The Government-Business Partnership and Social Challenges - Research Paper Example

Executive summary

The purpose of this research is to provide the impartial discussion of the two important questions: the social issues generated by the capitalist paradigm, and the role of government and business partnership in addressing the social inequities. There are many issues, which could be and should be addressed by both governments and businesses to increase their shared value, since innovations and changes in corporate culture and in the governmental policies can help to reach better results in the overall country’s performance.

Research is written with application of the review of sources such as scientific journals, books and reports, which provided essential insights towards the writing of the report.

Report emphasizes the main issues what can appear in the actual free market economy. It provides multiple opportunities for businesses, though it influences social health of the country and thus should be considered as both useful and harmful feature of the modern world. To minimize the negative effects of the free market economy, both government and businesses should take specific measures, which will be aimed on alleviation of poverty, social inequalities of any nature. Introduction

Paper will concentrate on the main social issues, which arise from the influence of free market economy. Furthermore, it will emphasize two devastating for society issues such as: poverty and gender inequality. These two social problems prevent people from professional and personal development make them unable to reach success in their chosen industry. It is underlined that these social issues affect economical and lead to even stronger problems, which in turn predetermine further development of society and overall economy of country.

This paper also addresses multiple ways how governments and businesses can help society to solve its problems and issues, which were caused by bad governmental decisions and changes derived from business development. Business and commercial organizations have more power and resources to change the current state of affairs than non-profit organizations, which have financing from the benefactors and other funds. However, still only commercial organizations have enough resources on their disposal to fix society and help people to get normal way of life (Childs and Cater, 1954).

This report is limited by the two major social issues, which will be addressed. There are many other social issues, which also affect the country, however, report will concentrate on the poverty and gender inequality. These two will be examined through the use of relevant theoretical material. It will help to define these issues and free market consequences. Then, paper will examine the contribution of these social issues to the overall country state and then report will provide the insights towards the support of businesses and government to fix these problems in the effective way.

The social inequality roots

Capitalism as a phenomenon has created the premise for the specific circumstances, where one part owns and possesses, and the other part is forced to sell its labour in order to survive. Such a relationship inevitably leads to the servant paradigm, where people making a living are obliged to serve their master with not to many options to choose (Islam and Verick, 2011). The emerging of the capitalist economies as the product of globalization age has undoubtedly blurred many frontiers and barriers (Lippit, 2005). But at the same time, capitalism become the misbalance source, which in its turn creates a vast array of social issues (Stiglitz, 2012). The interaction between the businesses and the public policies has become more evident in the recent decades, and business environment has realized the importance not only of being aware of the decision-making process but also of taking an active part (Islam and Verick, 2011). The financial recession of 2008 has naturally triggered the opposing confrontation between the business and the government as the most common tendency, which has been preserved for a number of years (Islam and Verick, 2011). The ideal conditions for the normally functioning and healthy economic environment were seen as anti-regulatory, where the government has minimal influence (Gallagher, 2007). During the eight-year period, the tectonic movements have been noted in the rapprochement direction in a number of countries, however, the divergence is now related to the corporate social responsibility relevance in the business context. The major argumentation for the CSR opponents is implied by the idea, that “business is the main business’s business” (Stiglitz, 2012).

To the contrast, the CSR proponents represent the excessively positive and pretentious paradigm, where corporate is practised to a rather contingent manner. Despite the latest business trends, the majority of companies consider social illnesses as the distraction, and such a neglecting attitude does not regard the fundamental role of social issues in the company’s strategic perspective. In fact, the societal challenges are the key gaps indicators, displaying the untouched areas (Haugen and Box, 2006).

The CSR sketchy character originates from its enforced introduction as the response to the 1990s discontent wave. Accompanied by the anti-globalist movement, the certain business percentage grasped the attractive idea as the means to avoid the non-governmental organizations.

The free market economy: the key issues

Free market economy is liberalized version of capitalism that should have help people to get more opportunities in their own ventures to increase their profits or to get good job, since there should be many businesses, which can offer good jobs. However, the effect is just the opposite. Due to the increasing players in the business world, strong economic turmoil can be observed. It ruins the small-medium businesses, which are the main source of profits for common citizens of country. It increases amount of people, which live in total poverty. That is the main key issue that is a result of the broad application of free market principles. Economic decline that accompanies the rises of the new way of economic relationships makes almost impossible the creation of new small businesses in the developing economies, since they are occupied by the stronger companies, which have conquered the market. It prevents people from going of the poverty and acquiring the financial independence. Furthermore, people lose the opportunity to get good job, since most of them are occupied by the experienced employees, who worked in such jobs for many years before the times of recession. Students, who graduate from the universities have substantial problems finding the job, since they have lack of experience and they cannot get this important experience, hence companies and overfilled by probationers. This provides difficulties for professionals to get their dream job. Instead they need to work to gain some resources for living and lose their skills. At the result, rates of poverty increases, poverty gives birth to even more complicated issues, which find their reflection in the economic problems, which in turn prevent people from the stable and reliable work and gaining resources for living.

Another key issue that is associated with the free market economy is associated with the gender acceptance problems. For many people women cannot be the equal employee in the same organization. Even if they could be, they would never get equal compensation as men get. Therefore, women should look for another jobs and find the recognition. Despite the fact that modern world companies work on this and provide executive jobs to the women, men pressure is still strong and it provides substantial problems for women to have good working conditions in most organizations. Free market economy has shifted the paradigms for business relationships and internal relationships in the staff. It means that in the world of internal competition in the staff, women cannot get the same carrier growth. They have initial lack of opportunities to compete with men. This is quite important social issue, since it prevents women from realizing their professional potential, making them inactive, unproductive.

Poverty and Gender Inequality

The highly competitive environment, nurtured by the free market paradigm has naturally exacerbated the discrepancies, expanding the void between the rich and the poor. The poverty and gender inequity issues appear to be inextricably interconnected, nevertheless, the official statistics are reluctant to perceive the poverty aspect through the gender prism (Campbell, n.d.). The poverty pervasiveness has reached the critical rates, and the issue affects people of different gender, age, or culture (Cowell, 2011). Regarding the feminine biological prerequisites – the subordination factor based on the cultural background and the role allocation – women are historically subject to adverse conditions, which in their turn aggravate the poverty impact.

The contributive factors: the poverty

The poverty issue reflects the incapacity to support oneself with the basic conditions, essential for normal sustenance. Apart from the income perspective, the poverty destructive power is mirrored in the inability to ensure the proper education, working experience, medical care, nutrition, and leisure (Lister, 2004). Therefore, the poverty as the social illness does not stem from the isolated and individual cause; the problem arises from the systematic malfunctions. Low-income rates are considered the major poverty cause, which influences the problem pervasiveness (Lister, 2004). The inability to provide the proper education transforms into the high unemployment rates which increase the chances of the poor future (Stiglitz, 2012). The accessible housing deficiency entails the challenges related to the job seeking procedure and is directly connected with the health issues, as the illness percentage, both – physical and mental disorders – are greatly influenced by the living conditions. Basically, the social and financial dimensions are dependent on the community services as an integral part of the avoidance strategy, which is nowadays under pressure (Cowell, 2011).

Problem that caused by the social inequality and the lowering the living standards for citizens of Australia influences the society and overall performance of economics in the high scale, that is why governments along with businesses should introduce certain policies to solve the reasons for such issues (Childs and Cater, 1954).

The contributive factors: the gender inequality

The gender inequality largely manifests itself in the financial sphere, where the interdependent factors influence the gender inequity. First, and foremost, the discrimination issue is reflected in the pay gap, where female workers tend to be paid less than the opposite sex professionals (Stiglitz, 2012). Furthermore, the women’s work underestimation is based on the perceptional difference between the men’s and women’s responsibilities and the manner to which they are appreciated. The other significant contributive factor is the labour segregation, where the female worker tends to be dominant in the sectors, characterized by a lower value (Stiglitz, 2012). The segregation aspect is rooted in the cultural dimension with the strong linkage to the traditions and cradled stereotypic thinking, which directly influences the decision-making in terms of profession. One of the major factors, having the serious impact, is the women’s endeavour to establish the family-work equilibrium. The present-day tendency reflects the challenges due to unequally allocated roles and responsibilities (Stiglitz, 2012).

Governmental and business strategies to confront poverty

One of the main reasons of the poverty and lowering living standards is expensive childcare that is the root of the problems, associated with the low level of education of citizens and their inability to get good jobs (Childs and Cater, 1954). Making the healthcare affordable, society can get the hope for equality among the people, since all people will be able to get the enough support from government for their children. It is well-known fact that first year of children development are critical and thus, government should help its supporters to handle health issues, which can prevent them from growing healthy and productive employees. To introduce such changes government should cap the costs by 20% family income. It will help people to engage in quality health care and help their children to stay healthy. Affordable healthcare can help people to be involved in some risky ventures, which can lead to opening of new businesses, since they will know that their back areas are covered by government. It will people to become financially independent and decrease the gap between the rich people and low-income (Childs and Cater, 1954).

One more issue is associated with polarized pay. It means that executives acquire the higher wages, while the lower employees, which are driving factors of all companies receive much smaller wages, which cannot cover all employees’ expenses. Thus, there are many working people, which live in high level of poverty. Even having one working adult, they cannot afford things, which they need for reliable living. This cannot lead to healthy society and government and businesses should do something with this problem. One of the solutions is increasing of wages and emphasizing the importance of lower employees for companies, to control the releasing of salaries to get enough information about the salaries distribution and the level of employees’ satisfaction with their job (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).

There are many companies, such as Cisco that emphasize that their employees have all possibilities to get their own independence, by creating their own business and increasing level of profits. It can help to create more good jobs around the country. It is the main way to decrease the overall level of social inequality and decrease the level of poverty. It is important to understand that people should get resources for living and they cannot do that without the good job that will supply them with the reliable salary (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).

The Measures of Business-Government Partnership: Gender Inequality

Considering the gender inequality, one should underline that businesses and governments can provide the solutions of this problem to increase the overall state of society. Governments, encouraging the companies to make changes in their corporate culture can help to alleviate the consequences of this social problem. Below are the main ways, how corporate culture can be changed to eliminate the gender inequality (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011). Job interviews should be reconsidered, since they are aimed mainly on men and their salary request, while women tend to request lower salary due to their social position. Abolishing such question on the interview can help women-employees to think about their own position and ask for fair payment for all efforts ,which will be made. It is impossible to encourage other employees to treat women as the equal employees without essential training of the men-employees that women are sometimes even more effective employees. Furthermore, government can introduce special education policies, which will be aimed on the encouraging students to find future-oriented, promising jobs, regardless of gender. It can help women to find better jobs, which will offer them personal development and carrier. One more issue that should be controlled by government to solve the problem belongs to the proactivity of businesses towards the welcoming women in the workplace. Employees should know that managers want to hire women and support them in their ventures. Salaries for both groups should be monitored, ensuring the equal treatment. Young people today have a very different view of what a great career means (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011). Many want equality in their private and professional lives, and see a healthy work-life balance as crucial to their happiness. This presents a huge opportunity for redefining gender roles. The challenge is to address this in all sectors – business, education, research and politics. When it comes to gender equality, we all have to work together. Only then can we provide the next generation with the very best support for shaping their path in life and contributing to Switzerland’s continued success – regardless of gender (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).

There are many gender roles, which are set incorrectly, since they come from the past, all these things are developed only due to the fact that people had it in culture and mentality. It is hard to solve such issues, since they take roots in people’s minds. Government and commercial companies can easily encourage employees to respect and treat their women-colleagues in the proper way. Furthermore, commercial companies have many controls such as variety of bonuses to reward the most successful employees in this venture. Government roles in this process is to spread this vision and make national companies understand these principles of the fair work and to encourage companies using their own controls, which also have strong influence on the businesses (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).

Considering the implications, it should be emphasized that companies along with government have all potential to solve the social issues. Furthermore, they can alleviate consequences of such issues, so social health can be improved. Speaking about the poverty governments can issue special recommendations for businesses and non-commercial organizations to consider the vulnerable strata of population. Developed companies should provide better opportunities for all people to get the job. They should encourage their employee to get the financial independence that in turn will lead to even more workplaces. The main reason for poverty is unemployment and joint efforts of government and businesses can help to override such issues. With development of country-wide recommendations for businesses and governmental structures social problem such as poverty can be partly solved. There are many reasons for poverty, which are above their possible way of assistance, thus, another types of assistance should be applied. Speaking about the gender inequality, one should underline that with the above mentioned measures it is easy to achieve the necessary level of equality. Both government and companies should be engaged in this process to reach the maximum results.

Conclusion

It is important to understand that social problems appears in the modern world due to the bad conditions in the job, due to inability of governments to emphasize the equality of people and importance of their efforts. Furthermore, governments should support vulnerable groups of citizens, which cannot change their way of living without the external support. Furthermore, such people need support in growing children and in the maintaining fair salaries in the workplace. Knowing that executives and managers have substantially higher salaries discourage people from being productive and loyal to the employer that can lead to firing and increasing of unemployment rates. It is quite important social issues, which should be solved along with gender inequality that produces the negative effect on one group of employees, which also contribute to the overall development of economy. Otherwise, such social problems can give rise to the national economic problems, which will lead to even stronger misconducts. Considering the good examples of the proper business activity, one should underline Cisco activities, since it trains millions of people to be not only responsible and loyal but to create even more ventures in IT and disseminate IT technology. Businesses have all enough resources to make a difference in society. However, businesses need support and control of the government to make such changes possible (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).

Shared value that is good both for businesses and society can help to solve multiple issues, which were stated above. Thus, government should help businesses to understand that they can contribute both to their profitability rates and social benefits at the same time. Even Non-profit organizations cannot provide the same effect on society, since they have substantial lack of resources, which can be easily covered by the profits, which usual businesses have. Government should turn the businesses in the right direction to make them useful for society and overall country’s well-being (Marquis, Lounsbury and Greenwood, 2011).