Myocardial Infarction Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Myocardial Infarction - Essay Example Thus, scientists do their best to make it possible to reveal the danger of myocardial infarction in patients timely in order to save their lives. This paper will seek to discuss the topic of myocardial infarction in detail, including prevention/ treatment options and recommendations for future research. Myocardial infarction can be defined as â€Å"the irreversible damage of myocardial tissue caused by prolonged ischemia and hypoxia. In simpler terms, myocardial infarction is caused by the death of one of the heart muscles which, in its turn, leads to irreversible changes in the heart function and, in many cases, to death† (Sharis & Cannon 2003). Professionals in cardiac studies usually link myocardial infarction etiology to complete focal blockage of one of the coronary arteries or their branches. The latter reflects in and leads to impaired contractility of one of the heart muscles but does not extend beyond the affected heart segment (Sharis & Cannon 2003). The myocardial ischemia begins in the inner lining of the heart, called endocardium and then spreads to the outer heart lining (epicardium); the risks of irreversible heart damage significantly increase if the complete blockage lasts 15-20 minutes (Sharis & Cannon 2003). Irreversible damage covers the affected segment and occurs within the first 2 or 3 hours following the infarction (Sharis & Cannon 2003). Restoration of the blood flow and heart activity is associated with the salvation of the heart muscle, and the earlier the salvation occurs the better the heart and blood flow will be. The size of the affected area is the determining factor of death of infarction, and increased oxygen supply to the site of blockage is believed to be a more effective instrument of salvaging the heart muscle, compared to reducing oxygen demand (Sharis & Cannon 2003). A whole set of modifiable risk factors contributes to the development of myocardial infarction risks in different population groups – smoking, diabetes,

The Effect of “Publish or Perish” Motto on Academics Essay Example for Free

The Effect of â€Å"Publish or Perish† Motto on Academics Essay Retailing, warehousing and producing knowledge are the core missions of the academic scholars in the universities. Universities warehouse† knowledge through libraries; they disseminate or retail knowledge via their teaching function; and they produce or â€Å"manufacture† knowledge through research (Hunt, 2000). In order to accomplish these missions, namely to enhance the production and dissemination quantum of the knowledge, governmental institutions and university administrations use incentive and reward systems (Bloom et al. , 1988). These systems present in most universities acknowledge publications and citations as the evidence of scholarly achievement and necessity for promotion, grant, and tenure (Darko, 2003). However, incentive and reward systems in academia were considered to lead a publish or perish syndrome by keeping the academic staff under pressure (Bloom et al. , 1988). On the one hand, these systems lead to a an increase in the quantity of books and papers (Bloom et al. , 1988); on the other hand, the quality of the generated knowledge may decrease since the academics aim to reach maximum number of publications (Nyilasy et al., 2007). As it is seen, these systems have both advantageous and disadvantageous. In this context, the objective of this paper is to analyze whether the incentive and reward systems have institutionalized a restrictive approach to knowledge development or they enhance and encourage the producing of the knowledge. On the other hand, it will be tried to compare the Turkey’s current academic environment with the other countries in the context of ethical academic behaviours. THE OBJECTIVE OF ACADEMICS  Marketing as a university discipline has several responsibilities such as; to society, for providing objective knowledge and technically competent, socially responsible, liberally educated graduates; To students, for providing an education that will enable them to get on the â€Å"socioeconomic ladder† and prepare them for their roles as competent, responsible marketers and citizens; to marketing practice, for providing a continuing supply of competent, responsible entrants to the marketing profession and for providing new knowledge about both the micro and macro dimensions of marketing; and to the academy, for upholding its mission of retailing,  warehousing and producing knowledge, its contract with society of objective knowledge for academic freedom, and its core values of reason, evidence, openness and civility (Hunt, 2002, p. 306). In parallel with this view, Irele (1993, p. 74) claimed that â€Å"A university has three functions to perform which are to conserve knowledge; to advance knowledge; and to disseminate knowledge. It falls short of the full realization of its aim unless, having provided for the conservation and advancement of knowledge, it makes provision for its dissemination as well†. It can be revealed from these statements that, production and dissemination of the knowledge are two of the core missions of universities. Knowledge produced by academic researchers tends to be distributed to the discipline through research books, journals, academic conferences, training and development courses ((Bloom et al. , 1988; McKenzie et al. , 2002; Nyilasy et al. , 2007). However, according to the American Marketing Association (as of now AMA) Task Force on the development of marketing, academic researchers do not produce and disseminate enough publications (Bloom et al., 1988). Furthermore, there is a dissemination problem that academicians are not successful in disseminating the knowledge they generate (Nyilasy et al. , 2007). In order to overcome these problems and increase the production and dissemination of knowledge, and also to become more competitive, university management boards apply incentive and reward systems (Bloom et al. , 1988). INCENTIVE AND REWARDS SYSTEMS At first sight, the incentive and reward systems may be seen well functioning that it leads to increase on knowledge generation and motivate the researchers. However there are several disadvantages and side effects of these systems and in the literature the outcomes of these systems have been criticized by several authors under the â€Å"publish or perish† mantra (List at al. , 2007;Bloom et al. , 1988; Nyilasy et al. , 2007; Brennan Ankers, 2004; Darko, 2003; Remus, 1977; Gad-el-hak, 2004). One of the best explanation of publish or perish doctrine made by P. Van Den Berghe (1970, p. 87) as â€Å"Publishing has become a compulsion. The average academic author does not write because he has something to say, because he hopes to contribute to knowledge, or because he has fun doing it; rather, he writes and publishes in order to improve his vita. This document is frequently the only thing about him which his colleagues will ever read; it is the passport to academic success; and, beyond the routine acquisition of a Ph. D. , published titles are the main ornament of a vita. On the other hand, there are some alternative views such as Blunt (1973) claimed that equating not publishing with perishing is an over dramatization of the present condition. In fact, in this context incentive and rewards refers to â€Å"tenure† and â€Å"promotion†. Namely, in order to get a tenure or promotion to the more senior academic positions it is essential to publish books, academic paper and be cited (Blunt, 1973). In addition, Remus (1977) claimed that publication is one of the most essential criterion for gaining tenure and promotion in a highly competitive academic environment which Remus defined this environment as a treacherous dog-eat-dog world metaphorically. Since AMA (1988) claimed that publications in the marketing field is not enough and there need to overcome the impediments in order to increase the quantity of the publications. The AMA assessed several suggestions to motivate the researchers; the researchers must be provided large scale funding source and faculty release time for their research; the average revision time of the journals must be decreased as much as possible, thus further expenditures of time and effort of both reviewers and authors will be prevented; special workshops and consortia must be supported related to the need of the researchers. To sum up, this system is very effective and advantageous in order to motivate the researchers and achieve a maximum number of publications. However, there are also some disadvantageous and side effects of this system. In the next section the negative effects of this system will be criticized. SIDE EFFECTS OF INCENTIVE AND REWARD SYSTEMS As discussed in the preceding sections, the system puts the researcher under the pressure of publishing more and more books, journals and conference papers. The strong and undesirable incentives motivate especially the young academics through knowledge development (Blunt, 1973). However, it is extremely short-term in orientation and the system discourages risk-taking in the development of new ideas, discourages investment in long-term projects on significant issues, and instead encourages minor improvements in establishing ideas (Bloom et al. , 1988). On the other hand, the young academicians have started to publish books without getting enough wisdom in a particular field (Gad-el-hak, 2004). When the researcher’s age and experience increase, they provide fewer contributions to the journals. The AMA stated the possible reason for this situation as following; (1) A sense that the rewards for research and publication have been less than expected or are simply insufficient to justify additional effort. (2) A cumulative frustration with the competitive review processes of the major journals of the field. (3) An increased need or desire for outside income during the middle years of ones career. (4) An increased capability to undertake activities that hold higher personal value (e. g. , teaching, consulting, administrative positions) than does research and writing(Bloom et al. , 1988, p. 4). Another important issue affected by the system is the quality concern. Publish or perish philosophy makes the researchers give more importance to the quantity of the publications rather than quality (Lofthouse, 1974). In order to get a tenure or promotion, most researchers focus on publishing as much as they can, even sometimes they use â€Å"cut-and-paste† to reach their goals. Furthermore, to fulfil the increasing demand for publishing papers, everyday more and more journals enter the academic market. Thus, there have been the journals stratified into several quality categories which fits different quality papers (Gad-el-hak, 2004). However, since journals are peer reviewed they can preserve their quality in balance (Bloom et al. , 1988). The quality concern is emerged in book publishing as well and probably more noteworthy that there is no need to be reviewed which makes it easier to publish a book than a journal article accepted (Gad-el-hak, 2004). Gad-el-Hak (2004) provided some extreme examples related to the quantity of publications. The first one is a dean of major school of engineering listed 52 papers that he wrote just in a year which equals to publishing a paper every week. In the second example, a professor was introduces at a meeting as the author of 80 books in his 20 year career which is equal to a book every three months. Citation documents the ? ow of information and the links within and among disciplines or other units of analysis (Goldman Grinstein, 2010). The number of citations is a dominant criterion for promotion, salary increases and funding. It also will determine to what extent the individual researcher is seen as a thought leader. On the other hand, it is an indicator of quality, innovativeness and contribution of the publication to the science. Therefore, the researchers try to maximize the number of times they are cited (Verniers, 2010). However, except the articles published in top journals which represent the core of a discipline, most articles receive few or no citation (Van Dalen Klamer, 2005). Also some researchers use make citation unethically. For example, authors generally do not actually consult some of the references they cite, some authors add references at the completion of a research because they support the researcher’s arguments or findings authors often reference well known authors in order to add credibility and prestige, and that misquotations of what is actually written in the references are prevalent (Goldman Grinstein, 2010, p.1389) As Hunt (2000) claimed another mission of academics is the retailing the knowledge in terms of teaching. However, since the â€Å"publish or perish† motto force the academics to focus on publications, especially the young academicians give less emphasis to the teaching function (Blunt, 1973). On the other hand, this motto also affects the relationship level between the practitioners and academicians. Brennan and Ankers (2004, p.  511) claimed that â€Å"It seems clear that although academics would like to get closer to practitioners, they are inhibited by institutional factors, such as academic reward systems and the â€Å"publish or perish† culture†. Since the Publish or perish culture suppresses the academics, they are tempted to perform unethical behaviours such as copying research, faking data and statistics, intentionally leaving out erroneous findings (Van Dalen Klamer, 2005). (List et al., 2007) made a research on this topic and proved that some researchers have falsified the research data; also they became co-authors of the papers without contributing. In addition, Remus (1977) very clearly identified the publication tricks as following; Joint Author Trick, colleagues write papers independently, and they add his / her colleagues name to the paper. Thus, in average both get more point. Experimental Trip trick, in some cases the academics force the students to participate in experiments. Thus, they can set up experiments in a very short time and free of charge. Graduate Student Gap, Graduate students perform great effort to show him qualified, so the academics may use them for library research, analyze and write up the data, or to find new creative research topics. Senior Author Trick, sometimes the junior academics use the name of senior, well-known authors in their studies without their contribution to publish their articles in top journals and books in quality publishers. Kitchen Sink Trick, since the data gathering phase is time consuming, they may use the same data more than once for different articles. In order to overcome the side effects of the publish or perish concept, Gad-el-Hak (2004) offered some suggestions such as; resumes submitted to promotion and tenure committees should be limited to listing only 5–10 the most significant publications; co-authors should contribute meaningfully to a publication and no name should be added merely because he or she is a member of a research group, or worse, the head of the group; journals should publish their impact factor and it should be an important consideration when libraries decide which journals to drop; Completed book manuscripts should go through peer review before publication. PUBLISH OR PERISH SYSTEM IN TURKEY In this section, as an academic member in a university, I will express my observations about the functioning of publish or perish system by comparing with the outside of Turkey. There is an incentive and rewards system in Turkey as well. For example, In order to apply for an Associate Professor position, academicians have to get at least 6 points by publishing books, articles, conference papers and being cited (UAK, 2012). In addition, The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) makes payment for the articles published in top journals in order to motivate academics. However the side effects in terms unethical academic consequences of the system is very similar to the other countries. Probably, one of the most important factors is they are assigned many courses to teach and also they are charged with administrative work load. The most common unethical behaviours in Turkey are plagiarism refers to stealing from other authors’ publications without citation and permission, duplication which is publishing the same or similar papers in different journals or conferences, Fabrication which is making up unreal results and publish, and Salamization  refers to slicing up one research in more or less identical papers (Ruacan, 2008). As indicated in the AMA task force report (1988), most of the senior academicians slow up researching and publishing, instead they mostly focus on consulting to the private sector companies, administrative functions, organizing conferences in their most productive period in Turkey as well. On the other hand in order to increase the quantity of their publications some academics search for the journals, mostly in third world countries such as African journals, that they can easily publish their unqualified articles. Furthermore, some of the academics make a deal with publishing companies to publish their book. Actually, the aim is not selling the book and making profit. In most cases the only reason is just getting point to get a promotion or tenure. In addition, authors in Turkey use joint author trick which was stated by Remus (1977) to gain more point. For instance, there are three colleagues and each of them prepared a paper. If they publish them as single authored in an international journal, each will get 3 points independently. However, if they write the other two colleagues’ names as co-authors each will get 5. 4 point which is approximately twice of the former choice (UAK, 2012). CONCLUSION To sum up, producing and disseminating of the knowledge is one of the most crucial missions for the universities. To accomplish this duty, the administrative directors of the universities and Institutes of Higher Education use some incentive and reward systems. However, in some cases these strategies put the academic staff under the pressure which is called as the â€Å"Publish or Perish† motto. Thus, in order to survive in the academic world, the members sometimes look for some unethical ways such as plagiarism, salamization, duplication, fabrication, joint author, publishing unqualified books, and so on. While the quantity of the publications increases, their quality may decrease. In my opinion, being academic members must be encouraged by increasing the salary of the member, providing extra opportunities, to increase the attraction of being a faculty member. Thus, the more qualified people will demand to be an academician and the cumulative quality of the universities and academics will increase and probably there will be a decrease in the rate of unethical academic behaviour. On the other hand, some reformations must be made to prevent the unstandardized proceedings, patronages, and unfairness: In this way, the motivation and quality of the junior academic personnel will increase and they would be more productive. REFERENCES Berghe, P. (1970). Academic Gamesmanship, London: Abelard-Schuman Bloom, P. , Hirschman, E. , Mcaleer, L. , Group, T. M., Weitz, B. , Wilkie, W. , Dame, N. , et al. (1988). Developing , Disseminating , and Utilizing Marketing Knowledge, Journal of Marketing Vol. 52(October), pp. 1–25. Brennan, R. , and P. Ankers, (2004). In Search of Relevance: Is There an Academic-Practitioner Divide in Business-to-Business Marketing? Marketing Intelligence and Planning, Vol: 22(5), pp. 511–519. Darko, C. O. (2003). Scholarly Publ? sh? ng In Africa: A Case Study Of The Pol? cies And Practices Of African Un? versity Presses, Inpublished PhD Dissertation, Graduate School of the University of Stirling Gad-el-Hak, M. (2004). Publish or Perish An Ailing Enterprise ,Phisics Today,pp. 61-62 Goldman, A. , Grinstein, A. (2010). Stages in the Development of Market Orientation Publication Activity: A Longitudinal Assessment. European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 44 (9/10), pp. 1384–1409. Hunt, S. D. (2000). Marketing is , Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science Vol: 20,(4), pp. 301-311. Hunt, S. D. (2002). Marketing as a Profession: On Closing Stakeholder Gaps. European Journal of Marketing, Vol: 36(3),pp. 305–312. Irele, A. (1993), The challenge of university Publishing in Africa, with special reference to Nigeria. In Altbach PG (ed) readings on Publishing in Africa and the Third World. Buffalo: Bellagio. List, J. , Bailey, C. , Euzent, P. , Martin, T. (2007). Academic economists behaving badly? A survey on three areas of unethical behavior. Economic Inquiry, 39(1), 162–170. doi:10. 1111/j. 1465-7295. 2001. tb00058. x Lofthouse, S. (1974). Thoughts on â€Å" Publish Or Perish†, Higher Education Vol: 3 pp. 59 80. McKenzie, C. J. , Wright, S. , Ball, D. F. Baron, P. J. (2002) The publications of marketing faculty – who are we really talking to? European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 36 (November), pp. 1196–1208. Nyilasy, G. , Reid, L. , Rodgers, S. , Wang, Y. , Rettie, R. , Alpert, F. , Matthes, J. , et al. (2007). The academician–practitioner gap in advertising, International Journal of Advertising, Vol: 26(4) pp. 425-447. Peter Blunt,(1976), Publish or perish or neither: What is happening in academia, Vestes, vol. 19 (1), pp. 62-64. Remus, Wi?. (1977). Strategies for a Publish or Perish World or Why Journals Are Unreadable, Interfaces, Vol. 8 (1), pp. 64-69. Ruacan, S. (2008). Bilimsel Arast? rma ve Yay? nlarda Etik Ilkeler. Hacettepe Universitesi. Onkoloji Enstitusu. http://www. ulakbim. gov. tr/dokumanlar/sempozyum1/sruacan 2. pdf. (accesed 12. 12. 2012). UAK (2012), Criteria for Associate Professor Application, http://www. uak. gov. tr/temelalan /tablo11. pdf (Accessed 12. 12. 2012). Van Dalen, Hendrik P. and Arjo Klamer (2005), â€Å"Is There Such a Thing Called Scientific Waste? † Tinbergen discussion paper, Erasmus University Rotterdam. Verniers, I (2010), Essays on Marketing and Scientific Innovations, Unpublished PhD Dissertation, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University.

Driving Forces Of Ecommerce In Banking Sector Information Technology Essay

Driving Forces Of Ecommerce In Banking Sector Information Technology Essay Ecommerce is the abbreviated form of the concept of Electronic Commerce. This concept was initially introduced as an alternate for onsite trading. Selling and purchasing of goods was done using electronic systems like internet. E commerce ha spread world wide with the increasingly use of internet technology. Now the ecommerce has also spread in other business environments like tourism, banking, employment, real estate and teaching. Ecommerce has become a more convenient platform for exchanging goods and services. E commerce has also broadened the sense of global market as people can buy and sale goods and services to or from a person sitting overseas. Ecommerce has helped the consumers in many ways. E commerce provides a better insight about the product and services offered by a company. All the major retailers of the world have entered the business system of ecommerce because of the increasing use of it. In the initial stage of the ecommerce the startup companies captured the market share of well established conventional retailers only by using e commerce system for selling there product. Now the ecommerce has improved the service of each sector which has implemented the idea in their system. Due to ecommerce tourism sector has improved because now people do not have to go to the registration counter to get tickets for some place they can book their tickets online using various ecommerce sites. Banking services have drastically improved after the ecommerce system. Customers do not have to stand in queue for hours for some small things like checking balance, fund transfer etc. Ecommerce has also eased the tasks of HR managers of companies as the websites of most companies now have a career section where the aspirants can view the current openings in the company and apply for the suitable job. HR managers can view job application on the website and contact suitable applicant for further conversation. Many ecommerce sites provide facilities related to real estate business where people can get information about the different lands. Many sites like amazon, ebay, rediff have implemented the ecommerce system in the field of teaching. Study materials, books, journals, magazines etc. are available online and people can buy or subscribe them. Knowledge management system is another form of ecommerce which has improved the knowledge sharing system and has been beneficial for the education system. (Concept: Ecommerce) Banking Ecommerce E commerce in the banking sector is also known as internet banking as various tasks of banks is being done on internet. Banks have enabled electronic services to improve customer services and reduce the work load of the employees. All the normal daily bank jobs can now be done using the banks web portal. Following banking service have been transferred to the ecommerce system of the bank: Financial transactions are now being performed by using the banks online banking system or ecommerce system. These transactional services include presentation and payment of bills, fun transfer from one account to other account, investment facilities, and application for loans can be submitted on the ecommerce system of the bank. Customers can generate the periodic financial statements of their bank account by availing the internet banking facility of the bank. Long queues at the cash counter can be avoided by using the fund transfer facility on the ecommerce system of banks. ATM service is also a form of ecommerce system to transact cash without standing in long queues at the cash counter. Other non transactional services like getting bank statements and checking balance in the account are also being performed on the ecommerce system of banks. (Silvain de munck, 2001) Driving forces of Ecommerce in Banking Sector Following are the three major forces that support the use of ecommerce system in the banking sector: Economic forces: This is one the most important benefits of the ecommerce system in the banking sector. Ecommerce system are economic efficient as the cost of communication is reduced, one time investment in the infrastructure establishment will be cheaper than appointing extra staff to attend more customers, electronic transactions will be faster and more economic and better customer services can be provided on comparatively low cost. Ecommerce system of banks will also enable effective communication between all the branches and a centralized database of customers and their information can be maintained by using ecommerce system in banks. Market forces: Internet banking facilities are proved to be an extra advantage for the marketing of banks. Internet banking provides better and enhanced customer services and support. Internet is he best way of marketing in todayà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s global scenario. Technology forces: Advancement in technology is another major force for implementing ecommerce system in the banking sector. In this competitive era every organization has to walk parallel with the latest tools and technologies otherwise they will loose competitive advantage in the market. There has been much advancement in the internet security which has made the ecommerce a more reliable and secures way of banking. (Silvain de munck, 2001) Conclusion Ecommerce is the technical way of selling and purchasing goods or services. Implementation of ecommerce in each sector has improved the performance and efficiency of that sector. The banking sector has taken huge advantage from the ecommerce or internet banking system. Ecommerce has reduced the pressure of employees of banks and increased the level of customer services. The customers of banks are now happier and satisfied as they are also feeling relaxed with the advanced ecommerce system of banks. Many economic, marketing and technological forces have attracted the banking sector towards the ecommerce system. The current advanced technology has made the ecommerce system a more secure, reliable and easy system for day to day banking tasks.

Concepts of Masculinity in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished Essay -- Faulkn

Concepts of Masculinity in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished In The Unvanquished, the reader assumes that the narrator is Bayard Sartoris, a boy born to John Sartoris and his now deceased wife. Bayard's gender is not immediately apparent, though remote understanding of southern customs and common boyhood activities encourages one to guess that he is male. First, Ringo is more easily identified as a black boy, and by the age of twelve, black boys and white girls would likely not be permitted such intimate and unsupervised interaction. Second, the boys' infatuation with "playing war" and the chores which are assigned to them suggest that Bayard is probably male. This conclusion is finally justified for the reader when John discovers that the young lads separated from Miss Rosa. He repeats in frustration, "You damn boys" (63). Although the opening sentence implies that the narrator is looking back to childhood, the person's exact age cannot be determined. The assigned section indicates that Bayard and Ringo were approximately the same age, twelve years old at the beginning of the story ...

Frq Articles of Confederation Essay

The Articles of Confederation from 1781 to 1789 did not provide the United States with an effective form of government because of its problems in terms of domestic policy, foreign policy, and economics. Domestic policy, or the set of decisions that a government makes relating to things that directly affect the people in its own country, was not adequate enough to solve strife between states. The Articles stated that state legislatures chose representatives for the house, rather than the people themselves. This began to lean toward the British practices of virtual representation, which the U. S. fought a war to be rid of. Another problem was that each state only received one vote, which was unfair to the larger states with a greater population. With a super majority required to pass laws, almost no laws were passed because no one was able to agree. The lack of federal courts also made it difficult to solve disputes, more specifically those between states, making them all grow more independently rather than as a unified nation. Foreign policy was a mess under the Articles of Confederation. The states were unwilling to give up their land and power as they were afraid that is the federal government gained any more power then they would return to a monarchical type system. With no president, there was no figure to enforce laws or make negotiate with other countries, and the governors were only concerned with the welfare of their own state, preventing the states from becoming more unified. Because the federal government lacked any power, it was impossible to solve the problem with the Mississippi river and fishing rights, and there was no one to stop Shay’s Rebellion. This lack of power caused great fear that the British could easily come and take us over once again. Massive debts had piled up from the Revolution and from starting a new country, so states were looking for a way to pay them off. They began printing their own currency, only to cause massive inflation and difficulties trading both with other nations, and even from state to state. This inability to trade caused further problems, and they went into a recession. This all resulted from states holding most of the power, rather than their being a balance between state and federal. As the states did not want to lose their power, they would not give up any land to the federal government even if it were to pay off some of its debts. Congress did not have the ability to tax, causing further economic strain and making it difficult to pay off their many debts.

Impact of Perry essays

Impact of Perry essays On July 8, 1853, Commodore Matthew Perry of the United States Navy, commanding a squadron of two steamers and two sailing vessels, sailed into Tokyo harbor, carrying the message to the Japanese authorities : Agree to trade in peace, or suffer the consequences in war.(Andrew Gordon, Modern History of Japan, p49). His mission signified American interest in Japan trade. After taking over California from Mexico in the 1848, Americans wanted to become a commercial power in the Pacific. Also, with the whaling supplies exhausted in the Atlantic, Americans and British whalers had ventured into the Pacific waters and facing the competition of the British, the American wanted Japanese to sell coal to their naval fleet and allow resupply stops for the whalers in Japanese ports and to open Japan as a new market for their manufactured goods. Japan at this time was ruled by the shogun from the Tokugawa family and during this period, Japanese contacts with outsiders were severely limited, primarily due to the fear of the shogun and the other samurai that outside contacts presented a potential threat to their power. In response to this incident, the shogun ordered defence to be strengthened along the coastline and rumours of impending war sparked off panic in Japan. Also, the shogun did something unprecedented and unusual, he actually requested the various daimyos submit their advice on how to best deal with the Americans in hope of rallying a consensus for his choice to make some concessions and avoid war(Gordan, Modern History of Japan, p49). In early 1854, he returned with a fleet of 9 ships and the Japanese tried to intimidate the Americans but to no avail, and faced with the firmness of Perry and aware of their military strength relative to the Americans, the shogun signed the Treaty of Kanagawa which opened 2 ports(Shimoda and Hakodate) to the Americans. This event was followed by similar treaties with other Western p...