Digital Commons Network^™

When Does Sexuality-Based Discrimination Motivate Political Participation?, Douglas D. Page

Political Science Faculty Publications

The established consensus in political behavior research is that discrimination by political institutions motivates marginalized groups to vote and protest their conditions. However, existing studies miss a comparison between states with high and low levels of political discrimination, and they miss a comparison between states before and after the development of opportunities for groups to mobilize. In particular, a growing body of research shows that sexual-minority groups face discrimination to varying degrees across Europe. Sexual minorities in states with high levels of discrimination lack the support of other minority-group members, which encourages political participation. The analysis is based on surveys …

Perspective: Arabia Infelix: The War Devouring Yemen, Sheila Carapico

Political Science Faculty Publications

For many centuries, European cartographers labeled the southwest corner of the otherwise mostly desert Arabian Peninsula as Arabia Felix, or “Happy Arabia.” It was a place where towering mountains trapped clouds blown in from the Indian Ocean so that twice-annual monsoon rains blessed terraced slopes and lowland wadis with plentiful crops. Sadly, since fighting engulfed the country in late March 2015, Yemen has never been less felix.

Violent And Non-Violent Strategies Of Counterinsurgency, Anna O. Pechenkina, D. Scott Bennett

Political Science Faculty Publications

Responses to insurgency include both a large-scale societal reform directed at improving the lives of civilians and a direct military response with no additional programs to improve civilian welfare. In this paper, we as, what is the optimal combination of aid and military response from the viewpoint of the state? Using a computational model, we evaluate what mix of these two strategies helps the government defeat an insurgency more quickly. Our model yields that aid may boost a military strategy that avoids civilian casualties, but it may not compensate for a military strategy that targets civilians indiscriminately.

Ethnic Conflict And Gender Inequality In Education: The Case Of Turkey, Ramazan Kilinc, Jody L. Neathery-Castro, Selin Akyuz

Political Science Faculty Publications

Although conflict remains a major obstacle to development in many areas of the world, its impact on education has been rarely studied. This article investigates the relationship between conflict and gender equality, focusing on the schooling of the girls in the conflict-ridden regions of Turkey. Patriarchy is the most important determinant of low educational levels among girls in Southeastern Turkey. However, ethnic conflict exacerbates male-dominant traditions and blocks economic development, reinforcing patriarchal norms and limiting girls’ school attendance. Yet, by provoking political mobilization around a Kurdish identity, ethnic conflict may undermine patriarchy and unintentionally promote girls’ education.

Undergraduate Research Needs: Faculty-Librarian Collaboration To Improve Information Literacy In Policy Papers, Michelle C. Pautz, Heidi Gauder

Political Science Faculty Publications

To improve the quality of semester-long policy projects of upper-division political science students, a faculty member and research librarian collaborated to reframe the assignment in hopes of improving students’ research skills and information literacy, revising the traditional one-way model of faculty sending students to the library to get information. The outcomes over the course of two semesters have been promising. Citations in two sets of student papers showed a remarkable increase in the number and quality of sources used. This suggests that when faculty work with librarians throughout the semester, such collaboration can improve students’ information literacy and thus their …

Research Offers Tough Love To Improve Human Rights Practices, Joel Pruce

Political Science Faculty Publications

We know what it means to practice a skill such as juggling or dancing, but what does it mean to "practice" human rights?

Contributions to OpenGlobalRights (OGR), since its inception, have gravitated around critique of human rights practices by focusing on advocacy and activism, cultivating debates that address the contemporary dilemmas facing human rights movements worldwide. The launch of OGR four years ago is a symptom of what I’ve referred to elsewhere as a “practice turn” in the scholarly field of human rights—one that takes human rights practice as its subject, forges space for scholar-practitioner collaboration and communication, and focuses …

Ethnic Violence, Local Security And Return Migration: Enclave Communities In Kosovo, Sandra F. Joireman

Political Science Faculty Publications

Forced migration has become commonplace in the international political landscape. In 2015, 60 million people were displaced by violence, more than ever before recorded (UNHCR, 2015). While we know that violence leads to displacement, we know little about return migration after conflict – who comes back and where they settle. This article seeks to engage and supplement the literature on return migration after conflict, advocating for a broader understanding of the security choices made by displaced people. Emphasized here is the importance of a local understanding of safety and the role played by enclave communities in providing a secure context …

Bargaining Theory, Civil War Outcomes, And War Recurrence: Assessing The Results Of Empirical Tests Of The Theory, Caroline A. Hartzell

Political Science Faculty Publications

Once ended, a significant number of civil wars recur. One influential empirical international relations theory on which scholars have drawn in an effort to provide an explanation for this phenomenon is the bargaining model of war. Devised initially for the study of interstate war, the theory posits that bargaining problems may prevent belligerents from reaching a deal that enables them to avoid a costly war. Bargaining problems also have been identified as contributing to the recurrence of armed intrastate conflict. Working within the framework of bargaining theory, a number of scholars have claimed that the most effective way to inhibit …

Courts And Executives, Jeffrey L. Yates, Scott S. Boddery

Political Science Faculty Publications

William Howard Taft was both our twenty-seventh president and the tenth Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court -- the only person to have ever held both high positions in our country. He once famously commented that "presidents may come and go, but the Supreme Court goes on forever" (Pringle 1998). His remark reminds us that presidents serve only four-year terms (and are now limited to two of them), but justices of the Supreme court are appointed for life and leave a legacy of precedent-setting cases after departing the High Court. Of course, presidents also leave a legacy of important …

How To Merge Courses Via Skype™? Lessons From An International Blended Learning Project, Yasemin Akbaba, Filiz Başkan

Political Science Faculty Publications

This study reports on an international project in which students taking the course Contemporary Issues in Turkish Politics in spring 2011 and fall 2011 at two institutions of higher education, ‘Gettysburg College’ in the United States and ‘Izmir University of Economics’ in Turkey, worked together in virtual learning environments to complete various tasks as part of their course work. The project employed a blend of traditional and technology-based teaching methods in order to introduce a technology like Skype in a bi-national learning environment in Turkey. Students collaborated and interacted with their international counterparts in two different virtual contexts. First, classrooms …

Liberal-Democratic States Should Privilege Parental Efforts To Instill Identities And Values, Andrew M. Robinson

Political Science Faculty Publications

Liberal-democratic states’ commitments to equality and personal autonomy have always proven problematic with respect to state regulation of relations between parents and children. In the parental authority literature positions have varied from invoking children’s interests to argue for limitations on parental efforts to instill identities and values to invoking parental rights to justify state privileging of such efforts.

This article argues that liberal-democratic states should privilege parental efforts to raise their children to share their identities and values. Its approach is distinctive in two ways: i) it engages in interdisciplinary reflection upon selected findings in psychological literature on immigrant youth, …

Why Did You Leave So Soon, My Friend, Ali Abdullatif Ahmida

Political Science Faculty Publications

Eulogy for Muhammad Faqih Salih (1953-2017), Libyan modernist poet, by his friend, Professor Ali Abdullatif Ahmida.

Wind-Powered Log Cabins And Democratic Hope, James H. Read

Political Science Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Policy Spillover And Gun Migration: The Interstate Dynamics Of State Gun Control Policies, Michael Coates, Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz

Political Science Faculty Publications

Objective

In this article, we examine state policy spillover by examining how differences between state gun control policies affect the migration of guns between states with lax regulatory environments for gun purchasing and licensing to states with relatively strict regulatory environments.

Method

We test our hypothesis using data from 2007 to 2013 from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms on the presence of criminal guns and from the Brady Campaign on state gun control laws.

Results

Our results suggest that a large proportion of criminal guns in states with strict gun control laws were originally purchased in states with …

Crime And Partisanship : How Party Id Muddles Reality, Perception And Policy Attitudes On Crime And Guns, Shanna Pearson-Merkowitz, Joshua J. Dyck

Political Science Faculty Publications

Objective

In this article we theorize that partisanship is such a strong filter of information that it can affect how individuals make sense of their lived environment and how the geographic experience informs policy attitudes. As a result, although “independents” tend to be less politically knowledgeable and have less developed policy opinions, their policy attitudes on gun control are more informed by their lived experience than partisans.

Methods

We use data from an original survey of American adults about crime and gun control linked to crime statistics from the FBI.

Results

We find that stronger partisanship leads to resistance to …

International Norms And Foreign Policy, Vaughn P. Shannon

Political Science Faculty Publications

International norms exist as constraints on foreign policy, yet norms are also the product of the foreign policies of states and other actors. Research has demonstrated how norms restrain foreign policy choice and behavior, and even alter state conceptions of national interests. Other studies point to the weakness of norms in the face of national interests and state power. Others note that the meaning of norms and their obligations are often contested, leading to problems of norm violation and norm enforcement. As social constructions, an important consideration is how and when foreign policy promotes norms and norm diffusion in the …

What Does Human Rights Look Like? The Visual Culture Of Aid, Advocacy, And Activism, Joel R. Pruce

Political Science Faculty Publications

We live in a highly complex and evolving world that requires a fuller and deeper understanding of how modern technological tools, ideas, practices, and institutions interact, and how different societies adjust themselves to emerging realities of the digital age. This book conveys such issues with a fresh perspective and in a systematic and coherent way. While many studies have explained in depth the change in the aftermath of the unrests and uprisings throughout the world, they rarely mentioned the need for constructing new human rights norms and standards. This edited collection provides a balanced conceptual framework to demonstrate not only …

Introduction: Symposium On The Social Practice Of Human Rights, Richard K. Ghere

Political Science Faculty Publications

This volume of Public Integrity presents a symposium of five articles related to human rights that (a) introduce readers to the general origin and nature of human rights conversation, (b) characterize how these norms are conveyed in the current digital age, or (c) depict how local governments and nonprofit agencies confront matters of human rights. Nonetheless, in publishing this symposium, PI “pushes the envelope” in asserting that human rights questions legitimately qualify as matters germane to the study and practice of public administration. Readers could, after all, maintain that, notwithstanding the aspirational appeal of human rights, international norms fall well …

A Tale Of Two Inaugural Addresses, James H. Read

Political Science Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Living With Others: Fostering Radical Cosmopolitanism Through Citizenship Politics In Berlin, Feyzi Baban, Kim Rygiel

Political Science Faculty Publications

A growing refugee and migration crisis has imploded on European shores, immobilizing E.U. countries and fuelling a rise in far-right parties. Against this backdrop, this paper investigates the question of how to foster pluralism and a cosmopolitan desire for living with others who are newcomers. It does so by investigating community-based, citizen-led initiatives that open communities to newcomers, such as refugees and migrants, and foster cultural pluralism in ways that transform understandings of who is a citizen and belongs to the community. This study focuses on initiatives which seek to build solidarity and social relations with newcomers, but in ways …

Theory, Data, And Deterrence: A Response To Kenwick, Vasquez, And Powers, Brett Ashley Leeds, Jesse C. Johnson

Political Science Faculty Publications

Kenwick, Vasquez, and Powers question whether empirical evidence supports the claim that defense pacts deter conflict as our prior research has concluded. We review the theoretical argument for why defense pacts should deter conflict and consider the challenges inherent in evaluating deterrence using observational data. We then consider whether the research design choices of Kenwick et al. improve upon our research design. We demonstrate that claims that defense pacts deter conflict are robust to many of these changes in research design, and we argue that the consequential difference, while perhaps appropriate for testing the Steps-to-War argument, is not appropriate for …

La Incidencia De Las Pandillas En Los Barrios Salvadoreños Y Su Efecto En La Legitimidad Política, Abby Córdova

Political Science Faculty Publications

Este artículo explora cómo la incidencia de las pandillas en los barrios salvadoreños erosiona la confianza en el gobierno nacional. Los resultados muestran que los niveles de confianza en el gobierno nacional varían de un barrio a otro, dependiendo de la vulnerabilidad de sus habitantes a la inseguridad generada por las pandillas. Se demuestra que, en barrios asediados por las pandillas, víctimas y no víctimas del crimen muestran niveles similares y bajos de confianza en el gobierno nacional.

This article explores how the incidence of gangs in Salvadoran neighborhoods erodes trust in the national government. The results show that levels …

Hitting The "Bullseye" In Supreme Court Coverage: News Quality In The Court's 2014 Term, Michael A. Zilis, Justin Wedeking, Alexander Denison

Political Science Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Review Of Practicing Democracy: Popular Politics In The United States From The Constitution To The Civil War Ed Bydaniel Peart And Adam I. P. Smith, James H. Read

Political Science Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Kwazakhele After Twenty Years Of Democracy: The Contradictory Development Of Political Pluralism And Political Alienation, Gary Prevost, Janet Cherry

Political Science Faculty Publications

The article explores political participation and democratic consolidation in South Africa 20 years after the end of apartheid. It does so through the lens of the residents of Kwazakhele, a black township in Nelson Mandela Bay in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Two surveys conducted in the month following the May 2014 elections provide the basis for analysing the political attitudes and expectations of older residents and comparing them with those of younger residents of the 'born free' generation. The findings are that while there is a high level of participation by older residents, there is a significant …

Stand Your Ground Laws, Gregory Neddenriep, Eron Mccormick

Political Science Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Chile's Elites Face Demands For Reform, Jennifer Pribble

Political Science Faculty Publications

An estimated one million Chileans took to the streets in August 2016 to demand reform of the country’s privatized pension system, calling for an end to individualized retirement savings accounts, which were created in 1981 during General Augusto Pinochet’s military dictatorship. The mobilization, involving around 5 percent of the country’s population, was the largest since Chile’s return to democracy in 1990. Demonstrations of growing discontent have become common in Chile of late. The pension protests came in the wake of more than five years of student mobilization aimed at forcing a reform of the Pinochet-era education system.

What accounts for …

Social Policies And Center-Right Governments In Argentina And Chile, Sara Niedzwiecki, Jennifer Pribble

Political Science Faculty Publications

Latin America’s “left turn” expanded cash transfers and public services, contributing to lower poverty and inequality. Recently, right-leaning candidates and parties have begun to win back seats in the legislature, and in some cases have captured the executive branch. This shift has sparked debate about the future of Latin America’s welfare states. In this paper we analyze social policy reforms enacted by two recent right-leaning governments: Sebastián Piñera in Chile (2010-2014) and Mauricio Macri in Argentina (2015—). Contrary to neoliberal adjustment policies of the past, we find that neither Macri nor Piñera engaged in privatization or deep spending cuts. Instead, …

Protecting Future Rights For Future Citizens: Children’S Property Rights In Fragile Environments, Sandra F. Joireman

Political Science Faculty Publications

The property rights of children is an understudied area that straddles the development/humanitarian divide. Access to assets is important to the livelihood choices and economic well-being of adults. Yet, adults’ ability to claim property can be significantly impaired by humanitarian emergencies that occurred in their youth. We typically do not think of children as economic actors because of their age; their property rights are future rights not yet realized. This paper addresses the future rights to property held by children and examines how fragile environments, characterized by conflict, displacement and disease, can undermine their ability to claim those rights when …

Politica Y Efectividad De Las Institutciones Municipales En Chile, Jennifer Pribble

Political Science Faculty Publications

Uno de los hallazgos centrales en la obra de Valenzuela (1977) sobre política chilena a nivel local, es que el cargo municipal a menudo constituía el primer escalón hacia la elección en uno de mayor prestigio a nivel nacional, como diputado o senador. Una mirada a la política chilena posterior a 1970 sugiere que esta tendencia es menos común en la actualidad. A pesar del poder relativo y la relevancia de los alcaldes, especialmente en municipalidades urbanas de bajos ingresos, solo un puñado de individuos ha seguido una carrera en la política a nivel nacional². Aun así, muchos …