Global Superpowers

Global Superpowers

What makes a country a superpower?

In today’s world the superpowers consist of China, India, Russia, European Union, USA, Brazil and United Kingdom. All these countries have common things make them the superpowers of today. These things consist of a out-sized cultural, economic, political, military, geographic and demographic variables that contribute to making a specific country a superpower. All of these important factors affect the countries ability to have influence throughout the world, these combining factors help give countries credibility within the world and overall making it a strong superpower.

	United States of America	Soviet Union
Positive	Military, economy, political, democracy (Compared to the Soviet Union, US had a strong economy, giving a better standard of living for its citizens.)	Military, geographic (largest country in the world) Soviet Union being a Communist country had a high focus on military power, unfortunately this took a strain on other areas that make a superpower.
Negative	Geographic (The United States of America although has a good population the land mass in comparison with the Soviet Union is quite small)	Democracy, Political, economic status (because of the strain that the cold war took on the Soviet Union it meant that economic, democracy was affected. Communist party meant that people were simply controlled.

I think that being a superpower may have could be correlated with terrorist choosing to attack certain countries. However I also think that this can’t be the main reason why terrorist choose to attack particular countries. The reason I think this is because of the logic behind the attack. An attack is meant to have a lasting effect on how the country is run, usually either politically or economically. To be a global superpower a country already is strong in these areas and therefore a terrorist attack even though very devastating, the affect wouldn't be lasting. This is why I think that there would have to be some sort of co-inciting issue that gives some sort of reasoning behind the attack.

Essay Outline

Name: Michael Wiggins                                                                       

Individual Research title: Humanity’s survival energy combination.

What question do I want to ask?

What is the best combination of sustainable renewable energy, which can give humanity a constant supply of electricity?

Where will I find the information to answer my questions?

The information needed will be found on various government and political articles that relate to the topic of ‘sustainable renewable energy’. I will need various perspectives from many sources and countries. Each energy source will be evaluated into the pros and cons of the source and whether or not it is sustainable option.

How will I analyse the information? 

Each energy source will be evaluated into the pros and cons of the source and whether or not it is sustainable option.

How will I identify and evaluate possible scenarios?

I will evaluate possible scenarios of bias within the article and or on the topic by looking at the author’s background and analyze whether it has possibly shaped or changed her view on the topic.

Possible scenarios

Bias, irrelevance towards the topic, unclear perspective, not enough information on the author

Comparison between two food insecurity articles

·         The Bias

o   The “Hindu” is against the government

o   The “Guardian” is for the government

o   Both papers are liberal views

o   The author of the “Hindu” is a professor in food insecurity and global environmental change

o   The author of the “Guardian” is a campaign manager of an NGO called 'Oxfam'

·         What is written – deeper meaning

o   “The most persuasive argument to the court is that the right to food is directly related to the constitutional guarantee of the right to life”

In this quote found in the 'Guardian' article is presenting a deeper meaning explaining that the right to food is a right to life, which human has a right to.

o   “Rather than using the abundance of grain as an opportunity to raise consumption among the people, the government has declared its intention to sell its stocks in foreign markets at subsidized prices"

 This quote found in the 'Hindu' presents to the readers that problem is that even though India has the opportunity to distribute food equally among the people, they chose to do the opposite and sell the stock to international markets for the same price.

·         Purpose

o   Informative or Persuasive

 “This stock is enough to provide 70kg a person, that is, about one-half an individual’s annual cereal requirement, to more than 600 million people.” The "Hindu" article is an informative, giving statistical and factual information.

·         Contention

o   “Rather than using the abundance of grain as an opportunity to raise consumption among the people, the government has declared its intention to sell its stocks in foreign markets at subsidized prices. Foreign buyers of Indian rice and wheat will only have to pay the rates charged to "below-poverty-line" (BPL) consumers in India.” This quote sums up the contention of the 'Hindu' article.

o   “If food security is about having certainty about the future, the common goal must also be growth in agriculture and food security that gives the same rights on the land to men and women farmers.” This quote sums up the contention of the 'Guardian' article

·         Differences

o   One blaming (Hindu), other trying to find solutions to the problem (Guardian)

o   The 'Guardian' was opinionated and the 'Hindu' was factual and statistical

Food Scarcity

Global Perspectives: Food scarcity

What are your personal perspectives?

·         Who is affected?

The people that are affected by food scarcity are those who struggle to find enough food of the right nutritional value to sustain a healthy living style. These people work hard every day just to make sure that they know that they will get a meal at least once a day.

·         How many are affected?

There are millions around the world due to poverty and global economy that are affected by food scarcity every day.

·         Is this a major problem?

This is a major problem around the world, because people are dying from starvation or lack of food with the proper intake of the right nutrition.

·         What are some solutions?

For a solution to have any ground breaking impact on this global problem, would have to be a global response on the situation. These solutions would need to be education for both farmers and public, to efficiently in crop growing and nutrition, fair distribution of food within countries.

What is the local/national (India) perspective?

What I think the local/national perspective on the problem of food scarcity is that it is often thought of as someone else’s problem and no one wants to put the major effort on the problem.

What is the global perspective?

The global perspective is that the country with enough to sustain themselves, need to and more, to be able to support the countries that are unable to support themselves.

 Causes of food scarcity: Migrations, conflict, disaster and famine.

What is the purpose of the video?	What are the claims being made?	Do you agree/disagree with contention of the video? Why?	Is this video factual or telling a story? What about?
To show what people with more can do to the less fortunate and to that we are all human.	The poor, hungry and ignored deserve to be treated like humans with basic human rights.	I agree with his argument, as every human should have access to basic human necessities.	This video is telling a story about a humble man treating and caring for those less fortunate around him.