- 最后登录
- 2013-9-27
- 在线时间
- 126 小时
- 寄托币
- 92
- 声望
- 0
- 注册时间
- 2009-3-9
- 阅读权限
- 15
- 帖子
- 4
- 精华
- 0
- 积分
- 75
- UID
- 2613601

- 声望
- 0
- 寄托币
- 92
- 注册时间
- 2009-3-9
- 精华
- 0
- 帖子
- 4
|
本帖最后由 sherry_cherish 于 2009-8-2 09:14 编辑
Issue 11
All nations should help support the development of a global university designed to encourage students in the process of solving the world`s most persistent social problems.
We live in a world invested with all sorts of fears: epidemics, environmental pollution, energy shortage, terrorism, and so forth. Such persistent social problems can never be solved single-handed by one solitary country. Therefore, there comes a voice asking for a global university, upon which all nations pin their hopes to equip students from all over the world with the ability of terminating these pressing problems. Seemingly, such a global university might bring desirable consequences in the process of addressing common issues among nations. Certain vital problems lying beneath might hinder the achievement of its objectives radically.
Admittedly, a global university, where the students, regardless of their complexions or nationalities, can swim in sea of knowledge altogether under the guidance of excellent experts and academicians who enjoy high prestige in the academic realm. In terms of science, the most advanced discoveries and technologies can be gathered and work together for the good of the earth as a whole. From the aspect of humanity, by meeting people with diversified culture traditions, values, and religions, one can learn the different standpoint and perspective of one another, which may redounds to an advent of a mutual understanding. With the blurred boundaries of cultures, nationalities and races, the sharing of intelligence and the formation of a cosmopolitan spirit of the young, a global university will technically lead us to a desirable world free of common enduring issues of society ultimately.
However, before carried away by the magnificent blue print of the splendid future, we have to stay sober and ponder its feasibility on a pragmatic ground concerning with its objective—“to solve persistent social issues”.
Thereupon, the first knotty problem would be the diverse interpretation towards the “persistent social problems” in different nations. Take demographics as an example. In the third world, particularly in India and China, the two most heavily populated nations of the world, governments are faced with imperatives to curb the growth rate of population. The industrialized nations, on the contrary, are endeavoring to sustain theirs. Hence, it requires all nations to reach a consensus about the explanation of lasting social problems to be posed on the researching platform of the global university in the first place.
A second problem inherent in solving the social issues involves the distinctions of the cruxes among different nations. The cause of the social issues in a certain nation might be entirely distinguished from one another. For instance, suicide may be committed more for psychological reasons in affluent nations, such as stress from work and interpersonal relationship in most cases, rather than for the privation of life in impoverished nations. Respective root cause demands distinctive remedy. There is no omnipotent or universal answer to social problems in different nations. Such common social problems call for the necessity to identify the nature or cause of the phenomena and their specific remedies, to which a global university might be more of hindrance than help.
The third reason for my doubt about the function of a global university has to do with each nation’s priorities to protect the their own interests. Regardless of the foregoing diverse situations, assuming facing similar persistent social issues which have similar causes in different nations, every nation nevertheless naturally concerns more on their own interests. An apt example would be the refusal China and India made, standing at the cross roads between mitigation and adaptation with their limited climate change budgets, to reducing carbon emissions while the developed world increases pressure on the two major emitters to undertake some mandatory emission targets. Understandably, developing the economy is all developing countries’ priority, which overwhelmingly overweighs the mitigation in climate change. Thus, different nation lays different emphases on each social problem. Given that sovereign countries naturally press for an agenda in the interest of their own, query a functional global university is feasible thoroughly.
To sum up, the original intention to establish a global university so as to solve the enduring social issues is a fantastic notion. However, the status quo of diverse nations might fail the university. After the close scrutiny, we can eventually reach the conclusion that all of the foregoing variances are radically due to the fact that human-beings have not yet exceeded national or racial boundaries. As long as the boundaries of nations exist, the discrepancies would coexist, the pursuit of a nation’s own interest will hardly cease, the vista of a functional global university might remains shrouded in mist.
偶没法传附件,就传群上啦 |
|