RURAL DEVELOPMENT: A POLITICAL PLOY

The development of rural area by the government is not a political ploy. It is more in developing the welfare of the society. It can be seen through the objectives of the rural development. Among the objectives are:

To eradicate poverty

Government develop the rural area is to eradicate poverty. It can be seen through government efforts. For example, New Land Development. Government through public enterprises like FELDA, FELCRA, RISDA and more, gives the society chances to own property.

Other than that, the society also provided with job opportunities through implementations of government’s programs. Most of the society in rural area is lack of education, but the job opportunities provided to them do not require qualification. It is more to job that requires skills and practice. As long as government gives opportunities and chances to the society, people can develop themselves even though they are lack of education.

When government always supporting rural development programs, it will decrease the gap between the rich and poor people in the country. This indirectly will generate the economy in the country.

To reduce migration

To develop rural area is to reduce migration. This is because when less development in rural area people tend to move to more developed area. As a human being, we always look for better environment that can provide us with better place of living. What we can consider as a better place for living is a place that provides easy access to the basic necessities, services, and also job opportunities.

Rural development is not a political ploy because government develops rural area to reduce the migration from rural area to the urban area. This can reduce the density of urban area. When the density is high, government will face more social problems and unequal development between geographical areas within the country.

To increase local people participation

Development in rural area is to increase local people participation rather than a political ploy. Government open up rural area and provides the society in that area with development programs and projects. The implementation of the programs and projects demand the participation from the local. This is because the development programs and projects are for the sake of the society. Indirectly, when government implements programs and projects, it will increase the local people participation.

In conclusion, development of rural area by the government is totally not a political ploy. Rural development is purely government effort without any political agenda. As referring to the definition of rural development by Maimunah, rural development is a process of upgrading the levels of living of rural society through improvement on all aspects of human development. This includes adequate provision of basic needs such as food, shelter, health and protection as well as other physical-socio need. It shows that rural development is regards with human development rather than a political ploy.

Obstacles to development

ECONOMIC OBSTACLES

1) Dependence on primary product export

Each country usually has its own primary product export. Through this primary product export the country get the revenue. The more revenue they get the more budget they will have to allocate for the development. In some circumstances, where the primary products export facing problem in producing it, this will leads to economic downturn if the impact is in long term. For example is decrease in price of rubber.

2) Lack of financial strengthen

Undeveloped country needs aid to develop their region. These countries rely or depend too much on financial aid. Without the financial aid, these countries cannot develop the region because lack of financial strengthens.

e.g.: there are several countries that are indebted with international monetary fund (IMF). They are Syria (1970-present) and Sudan (1969-present).

SOCIAL OBSTACLES

1) Population growth

An increasing number of populations in one country will influence the distribution of wealth for development. When the population is high, there will be imbalance between providing basic necessities and development for the public. For example, like Indonesia. Indonesia here covers a wide area. Due to this the developments mainly focus on the city where the government administration center situated. However, the government of Indonesia still developing the other areas but not focusing on developing the areas.

2) Lack of access to education

Usually we need education to develop ourselves .By having education we will know on how to improve ourselves to a higher level. But for the poor society they cannot afford to get education because they don’t have the money to pay for it. Thus poor society usually undeveloped compared to the rich society. For example most people in Africa is undeveloped because they are lack of education and cannot afford to improve their quality of life.

Teacher's Note - TEST

Salam.

Because of BTN, I've to reschedule your Test 1. I've decided the test will be held as follows:

• AMD6PA - Tuesday (Feb. 17th, 2009), KARAH 10/3, 10.15am - 12.05pm

• AMD6PB - Thursday (Feb. 19th, 2009), 12B1, 12.15pm - 2.05pm

• AMD6PC + AMD6PD - Monday (Feb. 16th, 2009), 8C, 4.20pm - 6.10pm

Thus, for this coming Monday, AMD6PA and AMD6PB can have more time to study because your test will be held as scheduled.

Only AMD6PC and AMD6PD will take the test on that day.

Those from AMD6PC and AMD6PD who has problem taking test on the mentioned day, please notify me by or before Sunday (Feb. 15th, 2009 - 10am) so I can prepare the things accordingly.

The test will covers all chapters i.e. chapter 1 - 4, and don't forget Vago's chapter 6 and 9.



Good luck everybody and have a nice day!

Love you all ... as always!

Wassalam

Differences between Karl Marx and Ralf Dahrendorf Theories

Karl Marx

1-Conflict happens when there is a difference in level of classes.

e.g. ~If developing nation wants to stand among the developed nations they have to make sure resources is available, if not, conflict will happen throughout the development process.

2- Conflict as primary sources in internal working society.

e.g. ~ Life conflicts of the poorer people generate their spirit in improving their status of life.

3- Conflict results from internal contradiction arising in historical development.

e.g. ~ Impact of colonization like Malays in village, Chinese in mines and Indians in estate.

4- Many conflicts are not capable of resolution.

e.g.~ Even though many policy had been implemented by the government, however, fatal accident cannot be avoided.

Ralf Dahrendorf

1-Conflict happens due to unequal authority within the society.

e.g.~ Differences between manager and subordinates in terms of position, power, and qualification.

2- Importance of dealing with external conflict.

e.g~ in organization, the conflict exists when there is more than one organization that produces the same products or services.

3- Conflict results from pressure exerted by other society.

e.g~ when recession in the economics of US occurred, the currency of the country fall. It affects our country economic condition.

4- Conflict can be resolve through compromise.

e.g ~If there is conflict arises during implementation of a new policy, we can settle through set up a meeting, discussion or negotiation

Teacher's Note - Public Announcement

Dear students,

Hi and welcome back to class.

As I browsed your blog and read and commented on them, I noticed some common pattern of answer, 1) where you have the tendency to simplify your answer that sometimes I couldn’t find any relevancy to point discussed before it; 2) having so much unnecessary facts and details that making readers fell like reading a textbook.

Even though a blog entry should be short and simple, you don’t have to discount many of your words and make your argument everywhere. You don’t have to write an essay for that matter, but try to use concise word to articulate your point.

For those who love to back up their answer with all facts and data (as if we really want to know!), you too need to be concise and precise in choosing your words so that your entry doesn’t dazzled me … you know how much I hate to scroll the whole page just to find your main point at the end of your entry!

It is a waste when you come out with such a good point but having discussed it on the surface or lace it with unnecessary ‘ornament’ …

Try to be concise and precise and at the same time keep it short and simple.

On other words … briefly elaborate your point in detail – if you know what I mean.

Thank you and have a nice day!

Bully among teenagers

Hello everyone! We are here to talk about our picked issue which is “Bully among teenagers”. Hope this post will tell you a bit about how it really reflects in social change.

What is bullying?
Bullying includes a wide variety of behaviors, but all involve a person or a group repeatedly trying to harm someone who is weaker or more vulnerable. It can involve direct attacks (such as hitting, threatening or intimidating, maliciously teasing and taunting, name-calling, making sexual remarks, and stealing or damaging belongings) or more subtle, indirect attacks (such as spreading rumors or encouraging others to reject or exclude someone).

The key words here are - person or a group repeatedly trying to harm someone who is weaker or more vulnerable.

Components of Change

Identity of change
Identity of change is something that gives impact to the social structure. Social structure is the patterns of behavior that includes statuses, roles, groups, and institutions such as family, religion, politics and the economic system. In this issue, the identity of change can be identifying through how the bullying among teenagers can gives impact to the social behavior. In this case, we look into the person that had been the victim of bullying. The impact of bully can caused emotion unstable. This includes trauma, afraid and the most obvious impact is social isolation. If bullying continues for some time, it can begin to affect teens' self-esteem and feelings of self-worth. It also can increase their social isolation, leading them to become withdrawn and depressed, anxious and insecure.

Level of change
It is referring to the teenagers, the one that had been the victim. It can be seen through their behavior, before and after they had been victimized. We categorized the change as planned change. This is because, the intention to bully placed on the person or group who tend to do so. They can plan whether to bully or not to bully.

Duration of change
Referring to level of change, as long as the person or a group have the intention to bully, so the duration will be within the time they tend to do so. Meaning to say, as long as they do bully, duration of change will continue.

Magnitude of change
We classified magnitude of change of the issue to be in the form of incremental. The issue of bullying had existed since old time. We can say that, it will continuously exist as long as there a person or a group has the intention to bully.

Rate of change
The rate of change is continuous. As to justify, the issue of bullying never stop if there is no efforts to curb it. The roles by parents and teachers are important in a way to overcome the issue of bullying.

Variables of Change

Technology
The person or groups that have the tendency to bully had been influenced by the mass media. It can be seen through program like World Wrestling Federation (WWF), a story about violence, and also video game which is the biggest influence among teenagers.

Conflict
It can be seen through conflict of the individuals who have the tendency to bully where they wants to take control over other or releasing their stress and also conflict between the individual and the parents through different understanding.

Economic
Bully can be in term of money. They go over person who is defenseless and collect the money. How it relates to economic? A person who intend to bully might be come from different background. They can be rich or suffer from poverty. They tend to continue bullying to serve their own necessities such as pocket money or food.

QUESTION 9: should the government adopt the private sector method in administering public affairs. Provide with the related example.

Privatization is the incidence or process of transferring ownership of business from the public sector (government) to the private sector (business). In a broader sense, privatization refers to transfer of any government function to the private sector including governmental functions like revenue collection and law enforcement.

In our opinion the government should adopt the privatization method because:

• 
  
  Efficiency and productivity: better utilization of resources lead to speed delivery of facilities closed to the attention to consumer demand and lower production cost.


• 
  
  Decrease the burden of government: because government had to borne for many things like wages, new recruitment every year which is cost the government.


• Reduce size of public sector: it is due to the privatization. For example are telecom department and national electricity board. From that, it will increase the ability of government because the government will be more focus on any other matters.
  


• Example: TNB, TELECOM, MAS & KTNB.

QUESTION 10: OF ALL ASPECTS OF DEVELOPMENT IN A COUNTRY (INCLUSIVE OF SOCIAL, ECONOMIC AND POLITIC).EACH OF THOSE THAT SHOULD BE GIVEN MORE EMPHASIS RIGHT NOW AND WHY?

In our opinion we choose the social development as most important aspect because Malaysian is multi racial country where we need the solidarity for the peaceful and freedom in our country. Solidarity leads to shift of economic and politic which bring to the national development. Other than that we need people participation and involve in the government activities because its shows that the people support and give feedback whether they are satisfied or not towards what government are doing. For example are the existences of new policy and provided service. The people mentality and attitudes are also important in social development because it is an indicator in the certain matters.

TUTORIAL 2

In your opinion, what would be the appropriate theme in illustrating the current development situation in Malaysia and justify your answer.

In our opinion, the current development situation in Malaysia can be illustrated as emphasis on strengthen the social solidarity between races. Social solidarity refers to the integration, and degree and type of integration, shown by a society or group. It refers to the ties in society social relations that bind people to one another. We choose social solidarity as the theme because:

Continuation of Malaysian National Service program
National Service one of the effort by the government to encourage friendship between youth of certain ages with different races and ethnic groups and address concerns that the country's various races were becoming increasingly isolated from one another.
Argument – We think that, if the program itself is not succeeding, government will not continue on the program because government had spent big number of money on the program. It shows that, the government is willing to spend even more money because undoubtedly the program has reached the objectives. That is why government continues organizing the program where it is also giving in future time in terms of security of the country.

The role of media
As we can see, the important of solidarity among the citizen promotes through television and newspaper. PETRONAS and FINAS are the organization that actively producing advertisement which brings the message of solidarity.
Argument - it is important for us to start cultivating the solidarity from beginning towards the new generation. They have to be to be taught not to differentiate people according races, religions or their ethnics. By advertisement, they will be influenced and taught with the principle of equality among the citizen.

JKK and Rukun Tetangga
The existence of these two committees allows different races, religions or ethnics to participate handling matters pertaining of their residential area.
Argument – in a residential area, there are various races, religions and ethnics even in some area they are in a very small number. It is irrelevant to say if in an area, the residents only among one race. In activities organize by these committees allows everyone to participate without differentiating their background.

Open house during festival
Government organizing open house during festive season for citizen gather and develop social relations among them.
Argument – when the citizen come and joins the activities, they actually showing support on government effort.

Analyze the impact of securing foreign aid to the development of a country. How far do you think the government should comply with the rules put by the borrower and why you say so?

There are positive and negative impacts of securing foreign aid to the development of a country. Foreign aid can be in term of money, technology and expertise. When we get foreign aid in term of money, it will helps in improving the development project in our country such as RISDA and FELDA.

The money that we get is not necessarily to develop the urban area only, but we also can develop the rural area. By developing a new project, government indirectly open job opportunity to the citizen. This thing will reduce the number of unemployment in the country.

Securing foreign aid usually from the develop nation like U.S. if we hire expertise from the develop nation, we can learn on how to develop our country especially in term of technology like them. Besides helping in developing the country, securing foreign aid also can strengthen the relationship between both countries.

Usually, if the borrower give us foreign aid, there must be some sort of benefit that they can get, for instance like invest in our country. So, we can see that this situation will give benefits to both parties. Even though, there are lots of positive impacts from securing foreign aid, there is also negative impact from doing this. Usually, we are being controlled by the borrower with their specific terms and conditions. If we did not follow it, the borrower might stop from giving foreign aid to our country.

The government should comply with the rules put by the borrower as long as it is not too strict to be followed. By following the rules, the government can use the money that we get only for the development of the country. This will avoid them from using it for the sake of their life. If we refuse to follow, the borrower might stop from giving foreign aid to our country. When this thing happens, it will affect our economic development. So, other countries will lose their confident to invest in our country. It also will lose the relationship with other countries. Usually, we are securing foreign aid from the develop country. These countries are more advanced and have more influences compared to our country. If we refuse to follow on what have been stated in the terms and conditions, we might be treated from the develop country. It indirectly will affect the security of our country.

Development Administration

TASK 1

If you were about to redefine development administration,how it would be?What rational of the definition?

Development administration is a subfield of public administration.It refers to how well to administer or to deal with the development.When we talk about administor,it referring directly to the public administrators because there are the one who deal with the administration in the country.We can see that the adminisration is under the responsibility of the government. So, this is the main reason why development administration is a subfield odf public administration. Development administration can be defined as a mechanism or tool that being used to set up a program, project, or policy in order to achieve the development objectives. As stated before, the responsibility lies in the hand of public administrator. So, public administrator must have enough capability in order to make sure the country can be smoothly developed. All of the resources also must be allocated efficiently. For example, E-Government is one of the effort of the development done by the government. Before this, we have to pay all of the bil at the counter. But, after government introduced E-Government system,we can settle all of the bil within a short period. So, we can see E-Government is one of the mechanism that being used by the public administrator to achieve the development objectives in Malaysia.

TASK 2

Why do we need development?

The development can be defined as the developing action towards something. It is taken in order to make an improvement or make things better than the previous. Other than that, it is also can be seen as to make change. Change means to make something new which is different compare to the old one. Development is very important in one country where it can be happened in three ways includes economic, social and politic.

Economic development is the development of economic wealth of countries or regions for the purpose of welfare of their people. From a policy perspective, economic development can be defined as efforts that seeks to improve the economic and quality of life for a community by creating or retaining jobs and supporting or growing incomes and the tax bases. The economic development is very important for one country in order to be developed. It is because we cannot do anything if the economy is in bad conditions for example inflation and unemployment at the very high rate. There are several needs for development which includes reducing poverty, improving the standard of living and providing more job opportunity to the people. Nowadays, government has taken several action includes providing infrastructure and services for example highways, parks, housing project and also creating industry by giving loans to provide job opportunity.

Social development refers to the attitudes or behaviors of the people within the country. Social development implies qualitative change in way how the society carries out activities, such as through more progressive attitudes and behaviors, the adoption of more effective social organization and advancement in the technology. There are several tools that can be used that can leads to social development such as provide training programs to the civil servants, campaign that expose to the expanded thinking for the society and also generating a body to indicate the needs and progress of social development.

One of the indicators that show there is political development in the country is to see through the public participation. Basically, there are two parties, the people and the government. In order to make both of the parties do interact, the participations of the people is needed in order to make known of government the needs of the people. For example is the participation of people during general election. Where they come and vote to select their representative that they prefer. This situation clearly shows that there is existence of people participation and they are together in making decision and not depending on the government itself alone. Other that the people also have the right to voice up anything that they feel not satisfies to them and government also provides a proper channel for example the tribunal. The tribunal is a body that formed outside the jurisdiction of the court and its responsibility is to solve small cases like claims by the people.

What are the significances of administration in development?

It can improve the economy level especially in rural areas. As we can see, nowadays we have local government that consists of three types which is city council, municipality and district. The type is depending of several criteria includes the population, development of the area, education and more. With the development administration, rural areas can be upgraded from one time to time depends on how far that areas had achieve the stated criteria.

It can eradicate poverty. As we know, the main objective of the government is to serve the people well and concern about the welfare of the people. Therefore we can say that the development administration give a lot of benefit to the people especially those who are not affordable and considered as poor. For example is RM 50 million is allocated to build 1400 houses under the housing assistant program. The priority is given to senior citizen, disable and single parents.

It can provide job opportunity to the people. It is due to the above points. Once economic develop, there will be existence of job opportunity. This is because the company or the government needs workforce or people that have the ability and experts to carry out the policy starts from planning to the process of implementing the policy. Same goes for any programs or initiatives taken by the government in eradicating poverty.

What are the differences between?

a) Developed nations

The country that have achieved a high level of industrialization in which the tertiary and quaternary sector is the dominate industry, a high income per capital, Human Development Index (HDI) and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capital. For example: Japan, Canada and Germany.

b) Developing nations

The country that has not reached the western style standards of democratic government, free market economy, industrialization, social program and human rights quarantine for their citizen. The country with more advance economy than other developing nations but have not yet fully demonstrated the signs of a developed country is grouped under the term Newly Industrialized Countries (NCIs). Development entails a modern infrastructure (physical and institution) and a move away from low value added sectors such as agriculture and natural resources extraction.

c) Least developed nations

The poorest development indicators. The physical quality of life is at very low. The manufactured goods account is no more 10% of GDP. The number of least develop countries grew from 24 in 1971 to 42 in1989. For example: east Timor (the world’s newest country).

d) Under developed nations.

Is the state that has not reached its maturity which include lack of job opportunity, health care, drinkable water, food, education and housing. The example: Africa

TASK 3

Find out the relevancy of development administration to:

1. Human and social dimensions of development

It is where the human means the individual or human in the society and society means the large number of people that live in some country for a fixed period. It is important because society as a manpower that have been used in order to generate on mobilizing the country. The society is needed to involve and participate in any industry as workers that help to produce product on service. For example, the expertise which development among the society will helps in the development of the country.

2. Economic development

The economy is the realized social system of production, exchange, distribution and consumption of goods and services of a country or other area. A given economy is the end result of a process that involves its technology evolution, civilizations history and social organization as well as it geography, resources endorsement and ecology among other factors. Economic development is important to help to increase the revenue of the government. What we can see, the government had made international trade, export and import. The increase in export will make the money inflow in government revenue, so it can help to enhance the economy development. In vice versa, if the import is decrease it will reduce the money outflow. When the economy had been developing, job opportunity will increase. For example, Islamic banking that had been practicing by the banks.

3. Political development

Political development can be described as the mechanism for the people and the government to develop the country. It is relevant with the development administration in our country because every country need to ensure their stability to get more freedom to consult with the representative for any needs. The political development is very important in aspect of political participation. The related person that will involve in the political development is the citizen because the country will not fully stable without public participation. The political development also important to ensure the political stability and all parties are unites so that a good decision can be made. Political stability can be seen as the symbol of the existence of accountability in the government. It allows people to voice up their demands freely, advancement of the country and avoids chaos. For example, we can see the difference between state that ruled by the opposition and the government. For example Kelantan who ruled by the opposition.

4. Public administration (reinventing public sector)

Public administration development can be described as the development, implementation and study of branches of government policy. Development administration is the branch of the pubic administration that concern on the ability of administration and development. Public administration development means to improve the public sector in way of administration. Public administration needs development administration to achieve the national objective. The public administration will delegate the power to development administration and it will seek for appropriate method that can be implemented. It will help to improve the available system or services that provided to the people. For example, in the public sector, government has various departments and every department carries its own functions. Ministry of Human Resource carries functions as to provide job opportunity to the citizens and also to take care of the welfare of the civil servants.