This page will allow for a free-form discussion. Students should feel free to post whatever they like here: questions, comments, musings, &c.
This page will allow for a free-form discussion. Students should feel free to post whatever they like here: questions, comments, musings, &c.
I’d like to go back to the discussion of solidarity, specifically the change in how we form solidarity due to technology. I wonder how this change will affect the traditional family unit. It used to be that families would sit down to dinner and really talk. These discussions would allow parents to be better parents by being actively involved in and updated on their children’s lives. Children were willing, happy even, to talk to their parents, even if only because they had no one else to talk to. With the technology we have today, kids have so many other people they can talk to instead. I think this has a strong potential to make kids better off. A child who, in the past, would have felt isolated and alone due to some special interest is now guaranteed to find others with the same interest through the internet. Parents, however, have a tougher job. It’s so much more difficult now for parents to know what their children are doing. Cell phones and the internet allow kids so much freedom that it might be impossible for parents to be as vigilant as they have been in the past. Furthermore, with family dinners turning into situations where the kids are texting their friends under the table and uninvolved in the conversation, I wonder what will happen to the relationship between parent and child. If children feel that they don’t need their parents, that they can turn instead to friends or the internet for advice, I foresee a drastic and unwelcome change in family dynamics.
@Betsy
I agree that the terms of the climate change debate are often hypocritical for the reasons you stated. This hypocrisy is similar to what we saw on the economic side as well with the rich countries writing the rules of globalization in their favor through the WTO, IMF, etc. This is especially unfair because it is the undeveloped world that will feel the effects of change quickest. The US has the resources and ability to insulate its industries, such as farming and fishing that depend on climate predictability, from detrimental effects. Smaller nations where most of the population is in these industries for subsistence do not have this safety net.
An interesting case study is the Maldives, an island nation whose very existence is imminently threatened by rising oceans. They are attempting to go entirely carbon neutral, taking innovative and drastic steps, and have been very strong advocates of acute action at UN talks on climate change. However, do you ever think the US will take cars off the road because the Maldives with its <2 billion dollar gdp asked us to?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/15/maldives-president-nasheed-carbon-neutral
Hey everyone – signing off, this is my last post. The presentations were awesome: everyone felt like they cared about the topic and its implications and it felt like people really got into their projects. I really liked that three of the projects about dairy farming tied together so well. Maybe if we had had some in-class time, it would have been cool for different groups to talk together and collaborate to fit our presentations more closely together.
I also agree with the comments some others voiced that the group projects would ideally tie in more closely with the readings and class discussions in the second half of the class. The reading topics definitely diverged after we got to the current-day political readings, and I felt more conflict between getting the readings done and giving thought to the Vermonty stuff.
Maybe, readings in the 3rd and 4th weeks of class could be focused more on the “common ground” that all of us will be thinking about for our projects? That would make the readings more relevant and helpful to our projects.
– the pragmatic questions of how to hammer out a policy proposal
– Vermont’s historical global policies and priorities
– State authority vs. US authority
Along the lines of the discussion concerning the diminishing amount of personal contact, I think that it is interesting to look at how the spread of information and communication technology has influenced urbanization. Throughout subsequent transportation and communication revolutions has urban growth become much harder to implement and encourage? In history, one of the strongest arguments for the development of urban centers has been social and economic needs. Social interactions, defense, and access to means of production and survival all acted as centralizing forces amongst populations. With the invention of the steam engine and other modes of transportation during the industrial revolution, people no longer felt as great a need to congregate around natural resources, although they were still forced to live near the workplace. In recent years, with the explosion of communication and information technology, people have the opportunity to live much further from the workplace due to the low cost of transportation and high speed of communication. This shift in ability has changed the way that people locate. Whereas, in the past the urbanization patterns have been determined largely by access to industry, with the transition from manufacturing to IT firms, this also will have an effect on where people live. Overall, urbanization patterns will change and cities may not be as essential to the development of nations.
Lilly, your connection between information and communication technologies and urbanization is interesting. More than just discouraging or reducing the need for high density living, I think information and communication technology contributes to further de-urbanization, or suburbanization. The initial suburbanization of many urban peripheries was caused by racial tensions and the advent of the automobile, which reduced travel costs for those who could afford it. Now, it seems that the internet is ensuring the continuation of this trend. While the automobile reduced the cost of distance, the internet makes distance irrelevant altogether. It will be interesting to see what becomes of our cities in the future.
http://www.vermonttiger.com/content/2009/11/farmers-and-bankers.html#more
This article ties in very nicely with Topher, Aseem, and Brian’s proposal, it raises some objections to Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders’ proposal to found a guest worker program for dairy farm migrant laborers. The author emphasizes the fact that jobs on dairy farms are unable to attract Vermont laborers due to low wages and unpleasant conditions. He then highlights the hypocrisy between Sanders’ support for a dairy farm guest worker program and his opposition to allowing foreigners to work in the financial industry. The presentation yesterday convinced me that migrant laborers are necessary for the survival of the Vermont dairy industry today, and therefore I would support Sanders’ proposal to allow them to gain documented status. However, in the long term, I question the support of an industry which apparently provides jobs that Vermonters are no longer willing to perform and must be filled with migrant labor.
Although I was late and not able to listen to all of them, like Topher said, I thought the presentations were extremely thought provoking and provided some interesting policy proposals that hopefully some of these future gubernatorial candidates will take a look at.
Regarding Maddie’s comment about the nature of parent/child relationships given the current state of technology, yes I agree that it could potentially have damaging effects to the previously intimate parent/child relationship. However, I know we touched on this in class about a week ago, but I think the greater issue is that younger children may face the potential loss of everyday social skills, as they no longer have any need for face-to-face or even voice-to-voice contact, when they could simply text, ‘tweet, or type online to accomplish the very same goal.
I agree with Andrew that the greater issue with new ways of communication is the loss of necessary, everyday social skills. I wouldn’t say, however, that children have no need for face-to-face contact. It is certainly a necessity when it comes to family communication as well as in school. Undoubtedly, though, it becomes a problem when texting, tweeting, etc. become main forms of communication.
Regardless, as these methods of communication grow amongst the youth, I think that they will become more and more integrated into the society. An example of this is email. Most grandparents are completely incompetent when it comes to email, since it was before their time. As email started gaining popularity and usage in the 90s, a large majority of people working in offices were starting up at that time. Since then, it has been an absolutely crucial tool for business. Whether this is a function of the ages of people in the workforce or email was embraced because of how well it helps in the office, I can’t say definitively (probably some of both). My point is that as we move forward, I can envision video chatting, texting, facebook, etc. growing in usage in the office as more and more people are comfortable with those methods of communication.
In response to Maddie’s post, I think that our generation will see a reduction in parent involvement in the younger generations. Unfortunately, as parenting becomes significantly more difficult many parents will probably not step up to the plate. As Maddie said, children will turn to their friends or their internet connection for advice and life lessons. I can see this leading to self perpetuating social globalization. Traditionally, parents instill their values, beliefs and traditions through parenting. If however parenting is replaced by the internet, these beliefs and traditions that serve to define cultures will be irrelevant. Cultures could be largely defined through internet connections creating a largely homogenized world culture.
On the question of the effects of social/cultural globalization on the family. I recognize that communication technology (among other processes) is changing and will continue to family dynamics but I’m not ready to say that these changes are bad or unprecedented. I think previous generations have always feared the effects of technological innovation on the next generation, namely a loss of authenticity (whatever that means). Also, really soon, most parents will have been born and raised in the Internet Age… Parenting will change, the family will change (on the whole) but I think it will be as natural as technological change, not good, not bad.
To chime in on the debate over whether new communication technology is adversely impacting children’s development, I would side with Aseem to argue that texting, tweeting etc. will not destroy family dynamics. In my view, those who trumpet the dangers of new technology are those who understand its least. Pundits who are unfamiliar with Facebook see it only as taking away from traditional family relations, but fail to understand the way that these new technologies also add to family connectivity. As James brought up in class, many parents now have Facebook (unfortunately), and my eighty year old grandmother sends me regular emails. New technologies change the medium of communication, but are not destroying American familes as some claim.
The last presentation on Thursday, specifically Jamie’s part, brought to the front of my mind an issue I’ve been wrestling with all term. Until this class, I’d been a huge proponent of efficiency over all else. However, the problems with the Vermont dairy industry have made me think differently. Subsidies are inefficient (this is common knowledge) and highly protectionary. They raise prices artificially high and prevent market forces from free action. On the one hand, it makes sense to advocate for the abolition of farming subsidies in Vermont. We could buy our dairy and agricultural products from overseas for much cheaper, making everyone better off. Vermonters would simply have to discover what their comparative advantage really is, and the world would run more efficiently. However, the undependable infrastructure in many third world countries makes me wonder if perhaps the gross negative externalities these countries would create negates the benefits of lower costs, leading to a net increase in efficiency of around zero. Even if efficiency would increase, for the first time, I’m not sure that’s good. After growing up in sprawling suburbs just 20 minutes outside a big city, I find something horribly tragic about the thought of potentially losing the pastoral beauty of Vermont. If there’s one thing this class has taught me, it’s that nothing is really inevitable or irreversible and that, while the black and white yin yang table might look pretty, we truly live in shades of gray.
I also found the farm subsidy presentations intriguing. A technique I’m curious about, to help farmers, is hedging their produce, milk, etc. on the market. They could (and some do) hedge by buying future contracts against whatever they are producing. For example, if a farmer is going to sell 2000 bushels of corn at a future date they could purchase a futures contract at $6.00 per bushel. If corn prices drop below 6 dollars this guarantees a price of at least $6.00 a bushel come sales time. If however the price of corn goes up they just lose the price of the futures contract and sell at the higher price. It would be interesting to see how an encouragement for farmer education regarding futures trading would effect the wellbeing of small town agriculture.
The discussion of whether of not the structure and role of the family will change due an increase in information technology is very interesting. As I mentioned in class, I believe that new forms of technology have begun to create new rites of passage for children. Now events such as obtaining your first cell phone, ipod, or screen-name are very significant in children’s lives. Parents now have to create rules and guidelines to ensure proper use of these technologies and to protect their children. I think that this adds a new dynamic to family relationships as parents now have many more outside forces to contend with. With globalization, parents may have to be more protective of their children, or at least feel that they need to be. I agree that this may change the relationship between parents and children because their are more unknown factors to contend with, but essentially parents make rules and children follow them. I don’t think that that will change.
I wanted to bring up the topic of the iPad’s potential effect on the current wave of globalization. …Just kidding.
Maddie brought up a really important point the other day after the presentations. I agree with what Mike said about slashing farm subsidies because people in Vermont should have the choice to buy cheaper priced dairy products, and that efficiency and access to cheap goods is extremely important. But if manufacturing and agriculture gets outsourced to developing countries that are less apt to follow environmental and health standards, is there a point where we should suspend “efficiency” to protect the environment or have safer foods?
I think there is. There is definitely a point where the benefits of cheap prices and free trade is undermined by its negative externalities. But it’s a really hard line to draw, because there are always convincing arguments for both sides.
I agree with Brian, we certainly should take into account the negative externalities that come with a situation like this. Like we’ve seen with sweatshops, yes, we get better prices, but there are potential issues with importing a lot of products from poor areas. Therefore, we must take an active role in monitoring the production situations, making sure that the workers and the environment are being treated properly, as well as checking for any other possible negative externalities. Of course, checking in and making sure everything is being done right could be an added cost, giving the outsourcing of farming less advantage over domestic farming. There seem to be so many complications involved with importing food from unfamiliar and less trusted areas that I can’t really foresee this change occurring in the near future.