[诸葛国际][英研]内部培训教材之写作范例Ⅱ-03

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3Competition or Cooperation? Last week, our department held an English debate on which was more important in the present-day society, cooperation or competition. The affirmative side argued for the priority of cooperation as opposed to competition, whereas the negative side defended the reverse. After a tug-of-war, neither side seemed to gain enough ground. Finally, the affirmative side won, largely thanks to our traditional preference for cooperation. I was neither a contestant nor a referee at that time. If I had been either of them, I would, in support of the negative side, have drummed for the contention that competition is more important than cooperation in the current situation.    To start with, competition is a pervasive necessity that grows out of the modern times. High school students need to compete for entrance into top universities. University students must compete for academic recognition and a bright future. Employees should compete for prospects of promotion and pay raises. If some compete for good things, some others have to compete in order to avoid bad things: failure to pursue further education, inability to graduate with a degree, or loss of hopes to prolong employment. In the context of economic globalization, domestic manufacturers also must compete with their international counterparts. With survival at stake, they will take the initiative to upgrade their products and better their services. Cooperation may also contribute to the improvements, but it may prove ineffective when the interests of the parties involved are at odds, which is often the case in today's society.Moreover, competition is the source of greater dynamic power than cooperation today. Where individualism counts, the pressure from competition can help to tap one's potential. This is best exemplified by athletic sports. By virtue of competition man gets to know his limits. In the course of competition, we aspire to do our best and perfect ourselves. If China is to prosper in the new century, we Chinese people, from intellectuals to the illiterate, must take an active part in the competition and survive all challenges from within and abroad. Competition ensues from the operation and advance of market economy. In the new system, one gets paid by how much he does and how well he does it. With their own interests involved, people naturally do their uttermost to take care of their concerns. In fact, only with the introduction of competitive mechanism can we effectively crash the egalitarianism that has bound the Chinese people for centuries, so that industry is encouraged and laziness is punished. In this connection, cooperation does not seem to work.Of course, the emphasis on the primacy of competition above does not entail the rejection of cooperation. By all means, cooperation is essential when an individual endeavor promises no positive results. There are such occasions in the present society. For instance, the well-known multinational collaboration project on the decoding of human genome engaged a constellation of scientists from different countries and regions. Even in a common laboratory, cooperation in one form or another is highly valued and practiced.To sum up, competition figures more significantly than cooperation in the present-day-society for varied reasons. Meanwhile, it should be borne in mind that its dominant-T role competition is no substitute for cooperation. A rational attitude might be to practice competition on the basis of cooperation and foster cooperation in the course of competition.
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