Language and morality: Gained in translation

2014/05/21 Leave a comment

Interesting finding but not surprising that slowing down thinking, through the language barrier, can lead to more rational outcomes:

Several psychologists, including Daniel Kahneman, who was awarded the Nobel prize in economics in 2002 for his work on how people make decisions, think that the mind uses two separate cognitive systems—one for quick, intuitive decisions and another that makes slower, more reasoned choices. These can conflict, which is what the trolley dilemma is designed to provoke: normal people have a moral aversion to killing (the intuitive system), but can nonetheless recognise that one death is, mathematically speaking, better than five (the reasoning system).

This latest study fits with other research which suggests that speaking a foreign language boosts the second system—provided, that is, you don’t speak it as well as a native. Earlier work, by some of the same scholars who performed this new study, found that people tend to fare better on tests of pure logic in a foreign language—and particularly on questions with an obvious-but-wrong answer and a correct answer that takes time to work out.

Dr Costa and his colleagues hypothesise that, while fluent speakers can form sentences effortlessly, the merely competent must spend more brainpower, and reason much more carefully, when operating in their less-familiar tongue. And that kind of thinking helps to provide psychological and emotional distance, in much the same way that replacing the fat man with a switch does. As further support for that idea, the researchers note that the effect of speaking the foreign language became smaller as the speaker’s familiarity with it increased.

Language and morality: Gained in translation | The Economist.

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No ‘trust gap’ for average bureaucrat, Wayne Wouters says | Ottawa Citizen

2014/05/21 Leave a comment

There is some validity to his comments, given that it is true that most public servants have relatively little contact with the political level. But there are issues at senior levels, and after 8 years of a Conservative government, public servants have adjusted and many of those viewed as “enemies” have moved on. Destination 2020 was also carefully – and understandably – managed to focus more on the ways of working rather than addressing the fundamental relationship issues. Public servants tend to be cautious in voicing criticism while within the public service; those of us who are retired have more flexibility. And as Head of the Public Service, he has to encourage rather than discourage:

…. Privy Council Clerk Wayne Wouters says he barely heard any complaints about public servants’ relationship with Conservative ministers and their offices from the 110,000 bureaucrats across the country who took part in his Blueprint 2020 discussions on how to re-shape the workforce.

“The only time … I hear about a trust gap (is) from those who don’t necessarily work in government,” he told the Citizen.

“What I was amazed by on all this was the degree of commitment and passion people had … I don’t think we heard this whole trust thing that others seem to be talking about.”

His remarks were a striking contrast to what the association representing senior managers and executives running departments has said. The trust gap was one of APEX’s chief concerns during the Blueprint 2020 review and it suggested steps to restore respect and confidence between public servants and their political masters.

The Public Policy Forum also conducted a major study among public and private sector leaders on leadership skills for the future public service and said the trust gap emerged as a top issue.

Wouters acknowledged some senior executives may have concerns, but average public servants are far removed from that political interaction and their big worries are getting the tools to do their jobs, he said.

While I had provided the Clerk with a courtesy copy of my book, Policy Arrogance or Innocent Bias: Resetting Citizenship and Multiculturalism, I did not necessarily expect substantive comment but was surprised that at the lack of acknowledgement by his office. Same thing with CIC’s Deputy. However, the President of the Canada School of Public Service did acknowledge and circulate the book to her senior management team.

From my discussions with current and former public servants, largely at the executive level, things are not quite so rosy as portrayed.

No ‘trust gap’ for average bureaucrat, Wayne Wouters says | Ottawa Citizen.

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Quantifying and Visualizing Global International Migration Flows

2014/05/20 Leave a comment

Migration flowsAn interesting study on global migration flows and patterns by the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital. Highlights:

Contrary to common belief (4–6), our data (Fig. 3) do not indicate a continuous increase in migration flows over the past two decades, neither in absolute or relative terms. According to our estimates, the volume of global migration flows declined from 41.4 million (0.75% of world population) during 1990 to 1995, to 34.2 million (0.57% of world population) during 1995 to 2000. A substantial part of the fall might be accounted for by ceasing of cross-border movements triggered by the violent conflicts in Rwanda and the ending of the Soviet-installed Najibullah regime in Afghanistan. The number of global movements increased by 5.7 million between 1995–2000 and 2000–2005, and by 1.6 million between 2000–2005 and 2005–2010, whereas the percentage of the world population moving over 5-year periods has been relatively stable since 1995.

The size of migration flows within and between 15 world regions in 2005 to 2010 (estimates are in database S1) is shown in Fig. 4. Several migration patterns shown in Fig. 4 are broadly in line with previous assessments based on global stock data (11) and flow data for selected countries published by the U.N. (3, 4, 18, 19). Earlier observations include the attractiveness of North America as a migrant destination, the substantial movements from South Asia to the Gulf states in Western Asia, the diverse movements within and between the European regions, and the general tendency for more developed regions to record net migration gains, whereas the less developed countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America sent more migrants than they received from 2005 to 2010.

Check out the nifty interactive graphic here as a good example of how to visualize data.

Quantifying Global International Migration Flows.

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Temporary foreign workers: Canada needs fewer guests – and more citizens

2014/05/20 Leave a comment

Globe editorial:

What should Mr. Kenney do?

Study the issue: Take the time needed to get this right. Commission a group of experts and give them at least six months. Bring the other parties in, and borrow their best ideas. Don’t just introduce legislation in the next few weeks, backed up by nothing more than a thin press release and no actual evidence, and try to hustle it through Parliament. Learn from the fiasco of the Fair Elections Act.

Be principled: A temporary worker program should be for jobs that are temporary. There’s a logic to bringing in seasonal agricultural workers. There may be a logic to some highly skilled workers being brought in under the program, in cases where no trained Canadians exist or where the job is temporary. But burger flippers?

Shrink the program: Make it smaller. Much smaller. Cap the number allowed in each year. Let Canada’s labour market work. If employers in low-wage fields find that they have to offer compensation in excess of minimum wage to attract short-order cooks, customer-service agents and retail sales people, that’s a good thing. It will lead to higher wages for people at the low end of the wage scale, and it will also spur innovation and productivity gains. We want the market to work and to self-correct as it is supposed to, with a tight labour supply in one area of the country forcing up wages, thereby drawing in the underemployed, be they part-time students from down the road or the unemployed from across the country.

Give temporary workers more rights: Shrink the program – but expand their rights. Why not give them the right to change jobs, and even complete labour mobility within Canada, just like Canadians? Give them the power to fight back against abuse and raise their own wages.

More citizens, fewer guests: Canada was built by immigrants who became citizens, not visitors who went home. That’s our future, too.

Citizenship Bill C-24 at Committee goes in other direction, by making citizenship harder to get and no longer providing credit for time spent in Canada as temporary foreign workers.

Temporary foreign workers: Canada needs fewer guests – and more citizens – The Globe and Mail.

Interestingly, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business includes in its recommendations on Temporary Foreign Workers a pathway to citizenship, while the government’s Bill C-24 makes this more difficult given removal of partial credit for pre-Permanent Residents time:

•  Ending the moratorium on restaurants

• Creating a pathway to permanent residence for all TFWs

• A Bill of Rights for TFWs

• Stricter enforcement of existing rules

• An accredited TFW stream for trusted employers

• Matching TFW/Canadian wages by employer

• Maximum 1:1 ratio of TFWs to Canadians

• Allowing permanent immigration for those in entry-level jobs

• Ensuring other government programs (eg. EI) address need for entry-level workers.

CFIB urges feds to end moratorium, enforce rules, protect TFWs’ rights – National Scene – Daily Business Buzz.

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Foreign workers issue delays trade deals

2014/05/20 Leave a comment

The higher-end of Temporary Foreign Workers. But given that one of the original cases was in relation to foreign IT workers displacing Canadian IT workers at the Royal Bank, not an easy issue for the Government. Particularly given that in contrast to NAFTA and the upcoming CETA, India is a low-cost supplier of IT services:

While discussions have also been delayed in part because of India’s lengthy election cycle, the fact that foreign workers have emerged as a potential stumbling block has implications for other lucrative trade agreements that Canada hopes to realize. It remains to be seen whether the resounding victory by Narendra Modi, a pro-business Hindu nationalist who heads the Bharatiya Janata Party, will help Canada overcome the impasse.

Rentala Chandrashekhar, the president of the National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM), which represents India’s IT community, recently visited Ottawa to stress the negative impact Canada’s reforms are having on trade and the potential that further changes could make things worse for both economies.

Mr. Chandrashekhar, a former senior public servant with the Indian government, met with Immigration Minister Chris Alexander, senior officials with Employment Minister Jason Kenney’s department and Don Stephenson, the chief trade negotiator for the Canada-India talks.

“Most important is perception, the perception that the Canadian economy is becoming more closed,” Mr. Chandrashekhar told the Globe. “The perception that walls are being put up … [This] is not something that is very conductive to the kind of environment that you need for pushing forward the idea of a freer trade regime.”

Foreign workers issue delays trade deals – The Globe and Mail.

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Review of Living with Cancer: A Journey

2014/05/20 Leave a comment

Nice review in our community newspaper of my book, Living with Cancer: A Journey. My other identity that unfortunately, too many of us, or those close to us, have.

Glebe Report Review

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Immigrants more likely to fail citizenship test the longer they’re here

2014/05/17 1 Comment

Some internal data from CIC on citizenship pass rates and trends. Delivering on “harder to get,” C-24 revocation provisions aimed at “easier to lose.”

Based on two immigration databases, the report, marked “confidential,” said the pass rates of the citizenship exam dropped significantly from 83 per cent in 2011 to 72.6 per cent in 2012, after the government introduced new test questions and raised the pass mark from 60 per cent to 75 per cent.

More than 80 per cent of immigrants applied for citizenship within the first five years of permanent residency and the group had a pass rate above 83 per cent — compared to the low 70s among those who have been in Canada for at least 10 years.

“That’s the irony,” said Meurrens. “People who want it do it quickly and are more motivated.”

…

The report also found immigrants from South Korea and China led the rest of the pack in passing the citizenship test, averaging 90 per cent and 88 per cent respectively.

In contrast, those from Sri Lanka and Vietnam had the lowest pass rates, averaging just 70 per cent and 67 per cent.

,,,

The number of rejected applicants has also remained consistent, averaging 2,308 per quarter. Flunking the citizenship test accounted for 65 per cent of all refused cases, followed by failing the language requirement (24 per cent) and not meeting the residence obligation (6.6. per cent). The rest were rejected on criminality and security grounds.

Immigrants more likely to fail citizenship test the longer they’re here | Toronto Star.

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Ottawa welcomes more new Canadians – Canada News Centre

2014/05/17 1 Comment

Continuing with the selective release of citizenship statistics by city rather than the overall national numbers – which are the ones that matter to know if CIC is on track to eliminate the backlog and improve processing times:

Over 3,500 new citizens have been welcomed in Ottawa so far in 2014–more than three times the number of newly naturalized Canadians over the same period in 2013.

Ottawa welcomes more new Canadians – Canada News Centre.

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Au Musée de l’histoire, une majorité d’événements célébreront la guerre

2014/05/17 Leave a comment

Have not seen anything recent in English media on the Museum of Canadian History programming. Liberals have raised over-emphasis on military ((26 out of 30 events), Conservatives have claimed, with straight face, that this was Museum’s decision:

«On est un pays qui a fait de grandes choses», juge le député Stéphane Dion, citant le Canada comme un «pionnier de la démocratie et des droits de la personne». «Il y a plein de choses que l’on peut célébrer et tout est orienté vers le militaire», déplore-t-il.

Il est d’accord que le «passé militaire glorieux» du Canada – l’armée n’étant intervenue à l’étranger que pour assurer la paix et la justice, selon lui – mérite d’être souligné, mais il estime avec cette vision réductrice des célébrations, les conservateurs «appauvrissent la richesse de notre histoire».

Selon lui, tout n’a pas été que conflits armés au Canada. Le député libéral de Saint-Laurent-Cartierville aurait aimé voir dans la liste des festivités une célébration de la Charte canadienne des droits et libertés et du centenaire du droit de vote des femmes, entre autres exemples.

Questionnée en Chambre à ce sujet, jeudi, la ministre du Patrimoine canadien, Shelly Glover, a répliqué que le Musée canadien de l’histoire prend ses propres décisions en matière de programmation.

«Les musées font leur propres décisions opérationnelles», a-t-elle répondu, écartant toute forme d’ingérence de son gouvernement.

«Ce sera un succès partout au pays grâce aux consultations que nous avons faites auprès des Canadiens et Canadiennes, et des consultations se poursuivent», a-t-elle ajouté au sujet des célébrations du 150e.

Au Musée de l’histoire, une majorité d’événements célébreront la guerre | Stéphanie Marin | National.

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Premier Clark apologizes for B.C.’s historical wrongs against Chinese immigrants

2014/05/17 Leave a comment

A reminder of the power of an apology (without admitting legal liability) for the Chinese Canadian community in healing old wounds:

Shui Lee endured decades of intolerance and racism in Canada just because he is Chinese, but on Thursday the 58-year-old restaurant owner said he is finally proud to be both Canadian and Chinese.

With tears in his eyes and holding the 1914 head-tax document belonging to his great, great grandfather, Lee described what British Columbia’s formal apology for racist and discriminatory government policies against Chinese immigrants means to him.

“When I walk out this door today, I feel so proud that I can put my head up and I tell everybody I’m proud to be Canadian,” he said. “I can be proud to be Chinese.”

Lee, a Kelowna, B.C., restaurant owner, said he often argued with friends, relatives and others about what he considered Canada’s racist and intolerant laws and policies towards Chinese immigrants, but was told not to rock the boat.

“They don’t want to apologize to you,” he said he was told. “But I prove it today, they are wrong. The government did apologize to us. And they admit they were wrong.”

Much like the federal government’s Chinese Head Tax ex gratis payments and historical recognition program, or PM Harper’s apology to First Nations for residential schools, recognition of the past helps reconciliation in the present and future. While challenging to governments, particularly which communities are recognized and which not, the old hard-line approach of earlier Liberal governments that we do not apologize for what happened in the past does not address this need.

Of course, the more organized the community, the better the chance for some form of historical recognition. Democracy in action.

Clark apologizes for B.C.’s historical wrongs against Chinese immigrants – The Globe and Mail.

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