A sustainable urbanism

City planners see the pace of development as their goal or accomplishment. In Zhuhai, the city where I used to live, there has been a drama which caused a huge reverberation from the society. In order to establish a modern and prosperous image of the city, the government decided to get rid of an area of old plants and an old park. Instead, the government decided to replace them with a small business district. This act pulled the public's nerves, especially for those original residents of that area. So people decided to fight for these old "heritages" of the city.

This dispute for the old urban heritage actually came from the protection awareness of the city residents. It is not just a simple question of removing the old trees and garden. It involves more issues such as how does a city protect its cultural heritages. The urbanization process will inevitably involve the struggle between what is considered as new and what is considered as old. No single urban city was built over night. What people should concern about is how to balance the collective culture for the urban residents and the new investment for the city.

Urban city is different from rural area. Scholars think that urban city is the product of industrialization. With the development of city, how to balance commercial business and culture? The reconstruction process should be a long-term plan with a more sustainable concern, whether it is about replacing, maintaining, or developing.

The culture heritage represents the history deposit of one city. It can be the symbol or signature of a city. However, urbanization forces people to compromise to get rid of part of the old culture. The lack of commercial element makes the culture heritage imcompatible with the modern society. As the city continues to grow, people have to sacrifice some of these old cultural symbols.

However, the problem is, some city planners get too carried away by the fast urban development. They just focus on the renovation of the city, and neglect the reservation of the original roots of the city. Surely there is no doubt that commerce and business can boost the urban development. We should prevent the commercial development of a city becoming an exploitation of the cultural heritages. The balance with the commercial development and reservation of culture heritage can achieve a Sustainable Urbanism.

The video is about Jeffrey Morgan, the Director of Real Estate Development for Historic Boston Incorporated, talking about the role of community development corporations at the intersection of micro-business development and inner-city neighborhood business district redevelopment.

Links:

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Urbanism

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.113.3642&rep=rep1&type=pdf

http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=xkjEzYg1PwU&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DxkjEzYg1PwU

Organization analysis

In this post, I compared three organizations: the Lawrenceville Corporation, the GLSEN Pittsburgh, and the Pittsburgh United.

Lawrenceville Corporation

Lawrenceville Corporation works with local stakeholders to creatively envision the future potential of the neighborhood while keeping an eye on national and regional trends and local opportunities . Thy rely on the board of directors for direction and planning. the board is volunteer based and it consists of 16 members. The organization depends on volunteers to run its programs, while they also utilizes a bunch of staff. Regular staff includes executive director, manager and department directors.

Lawrenceville corporation is community development corporation(CDC). The mission is to act as a catalyst and conduit for reinvestment in the Lawrenceville community. It mainly focuses on programs such as business district development, residential and commercial development, elm street program and community planning. It focuses much on the community assets and strengths. It is a organization that collaborates with many other organizations, which is a more horizontal structure.

GLSEN Pittsburgh
GLSEN Pittsburgh is a reginal chapter of a national organization, Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network(GSLEN). GLSEN Pittsburgh strives to assure that each member of every school community is valued and respected regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity in 11 county service areas of Southwestern Pennsylvania. It coversa variety of subjects and issues, from public policy to teacher training to supporting students and educators around the country. Under the supervision of the board, which has 5 members, there are six committees serving different functions. Unlike other organizations that have full-time or part-time paid staff, GLSEN Pittsburgh is entirely volunteer-based. It is a rather small size organization with about 20 regular volunteers and a floating number of spot volunteers who are available to offer help for major events. 

GLSEN Pittsburgh plays an important role in bringing GLSENnational's programs and visions to local communities. Itcurrently mainly focuses on three major programs include Gay-Straight alliances, youth program and educator training programs. GLSEN Pittsburgh works to support GSAs in schoolsto improve school climate around the Southwestern Pennsylvania area. Youth program includes PASS (peer advocate for safe school) and YES (youth empowerment service). Through the youth program, GLSEN Pittsburgh is committed to empower youth to bring about change in their schools. The Training Program is a training workshop offered to teachers, educators, and community-based organizers to gaining tools and resources to develop LGBT related trainings in schools to make schools safer and more affirming for LGBT students. 

Pittsburgh United

Pittsburgh United strives to advance social and economic justice in the Pittsburgh region by working to ensure that working families and low and moderate-income communities are able to share in the prosperity that is generated by economic growth and development. It currently has 12 board members. Regular staff includes executive director, manager and department directors. The organization is more like part of a national wide effort, so it is more vertical. 

Pittsburgh United focuses a lot on the social and economic justice in Pittsburgh area. As a part of the national network the partnership for working families, it promotes strategies that will transform the way that economic development impacts our communities so that all of the society may benefit from growth in Pittsburgh’s new economy.  Thus it is more like a advocacy organization working on campaigns and other events. It utilizes the existing social capitals to try to solve social issues. 

Links:

GLSEN Pittsburgh: glsenpgh.org

Lawrenceville corporation: lawrencevillecorp.com

Pittsburgh United: pittsburghunited.org

From a community to a city

Zhuhai is a modern city which has gone through tremendous transformation in the past decade years. It used to be a fishing village where people lived and gathered together because of kinship or friendship. However, today, it became a financial region with a image of urban prosperity and rapid economic development. The commercial culture has brought huge imacp on the city. In this case, what is the city image in the public mind, especially for the original residents and the new immigrants? How they see the city in different ways?

There is no doubt that Zhuhai has gone through a huge transformation. This transformation is structural. It has transformed from a Gesellschaft to a Gemeinschaft. The concepts of Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft were first introduced by Ferdinand Tonnies, a German sociologist. People usually refer the two concepts to "society" and "community". According to the definition, Gesellschaft refers to the society that is based on rational will and represents the non-human nature relationship which focuses on earning a living. This society aims at the exchange of interests. In this society, the capitalist industrial economy replaces the cohesion generated by family and blood.

Gemeinschaft is based on natural will, that people may associate themselves together as friends do. Natural will is the conditioning and originating element in any process of willing which is derived from the temperament, character, and intellectual attitude of the individual, whether it has its origin in linking, inclination, habit or memory. There are Gemeinschaft groups based on friendship, on neighborliness, and on blood relationships.

In the past, there were families and neighborhoods which composed the Gemeinschaft image of Zhuhai. The members of the community found their similarities, and operated under a collective conscience. Morality were upheld by the masses. Communication consisted of face-to-face interaction, and ideas are transmitted through an oral culture.

Later, with the transformation, it is now the economic interests which drove more immigrants together in this place and bond people together. Interests became the most motivation and concern for people. Relationship between people is relatively estranged and became more like a mean rather than goal. Divisions of labor and goal-oriented behavior in Zhuhai became distinctive to the Gesellschaft world. For this kind of Gesellschaft, there was only one factor that united people together, that is, the interest. People interacted with each other only for their own interests. They share a kind of working partnership or business relationship,and hardly develop or maintain any emotional bondage towards each other like people did in the past. The working relationship distanced people so they won’t be too intimate.They just know each other superficially. They do not really care how others were doing. What they focused was just whether they could make money through the business with other person. In this sense, Zhuhai as a Gesellschaft, is more like a mechanical construction, filling up with money, rather than a living organization.

Cultures in the city, also, transformed from pre-industrial, traditional communities into modern, urbanized societies with a more commercialized culture. But this community development is a inevitable phase for most of the modern cities nowadays. From Gemeinschaft to Gesellschaft, the society abandoned something but gained something new.  The transformation is not a bad thing, but it definitely has a great impact on how people interact with each other. 

Working on a more diverse and inclusive society

I have been in the United States for almost a year. Coming from a homogeneous society, I once concerned about myself being a ethnic minority. But the openness and inclusiveness of the American society really amazed me. I believe that is why it is such a place that keeps attacking people with different skin colors from all around the world. However, does it mean that I am assimilated to this culture? Does it mean that speaking the same language has made me lost my own cultural uniqueness? I don't think assimilation and diversity are conflict. Instead, both of them are the dynamics keep the society developing. 

Cultural assimilation is the process by which a person or a group's language or culture come to resemble those of another group. It has always been the trend that the strong and influential cultural assimilate small culture. Compared with the Western culture on the basis of industrialization, the Oriental cultural roots in agriculture. With the increasing globalization, what we can observe is the penetration of industrial culture.

However, in terms of ethnic minorities, will they fully integrate themselves into a new culture? There has been time when non-white immigration facing many difficulties integrating into the American society. It was easy for them to feel marginalized in life, employment, culture, and education. However, this pressure is not for one direction. The one hand, the ethnic minority felt depressed. On the other hand is the Whites also felt threatened, which could easily led to racial antagonism, thus destabilizing the society. 

Things got a lot better with the introduction of a series of equality act, especially the Civil Rights Act(1964). The society hopes to see all ethnic groups have greater initiative and power in the nation, which in turn is based on a common economic initiative as a key objective. Only in this way can we overcome the ideas and prejudices of individuals and groups. The cultural, racial equality and social diversity will be respected. 

With the efforts, there have been a lot of improvements in terms of the education, employment and overall social life of ethnic minorities or immigrants. Besides the diversity, culture assimilation becomes another very important theme nowadays. It does not refer to abandoning the original culture backgrounds of the ethnic minorities. It means to accept the values ​​of the mainstream of society, which is key to stabilize the country as a whole. This is the true intentions of the multicultural model. In believe that in the future, diversity will still growing in many ways, and it will be more diversity and inclusion of the society. 

Links:

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_rights_movement

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemeinschaft_and_Gesellschaft

http://sociology.about.com/od/G_Index/g/Gemeinschaft-Gesellschaft.htm

The impact of casino culture on the youth in Macau

When I was in my undergraduate school in Macau, I found a interesting phenomenon. Most of the local students had a part-time job while they were a full-time students, and their part-time jobs could still provide them a good amount of money to support themselves. They did not have too much pressure over the school work and they were not so ambitious towards the academic achievements as those students from outside the city. It seemed like for them, the future career was so promising that they did not have to worry too much about it. This phenomenon triggered my interest in the local environment and culture, and how it shaped the value of the local youth. 

Macau is known as a special administrative region within the People's Republic of China. It currently has 19 casinos and more are planned. It is a city where the gaming industry flourishes.  It is now the gambling center  in Asian which is also known as the Asian Las Vegas, which attracts millions of tourists to the city. Macau is undoubtedly a rich city, with per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of US$17,500. But this prosperity leads to one of the biggest worry that Macau society expressed about their youth. It is that youth in Macau nowadays have presented a rather aimless attitudes toward their future and expressed less interests in furthering their education levels.

With the prosperity this industry brings, job opportunities related to casino and tourism still continue to increase with a considerably high salary. Casinos also provide all necessary training, which attracts young people without much work experience or higher education. The government also provide many welfare benefits to the adult citizens in Macau. But the majority fear that all these promising economic developments have made their teenagers lack of studying and working incentives and therefore become aimless.

According to the statistics given by Youth Education Bureau, we can find the increasing dropouts of Macau Youth. The youth problem is now considered to be one of the most concerned problems in Macau.

Form 2003-2004, there were 4908 students dropped out of school, among these students, 2060 chose to take a job, 76％ of which devoted themselves in gaming and its related industry.

In 2007, 20% of the working young adults in Macau were engaged in gaming industry, and it is said that this proportion will be continued increasing. The fact that casinos luring students away from school worried many citizens. 

What is the culture climate that derived from this flourishing gaming industry? The gaming industry has an indivisible inner relationship with the Macau youths' value problem. The low threshold of the gaming related employment as well as the opportunity cost of taking high education, all lead to the youth’s dropouts and devote into gambling industry. Students tend to sacrifice their future and long-term security by forgoing their education for the quick cash provided by casino jobs. which is not a good sign of a better development prospect for Macau. 

The casino culture is having negative effects on the character of local students, who end up with a skewed vision of what money means. The over exposure to this kind of culture has a great impact on local children's life value and how they view the society. Young casino workers see money changing hands quickly, with gamblers wagering tens of thousands of dollars at a time. With this kind of culture controlling children's philosophy, they tend to consider less about the job satisfaction, the possibility to develop their potential and the meaningfulness of the work. 

There are both pros and cons about the casino culture in Macau society. I think the impact will continue to be a social issue that people need to consider. Efforts should be made from different parties: government, school, family, mass media, etc. Although the casino industry has brought about huge economic development in Macau. However, it is crucial to avoid the negative impact that casino culture brings to the youth. 

Links:
Introduction to Macau society
http://www.everyculture.com/Ja-Ma/Macau.html

Macau Youth Education Bureau
http://portal.dsej.gov.mo/webdsejspace/internet/Inter_main_page.jsp

Macau church officials worry casinos lure students away from school
http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0501271.htm