Reflective Journal 4: Reflect on the societal problems faced by China and America. (Hint: you must definitely explain your responses to these societal problems. How can they be resolved? Who should be responsible for resolving these issues?)
All reflective journals must not exceed 800 words.
You must include a word-count at the end of your journal.
Please print on both sides of the paper.
Although China and America are superpowers in many aspects such as economy, military etc, they are still facing many serious societal problems today.
Today, China faces a serious problem of social unrest. This is due to the unfair treatment of the government towards the citizens which caused the citizens to be unsatisfied with their performance and thus leading to many riots and protests for better and fairer treatment. For example, just recently, there were riots at Chengdu, and industrial zone started by angry steelworkers who demanded higher wages. Also, people in China are demanding working conditions of a higher quality. I believe this is a problem that needs to be addressed as soon as possible because social unrest may cause negative impacts to the country. The citizens may not be as united as before due to all the unfair treatment by the government. For a country to be successful, it is essential for the people to be united in face of adversity. A country full of diversity will just fall and collapse when the country face problems as they can’t face those challenges as a country.
In China, the first class citizens are getting more privileges than the second class citizens. As only the government has the right to control these privileges, I think that the government should be responsible in solving this issue. Since the citizens do not really trust the government anymore, they may want to first start a campaign, for instance, to gain the trust of the people first. When the people trust the government, only then the government can start changing policies without worrying whether or not the citizens will be unreasonable as they trust the government to be fair and objective. Besides, the government must also compensate for the loss of the people they mistreated to gain some support of the citizens. The government should avoid dividing the country into first class and second class because this might affect the unity of the people as the people from the first class might look down on the people of the second class. They have to be equal to all citizens regardless of race, language, religion or social class whatsoever. Although the government plays a big part, the citizens can help by forgetting and forgiving the mistakes that the government made in the past and let the government use something in the future to compensate them because there is really no point in starting riots as it will only make matters worse and there will be more social unrest. If the government still does not change its ways, the citizens should consider voting for another party to run the country.
In comparison, America’s most serious problem seems like its education standards. In the past few years, America’s academic achievements have been falling greatly, and this is mainly due to the low quality of the teachers. Many teachers quit their jobs after working not longer than 5 years or more. This is a problem as the US government has to spend a big portion of the education budget just to hire new qualified teachers to teach the students. If there are not enough teachers in America, the inexperienced and unqualified teachers have to be hired to teach, which will then affect the academic achievements greatly. When the education standards drop, the future workforce of America will be relatively incapable and untalented. With an unskilled workforce, the economy of America will also be affected negatively.
To resolve this problem, the best way is for the government and the teachers to cooperate and work together. The government can introduce a merit pay system whereby teachers are judged by the grades of their students and paid accordingly. This will motivate the teachers to work harder and teach their students better so that their students can do well academically. This will in turn pull up the academic achievements of the nation significantly when all the teachers teach their students to the best of their ability. The teachers will also not quit their jobs so easily because they are rewarded based on their class results and that this system is very fair and the teachers can also benefit easily. The government can then spend the money which was previously used to hire new teachers every now and then on more important and useful things like learning resources, facilities, and on training the teachers through workshops, courses. Also, the government should aim to change the mindset of the general public that think of teachers as “low-class” jobs and are unwilling to work as teachers. They should promote the importance of education so let they are more willing to work as teachers as they want to contribute back to the society. This is similar to the Confucian ideology of 饮水思源 which means giving back.
In conclusion, China and America can choose many ways to solve their issues. Essentially, it is their government that can make the most significant difference to the 2 countries.
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