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SCMP Reporter

Q Are HK companies socially responsible?

Hong Kong companies make a big show about corporate responsibility, but many of them place making a quick buck ahead of their duty to stick to the law and to set a good example to citizens in general.

Financial and telecommunications corporations  think nothing of setting up mobile offices on the busiest of streets. They park their minibuses in drop-off zones for the entire day and much of the evening, engines on.

This increases levels of pollution and congestion on our streets.

Other companies  park illegally every day and set up mobile work stations on crowded, narrow streets.

Often they go off and leave the vehicles unattended.

Not only is this against the law, these vehicles can block access to emergency services and cause unnecessary delay to fire engines and ambulances rushing to answer 999 calls.

Not only are these companies showing a total disregard for the law, they are setting a bad example to other drivers.

Even worse, they are teaching their young staff that it is quite acceptable to ignore regulations and guidelines and to add to the rising levels of pollution, as long as they make another sale or sign up another customer.

These companies are often the first to complain that traffic congestion and air pollution are driving business away from our city and to demand that the government do something about this.

It is high time that all big companies in Hong Kong walk the walk and ensure that their operations are being undertaken with due regard to local regulations and environmental guidelines.

They should be setting a good example to small companies  and citizens, and demonstrating how we can all contribute to a more healthy,  stress-free environment.

Karen Greene, Tsim Sha Tsui

Q Do you think Dr Li Yui-ching was treated fairly?

I was shocked to see the report about Dr Li. But it would not surprise many staff at the University of Hong Kong, because it is usual practice [to have Chinese-language work assessed by English-speaking adjudicators] in many departments here since British colonial rule.

While Dr Li's case has a strong basis for further investigation, the ignorance of senior staff members of the university to this problem shows  that such actions are considered normal and are approved of.  As a staff member of HKU, I can say that Dr Li's case is not the only such one within the university. Many others are silent sufferers and are not coming forward.

Partiality, discrimination (on the basis of language or race), irrationality and double standards are common. I have seen people appointed as assistant professors with just three or four published papers in low-impact journals, while another with better qualifications, with 10 to 15 publications in high-impact journals, is not given the position.

I have also seen a case in which the contract of a staff member with more than 30 publications in international journals was not approved to the level of assistant professor, while another with only about 20 publications in low-quality journals was pushed for promotion to associate professor.

In some cases, ethnicity   is important too.

Academic freedom is scarce in many departments. When a junior member writes a research proposal, it is not unusual for a senior member to put in his name as the principal investigator.

It is  not appropriate to give first authorship of a paper to a senior staff member when a junior member (who was, perhaps, intentionally kept junior) writes the paper while the senior member travels around the world for unnecessary academic conferences and meetings.

Is it appropriate to include someone's name in a proposal or a paper, at the request of your boss, without them making any contribution?

Fairness doesn't exist at HKU.

Hong Kong needs transparency and a strong policy change in its academic institutions. Summative review should be performed by independent bodies. Heads of departments should no longer be allowed to set up private kingdoms.

Since universities are run by public money, it is time for the public to be allowed to investigate their academic freedom and staff review mechanisms. Is it possible to establish an independent body (similar to the Independent Commission Against Corruption) that could receive complaints from staff members?

Name and address supplied

On other matters ...

Depression is much more than a biological illness, although the current 'medical model' likes to view it that way.

From time immemorial, human emotions have been represented by the mind, heart, soul and spirit.  Feelings - especially sublime ones, and perhaps  including those experienced when someone undergoes depression - cannot simply be reduced to excesses or deficits of certain chemicals.

I am in good company when I say this. Noted US psychiatrist Peter Breggin, with his numerous books pointing out the flaws of 'scientific' psychiatry, has clarified that depression is a psycho-spiritual crisis that can be dealt with more effectively and far more safely with psychotherapy than with mind-numbing and brain-damaging psychotropics.

Another good book castigating the psychiatric establishment and its simplistic approach to treating mental and emotional problems is Dr Colin Ross and Alvin Pam's 1995 Pseudoscience in Biological Psychiatry.

It is simply naive to believe depression is a one-dimensional illness or just a biological condition.

Biology is certainly not destiny. As important as it is, it is only as important as psychology or mindset.

As they point out, the brain may play a mediating role in 'mental' illnesses such as depression. The neurotransmitters gone awry may just be the biochemical result of interpersonal problems, social conflicts and psychic difficulties perceived and therefore mediated by the brain.

Biological reductionism, by  depicting the mind as just the brain and being oblivious to psychosocial and spiritual factors in such a multi-factorial illness as depression, certainly does patients a huge disservice.

Benjamin Tang, Diamond Hill



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