试题库在线考试题库-历年真题模拟试题及答案-考博英语在线试题测试中心-希赛网

题库

首页 > 题库 > 对外经济贸易大学

Translate the following passage from Chinese into English 人皆生而为新，为前所未有之所存在：人皆生而能赢。人皆有其特立独行之方式去审视，聆听，触摸，品味及思考，因而都具备独特潜质，能力和局限。人皆能举足轻重，富有创意，成就功业。“成者”与“败者”含义颇多。谈及成者我们并非指的是使他人失败的人。对我们而言，成者必为人守信，值得信赖，有求必应，态度诚恳，或为个人，或为社会一员皆能以真诚回应他人。成者敢于利用所学，独立思考，区分事实与观点，且并不佯装通晓所有答案，他们倾听，权衡他人意见，但能得出自己的结论。尽管他们尊重，敬佩他们，但并不为他们所局限，所束缚，也不对他人敬若神灵。

Translate the following passage from English into Chinese It is not difficult to imagine a world short of ambition. It would probably be a kinder world: without demands, without abrasions, without disappointments. People would have time for reflection. Such work as they did would not be for themselves but for the collectivity. Competition would never enter in, conflict would be eliminated, tension become a thing of the past. The stress of creation would be at an end. Art would no longer be troubling, but purely celebratory in its functions. Longevity would be increased, for fewer people would die of heart attack or stroke caused by tumultuous endeavor. Anxiety would be extinct. Time would stretch on and on, with ambition long departed from the human heart.There is a strong view that holds that success is a myth, and ambition therefore a sham. Does this mean that success does not really exist? That achievement is at bottom empty? That the efforts of men and women are of no significance alongside the force of movements and events?That not all success, obviously, is worth esteeming, nor all ambition worth cultivating?

Biologically, there is only one quality which distinguishes us from animals: the ability to laughs. In a universe which appears to be utterly devoid（1）humor, we enjoy this supreme luxury. And it is a luxury, for unlike any other bodily process, laughter does not seem to serve a biologically useful purpose. In a divide world, laughter is a unifying force. Human beings oppose each other on a great many issues. Nations may disagree about systems of government and human relations may be plagued by ideological factions and political camps, but we all share the ability to laugh. And laughter, （2 ） turn, depends on that most complex and subtle of all human qualities: a sense of humor. Certain comic stereotypes have universal appeal. This can best be seen from the world-wide popularity of Charlie Chaplin’s early films.The little man （3） odds with society never fails to amuse no matter which country we come from. As that great commentator on human affairs, Dr. Samuel Johnson, once remarked, “Men have been wise in very different modes; but they have always laughed （4） the same way.” A sense of humor may take various forms and laughter may be anything from a refined tingle （5） an earth quaking roar, but the effect is always the same. Humor helps us to maintain a correct sense of values. It is the one quality which political fanatics appear to lack. If we can see the funny side, we never make the mistake of taking ourselves too seriously. We are always reminded that tragedy is not really far removed （6 ） comedy. So we never get & lop sided view of things.This is one of the chief functions of satire and irony. Human pain and suffering are so grim; we hover so often （7） the brink of war, political realities are usually enough to plunge us into total despair. In such circumstances, cartoons and satirical accounts of somber political events redress the balance. They take the wind out of pompous and arrogant politicians who have lost their sense （ 8） proportion. They enable us to see that many of our most profound actions are merely comic or absurd. We laugh when a great satirist like Swift writes about war in Gulliver’s Travels. The Lilliputians and their neighbors attack each other because they can’t agree which end to break an egg. We laugh because we meant to laugh; but we are meant to weep too. It is too powerful a weapon to be allowed to flourish.The sense of humor must be singled （9） as man’s most important quality because it is associated with laughter. And laughter, in turn, is associated with happiness. Courage, determination, initiative — these are qualities we share （10） other forms of life. But the sense of humor is uniquely human. If happiness is one of the great goals of life, then it is the sense of humor that provides the key.Fill in each blank in the article with an appropriate preposition(介词).Read the article carefully and explain the meaning of the words according to the context. devoid (in paragraph 1)plague (in paragraph 1)stereotype (in paragraph 1)fanatic (in paragraph 3)satire (in paragraph 4)somber (in paragraph 4)redress (in paragraph 4)absurd (in paragraph 4)weep (in paragraph 4)initiative (in paragraph 5)

Among the more benign activities of the United Nations is the dedication of various years to specific causes. Mountains, deserts, rice and dialogue have all had their 365 days of fame. There is little evidence that the attention has done mountains, deserts rice and dialogue any harm—but also not much to suggest that they have benefited either.In the next 12 months the spotlight falls on microfinance, the business of lending small amounts of money to the poor, taking deposits from them, transmitting money on their behalf and insuring them. With luck, the UN’s effort will turn out to be substantial rather than symbolic. It certainly kicked off in style, with a big party at the UN’s New York head quarters that demonstrated how fashionable the subject has become. Among the 700 in attendance were top bankers, politicians and a film star or two. The UN also announced the appointment of an advisory panel to consider what may be impeding the growth and effectiveness of microfinance.The success of the year depends to a great extent on whether the UN can harness its member states and financial institutions to establish some basic facts. Remarkably little is known about how finance operates outside wealthy countries. No good data exist on how many people have access to financial institutions, the breadth and penetration of banks in poor countries, the real cost of a loan and the time it takes to get one, the ease of making a deposit and so forth.Micro finance itself is something of a mystery. There are no authoritative figures on the number and performance of microfinance lending institutions. There is not even convincing information, beyond lots of anecdotes illustrated by photographs of women in rural villages, about whether microfinance makes any. significant contribution to economic growth or is merely another philanthropic fad.In principle, loans to the poor should bring great benefits, because the poor have less capital and often can borrow only with great difficulty. If at all, they ought to use extra capital more productively than the rich. Indeed, this might explain why even in the poorest places there is some form of money lending despite staggeringly high interest rates; 1,000% a year is not uncommon. However, such rates inevitably take a toll on enterprise and economic growth. The year of microcredit will have proven to be of great worth if it can first document the impediments to more efficient forms of financial intermediation and then begin to clear them away.For example, the UN would do well to address the common complaint that banks ignore the poor out of class bias. If they do, the UN’s interest may hasten change: some financial institutions are already making efforts to work with the poor, either directly or by providing wholesale services to smaller financial institutions. And many working in microfinance complain that their small size and lack of traditional assets make it hard to attract capital either on their own account or through syndicated loans. A year hence, perhaps some of this will be changed.What is microfmance? According to the text, how is the current performance of microfinance? (5 points)What are the possible benefits of microfinance to the poor people? What should the UN do to promote microfinance? (5 points)

Translate the following into English. 世界银行预计，美元将在2025年丧失单一统治地位，而欧元与人民币将在一个“多种货币并存”的新型货币体系中确立平起平坐的地位。失去这种转变的将是新兴市场经济体日益增强的实力与优势，其中有6个国家——巴西、印度、中国、印尼、俄罗斯和韩国一将在2025年占据全球增长总量一半以上。根据世行周二发布的一份报告，从现在起至2025年，新兴经济体将以每年4.7%的速度增长，远远快于同期发达经济体2.3%的年增速。“全球增长与投资的天平将向发展中或新兴经济体倾斜，” 报告主要作者曼苏尔.戴拉米(Mansoor Dailami)表示，这种转变意义深远。戴拉米称，例如，这种实力转移将大力推动投资流入驱动全球増长的国家，跨境并购活动将显著增加。企业界的格局也将发生变化一 “你会看到老牌跨国企业将不再占据统治地位。”此外，一种不同的国际货币体系将逐渐形成。美元作为世界主要储备货币的地位将告终。“美元当前的主导地位将在2025年前消失，被一种以美元、欧元和人民币为中心的货币体系所取代，这三种货币都将发挥成熟国际货币的作用，报告指出。报告还介绍了15年后货币市场“最可能”出现的三种情形。报告认为欧元是美元最“可信”的对手，但有一个问题需要留意。“欧元的地位必将增强，只要欧元能够成功化解多个成员国目前面临的主权债务危机，并能够避免与欧洲成员国相关的道德风险问题。”对于中国，报告指出，官方通过发展离岸人民币市场和鼓励人民币在国际贸易结算和计价中的使用，已经启动了人民币的“国际化”进程。“人民币角色的提升，将有助于解决中国在全球舞台上的强大经济实力和中国仍严重依赖外国货币这两者之间的脱节。”世行首席经济学家林毅表示，世行描绘出的情形意味着金融机构必须“尽快适应，跟上形势。”

Translate the following into Chinese. China’s long-running campaign to tighten monetary policy may have a little more life in it with economists expecting the People’s Bank of China will raise interest rates at least one more time this year, a survey of economists by Dow Jones Newswires showed Wednesday.Six out of ten economists polled said they expected China’s central bank will likely raise the benchmark lending and deposit rates by a further 0.25 percentage point each this year to combat high inflation. The other four forecasters predicted between one and two hikes through the end of the year.The People’s Bank of China is also likely to raise banks’ reserve requirement ratio by 50 basis points next month, continuing its pattern of raising the ratio once a month so far this year, according to the survey. But economists expect the pace of such increases to slow later in the year. “With inflation staying relatively high, the authorities are unlikely to relax policy tightening in the short term,” China International Capital Corporation Ltd, economist Peng Wensheng (彭文生) said.The latest inflation data showed that China’s consumer price index rose 5.3% from a year earlier in April, down slightly from March’s 5.4% rise but still well above the official full-year target of around 4%. Many economists expect inflation to peak in June.

Write a composition of about 300 words based on the following:It is widely known that education in China is expanding, as there are substantially more Ph.D. engineers and scientists in China than in the United States, and China is increasingly dominant in terms of foreign undergraduates studying in the US. A lot of Westerners think that these are a sign of the growing gap in ambition that separates the aspiring developing China from the tired, old, “advanced” America. Do you agree? Are there other reasons for these phenomenons? What do you think they are?

Translate the following from English into Chinese. We can take the mysterious, hazy future and carve out of it anything that we can imagine,just as a sculptor carves a statue from a shapeless stone. We are all in the position of the farmer. If we plant a good seed, we reap a good harvest. If our seed is poor and full of weeds, we reap a useless crop. If we plant nothing at all, we harvest nothing at all.I want the future to be better than the past. I don’t want it contaminated by the mistakes and errors with which history is filled. We should all be concerned about the future because that is where we will spend the remainder of our lives.The past is gone and static. Nothing we can do will change it. The future is before us and dynamic. Everything we do will affect it. Each day brings with it new frontiers, in our homes and in our businesses, if we will only recognize them. We are just at the beginning of the progress in every field of human endeavor.

Translate the following from Chinese into English.在人际关系上我们不要太浪漫主义，人是很有趣的，往往在接触一个人吋首先看到的都是他或她的优点，这一点颇像是在赞馆里用衩的经验。开始吃头盘或冷碟的吋候，印象很好。吃头两个主菜吋，也是赞不绝口。愈吃愈趋于冷静。吃完了这顿宴席，缺点就都找出来了。于是转喜为怒，转赞美为贵备挑剔，转首肯为摇头。这是因为：第一，开始吃的时候你正处于饥饿状态，而饿了吃糖甜如蜜，饱了吃蜜也不甜。第二，你初到一个餐馆，开始举筷吋有新鲜感，新盖的茅房三天香，这也可以叫做“陌生化效应”吧。

Hurricanes, house fires, cancer, white-water rafting accidents, plane crashes, vicious attacks in dark archways. Nobody asks for any of it. But to their surprise, many people find that enduring such an ordeal ultimately changes them for the better. Their opinion might be something like this: “I wish it hadn’t happened, but I’m a better person for it.”We love to hear the stories of people who have been transformed by their tribulations, perhaps because they testify（1）a psychological truth, one that sometimes gets lost amid endless reports of disaster; there is a built—in human capacity to flourish under the most difficult circumstances. Positive reactions to profoundly disturbing experiences are not limited to the toughest or the bravest. In fact, roughly half of the people who struggle with adversity say that their lives have in some ways improved.In a dark room in Queens, New York, 31-year-old fashion designer Tracy Cyr believed she was dying. A few months before, she had stopped taking the powerful immune-suppressing drugs that kept her arthritis （2） check. She never anticipated what would happen: a withdrawal reaction that eventually left her in total body agony and neurological meltdown. The slightest movement-trying to swallow, for example- was excruciating. Even the pressure of her check on the pillow was almost unbearable.Cyr is no wimp-diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis at the age of two, she’d endured the symptoms and the treatments (drugs, surgery) her whole life. But this time, she was way past her limits, and nothing her doctors did seemed to help. Either the disease was going to kill her or, pretty soon, she’d have to kill herself.As her sleepless nights wore on, though, her suicidal thoughts began to be interrupted by new feelings of gratitude. She was still in agony, but a new consciousness grew stronger each night: an awesome sense of liberation, combined with an all-encompassing feeling of sympathy and compassion. “I felt stripped（3）everything I’d ever identified myself with,” she said six months later. “Everything I thought I’d known or believed in was useless-time, money, self-image, perception that was so forcing.”Within a few months, she began to be able to move more freely, thanks to a cocktail of steroids and other drugs. But as her physical strength came back, she did not return to her old way of being as a feisty, demanding “sex-in-the-City, three-inch-stilettos-and-fishnets” girl. Now quieter and more tolerant, she makes a point of being submissive in a tum-the-other cheek kind of way. Cyr still takes a pharmacopoeia of drugs every day, but she says there’s no question that her life is better now. “I felt I had been shown the secret of life and why we’re here, to be happy and to nurture other life. It’s that simple.”Her mind-blowing experience came as a total surprise. But that feeling of transformation is in some ways typical, says Rich Tedeschi, a professor of psychology at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte who coined the term “post-traumatic growth”，His studies of people who have endured extreme events like combat, violent crime or sudden serious illness show that most feel dazed and anxious in the immediate aftermath. They are preoccupied with the idea that their lives have been shattered. A few people are haunted long afterward by memory problems, sleep trouble and similar symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. But Tedeschi and others have found that for many people—perhaps even the majority life ultimately becomes richer and more gratifying.Something similar happens to many people who experience a terrifying physical threat. In that moment, our sense of invulnerability is pierced, and the self-protective mental armor that normally stands between us and our perceptions of the world is tom away. Our everyday life scripts---our habits, self-perceptions and assumptions-go out the window, and we’re left with a raw experience of the world.Still, actually implementing these changes, as well as fully coming to terms（4）the new reality, usually takes conscious effort. Being willing and able to take on this process is one of the major differences between those who grow through adversity and those who are destroyed by it.Eventually, they may find themselves freed in ways they never imagined. Survivors often say they become more tolerant and forgiving （5）others, capable of bringing peace to formerly troubled relationships. They say that material ambitions suddenly seemed silly and the pleasures of friends and family became paramount-and that the crisis allowed them to reorganize life in line with the new priorities.People who have grown（6）adversity often feel much less fear, despite the frightening things they’ve been through. They are surprised by their own strength, confident that they can handle whatever else life throws at them. “People don’t say that what they went through was wonderful,n says Tedeschi. “They weren’t meaning to grow from it. They were just trying to survive. But in retrospect, what they gained was more than they even anticipated.”In his recent book Satisfaction, Emory University psychiatrist Gregory Bens points to extreme endurance athletes who push themselves to their physical limits for days at a time. They cycle through the same sequence of sensations as do trauma survivors; self-loss, confusion and, finally, a new sense of mastery. For ultramarathoners, who regularly run 100-mile races that last more than 24 hours, vomiting and hallucinating are normal. After a day and night of running without stopping or sleeping, competitors sometimes forget who they are and what they’re doing.But the feeling of mastering extraordinary difficulty makes up for it, reports Honolulu businessman Randy Havre. Havre, 51, found this feeling near the summit of Mauna Kea nearly 10 years ago. He was nearing the end of a 44-mile race that took him from sea level to the top of the volcano-a vertical ascent of 13,766 feet. He was on his way to setting the unofficial world record for the climb, but the high elevation was starting to get （ 7） him.“When you get to about 10,000 feet, things tend to get a little weird because of the swelling and pressure on your brain,” he says. “Above that, it gets exponentially weirder. I remember busting out crying at 12,000 feet. But if you can finish these things, you know; Hey, I can get through this stuff. You were able to hang （8） there, and you’re stronger for that.”The emotional reward can compensate for the pain and difficulty of adversity. This perspective does not cancel （9） what happened, but it puts it all in a different context: that it’s possible to live an extraordinarily rewarding life even within the constraints and struggles we face. In some form or other, says King, we all must go （10） this realization. “You’re not going to be the person you thought you were, but here’s who you are going to be instead- and that turns out to be a pretty great life.”Fill in each blank in the article with an appropriate preposition (介词).Read the article carefully and explain the meaning of the words according to the context.tribulations (in paragraph 2)adversity (in paragraph 2)withdrawal (in paragraph 3)excruciating (in paragraph 3)wimp (in paragraph 4)aftermath (in paragraph 7)gratifying (in paragraph 7)paramount (in paragraph 10)hallucinating (in paragraph 12)exponentially (in paragraph 14)According to Rich Tedeschi, a professor of psychology at the University North Carolina in Charlotte, there is a phenomenon called “post-trauma growth”. What does it mean?

The conclusion of the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations in 1994，and the establishment of the WTO in 1995 to provide the institutional support to the multilateral trade agreements, constituted a significant milestone in the evolution of the multilateral trading system. The principle of “single undertaking，” bound all WTO members to all the results of the Uruguay Round negotiations (with the exception of plurilateral agreements), thereby reinforcing the fundamental principle of most-favored nation (MFN) treatment. With the conclusion of the Uruguay Round and the strengthened multilateral trading system (MTS), there was an expectation that exceptions to multilateralism, such as regional trade agreements, even though legally covered by the WTO under certain conditions, would either become less of an alterative policy option for countries or will need to be adapted and conducted in such a manner as to become outward-oriented; not inward-looking, and has constitute building blocks for the new multilateralism ushered in by the WTO.This objective has been continually emphasized in WTO Ministerial Declarations that reaffirm commitment to the supremacy of multilateralism while recognizing the important role that regional trade agreements (RTAs) can play. This is apparent from paragraph 4 in the Doha Declaration where WTO Members stressed their “commitment to the WTO as the unique forum for global trade rule-making and liberalization, while also recognizing that regional trade agreements can play an important role in promoting the liberalization and expansion of trade and in fostering development”. In the work programme adopted at Doha. WTO Members also agree to negotiations aimed at clarifying and improving, existing WTO provisions applying to RTAs while taking into account their developmental aspects (paragraph 29). Such “developmental aspects are a concrete expression of the wider emphasis in the Doha Work Programmed (DWP) on development issues, including implementation-related issues and As recognized by these Declarations, the growth, expansion and deepening of regional trade agreements has been remarkable. Almost all countries in the world and virtually all WTO Members (the exception being Mongolia) today are party to, or are in the process of negotiating, at least one RTA. Thus, regionalism has become a policy option for most countries and is a permanent feature of the international trading environment for the foreseeable future.A notable feature in the recent rise of regionalism is that countries that have traditionally favored the multilateral approach to trade liberalization, including Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Singapore, India and the Republic of Korea have joined the RTA bandwagon. The United States has also given more attention to concluding RTAs. A different composition of RTAs involving the widening of country coverage beyond the traditional regional zone has emerged. Significantly, RTAs have emerged between countries and entities in different regions/continents (e.g. EU-Mexico, EU-South Africa, US-Israel. Jordan, Morocco, Chile). In most cases, these agreements are bilateral in membership, concluded by two countries/entities, including the case of free trade agreements negotiated and concluded by the two distinct RTAs (e.g. EU-MERCOSUR under negotiation).The expansion, widening and deepening of RTAs has resulted in, a situation whereby intra-RTA trade accounted for some 40 per cent of world trade (merchandise imports) in 2000 and will account for over 50 per cent in 2005. Furthermore, intra-RTA trade has been significant, or has become more important for RTA members. Thus, international trade flows are increasingly concentrated within regional groupings formed by large trading nations.The qualitative dimension of RTAs in respect of coverage of policy areas has also evolved. Recent “new-generation” RTAs increasingly cover not only trade in goods, but also other “behind the border” regulatory areas, including trade in services, investment, competition policy, intellectual property rights, government procurement, labor, environment and development cooperation, thereby going beyond multilateral disciplines and liberalization commitments (“WTO-plus”). These are part and parcel of “deeper” integration efforts.Developing countries are no exception to the process of expansion and reinvigoration of theRTAs. They have actively participated in regional trade agreements among themselves (South-South) and with developed countries (North-South). In addition to these sub regional agreements, various bilateral preferential trade agreements (PTAs) have been launched among or involving developing countries, often on an interregional basis.What is WTO’s stance toward regionalism? How is the development of regionalism in the world right now? (5 points)Please briefly analyze the positive and negative effects of regionalism to developing countries. (10 points)With the thriving of regionalism in the world, what do you think is the future of WTO’s multilateral trading system (MTS)? (10 points)

Translate the following Chinese into English. 对于希望利用中国大量廉价劳动力的国内外企业来说，多年来，中国沿海制造业中心一直是生产基地的上上之选。然而，自今年5月份以来，中国境内劳资争端明显增多，加之人民币走强以及政府采取行动遏制污染和产能过剩，表明这种低成本的生产模式己不再稳固。

Make some comments in English on Chinese Primer’s promise to make people happier in his congress address.

Translate the following English into Chinese. Historically, economists have said that well-being is a simple function of income. However, it has bean found that once wealth reaches a subsistence level, its effectiveness as a generator of well-being is greatly diminished. This paradox has been referred to as the Easter in paradox. This means that aspirations increase with income; after basic needs are met; relative rather than absolute income levels influence well-being. Happiness economists hope to change the way governments view well-being and how to most effectively govern and allocate resources given this paradox. However, other research suggests that no paradox exists, and happiness is linearly related to the logarithm of absolute (real, PPP-adjusted) income, with little or no relative income component.Money correlates with happiness, but the rate diminishes with more money. In 2010, two economists found that higher earners generally reported better life satisfaction, but people’s day-to-day emotional well-being only rose with earnings until a threshold annual income of $75,000. Other factors have been suggested as making people happier than money. One study, when corrected for social status, showed no correlation between income and happiness.

Write a composition of about 300 words based on the following:The past 10 years has witnessed the unprecedented development of the Internet and the online world, which have already transformed the way most of us live. Please write a composition entitled “Is the Internet a blessing or curse for us?” What's your opinion about the advantages and disadvantages of tile internet? Do you think its advantages outweigh its disadvantages or the other way round? How to make the best use of the internet?

Translate the following passage from English to ChineseNature contains the elements, in color and form, of all pictures, as the keyboard contains the notes of all music.But the artist is born to pick, and choose; and group with science, these elements, that the result may be beautiful as the musician gathers his notes, and forms his chords, until he brings forth from chaos glorious harmony.To say to the painter, that Nature is to be taken as she is, is to say to the player, that he may sit on the piano...The dignity of the snow-capped mountain is lost in distinctness, but the joy of the tourist is to recognize the traveler on the top. The desire to see, for the sake of seeing, is, with the mass, alone the one to be gratified, hence the delight in detail.

Translate tile following passage from Chinese into English历代的智慧，几个世纪以来人类一直籍以为乐的故事，所有这些都可以从书中方便而又便宜的获得。但是我必须懂得如何利用这份宝藏，懂得如何才能使它对我们最为有益。世界上最为不幸的人，也就是那些从未体验过读好书之乐趣的人吧。我对人最为感兴趣，喜欢结识他们，喜欢了解他们。我认识的一些非凡之人，首先存在于作者的想象之中，然后表现在作品的字里行间，最后在我的想象中重新显现。我在书中找到了新的朋友，新的社会，还有新的语言。把你的一部分空闲时光用来培养阅读好书的爱好吧。爱读书的人从好书中不但得到乐趣，他们从中获得的那种精神粮食，从其它地方是很难得到的。尽管他们未必有意识地想到读书是为了提高才智。在不知不觉中，他们从书中吸取的知识积累起来，经过想象力的加工，对将来大有用处。

AS the planet warms, floods, storms, rising seas and drought will uproot millions of people and with dire wider consequences. Barack Obama, collecting his Nobel peace prize, said that climatic change “will fuel more conflict for decades”. He took the analysis not from environmental scaremongers but from a group of American generals.The forecast is close （1）becoming received wisdom. A flurry of new books with titles such as “Global Warring” and “Climatic Conflict” offer near-apocalyptic visions. Cleo Pascal, at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London, predicts those floods, storms, the failure of the Indian monsoon and agricultural collapse will bring “enormous mad specific geopolitical, economic and security consequences for all of us...the world of tomorrow looks chaotic and violent”. Jeffrey Mazo of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, also in London, calls climatic change an “existential threat” and fears it could usher （2） “state failure and internal conflict” in exposed places, notably Africa.Yet surprisingly few facts support these alarming assertions. Widely touted forecasts such asfor 200m climatic refugees in fire next few decades seem to have been plucked （3） the air.Little or no academic research has looked at questions such as whether Bangladeshis displaced by a rising sea would move a series of short distances over a long period, or (more disruptively) a greater distance immediately.So scientists preparing the fifth report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, due in 2013, are for the first time including a chapter on threats to human security. An early effortcame at a conference last month in Norway, （4） the auspices of the Peace Research Institute in Oslo.One idea is to find previous occasions when big environmental changes came （5） social,political and military shifts. Droughts in the Central Asian steppe, for example, led to mass westward migration and the “barbarian” invasions that helped topple the Roman Empire. Hunger and drought led to the collapse of Mayan civilization a millennium ago. Sudden cooling wiped out an early European settlement on Greenland. The Dust Bowl of the 1930s forced over 2m people to migrate within the United States.Those examples may be relevant in Africa, where in many countries around three-quarters of the population survive by cultivating a few varieties of crops watered directly by rain, the form offarming most vulnerable （6） climatic change. Africa has warmed by 0.5°C on average in thepast half century, and may heat by 1.5-4°C more this century. Heat hits cereal yields (specially maize), perhaps by 10-20% for a 1 *C rise. Rainfall patterns will also shift.The hardest evidence for a link so far comes from a team led by Marshall Burke of the University of California, which studied African wars from 1980 to 2002 and found that rising temperatures arc indeed associated with crop failure, economic decline and a sharp rise in the likelihood of war. It predicted a “50% increase” in the chance of civil war in Africa by 2030.But that claim is now heavily revised, since researchers redid their sums to take account of the more peaceful period of 2002-08. Others say that political and other factors such as ethnic conflict and outside intervention are far better indicators of the likelihood of fighting.Take the widely cited case of the war in Darfur, the western region of Sudan. Ban Ki-moon,the UN secretary-general, described it as “an ecological crisis, arising at least（7）part fromclimate change”. Environmental problems have probably worsened the Darfur’s dreadful plight, offering grist to those who call climate change a “threat multiplier5，. Average rainfall in the region fell abruptly (by a third or more) in the early 1970s and Darfur repeatedly suffered droughts. Clashes over grazing and then displacement of villagers were followed, from 2003, by horrific war.Yet the connection is elusive. Roughly three decades elapsed between the rain stopping and war starting. Many other factors political, ethnic, demographic and economic conspired to stoke violence. Those were specific to Darfur, whereas the sharp drop in rainfall hit the whole Sahel, without intensifying conflict elsewhere.Another commonly cited example is violent competition for scarce grazing between nomadic herdsmen in the Hom of Africa. Yet a study of fighting among pastoralists on the border between Kenya and Somalia in the past 60 years (presented at the conference) showed instead that conflict worsened when grazing was abundant and fell （ 8） droughts. Hungry people ware too busy staying alive, or too exhausted, to fight. By contrast, when rains made herdsmen’s lives easier, they could release surplus young labor for the violent sport of raiding other groups.Other researchers look at the political or military consequences of phenomena unrelated to weather, such as rapid urbanization, migration or earthquakes. Yet the evidence here too is mixed（9 ） best. Where natural disasters do show predictable political outcomes, they are very slight.A study of the short-term impact of hurricanes on Haiti and the Dominican Republic from 1850-2007, for example, suggests that the storms have grown more intense (if not more frequent), but their arrival is not associated with mom political violence. Another study showed that natural disasters usually produced short-term economic pain but no sign of increased political violence. Earthquakes, too, tend to produce mixed outcomes. A Mexican quake in 1985 may have stoked an insui^ency. But the tsunami of 2005 offered a moment for secessionists in Aceh and the central Indonesian government to co-operate Climate change could indeed cause woes aplenty. That is all the more reason to be precise （10） them.Fill in each blank in the article with an appropriate preposition (介词).Read the article carefully and explain the meaning of the words according to the context. scaremonger (in paragraph 1)apocalyptic (in paragraph 2)tout (in paragraph 3)topple (in paragraph 5)intervention (in paragraph 8)elapse (in paragraph 10)stoke (in paragraph 10)intensify (in paragraph 10)grazing (in paragraph 11)woe (in paragraph 13)The above article mentioned the widely cited ease of the war in Darfur, (the western region of Sudan. Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, described it as “an ecological crisis...” Why? Some people call climatic change a “threat multiplier”. What does that mean?

Toyota RecallsToyota Motor has always been fanatical about frugality, and for many years that was good for both the company and its customers. This is a Japanese carmaker that routinely turned down the heat at its employee dormitories during working hours and labeled photocopy machines with the cost per copy to discourage overuse. Its engineers collaborated with suppliers to extract cost-savings without compromising quality. Yet by the middle of the last decade Toyota's virtue had become a vice.So say current and former auto executives who are trying to grasp how Toyota, with its gold-plated reputation for engineering excellence, slipped up on such a scale, with 8 million cars recalled due to mechanical failures linked by U.S. regulators to 51 deaths. Before company officials knew that runaway acceleration was causing crashes, one of these executives says, a simple manufacturing process would sometimes ignite small fires in a component as a direct result of comer-cutting, it was just one early sign that the focus on cost reduction had gone too far.Those production mishaps occurred in 2006, a year after company President Katsuaki Watanabe boasted about having squeezed more than $10 billion from global operating costs in the previous six years — this despite an impressive run of profit growth and global maricet share gains in the middle of the last decade. Then Toyota pushed even harder for more cuts. It asked suppliers to design parts for its Camiy midsize sedan that were 10% cheaper and 10% lighter. The company's top U.S. executive, Jim Press, warned his bosses in Japan that vehicle quality was slipping, according to a slide presentation U.S. Senate investigators unearthed in their sudden-acceleration probe. But his warning had no apparent effect.The redesigned Camry brought out in 2006 had an embarrassing flaw in its headliner, the fabric and composite lining that covers the inside roof of the car. Under pressure to cut costs, the lead Camry supplier, Toyota-afTiliated Toyota Boshoku, chose a carbon fiber material that hadn't been approved by Toyota engineers, according to an executive who worked on the redesign. The headliner is made by compressing layers of materials together using a certain amount of heat to mold it. In this case, the carbon fiber required so much heat that the headliner would catch fire.Toyota fixed that problem, but when a North American parts supplier interested in working with the automaker did a teardown of a 2007 Camry, its engineers were surprised by how much the traditional Toyota craftsmanship had been watered down by years of nips and tucks. The padding in the ceiling of the car, though compliant with safety regulations, had been thinned out to save money. A tray for sunglasses used a flimsier type of plastic than previous models. “It was a bare-bones car at that point,” says one executive who declined to be identified for fear of harming business ties with Toyota.Toyota insists its focus on cost hasn't hurt consumers. “It’s not true that by reducing cost you automatically reduce quality," said Jim Wiseman, Toyota’s vice-president for North American corporate communications. “Every automaker has to stay competitive relative to price.”True, but probably not with the intensity Toyota brought to cost-cutting and rapid expansion under three successive presidents: Hiroshi Okuda (1995-1999), Fuji Cho (1999-2005), and Watanabe (2005 to 2009). Toyota executives will spend years mopping up after their mess.At last count, the company faced 109 class actions and 32 individual cases filed in courts in the U.S. and Canada. (In a well-publicized incident on Mar. 8, the owner of a 2008 Prius lost control of his car on a California interstate highway and had to be rescued by police.)What are the causes for Toyota’s global recalls? Identify both the direct and deeper causes.(8 points)This case illustrated the problems of the goal attainment view of organizational effectiveness. Define organizational effectiveness and discuss the limitations of the goal attainment view.(10 points)What do you think an organization can learn from Toyota’s lessons in achieving organizational effectiveness? (8 points)

Translate the following into English 决策过程对管理结盟的需要是基于两个方面的原因。首先，组织的目标往往模糊不清，而部门间的运营目标则缺乏一致性。在目标模糊又缺乏一致性的情况下，管理者对问题的优先顺序便无法统一。他们必须就问题讨价还价，并围绕着应该解决的问题建立起结盟。结盟的第二个原因是尽管管理者个人倾向于理性，但却受到人类认知的局限和其他局限性的制约。管理者们没有时间、资源或心智能力去识别与某一项决策相关的所有维度，并处理所有的信息。这些局限性便导致了结盟行为。管理者们通过相互交谈、交流看法来收集信息，减少模糊性。拥有相关信息或对某项决策的结果有相关利益的人们会被征求意见。建立结盟会使一项决策得到各相关利益方的支持。

暂未登录

学员用户尊享特权

老师批改作业做题助教答疑学员专用题库高频考点梳理

上一页 4 5 6 7 8 9 下一页