Posts tagged global issues
Calculating the World’s Population
From worldbank:
How do demographers figure out how many people live on Earth? Can they accurately calculate the number of people that have ever lived? You asked our data help desk these questions, and our open data whiz drew the answers in this video.
Do you have more questions about how data is calculated? Ask them at data help desk or on Twitter with hashtag #dataquestion
I’ve been happy ever since the World Bank has made its database freely available online. It’s been a great resource for my own work—but especially so for my students.
If you’re a kid in Finland, you don’t start school until you’re 7 years old. There’s almost no homework until you’re a teenager. You don’t wear a uniform, you can call your teacher by his first name, and you can attend class barefoot if the mood strikes you. It’s always casual Friday, and you spend fewer hours in the classroom than students in the rest of the developed world.
Despite—or because of—this leisurely approach, the Finnish educational system is one of the world’s finest. Finland’s literacy rate is 100 percent. When the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development administers its standardized reading and math exams to students from around the world, Finnish pupils regularly come out at or near the top.
What makes these results more amazing is that just four decades ago, Finland’s academic record was a mess. In the 1970s, though, the government did something extraordinary to combat lax education: It mandated that every teacher earn a master’s degree, even agreeing to foot the bills for the extra schooling. Teaching’s prestige skyrocketed; becoming a teacher in Finland is now as tough as becoming a lawyer. Only one in 10 primary school applicants makes the cut! Today, the rest of the world is scrambling to follow Finland’s example as its hyper-educated population continues to boost the country’s productivity. Maybe we should all kick off our shoes and learn a few things.
10 Contestants for Earth’s Next Superpower | Mental Floss
The Finish example is by far the most impressive (and transferable one). But the Swiss example isn’t bad, either.
From foreignaffairsmagazine:
Since the end of the industrial age, Americans have worried about improving their education system. But the country has never been able to make much progress. Other nations do it better, and the United States must learn from their examples if it hopes to catch up.
Yet another case for the value of comparative studies.
The idea that we can solve all our (or any) of our problems by simply thinking really hard about them (which we don’t really do) or by using abstract theories (without first testing them) is bizarre. In no other sector do we do this. In sports, coaches always study their competition to develop and refine their strategic thinking. In business, corporations always study their competitors to develop and refine their market or production strategies and goals. Shouldn’t this be common sense in public policy as well? Shouldn’t we always be asking ourselves how other countries do things, looking at their results, and then using that information to adjust our own policies?
From csmonitor:
Facing Terror: Boston bombing reveals a new American maturity toward insecurity
Graphics by Rich Clabaugh/The Christian Science Monitor
This data underscores that terrorism isn’t “new” to the United States. Rather, we tend to differentiate acts of “terrorism” (mass killings for political purpose) committed by “Others” from killing sprees or other “criminal” acts committed under more “normal” circumstances. This also underscores the power of naming—what we call something has significant repercussions for what kinds of policy solutions we apply.
From theweekmagazine:
11 countries where gay marriage is legal
“Culture wars! They are not, contrary to what U.S. media coverage might suggest, a wholly American phenomena,” reports Keith Wagstaff:
On Tuesday, France’s national assembly passed a bill to legalize gay marriage by a vote of 331-to-225 in the face of hundreds of thousands of protestors who overturned cars and fought off tear gas along the Champs-Elysees, according to The Associated Press. Last week, after facing stiff resistance from the conservative group Family First, the New Zealand parliament passed a bill legalizing same-sex marriage. Before that, on April 10, Uruguay’s parliament voted to become the second country in Latin America to recognize gay marriage despite strong Catholic opposition. (Argentina is the other Latin American country where same-sex marriage is legal.) The bills in New Zealand, France, and Uruguay are all expected to be signed into law.
Yay.
This topic is definitely getting included in the intro to comparative politics textbook I’m writing. Stay tuned.
From evanfleischer:
Dialogue! (The above photo was taken in Davis Square in Somerville.)
via.
Nice to see. We’re not alone. That goes both ways.
Statement of the Ambassador of the Czech Republic on the Boston terrorist attack
19.04.2013 / 21:27
As many I was deeply shocked by the tragedy that occurred in Boston earlier this month. It was a stark reminder of the fact that any of us could be a victim of senseless violence anywhere at any moment.
As more information on the origin of the alleged perpetrators is coming to light, I am concerned to note in the social media a most unfortunate misunderstanding in this respect. The Czech Republic and Chechnya are two very different entities - the Czech Republic is a Central European country; Chechnya is a part of the Russian Federation.
As the President of the Czech Republic Miloš Zeman noted in his message to President Obama, the Czech Republic is an active and reliable partner of the United States in the fight against terrorism. We are determined to stand side by side with our allies in this respect, there is no doubt about that.
Petr Gandalovič
Ambassador of the Czech Republic
There are a number of things that are sad about the Boston terrorist attack. One of them, is that one of our allies (part of the “New Europe” part of NATO) believes it’s necessary to make such a statement. They know so well how little the American public knows—and the tragic consequences of that.
I remember my own experience. I was a recent immigrant from Bolivia during the 1986 airstrikes against Libya, which were in retaliation for Gaddafi’s involvement in the Berlin disco bombing that killed three and wounded several hundred. After living for a year in my new neighborhood, I still had to regularly explain to my 5th grade classmates that I was from Bolivia, not Libya. And remind them that, until recently, they thought I was “Mexican.” But I’ll never forget how uncomfortable some stares became, from kids I spent most days playing backyard baseball or football.
In the days, weeks, and months that follow. It would be worthwhile to stop and ask ourselves—as a country—why we react this way. And whether our lack of knowledge about the rest of the world in any way contributes to our lack of security. Or, at the very least, why our own allies don’t trust us to distinguish between nationalities.
World Bank Dataviz: How much money do migrants send home?
From worldbank:
Remittances – money sent home by migrants to family and friends – soared to record levels last year. Officially recorded remittances reached $500bn in one year, but we estimate that the true figure, including unrecorded and informal channels, may be even higher.
The Guardian has put together an interactive map using World Bank Migration and Remittance data to show how much money is sent from one country to another. India, shown below, is the greatest recipient of remittances.
Click here for the full interactive feature: http://bit.ly/U9c4PO
From theeconomist:
Daily chart: the age of man. In 2011, the average person was just under 32. By the end of this century the average person will be a little over 42 and newborns can expect to live to 81.
The chart also suggests that the world’s population growth is starting to slow down. And the world’s population may stabilize at around 10 billion. Interesting.
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