Sociology Essay

Sociology Essay

Democracy and Development

Democracy is a rule of a nation’s government whereby the everyday citizens use their obligations, rights, and powers to choose individuals to represent their shared interests, in hand, the elected persons forming a governing body. Consequently, the elected governing body is termed as a parliament. The process of selecting persons and delegating them with the obligations of representing the masses results in the referring of democracy as a “rule of the majority.” Historically, democracy dates back to Classical Greek, whereby a jury chose male political representatives amongst the people from both the poor and wealthy social classes. On the other hand, development refers to the growth and improvement of a country’s or region’s welfare, politics, and economics. In the modern day society, development is synonymous with industrialization, modernization, or Westernization. Nonetheless, van Donge argues that democracy and development are not mutually exclusive, as a representation of the people’s interest does not necessarily lead to their implementation of consequent improvement.

Additionally, the terms “development and democracy do not have to be mutually exclusive” would stand to mean that certain hindrances deter them for achieving their overall objectives. Justice advocates for ethical ruling with respect to the law, while, in hand, development occurs by following these regulations and ethical boundaries. Nevertheless, wrongdoings such as corruption, fraud, fund mismanagement, irregular and biased allocation of resources, and political instability hinder and deter any form of growth that a region may expect. Subsequently, in such situations where different variable act as barriers to development, the elected leaders fail fully to delegate their duties and responsibilities to the citizens. Moreover, actions taken by the people to exercise their democratic rights including referendums and impeachments may deter foreign investors from investing, in hand, discouraging progress. Therefore, not all instances of constitutional privileges and actions lead to a region’s advancing, in hand, making the two not to be mutually exclusive.

Foreign Aid in the Third World

“Third World Nations” is a term regularly used to refer to nations with poor economic statuses. Arguably, such nations have significantly low gross domestic products (GDP), and even though some of these countries may be rich with resources, they still struggle to develop, serve their citizens, or eradicate diseases and poverty. In hand, these states find themselves relying on foreign aid to assist in achieving some of these objectives. This relief may come in the form of food, money, or any other type of resources. In the recent past, Kodama investigates the impact of these aids on the developing nations arguing that this investment has done little to eradicate poverty. The conclusions offered for such reasons are that in some instances due to uncontrolled and increased cases of corruption, monies contributed to these nations usually ends up in the wrong hands and subsequently in private individual’s accounts rather than being utilized for their initial objectives. Secondly, these funds fail to serve their intended purposes due to mismanagement partially by the governments or persons. In many times, the government may overspend on unnecessary investments adding more burden to the citizens, while not achieving anything. Thirdly, the regular provision of foreign aid results to overreliance on such funds causes a “blinded” effect on the nation’s ability to utilize its resources to foster its individual development.

Notably, the best ways to deal with these consequences may be first to implement mechanisms that would deter corruption from government individuals. These regulations would include severe legal consequences to persons charged and proven of committing such crimes. Moreover, the foreign investors should be keen to demand performance standards records to verify whether any money given was used for its intended purposes, and if not, should be refunded or taken to the next fiscal year to be used then. Finally, the best remedy to handling over-reliance would be to train developing countries to rely on their resources for development rather than waiting for outside help.

Improving Secondary Education

Developing nations struggle with many challenges amongst which poverty, illiteracy, diseases, and corruption among others. Notably, access to secondary education is amongst one of the biggest challenges facing such countries with illiteracy levels at very high rates. Global leaders have set out some objectives they wish to achieve by 2050, among them, improving education accessibility to all citizens, in hand, eradicating illiteracy. Developing nations could play a part in such objectives through various means including investing and funding for construction of new classrooms for their students. By doing so, these governments would ensure that the children have ample space to learn and play, therefore, fostering their learning capabilities.

Additionally, developing nations should consider training more teachers and school-related personnel by providing more courses related to such disciplines. Beckett suggests that the governments should consider paying their teachers well to make such careers attractable while also catering for the already existing teachers to improve their living and teaching standards. According to Beckett, another means of promoting secondary education would be through investing and purchasing the necessary materials and equipment suitable for proper teaching. Such equipment includes books, computers, chairs, blackboards, and laboratory devices. Moreover, the state’s governments may consider creating campaigns aimed at generating awareness among communities on the importance of education. Notably, many rural communities within developing nations do not take seriously matters relating to learning especially for the girl-child and emphasize more on the by-child; therefore, educating them that all children deserve equal learning opportunities would be impeccably resourceful.

Problems that Developing States Face during Development

The road to development is paved with many challenges and tribulations that may weaken or strengthen a nation’s ability to advance. These problems may arise from internal or external factors, in hand, demanding a country’s private handling or in other instances forcing it to outsource help from others. Some of the various challenges that these countries face on their roads to progress include rampant corruption, embezzlement of funds, poverty, diseases, credit devaluation, effects of global crises, and catastrophes. To begin with, world leader describes corruption as one of the biggest menaces and deterrents of growth within developing nations. Research by Kodama argues that majority of the funds intended for public development including construction of infrastructures such as schools, hospitals, roads, and public amenities usually ends up in private individual’s accounts and later directed towards private use. Corruption results in increased unemployment, public suffering, lack of facilities to serve better the majority, and an increased public debt.

Moreover, mismanagement and embezzlement of funds are other challenges that hinder proper utilization of public resources. Arguably, the government also contributes to such misappropriating by overspending on unrequired projects while neglecting the critical ones. Additionally, developing nations are further prone to external factors that may challenge their growth including the devaluation of their currencies of global financial crises. The devaluation of currency results to a country having a weaker trading power as compared to other nations, making it expensive for them to import products while forcing them to export products at low prices – nonetheless, this also makes their goods more competitive. The effects of international financial disasters such as the 2007-2008 financial crisis and the European Sovereign Debt Crisis have indirect and spilling effects on the economies of third world countries due to loss of market, in hand, negatively influencing their growth. Finally, poverty, diseases, and natural disasters deter growth as a country is forced to spend excessively to combat and eradicate them. Instances of floods, earthquakes and continuous droughts may even force a state to exhaust its resources and force it to rely on foreign assistance to deal with them.

Africa’s Infrastructural Problems and Potential for Good Growth

Many academicians regard Africa as the “dark continent” due to its limited infrastructural investment and development. Enuka argues that the vast majority of this continent remains rural and underdeveloped with minimal infrastructure including roads, modern houses, electricity, communication networks, and other public amenities. Most of the continent’s infrastructural challenges develop from the rampant corruption that ends up draining funds intended for public use and directing it into people’s pockets. The New York Times reported that an example of this increased exploitation is in Kenya, East Africa’s biggest economy, where mismanagement and poor utilization of resources hinder the proper development of Lake Turkana Wind Power Project. Additionally, inadequate training on experts who can develop state of the art infrastructural project also contributes to the nation’s dilemmas. In many situations, due to the lack of experts, many African countries are forced to contract outside professionals, in hand, raising the costs of the projects while denying local citizens the opportunities to gain experience.

Noteworthy, having these challenges for a continent implies that Africa has very significant potential for growth. To begin with, as other developed nations face a slowdown in investment, many global companies, especially those in construction, are looking for new opportunities, most of which are within Africa. Ultimately, the new growth of Africa would open up the possibilities for development of manufacturing and processing companies, financial institutions, road construction, communication developments, and technology startups. Additionally, the continent is improving its education levels, therefore, having an increased population who can work in financial institutions, technology companies, communication centers, and schools among others. Arguably, this improved employment standards would signify an enhancement in cost of living, increase in middle-class citizens, and an improvement in the market for new products.

Responsibility for Failure of Foreign Aid

The failure of proper implementation and utilization of foreign aid falls on different government agencies, private institutions, and private individuals. This failure is because of the various roles each plays in the chain of ensuring that funds are deposited, withdrawn, and utilized in the proper channels and for the intended purposes. Nonetheless, Combes argue that the most responsible party liable for the failure of the foreign aid working is the government. This is because it is the one charged with the handling, delegation, using, and demanding audit reports on how these resources were used. Moreover, it is the responsibility of the government to track and prosecute any cases of fraud, fund misappropriation, and incompetence during the borrowing, using and repaying of this aid money.

Additionally, the government fails by not developing its industries and utilizing available resources to create employment and foster growth. By failing to do so, the government is unable to raise revenue to sustain its citizens, therefore, renders to borrowing money. Furthermore, Combes et al. suggest that the state should take responsibility and invest in its education system, in hand, producing persons who are capable of being innovative and starting their businesses to create employment and generate revenue. Arguably, the nation should also work hand in hand with private institutions to research and develop new ways of eradicating poverty, increasing the country’s fund reserves, repaying foreign debts, and over-relying on foreign professionals to handle tasks that can be done internally. Though this private-government partnerships, these parties could help tackle diseases and develop the infrastructure. Nevertheless, by failure to eradicate corruption, fostering relationships with private organizations, utilizing available resources, developing the education systems, repaying foreign debt, and over-relying of foreign aid, governments continue to deter growth, in hand, failing the working of foreign aid.