. The only males he really sees in his life at an early age is at school, his brothers and men around the village he lives in. described main men that I am going to look at that are involved someway with Laurie Lee’s life are mostly in the chapter â€Å"The Uncles†.