MGT313 - Final Review
How do governments seek to cooperate with or work at arm's length with business? Does it matter whether the government is legitimately elected or has illegitimately acquired power?
- Government may work closely with business to build a collaborative partnership and seek mutually beneficial goals. They see each other as key partners in the relationship and work openly to achieve common objectives. Government can provide subsidies, grants, or other forms of assistance to help business expand, stabilize, or fight off threats. - Other cases, government goals and business objectives are at odds and cause adversarial relationships where it is best to work at arms length. Business and industries may reject offers of government intervention and assistance because they believe they could weather the financial storm and operate well without government meddling.Business often operate without gov. constraints which can be costly or restrict innovation. Regulations can also help business by setting minimum standards that all firms must meet, building public confidence in the safety of a product, creating a fair playing field for competition, or creating barriers to entry to maintain a business competitive advantage. - When dealing with a global economy, political leaders may illegally assume lawmaking or legislative power which can become economic power over business. Business managers may be challenged with the dilemma of doing business in such a country where their business dealing would support this illegitimate power. They may choose to become politically active or refuse to do business in this country until a legitimate government is installed.
Compare and contrast economic policies with social assistance policies.
Economic policies directly concern the economy. Fiscal policy refers to patterns of government collecting and spending funds that are intended to stimulate or support the economy. Monetary policy refers to policies that affect the supply, demand, and value of a nation's currency. It affects the buying power of money, the stability and value of savings, and the confidence of citizens and investors about the nation's future. Other forms of economic policy include taxation policy, industrial policy, and trade policy. Industrial nations have developed elaborate systems of social services for their citizens. Developing economies have improved key areas of social assistance and will continue to do so as their economies grow.
Government regulations come in different forms. Discuss the major types of government regulations of business.
Economic regulations aim to modify the normal operation of the free market and the forces of supply and demand. Economic regulations include those that control prices or wages, allocate public resources, establish services territories, set the number of participants, and ration resources. Antitrust laws prohibit unfair, anti-competitive practices by business. A firm may not engage in predatory pricing, the practice of selling below cost to drive rivals out of business. If a company uses its market dominance to restrain commerce, compete unfairly, or hurt customers, then it may be found guilty of violating antitrust laws. Social regulations are aimed at such important social goals as protecting consumers and the environment and providing workers with safe and healthy working conditions. Equal employment opportunity, protection of pension benefits, and health care for citizens are other important areas of social regulation. Laws concerning pollution, safety and health, health care, and job discrimination apply to all businesses; consumer protection laws apply to all relevant businesses producing and selling consumer goods.
Do you believe the rapid economic development of poorer countries helps or hurts the environment? Why?
I believe rapid economic development hurts the environment. Industrial development is a part of economic development and an industrial development which is not sustainable would adversely affect the environment.It would lead to deforestation as more land would be required to set to an industry,air pollution,and water pollution.Also the poor countries do not have resources to use environment friendly technology,so they use cheap technology that hurts the environment.The example of environment kuznet's curve(EKC) can be given in this case. EKC states that as a poor country starts to develop,the level of environment degradation rises.With further development,the level of degradation reaches a maximum and then starts to fall because the country has developed enough to use green technology.The shape of the curve is inverted U. Therefore, it can be concluded that rapid industrial development of poorer countries hurts the environment.
Describe the role of an organization's public affairs department and describe who would be in charge of that department
In many organizations, the task of managing political activity falls to the department of public affairs or government relations. The role of the public affairs department is to manage the firm's interaction with governments at all levels and to promote the firm's interests in the political process. Most companies have a senior manager or executive to lead the public affairs department. This manager is often a member of the company's senior management committee, providing expertise about the company's major strategy and policy decisions. Many companies assign employees from other parts of the business to work on public affairs issues and to help plan, coordinate, and execute public affairs activities. The heads of most public affairs departments are senior vice president or vice president positions; some report directly to the CEO, while others are one level below this in the organizational hierarchy. The typical public affairs executive spends most of the day direct lobbying with federal or state politicians, hosting visits by politicians to the company's locations, or attending fund-raising activities.
Compare and contrast the three levels of business political involvement.
Level 3 - Aggressive Organizational Involvement described as direct and personal. This level includes executive participation, involvement with industry working groups and task forces, and also public policy development. In this level managers become directly involved with developing public policy. Level 2 - Moderate Organizational Involvement described as indirect yet personal. This level includes having an organizational lobbyist,employee grassroots involvement and stockholders and customers are encouraged to become involved.Level 1 - Limited Organizational Involvement described as indirect and impersonal. This level includes contributions to political action committees and support of a trade association or industry activities.Managers of the organization are not willing or ready to become politically involved by giving their own time or getting their stakeholders involved but they want to do something to influence the political environment.
Prepare a strong argument in favor of and in opposition to businesses being involved in the political process
On one hand, business interests represent a real power in America, and have a right to voice their opinions in a nation where the stakes are so high for them. Their interests counterbalance other social issues and provide a different view of an issue. On the other hand, businesses are too big and powerful and can be controlling of the nation's politics. Also, many businesses are too selfish to promote policies that promote the common good. Why Businesses Should be Involved - Pluralistic system invites many participants, Economic stakes are high for firms, Business counterbalances other social interests, Two similar business involved in politics help other similar businesses, Business is a vital stakeholder of government Why Businesses Should NOT be involved - Managers are not qualified to engage in political debate, Business is too big, too powerful, they can be controlling, Business is too selfish to care about the common good, Business risks its credibility by engaging in partisan politics.
Identify and explain three major threats to the earth's ecosystem as described in the textbook. How will these threats accelerate the ecological crisis?
Population explosion, World poverty and income inequality, Rapid growth of many developing nations
Discuss some of the voluntary initiatives undertaken by businesses around the world in order to incorporate sustainable development into their everyday business practices.
Senior management is responsible for formulating a sustainable development policy for its organization, and for establishing specific objectives. Sustainable development means more than just the environment. It has social elements as well, such as then alleviation of poverty and distributional equity. It also takes into account economic considerations that may be absent from a strictly environmental viewpoint. In particular,it emphasizes maintaining or enhancing the world's capital endowment. Nevertheless, a policy on environmental responsibility is a good first step towards the broader concerns of sustainable development. Management should incorporate stakeholder expectations into a broad policy statement that sets out the organization mission with respect to sustainable development. This policy statement would guide the planning process and put forward values towards which management, employees and other groups such as suppliers are expected to strive. Drafting a policy statement that is both inspirational and capable of influencing behavior is a challenging task. However, the benefits justify the effort. Examples include:Extended product responsibility -Companies have a continuing responsibility for the environmental impact of the products and services,even after they are sold.Carbon neutrality -An organization or individual produces net zero emission of greenhouse gases; this is usually accomplished by a combination of energy efficiencies and carbon offsets.Life cycle analysis -Involves collecting information on the lifelong environmental impact of a product, from extraction of raw material to manufacturing to its distribution, use, and ultimate disposal.Industrial ecology -Refers to designing factories and distribution systems as if they were self-contained ecosystems
Define each key element of public policy process and provide an illustration or example for each element.
The actions of government in any nation can be understood in terms of several basic elements of public policy. These are inputs, goals, tools, and effects. Public policy inputs are external pressures that shape a government's policy decisions and strategies to address problems. Economic and foreign policy concerns, domestic political pressure from constituents and interest groups, technical information, and media attention all play a role in shaping national political decisions. Public policy goals can be broad and high-minded or narrow and self-serving. National values, such as freedom, democrat, and a fair chance for all citizens to share in economic prosperity, have led to the adoption of civil rights laws and economic assistance programs for those in need. Governments use different public policy tools to achieve policy goals. The tools of public policy involve combinations of incentives and penalties that government uses to prompt citizens, including businesses, to act in ways that achieve policy goals. Governmental regulatory powers are broad and constitute one of the most formidable instruments for accomplishing public purposes. Public policy effects are the outcomes arising from government regulation. Some are intended; others are unintended. It is almost inevitable that such actions will please some and displease others.
What is meant by the Earth's carrying capacity? How can it be measured? Discuss the changes that need to be made in order to bring the Earth's carrying capacity back into balance with the demands placed on it by human society.
The world's resource base, the air, water, soil, minerals, and so forth, is essentially finite. We have only one Earth; the ecosystem is not growing. If human societies use up resources faster than they can be replenished, and create waste faster than it can be dispersed, environmental devastation will be the inevitable results. Many believe human society is already overshooting the carry capacity of the earth's ecosystem. Just as it is possible to eat or drink too much before your body sends you a signal to stop, so too are people and business using up resources and emitting pollution at an unsustainable rate. One method of measuring the Earth's carrying capacity and how far human society has overshot it, is called the ecological footprint. This refers to the amount of land and water a human population needs to produce the resources it consumes and to absorb its wastes, given prevailing technology. A solution to balance the carrying capacity will require changes on many fronts such as technological innovation, changing patterns of consumption, and public policies that impose taxes on environmentally harmful products or activities.
Three critical factors have combined to accelerate the ecological crisis facing the world community and to make sustainable development more difficult. Explain and discuss these three factors.
Three critical factors have combined to accelerate the ecological crisis facing the world community and go make sustainable development more difficult: Population explosion, world poverty and income inequality, and rapid growth of many developing nations.