Kalamazoo College Guilds: Business SIPs

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This collection includes Senior Individualized Projects (SIP's) that deal with issues of business. Abstracts are generally available to the public, but PDF files are available only to current Kalamazoo College students, faculty, and staff.

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Now showing 1 - 5 of 7
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    Unionization in America: A General Overview and Case Study in Michigan
    (2000) Giglio, Francesco A.; Mayer, Jeremy D.
    This was the basis for my original research: Why small businesses welcome or discourage unionization and for what reasons? This brought me to my internship.
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    American City Form, and Bourgeois and Middle Class Power: An Investigation into the Relationship
    (2000) Sprague, Brandon G.; Filner, Matthew
    In the early nineteenth century, the primary form of the American city was the walking city in which the elite lived close to the center of town and the most burdensome elements of the population were relegated to the fringes of the urban area. Today, however, the suburbs of contemporary metropolises house the American bourgeois and middle class, in direct contrast to their location in the walking city. The process by which this transformation was achieved in the nineteenth century derived in part from a separation of work from home, and from the desire of bourgeois families to pursue space and health in the suburb. These changes constituted an ideological need among the American bourgeoisie and middle class for a new residential spaces. During the twentieth century, this need was met in part through federal policies that ultimately helped to propel the American city to its present sprawled form.
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    Aid to Madagascar: A Comparison of the World Bank and the Millennium Challenge Corporation
    (2006) Wodika, Katy; Miller-Adams, Michelle
    The aim of this paper is to analyze the difference between the World Bank and the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), using their programs in Madagascar as a case study. To begin, I have outlined the recent political and economic history of Madagascar and the World Bank. I describe as much of the history of the MCC as possible, seeing as it is a new organization created in 2003. Then I outline three recent active programs of the World Bank in Madagascar that are similar to three programs of the MCC. It is necessary to use these three programs because the MCC is still a very new program and does not have as extensive a number of projects as the World Bank. This is an important topic because the usefulness of international development aid has been repeatedly called into question. The Bush Administration's answer to these questions was to create the MCC, which is supposed to have an innovative methodology for awarding development aid. The World Bank's response to these queries and doubts has been to make changes in its operations, while not changing the main ideas of the World Bank. One of the main questions in this paper is if the World Bank can still be effective without more than just the minor facelift it has already undergone, and how functional it has been in Madagascar. The other main question is how the MCC's changes to the usual development aid model have actually changed the results of its programs. The first section of this paper describes the history, politics and economics of Madagascar. The second section describes the history of the World Bank, and its programs in Madagascar. The third section describes the Millennium Challenge Corporation, and its programs in Madagascar. The last section is an analysis and comparison of the two organizations, their programs, and my conclusions.
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    Integrating Economies: The China Challenge
    (2006) Wegert, Katherine; Xu, Guoqi, 1962-
    In November 2001, the World Trade Organization formally approved China's accession, a milestone in the history of global trade and a symbolic commitment of the Chinese leadership to the importance of free trade in today's global economy. Over the last four years China has taken important steps to implement the numerous obligations of the WTO agreement, phasing-in the most vital obligations in 2004. While important progress has been made, China's implementation is far from complete. Issues of transparency and market access abound, but international assistance is available to help. Australia, Canada and members of the European Union have all provided technical assistance programs to support the Chinese government in its endeavor to integrate China into the global economy. Americans, however, remain skeptical of China's intentions. With a skyrocketing global trade deficit and recent layoffs at historically preeminent American corporations, such as General Motors, the United States is becoming increasingly weary of the impact of the Chinese market on its domestic economy. Though understandable, American concerns about Chinese economic competition stem from misunderstandings about the dynamics of U.S. -China trade relations. The two economies are deeply intertwined; China is one of the fastest-growing export markets for U.S. products, reaching $28.4 billion in 2003, and nearly 60 percent of Chinese exports to the United States are produced by foreign firms, many of them American. Continuing such an antagonistic approach towards China's "peaceful rise" will be detrimental to American trade policy and influence abroad. The Bilateral WTO Agreement between China and the United States reflects this antagonistic relationship. Though it commits China to important and far-reaching reforms, it stops short of granting China the most fundamental of WTO principles -that of Most Favored Nation Status. Instead, many aspects of the agreement give the U.S. tremendous power to protect its industries and react to what it deems unfair trading practices.
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