Economist, Jan 18th 2014 (II)

choi

(1) Canadian multiculturalism  | The More the Merrier. Debates over immigration are often toxic. Not in Canada.
www.economist.com/news/americas/ ... canada-more-merrier

Quote:  

a community hospital in Ontario called "Lakeridge Health ran an advertisement in a Quebec medical-school newspaper showing a woman wearing a hijab and stethoscope over the caption: 'We don’t care what’s on your head, we care what’s in it.'

"Immigration itself is not in question. Canadians, even in Quebec, overwhelmingly back mass immigration, which adds an average of 250,000 newcomers (roughly 0.8% of the population) each year. First-generation immigrants make up a bigger share of Toronto’s and Vancouver’s populations than in many of the world’s great cosmopolitan cities [New York, London, Paris] (see chart).

My comment:
(a) hijab
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijab
(b) There is no need to read the rest.
(c) In US any immigrants AND Canadians are reluctant to go or return there, with a perennial gripe that Canada's economy is not as dynamic, that Canada has higher unemployment rate. I do not know where the truth lies: Americans and media in US seldom pay attention to Canada (much less than to Taiwan). But in recruitment section of major science magazines, most often research institutions in Canada requires citizenship, giving me the impression that not so much as parochial, the nation (Canada) needs measures to boost domestic employment of its citizens.

choi

(2) Japan  |  Sitting Tight. How the catastrophes of 2011 changed Japan.
www.economist.com/news/books-and ... japan-sitting-tight
(book review on David Pilling, Bending Adversity; Japan and the art of survival. By . Penguin

Quote:

(a) "As the book’s title indicates, they [Japanese] may 'bend' adversity to whatever interests they have, or adversity may 'bend' them, but change is unlikely to be more radical.

"This will be a disappointment to all those who liked to think that 3/11  [‘as the event is known in Japan;’ for the triple whammy of ‘earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident that struck Japan on Mar 11, 2011’] could bring about the third great transformation in the country’s modern history. The first two were the opening up of Japan following the restoration of imperial rule in the 1860s, and the economic and democratic miracles after 1945. Yet in both cases an old regime had collapsed, making a new start unavoidable. Today’s situation, as Mr Pilling rightly perceives, is quite different.

"Japanese culture is one of evolution, not revolution: one that seeks advances through myriad small steps rather than great leaps forward.

(b) "progress since 2011 has been frustrating. Mr Pilling’s explanation, derived both from his time living there and from the aftermath of the tsunami, is that Japan is just as divided, between rich and poor, young and old, north and south, rural and urban, left and right, business and civil society, as any other mature and affluent democracy, and so finds it just as difficult to take decisions.


My comment:
(a) "Japanese culture is one of evolution, not revolution." That probably extends to science and technology also.
(b) There is no need to read the rest, which is not as insightful.