The Yegiora Files

Recently China has increased its influence in the Pacific region. The increase can be measured in the volume of soft power resources deployed and employed by China. But does this Western notion give one a good understanding of what China is doing in the region and in PNG? Soft power is the opposite of hard power in terms of resources. In the words of Joseph Nye, soft co-optive power is just as important as hard command power. It plays the same role by influencing State B to want what State A wants, but in a non-coercive manner. There are 6 resources according to Nye and Joshua Kurlanzick: culture political values  foreign policy investment aid formal diplomacy The employment of the Belt and Road Initiative by China as a soft power resource is timely for a nation like PNG. Peter O'Neill was one of the first leaders in the Pacific region to sign up to the Initiative. He was attracted by the fact that China had the capability to help PNG develop its infrastructur...

Technology has changed the process of learning and teaching in the higher education sector. We are using different learning management systems and software to share and create content. As such, educators are generally expected to be tech savvy and learners more knowledgeable. Not all educators are excited about the change. Digital immigrants struggle to keep up with the speed at which the process of learning and teaching is changing. Many were born before the widespread adoption of digital technology, or grew up not using digital technology at an early age.   On the other hand, digital natives easily meet the general expectation because they grew up using digital technology at an early age. For them, the transition is less complex compared to digital immigrants. They know exactly what to do and how to do it.  To avoid becoming obsolete, digital immigrants in the higher education sector will need to work extra hard to narrow the gap between them and the digit...