Forum 1 response International Political Economy with works cited
Forum 1 response International Political Economy with works cited
As the lesson week1 stated, globalization “is the integration of virtually everything with everything.” The benefits of global integration and the drawback for states and regions are evident. For the sake of this discussion forum, I will analyze the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) as an example.
To promote regional peace, social and cultural development, and economic growth regional alliance formed in Bangkok in 1967. It took over the non-military role of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization in 1975. Its ten members are Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand (the five founding members), Brunei (from 1984), Vietnam (from 1995), Laos and Myanmar (from 1997), and Cambodia (from 1999). The head of each country meets annually in an ASEAN summit to discuss and resolve regional issues. The headquarters are in Jakarta, Indonesia. ASEAN has been successful in achieving peace. Its members pledge to rely exclusively on peaceful processes to settle intra-regional differences, and there have been no armed confrontations between these countries. ASEAN Leaders have established an ASEAN Security Community (ASC) to ensure that countries in the region live at peace with each other and with the world. In 1994, ASEAN established the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) as an informal channel for discussing security issues in the Asia–Pacific region and to promote preventive diplomacy. In addition to ASEAN members, the ARF includes Australia, Canada, China, the European Union (EU), India, Japan, Mongolia, New Zealand, North Korea, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, the Russian Federation, South Korea, and the USA. ASEAN heads of government signed a declaration prohibiting the possessions, manufacture, and acquisition of nuclear weapons in the region in 1995. Because of the integration the people from each country are able to travel without a visa (depending on your citizenship) that promotes cultural understanding. Trade agreements and the geopolitical bloc were also established.
The ASEAN region has a population of about 560 million (2006), a total area of 4.5 million square kilometers, a combined gross domestic product (GDP) of almost $1,100 billion, and a total trade of about $1,400 billion. Trade has been growing within the region as a result of ASEAN initiatives to encourage freer movements of goods and peoples. In 1992, member states signed an agreement to establish an ASEAN free-trade area (AFTA). Developed in stages, it was in place as of 2008, and the elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers among member countries was expected to promote greater economic efficiency, productivity, and competitiveness. The creation of ASEAN was the best thing that happened to Asia; however, the organization experienced the negative impact of globalization. For instance, the rapid economic growth in Asia has led to a growing reliance on energy imports, increasing the importance of sea lanes and transportation routes; which become an issue. China is trying to occupy the entire South China Sea (SCS) which also belong to ASEAN original members. China built artificial islands cause environmental degradation and conflict with ASEAN members (mainly Vietnam and The Philippines). The tension between Vietnam and China increases when China’s Navy prohibits Vietnamese fishermen to enter the nine-dash-line in the SCS. One of the reading this week titled, The Will -O’- The Wisp of the transnational State by Andres Beiler mentioned, “ this tension is presupposed to be a competitive struggle between states and state rivalry is, therefore, the expression of class struggle at the international level.” The effect of globalization is also obvious in the national level, China and other East Asian economies have received many manufacturing activities from developed countries because of their cheap labor (Khan, Habibullah. et. al). Globalization has reduced poverty, but the exploitation of workers in developing countries becomes a problem. In summary, globalization is only a good thing if it benefits all groups of society.
Reference:
Lesson Week 1.
Bieler, Andreas; Morton, Adam David .THE WILL-O’-THE-WISP OF THE TRANSNATIONAL STATE. https://search-proquest-com.
Khan, Habibullah; Bashar, Omar K M R. DOES GLOBALIZATION CREATE A ‘LEVEL PLAYING FIELD’ THROUGH OUTSOURCING AND BRAIN DRAIN IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY? https://search-proquest-com.
Forum 2 response International Political Economy with works cited:
Answer this question
Can globalization be changed by things like Brexit and the election of anti-globalization politicians?
Forum 3 response International Political Economy with works cited:
Answer this question
Globalization has undoubtedly been a boom for the developing world. Capital outflows to cheaper labor market areas have meant a huge increase in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to underdeveloped countries. The results of this have been increased wages, standards of living, healthcare and education in many places. However, this transfer has not come without a cost. Former manufacturing jobs in the developed world have been outsourced to lower cost locales in the Third World. This loss of employment has had second and third order effects in both the gaining and losing locations.
Economic anxiety has led to a political and cultural backlash in industrial countries with the populace taking out their frustrations at the ballot box. The results have been the rise of right wing and protectionist parties in both the US and Europe.
Developing countries, while happy to receive the inflow of capital, at times are uneasy or hostile to perceived Western cultural penetration. Another issue is thatwhile the developing and emerging economies are losing skilled labor through ‘brain drain’ to the advanced nations, they are gaining remittance earnings from those nations (Khan & Bashar, 2016). So from this perspective globalization could be viewed as a zero sum game. Still countries losing their best and brightest have good cause to be concerned.
Belier and Morton (2014), cite Hirst and Thompson (1999) and Weiss (1998), in arguing that globalization implies mainly an increase in cross-border flows and, therefore, does not change fundamentally the inter-state system. I disagree because culturally and economically globalization has upended the existing world political economy and forced governments to think in more international versus pure domestic terms. This shift in philosophies, where there are winners and losers, has many domestic audiences uneasy.
What seems to be beyond dispute is that globalization is here to stay. The genie can’t be put back in the bottle, governments and people will have to adapt. What has been most disruptive, I think, has been the pace of change. With increases in technology and shipping this shift has happened at breakneck speed from a historical perspective. Perhaps governments should acknowledge that while they can’t return the genie to the bottle they should focus on managing the pace of change and concentrate on smoothing out some of the rough edges.
The only constant is change. The world has been here before from rural-urban migrations, The Industrial Revolution and technological innovations. People will adjust. They have no choice. But, they adjust better when the change is gradual.
REF
Bieler, A., & Morton, A. D. (2014). THE WILL-O’-THE-WISP OF THE TRANSNATIONAL STATE. The Journal of Australian Political Economy, (72), 23-51. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.
Khan, H., & Bashar, O. K. M. R. (2016). DOES GLOBALIZATION CREATE A ‘LEVEL PLAYING FIELD’ THROUGH OUTSOURCING AND BRAIN DRAIN IN THE GLOBAL ECONOMY? The Journal of Developing Areas, 50(6), 191-207. http://apus.libguides.com/er.
Kosal, Margaret E., and Kristina Cole. 2009. “IPE’s Darwin on Globalization and Technology.” International Studies Review 11, no. 2: 365-367. International Security & Counter Terrorism Reference Center, EBSCOhost (accessed November 24, 2016). (Book Review) http://apus.libguides.com/er.
Forum 4 criminal procedure 250 bluebook format:
Obstruction of justice is an offense of intentionally hindering or obstructing the arrest, conviction, and punishment of the accused persons, including all proper and necessary proceedings for administering justice.[1] Certain elements must be in place in order to prove an obstruction of justice charge. The first element is intent. Intent means that the defendant intended to do the act that impeded, prevented, obstructed, or delayed the justice process and that he intended that the consequence of his action would be the obstruction of the justice process.[2] The second element is impeding, prevent, obstruct, or delaying an investigation.[3] Case decisions have established that blocking or subverting a police investigation by lying, running, or threatening police or others can be prosecuted as obstruction charges.[4] Hiding or destroying evidence can also be prosecuted under an obstruction statute unless the state has a specific statute that covers that type of behavior.[5] The third element of an obstruction of justice charge involves public officials such as an attorney general or personnel within the criminal justice system.[6]These persons may fail to disclose evidence or pursue investigations and are essentially obstructing themselves from furthering the interests of justice.[7] A final element in an obstruction of justice charge is ensuring the charge is not in violation of a citizens First Amendment Rights.[8] Essentially, a person may disagree with a police officer as long as they are not physically obstructing them from performing their duties, not causing imminent public disturbances, or inciting a riot.[9] This falls along the same lines as citizens recording interactions with the police and whether it can be considered an obstruction of justice.[10]
Based on the elements of obstruction of justice, the federal government was right to prosecute Martha Stewart for obstruction of justice. The element that most satisfies the case for obstruction charges is the impeding, preventing, obstructing, or delaying of the investigation. Stewart lied to investigators when the circumstances of her sale of 4000 shares of ImClone Systems was questioned as potential insider trading.[11] It was determined the Stewart lied to investigators by telling them that she and her stockbroker had previously agreed to sell the shares if the market value fell below a certain price.[12] It was also determined that a phone message from the broker was altered immediately following a conversation with her attorney.[13] It was also found that there was a document that was altered with the notation of “@60” to back up Stewart’s claims of the set price sell off but was scientifically proven to be made with a different ink pen at a later time.[14] The lying and altering of evidence fit the elements of an obstruction of justice charge and Stewart was rightly charged. I believe the only defense Stewart could provide against the charges would be to argue the intent behind her lying and evidence altering.
I found a case involving a Mayor for the town of Landrum, South Carolina. In State v. Cogdell, 273 S.C. 563 (1979), Mayor Cogdill was convicted of twenty-one counts of obstruction of justice and sentenced to three years imprisonment for failure to report traffic violations that he received as Mayor to the SC Department of Highways and Public Transportation.[15] Under SC Code Ann. §56-1-330, 56-1-780, and 56-5-2970, Mayor Cogdell was required to report the traffic violations.[16] The court determined that the appellants failure to report his traffic violations constituted obstruction of justice because the failure to report those violations prevented the imposition of the penalties mandated by statutory law.[17] The charges and sentence were upheld because the court found the appellant intentionally failed to report his traffic violations and the sentence was within the maximum limits prescribed by law.[18]
I do not think that obstruction of justice is a “we can’t get you with anything else” type of charge. In the Stewart case, obstruction was in combination with other charges. In the case I found, the Mayor intentionally failed to report his violations preventing him from being properly punished. If a person is hindering an investigation or preventing a punishment from occurring, they need to face the consequences of their actions and being charged with obstruction is an acceptable consequence.
Forum 5 criminal procedure 250 words bluebook format:
This week was an interesting topic to learn about, especially in regard to Martha Stewart and her crimes. One of the interesting tidbits was the fact that James Comey was the U.S. Southern District attorney who prosecuted her for lying. I found it fascinating due to the facts of his testifying before Congress and the allegations surrounding Mr. Comey, along with his firing as F.B.I. Director and the book that he wrote about his career.
Our text book defines obstruction of justice according the Model Penal Code as: § 242.1 OBSTRUCTING ADMINISTRATION OF LAW OR OTHER GOVERNMENTAL FUNCTIONS: person commits a misdemeanor if he purposely obstructs, impairs or perverts the administration of law or other governmental function by force, violence, physical interference or obstacle, breach of official duty, or any other unlawful act, except that this Section does not apply to flight by a person charged with crime, refusal to submit to arrest, failure to perform a legal duty other than an official duty, or any other means of avoiding compliance with law without affirmative interference with governmental functions.[1]. Obstruction of justice may also apply to those who hide or destroy evidence, lie on official reports, delay or subvert the course of an official investigation. [2].
According to the New York Times article and the quote from attorney James Comey stating “This criminal case is about lying—lying to the F.B.I, lying to the S.E.C., and lying to investors.” summed up why she was indicted; she lied to very important people, about information and when she “knew” what she “knew”, along with how she found out very critical information. [3]. The statements that Martha Stewart made regarding the sale of her nearly 4,000 shares of ImClone Systems were proven to be lies by the prosecutors. There was testimony from individuals in meetings with her, phone conversations and the infamous “@60” written on a worksheet that led to her indictment, and further conviction. She was found guilty of obstruction and her conduct was used to indict and later convict Peter Bacanovic, her stock broker at the time.
I found an article in the Los Angeles Times with various attorneys offering what they would use as a defense for Martha. Attorney J. Michael Nolan stated his defense would be based around the government singling her out due to her prominence and being a celebrity. He says his final words to the jury would be “If it wasn’t Martha Stewart, do you think we’d be here?” [4]. He went on to state “I bet there are 25 people who traded that stock, but they’re only charging her.” [5].
I found a similar case of obstruction, a bit more serious than Martha’s case, which involved a Georgia deputy sheriff who worked at the Fulton County jail. Mitnee Jones, the deputy, was convicted of obstruction for lying to the F.B.I. and providing false statements as part of an investigation into the death of an inmate at the Fulton County jail. [6]. While she was found guilty, she received a lighter sentence of 1 year & 3 months in prison and 120 hours of community service.
The question of Is this just a “can’t get you on anything else” charge? Is interesting, and the cynical side of me says yes! When a prosecutor has evidence or a person lying to them, on purpose or by omission, I think many times if the rest of the evidence is weak against an individual, then obstruction could have elements easier to prove.
[1] Joycelyn M. Pollock, Criminal Law (11th ed. 2016)
[2] Id. At 440
[3] Constance L. Hays, Prosecuting Martha Stewart: The Overview; Martha Stewart Indicted by U.S. On Obstruction, The New York Times, June 5, 2003,https://www.nytimes.com/
[4] Thomas S. Mulligan, A Pantry Full of Defense Strategies, Los Angeles Times, (June 9, 2003). http://articles.latimes.com/
[5] Id.
[6[ Lee Lofland, When Lying Becomes A Crime: Obstruction of Justice, www.leelofland.com, (April 12, 2017), https://www.leelofland.com/
Forum 6 real estate law 250 words bluebook format:
Scenario:
Kevin signs a contract to sell his house to Joe. However, Alex, without knowing about the deal with Joe, then offers Kev
1. When determining if Joe can sue Kevin for breach of contract it must first be established that the contract was valid when it was signed. First, both parties must have legal capacity, meaning they are mentally competent adults, belong to a partnership, corporation, or company that has the power to contract, or that they are the executor or trustee of an estate with the power to enter such a contract. Next, the two parties must have a “meeting of the minds” which ensures a mutual agreement on the real property to be sold, the time in which it will be sold, and the terms under which it will be sold. Then the parties must establish the consideration, which is money or something of value in some states or an agreement or recital to buy/sell the property in others. Finally, the sale must be lawful in the state where it is taking place. If all of these requirements were satisfied by Joe and Kevin when the contract was signed, then Joe has a good case to sue Kevin for breach of contract.[1]
2. There are four ways that Joe can seek remedy for Kevin’s breach of contract. The first is specific performance which would require Kevin to sell the property to Joe on the terms to which they had previously agreed. If the home has already been legally sold to Alex, then the home no longer belongs to Kevin and this option would not be enforceable. A second remedy would be for money damages if the house that Kevin agreed to sell Joe were promised at less than market value. In this case, Joe could sue Kevin for the amount of money that would allow him to purchase a comparable house in the market to the one on which Kevin breached contract. Joe could also be remedied by recession, which seeks to restore any financial costs of the wronged purchaser incurred in preparation to buy the home; these could be inspection costs, legal fees, etc. A final form of remedy must be built into the original contract for the sale of a real property. Liquidated damages require that a reasonable amount of money, close to what damages would be in the event of a default, be paid. This form of remedy is usually the exclusive remedy if the default occurs, but it assumes that the contract in which they are established is sound.[2]
3. In response to Joe’s suit, Kevin could mount an affirmative defense which would not contest Joe’s claims but would assert mitigating facts or circumstances that would render the breach of contract moot. Kevin could assert that any of the elements of a valid contract (discussed above) were not present, and this would negate the terms if found to be true. He could also assert that he was fraudulently induced to enter the contract if, for example, Joe had threatened him or lied about the sale of the house. Additionally, if the price or terms agreed upon by Joe and Kevin were grossly unfair, the latter could use that as an affirmative defense in the suit against him.[3]
[1] Daniel F. Hinkel, Practical Real Estate Law 144-149 (3d ed. 2000).
[2] Daniel F. Hinkel, Practical Real Estate Law 149-151 (3d ed. 2000).
[3] Richard Stim, Defenses to a Breach of Contract Claim, NOLO, https://www.nolo.com/legal-
Forum 7 real estate law 250 words bluebook format:
Scenario:
Kevin signs a contract to sell his house to Joe. However, Alex, without knowing about the deal with Joe, then offers Kev
There are a lot of possibilities that are unknown in this case. With only knowing the face value, it is hard to know what liabilities or claims there may be. If we look at the case at face value, then we assume that the contract that was signed by Kevin and Joe is valid. For the contract to be valid both Kevin and Joe have to have the Legal capacity to contract. This means that neither party is a minor or infant, mental incompetent, and for simplicity neither is a corporation. [1]
In my opinion, Joe has an excellent case against Kevin. Again looking at the facts as they are, Joe would have a case because they entered into a legally binding contract, and the reason, as it is written, that Kevin breached the contract is just because he wanted more money. As far as Joe’s remedies, there are four that Joe could be entitled to: specific performance, money damages, rescission, and liquidated damages. If the court ordered that the remedy would be specific performance, then Kevin would be forced to follow through with the contract that he had originally signed with Joe. In the remedy of money damages, Joe could be awarded monetary compensation, agreed upon price of the property was less than the appraised value. Joe would be awarded the difference in this instance. Under the remedy of rescission, the court would basically place Joe in a position that would be the same as if the contract had never been entered. So the contract would be terminated, and any expenses incurred by Joe would be reimbursed, such as inspections, title searches, and the like. The last remedy would be liquidated damages. In this remedy, there would have been a previously agreed upon amount in the case of default by either party. The most well known of this remedy would be earnest money in a property contract. [2]
It is my view that Kevin would not have many valid defenses of his breach of contract. The only thing that I can think that may be a plausible case for him is if he reached back to the validity of the contract. As mentioned previously, there are provisions under the legal capacity to contract that may be applied here. Kevin would have to be able to prove that either himself or Joe did not have the legal capacity in some manner.
Something else that Kevin would have to consider in all of this, is Alex. If for example, Joe was to be awarded specific performance in his case against Kevin, it may be that Alex would then be out whatever expenses he had incurred in the illicit (without his knowledge) contract he entered with Kevin. Kevin then may be in a situation where he would have to pay money damages to Alex. There are several possibilities that could arise from this situation, and they all would probably be against Kevin. It would have behooved Kevin to further researched real estate law before breaching his contract.
[1] Daniel F. Hinkel, Practical Real Estate Law 144-145 (2000).
[2] Daniel F. Hinkel, Practical Real Estate Law 149-151 (2000).
Answer preview Forum 1 response International Political Economy with works cited
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