blog #7 - issue 1 for argument essay

Many international students in Western universities are involved in plagiarism for different reasons.  Some students pretend other’s works as their own assignment for the efficiency.  Some students are not fluent with English; so, since they have a difficulty with their works, they use other’s work without giving credits.  However, the biggest reason why international students are involved in plagiarism is that they have never learned about plagiarism policies.  Since society has become more information-oriented, protecting copyrights has become an important issue.  In this sense, Western countries built up laws for valuing intellectual works in advance; however, Asian countries have not legislated the rules yet or are about to start to establish them.  According to Alvin Toffler, a futurist and the writer of “Revolutionary Wealth”, the process of changing laws is more difficult compared to the advancement of technology and change of society.  To be specific, the laws in Asian countries for the protecting intellectual properties cannot keep up with the change of society.  It makes Asian student be unaccustomed to plagiarism rules in colleges.  On the other hand, some people maintain that a part of international students’ culture affects them to be implicated in plagiarism.  For example, Elizabeth Redden, who is a writer of the article “Cheating across cultures”, argues that international students are involved in plagiarism due to their culture.  She insists that culture of international students, especially Asian culture, considers knowledge and intellectual properties as shared endeavors.  But, it is not concerned with Asian culture itself; it is rather related with underdevelopment of laws for preventing plagiarism.