Public relations is a broad set of planned communications about the company

The Scottish countryside will soon be home to creatures which is strange to Britain. This spring, 17 beavers (海狸) will be released into a remote area of rivers and forests. Hunted to extinction throughout Europe, beavers haven't roamed Britain's wilderness for almost 500 years. Ecologists would like to invite back other long-lost species to help restore the natural balance. To save the country's plants from deer, which have doubled to 2 million since the start of this decade, an Oxford University biologist late last year called for reintroducing the lynx (猞猁)—a wildcat that died out in Britain 1,300 years ago. Nature has long been a popular cause in Europe. British people love their countryside of fences and fields, the French their vineyards (葡萄园) and the Germans their hiking forests. But in recent years conservationists have set their sights on the more distant past, when Europe's forests and meadows were full of elephants, hippo-potamuses (河马), rhinoceroses(犀牛) and big cats. Some ambitious conservationists are now advocating a return to norms of wilderness that date back to 11,000 years ago when the biggest mammals were at the top of the food chain. Nobody is advocating allowing elephants and lions to run crazily in this densely populated region. But wilding supporters would give free control to a long list of lesser mammals, including the beaver and the lynx, which some people fear could be destructive. Some landowners withdraw at the thought of beavers cutting down trees with their teeth and flooding their property; the Scottish Parliament rejected several earlier efforts to reintroduce the mammal. Proposals to set loose wolves and bears in Britain have also encountered resistance. Although rhinos and hippos thrived in Europe thousands of years ago, no one is sure what effect they would have on ecosystems now. "The idea of bringing back big mammals is interesting, but when you get down to the nuts and bolts, there's a lot of questions," say some biologists. For example, elephants could destroy what little forest and grassland Europe has left. The beavers of Tierra del Fuego provide a cautionary tale. When a failed commercial fur farm released its few remaining beavers into the wild 60 years ago, the population exploded, and they are still revenging the local people. Is this Britain's future? Supporters say no, the beaver will fit right in. Destroying nature is not a job for the mild. The word "roamed" (Line 3, Para. 1) most probably means ______.

How does your reading proceed? Clearly you try to comprehend

Culture shock might be called an occupational disease of people who have been suddenly transplanted abroad. Like most ailments, it has its own 1 and cure. Culture shock is 2 by the anxiety that results from losing all our familiar signs and symbols of social intercourse. Those signs or cues include the thousand and one 3 in which we orient ourselves to the 4 of daily life: when to shake hands and what to say when we meet people, when and how to give tips, how to 5 purchases, when to accept and when to refuse invitations, when to take statement seriously and when not. These cues, 6 may be words, gestures, facial 7 customs, or norms, are 8 by all of us in the course of growing up and are as much a 9 of our culture as the language we speak or the beliefs we accept. All of us 10 for our peace of mind and our efficiency on hundreds of these cues, 11 of which we do not carry on the 12 of conscious awareness. Now when an individual 13 a strange culture, all or most of these familiar cues are removed. He or she is like a fish out of water. No matter how broad-minded or 14 of goodwill you may be, a series of props have been 15 under you, followed by a feeling of frustration and 16 . People react to the frustration in much the 17 way. First they reject the environment which causes the 18 . "The ways of the host country are bad because they make us feel bad." When foreigners in a strange land get together to 19 about the host country and its people, you can be sure they are 20 from culture shock.

Americans don't like to lose wars. Of course

Directions: Write a letter to apply for a part-time job in a local English training school

A. Asking for parental involvement B. Setting up small groups C

"There is one and only one social responsibility of business," wrote Milton Friedman, a Nobel prize-winning economist, "That is, to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits." But even if you accept Friedman's premise and regard corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies as a waste of shareholders' money, things may not be absolutely clear-cut. New research suggests that CSR may create monetary value for companies—at least when they are prosecuted for corruption. The largest firms in America and Britain together spend more than $15 billion a year on CSR, according to an estimate by EPG, a consulting firm. This could add value to their businesses in three ways. First, consumers may take CSR spending as a "signal" that a company's products are of high quality. Second, customers may be willing to buy a company's products as an indirect way to donate to the good causes it helps. And third, through a more diffuse "halo effect," whereby its good deeds earn it greater consideration from consumers and others. Previous studies on CSR have had trouble differentiating these effects because consumers can be affected by all three. A recent study attempts to separate them by looking at bribery prosecutions under America's Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). It argues that since prosecutors do not consume a company's products as part of their investigations, they could be influenced only by the halo effect. The study found that, among prosecuted firms, those with the most comprehensive CSR programmes tended to get more lenient penalties. Their analysis ruled out the possibility that it was firms' political influence, rather than their CSR stand, that accounted for the leniency: Companies that contributed more to political campaigns did not receive lower fines. In all, the study concludes that whereas prosecutors should only evaluate a case based on its merits, they do seem to be influenced by a company's record in CSR. "We estimate that either eliminating a substantial labour-rights concern, such as child labour, or increasing corporate giving by about 20% results in fines that generally are 40% lower than the typical punishment for bribing foreign officials," says one researcher. Researchers admit that their study does not answer the question of how much businesses ought to spend on CSR. Nor does it reveal how much companies are banking on the halo effect, rather than the other possible benefits, when they decide their do-gooding policies. But at least they have demonstrated that when companies get into trouble with the law, evidence of good character can win them a less costly punishment. The author views Milton Friedman's statement about CSR with ______.

Directions: You are preparing for an English test and are in need of some reference books

Mobile phones should carry a label if they proved to be a dangerous source of radiation

The exterior of this Moscow restaurant features a Memphis-inspired pattern

Directions: Suppose you are a college student and you intend to work part time during your vacatio

In the past several years

As a rule, women behave better than men

Directions: A. Title: On Tourism in Colleges B. Word limit: 160-200 words C

If sustainable competitive advantage depends on work force skills, American firms have a problem. Human resource management is not traditionally seen as 21 to the competitive survival of the firm in the United States. Labor is simply another factor of production to be hired or 22 at the lowest possible cost—much 23 one buys raw materials or equipment. The lack of importance 24 to human resource management can be seen in the corporation hierarchy. In an American firm the chief financial officer is almost always second 25 command. The 26 of head of human resource managements is usually a specialized job, off at the edge of the corporate hierarchy. The executive who 27 it is never consulted on major strategic decisions and has no chance to 28 to Chief Executive Officer (CEO). 29 , in Japan the head of human resource management is central—usually the second most important executive, after the CEO, in the firm's ______. As a 30 , problems 31 when new breakthrough technologies arrive. If American workers, for example, take much longer to learn 32 to operate new flexible manufacturing stations than workers in Germany (as they do), the effective cost of those stations is 33 in Germany than it is in the United Stated. More time is required before equipment is up and running at capacity, and the need for 34 retraining 35 costs and creates bottlenecks that 36 the speed with 37 new equipment can be employed. The result is a slower pace of technological 38 . And in the end the skills of the bottom half of the population 39 the wages of the top half. If the bottom half can't effectively staff the processes that have to be operated, the management and professional jobs that go with these processes will disappear.

A new report by the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank

It was a ruling that had consumers seething with anger and many a free trader crying foul. On November 20th the European Court of Justice decided that Tesco, a British supermarket chain, should not be allowed to import jeans made by America's Levi Strauss from outside the European Union and sell them at cut-rate prices without getting permission first from the jeans maker. Ironically, the ruling is based on an EU trademark directive that was designed to protect local, not American, manufacturers from price dumping. The idea is that any brand-owning firm should be allowed to position its goods and segment its markets as it sees fit: Levi's jeans, just like Gucci handbags, must be allowed to be expensive. Levi Strauss persuaded the court that, by selling its jeans cheaply alongside soap powder and bananas, Tesco was destroying the image and so the value of its brands—which could only lead to less innovation and, in the long run, would reduce consumer choice. Consumer groups and Tesco say that Levi's case is specious. The supermarket argues that it was just arbitraging the price differential between Levi's jeans sold in America and Europe—a service performed a million times a day in financial markets, and one that has led to real benefits for consumers. Tesco has been selling some 15,000 pairs of Levi's jeans a week, for about half the price they command in specialist stores approved by Levi Strauss. Christine Cross, Tesco's head of global non-food sourcing, says the ruling risks "creating a Fortress Europe with a vengeance". The debate will rage on, and has implications well beyond casual clothes (Levi Strauss was joined in its lawsuit by Zino Davidoff, a perfume maker). The question at its heart is not whether brands need to control how they are sold to protect their image, but whether it is the job of the courts to help them do this. Gucci, an Italian clothes label whose image was being destroyed by loose licensing and over-exposure in discount stores, saved itself not by resorting to the courts but by ending contracts with third-party suppliers, controlling its distribution better and opening its own stores. It is now hard to find cut-price Gucci anywhere. Brand experts argue that Levi Strauss, which has been losing market share to hipper rivals such as Diesel, is no longer strong enough to command premium prices. Left to market forces, so-so brands such as Levi's might well. fade away and be replaced by fresher labels. With the courts protecting its prices, Levi Strauss may hang on for longer. But no court can help to make it a great brand again. Which of the following is not true according to Paragraph 1?

Vladimir Putin is facing a dilemma: how can Russia's president fulfil his campaign promises to increase social spending, especially when they were directed toward his political base, while also ensuring that the country's deficit does not become unsustainable? He is keen to prolong the past decade's economic stability, which was his biggest electoral asset. If the direction of the country's pension system is any indication, Mr. Putin and his advisers are choosing short-term social and political stability at the expense of long-term growth and investment. On October 1st Dmitry Medvedev, the prime minister and former president, signed a long-expected strategy for reforming the pension system that would, among other things, nearly eliminate the funded component, in which workers pay into a personal investment account they claim upon retirement. The money freed up from this plan is supposed to plug the $50 billion hole in the pay-as-you-go system. The only way forward, argue nearly all experts, is to raise Russia's low pension age of 55 for women and 60 for men. Both the IMF and the members of Strategy 2020, an expert group formed by the Russian government, call for a gradual increase of the pension age to 63. The move is thought to be politically dangerous, if not impossible. Mr. Putin has increasingly relied on the support of the rural population and industrial workers, as well as the 40% or so of the electorate who are elderly. One of Mr. Putin's many pre-election promises, now turned into official directives, was to keep the pension age intact. That order left the government with few options. Mr. Medvedev and his team were thus handed an unenviable task. No one disputes that today's pension system, created in 2002, needs some kind of reform. Part of the problem is demography. Declining birth rates in the 1980s and 1990s have left Russia with too few workers to support those in retirement; birth rates have stabilised in recent years but too late to affect the looming pension crisis. Today there are 100 workers for every 87 pensioners, says Evsey Gurvich of the Economic Expert Group, who led the Strategy 2020 pension task-force; by 2020, that figure will be 100 workers for 100 pensioners. Mr. Gurvich warns of a creeping "gerontocracy". He predicts a deepening of "paternalistic thinking", in which citizens regard the state, and not themselves, as the source of their pensions. Perhaps that's exactly what the Kremlin has in mind. The problem President Putin is facing lies in ______.

In a world where bad news has become everyday news, people are turning to an ancient technique to deal with stress: meditation. At meditation centers, prayer groups and yoga studios around the United States, more and more are finding peace of mind by being quiet. Some use meditation to help deal with life changes; others, to process the painful reality of political and social unrest around the world of the type that has been experienced more recently. Stress from the September 11 terrorist attacks is probably "about 70 percent" of the reason one Chicago man started meditating and practicing yoga with his new wife. He became so emotionally affected that he realized he needed help in managing his stress. The yoga classes he takes begin and end with meditation. This "quiet time" helps him feel a lot more relaxed and gives him more breath control. The fact is, though, that he is not alone. Across the country, many are turning to more meditative exercise as they seek both psychological and physiological relief. In addition to helping people work out their stress, these classes bring people together, in the same way that religious services or other community activities have done in the past. Different schools of meditation teach particular techniques, but they share a common basis—focusing attention on something your mind can return to if you are distracted. This may be the rhythm of breathing, an object such as a candle flame, or a repetitive movement, as in walking or taiji. Regardless of the specific technique or mode that is followed, meditation has well-documented benefits. Medical research indicates that it causes a sharp decrease in metabolic activity, reduced muscle tension, slower breathing, and a shift from faster brainwaves to slower waves, it also reduces high blood pressure. Practitioners are convinced that meditation is good for health because it relaxes the body. For ages, meditation has been a core practice of many groups meeting in their communal or religious centers. However, let's not forget that this is the twenty-first century. So, for those people who are too shy or busy to go to the nearest meditation center, there are Internet sites that offer online guided meditation. One has a variety of meditations from various religious traditions. At another, Jesuit priests post meditations and readings from the Scriptures everyday, and at still another, Buddhist and Hindu practitioners include music and visuals to accompany their offerings. These websites allow anyone with a computer access to meditation at any time. The fact is that whether online, at yoga classes, or at local spiritual centers, more people are turning to the practice of meditation. The increasing popularity of meditation results from people's need for