Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Cancer In Pajamas: Radio, Podcasts, And The Politics Of Free Time In The Digital Age, Daniel Grjonko

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The podcast, an extremely potent fermentation of the radio which was so central to many of the Frankfurt School thinkers, is an important political subject to consider in light of rekindled social discussions concerning a society straddling the line between fascism and socialism. Especially the political podcast, which has become a pulse of intellectual discussion and historical analysis, promises itself simultaneously as a medium of entertainment, pedagogy, and translation into real-world organizing for a different world, true for both the left and the right. The truth, I propose, is a sinister other experience, one which maintains the status quo …

What Does One Billion Dollars Look Like?: Visualizing Extreme Wealth, William Mahoney Luckman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The word “billion” is a mathematical abstraction related to “big,” but it is difficult to understand the vast difference in value between one million and one billion; even harder to understand the vast difference in purchasing power between one billion dollars, and the average U.S. yearly income. Perhaps most difficult to conceive of is what that purchasing power and huge mass of capital translates to in terms of power. This project blends design, text, facts, and figures into an interactive narrative website that helps the user better understand their position in relation to extreme wealth: https://whatdoesonebilliondollarslooklike.website/

The site incorporates …

A Pearl Ravaged: The Paradox Of Haiti And Its Socioeconomic Origins, Isabel Ishibe Exel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Saint-Domingue was once the most profitable colony of the Caribbean, the so-called pearl of the Antilles. Nowadays, Haiti is known for being the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, a dramatic shift that raises the question of the factors contributing to Haiti's current state, marked by persistent violence, natural disasters, and political instability. Various discourses have framed Haiti as a country doomed for failure. However, relying on binary concepts such as success and failure is counterproductive to a refined analysis. How, then, should we structure this conversation? My ultimate goal for this work is to provide a nuanced analysis of …

Containerization Of Seafarers In The International Shipping Industry: Contemporary Seamanship, Maritime Social Infrastructures, And Mobility Politics Of Global Logistics, Liang Wu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation discusses the mobility politics of container shipping and argues that technological development, political-economic order, and social infrastructure co-produce one another. Containerization, the use of standardized containers to carry cargo across modes of transportation that is said to have revolutionized and globalized international trade since the late 1950s, has served to expand and extend the power of international coalitions of states and corporations to control the movements of commodities (shipments) and labor (seafarers). The advent and development of containerization was driven by a sociotechnical imaginary and international social contract of seamless shipping and cargo flows. In practice, this liberal, …

Migrant Children And Legislation: Integrating Knowledge About Trauma Into Policy, Yolennys E. Albornoz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study seeks to integrate some knowledge about trauma into migration policies in the U.S. regarding children. Migration is not a novel concept; it is a dynamic phenomenon that experiences continuous changes and constantly increases in numbers. Globally, the United States has been the primary destination for foreign migrants for a long time, and most of them are Latinos who cross the U.S. and Mexico border. Here, I explore how children face trauma in their home country, which forces them to migrate. Also, while they migrate and after they have migrated, exposing the three stages of trauma for migrant children. …

Normative Orientations To Housing Activism And The Uneven Path To Nonprofitization In New York City, 1964–1989, Andrew Wilkes

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

What are the distinct contributions of normative orientations (including theological and ideological ones) in the public policy process? While the literature on policy formation in the past three decades has embraced at least some idea that ideology matters, little has focused on whether the content of their specific normative orientations leads groups to contribute to, and engage in, a policy process differently. By examining Paul Sabatier’s advocacy coalition framework in conversation with Rev. Dr. Gayraud Wilmore’s tripartite, theoethical framework of liberation, elevation, and survival, this dissertation contends that the normative commitments of advocacy stakeholders within New York City’s tenant movement …

Collect Cosmic Dust, Make It Into Bright Stars: The Use Of Temporal Data In Regeneration Of Life Space And Time Via A Construction Of The Political-Sociological Theory Of Justice, Yi Wang

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis argues for an argument-counterargument approach to the atypical classics of Franz Kafka and Emily Dickinson. This approach to the literature is useful for a construction of the political-sociological theory of justice, which claims that the state of a just world is each individual’s lifetime moving in a dialectic-of-anti-violence-and-non-violence manner.

Freedom Song: Uncovering A Politics Of Dignity In Black Feminist Thought And Praxis, Abegail M. Dobson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This master's thesis delves into Intersectionality as an organizing framework and critical social theory, emphasizing the significance of Black feminist thought to social justice initiatives that challenge prevailing intersectional violence. The central inquiry of this project is uncovering a Black feminist conceptualization of dignity as articulated in foundational texts. I scrutinize the essence of dignity within Black feminist theory and praxis, particularly addressing the question: How valuable is a "right" when societal experiences consistently undermine one's basic needs and protections required to live a dignified life beyond survival?

Black feminist thought, encompassing praxis, is posited as a profound space for …

Rewiring The Spokes: The Future Of U.S. Bilateralism In Asia, Gian Marc Lombardo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Since the end of WWII, multilateralism has consistently grown as the go-to alliance structure for the United States. Despite this, the U.S. opted to create a series of bilateral alliances after WWII in Asia, dubbed the Hub-and-Spokes system. This alliance system has not only sustained itself, but also continues to fortify itself in the face of a rising threat in Asia. China has increased its assertiveness and has shifted the balance of threat in the region, while also being the primary economic and development option for regional states. This major change in the structure of Asian power has surfaced the …

The Relationship Between “Black Lives Matter” Movement Protests And Police Arrests In New York City, Chicago, And Los Angeles: An Empirical Analysis, Lukas Louwagie

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The summer of 2020 marked a boiling point of protest and frustration at long-criticized police behavior in the United States. The events that summer revealed the “Black Lives Matter” (BLM) movement as something that could not be ignored and was capable of drawing national support and attention across many dividing lines (Mitchell 2020). Today, it seems evident that the BLM movement has had a substantial impact on modern political discourse—yet its impact on police behavior and reform, the primary target of the movement, is murky. Police departments across the nation are pushing back against calls to defund and reform their …

Grand Strategy At The End Of History: Chinese Strategic Thought In The 21st Century And Its Western Perceptions, Daniel A. Rogers

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Too often does the study of grand strategy, especially as it is conducted by academics based in the United States, take on an ethnocentric perspective which would lead American audiences to believe it is their country alone which possesses a coherent grand strategy that seeks to secure the national interest and nothing more. This chauvinistic approach not only leaves the majority of the world out of the conversation of grand strategy, but also results in the characterizing of the strategic approaches of non-Western states as disruptors of the foreign policy goals of the United States. The People’s Republic of China …

Ethnic Tensions In The Western Balkans And The Experience Of Ethnic Minorities, Nadina Resulani

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Western Balkan has experienced a past of ethnic turmoil. From the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo to ethnic tensions in Serbia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia. Understanding that ethnicity itself continues to be a salient factor in Western Balkan, the question remains how Western Balkan states were able to remove themselves from the front light of ethnic tensions considering today these countries are known as being tourist destinations, cultural and academic meccas, and democratic candidates in line to join the European Union. In reviewing and comparing the geopolitical and social environment of three Western Balkan states: Montenegro, …

Does Political Advertising Persuade? A Quantitative Assessment Of The Effects Of Campaign Contact In The Context Of Race, Ethnicity, And Immigrant Origin In New York City Council Primary Elections From 2001 Through 2017, Laura M. Tamman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Through a quantitative analysis of the relationship between New York city council campaigns’ spending and election results between 2001 and 2017, controlling for key factors such as incumbency, I find substantial and statistically significant positive effects for radio advertising on election outcomes. I find small but significant effects for mail, and smaller sized effects for canvassing. My findings underscore the need for further study of the role of ethnic and community media outlets, such as radio, in shaping voter behavior. Moreover, I argue that the fixation of the current persuasion literature on television ads in presidential general elections misses critical …

Misogyny In Contemporary Populist Authoritarianism, Maxine Mannheim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The regression of rights for women and the LGBTQ community, as well as the freedoms of religious and ethnic minorities are coinciding with the global rise in populist authoritarianism. However, the link between misogyny, gendered narratives, and populist authoritarianism remains understudied and requires further elaboration. There can be no full investigation of modern populism, nor the political leaders who utilize it, without an understanding of the gender dynamics that permeate populist and authoritarian politics. I argue that misogyny is interwoven in populist authoritarianism, and that it is a defining characteristic observable in the ways in which leaders manipulate the emotions …

Conservative And Cultural Clashes With Comprehensive Sexuality Education, Bryan Z. Anderson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis analyzes the multifaceted debate over the use of comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) in United States public schools, while also emphasizing the ways in which withholding CSE is a strategy to uphold the white supremacist patriarchy. The work begins by historically framing the evolution of sexuality education through the United States’ history. This leads to the current discourse around CSE and the ways in which it is the optimal support for American youth today. After setting this foundation, the thesis looks at conservative figures and groups who are seeking to prevent public school adoption of CSE standards, as well …

Numbered, Weighed, Divided: Revolution And/As Apocalypse In The Modern Liberal Tradition, Asher J. Wycoff

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A long-standing political-theological critique contends that liberalism lacks the capacity to address theological challenges, and qualitative political challenges more generally. This charge is prevalent in our current age of crises, when the capacity to address such challenges is essential to any political tradition’s self-legitimation. I argue that the liberal tradition, broadly conceived, has long contended with theological challenges, particularly during modern revolutionary periods. Theological discourses, especially eschatological ones, circulate widely in these moments. Modern political actors impute cosmic significance to the events of their present, with a central analogy crystallizing between revolution and apocalypse. Reading major theorists of three modern …

Navigating Through World’S Military Spending Data With Scroll-Event Driven Visualization, Hong Beom Hur

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Catching up with the current geopolitical event is more important than ever these days. Anti-western nations like Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea constantly challenge the world order set by the United States and its close allies. As a result, the world has seen a rise in military spending consecutively for the last several years. This data visualization project aims to provide an easy-to-read summary of military spending data published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute for hotly conflicted regions: East Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

Scroll-event-driven visualization implemented using Scrollama.js and D3.js combines text, map, and data …

The Punitive Laboratory Of Neoliberalism: A Cross-National Examination, Beth A. Fera

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A large body of research has been produced to explain global punitive trends in recent decades. Neoliberalism, an economic philosophy expressed by market deregulation, privatization, and the retrenchment of social supports, has been offered as an explanation for increases in cross-national punitiveness. According to neoliberal penality theory, neoliberalism has shifted principles guiding punishment practices and the treatment of offenders, which has resulted in harsher national responses to crime. However, many tenets of this theory have not yet been tested empirically. Drawing heavily on propositions from neoliberal penality, group-threat, and penal populism literature, this dissertation examines the relationship between economic shifts, …

Understanding The Afghan Diaspora: Exploring The Factors Driving Migration And The Impact Of Migration Policies On Recent Afghan Evacuees Resettling In The United States, Aya H. Mohamed

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Afghanistan has been at war with the West since the late 1900’s, remaining in a state of constant turmoil. During the Cold War (1979), Afghanistan had fought a war with the Soviet Union, known as the Soviet- Afghan War. During this time, Afghanistan was invaded by both the Soviet and US, creating a ground for terrorism and the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan. In order to then eradicate the terrorist regime, the Taliban, the United States went to war with Afghanistan in 2001. The Taliban were suppressed by U.S. forces until August 2021, during which President Biden executed a …

The Relationship Between Democratic Measures, Lgbtiaq* Rights Acceptance, And U.S. Foreign Aid Allocation In The Global South, Jacqueline Biergans

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

U.S. democratization efforts abroad are sometimes framed as motive for U.S. aid allocations to Global South countries. In that regard, Jasbir Puar (2007 and 2013), Cynthia Weber (2016), and Laura J. Shepherd (2006) critique U.S. foreign policy for using LGBTIAQ* rights as an empty rhetoric rather than as benchmark by which to identify and reward countries’ level of democratization in the Global South. However, Claire Apodaga and Michael Stohl (1999) explain that the United States is prioritizing economic and security interests instead, whereas countries receive military support despite their human rights abuses at home. In this thesis, the relationship between …

Power And Authority In Karl Marx, Niccoló Machiavelli And Thomas Hobbes, Ekim Kilic

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The concepts of power and authority have been fundamental to political philosophy and science from the beginning. However, in much recent thinking, power’s central and defining relationship with the state has been called into question. This thesis studies the understanding of power and authority in the works of Niccolò Machiavelli, Thomas Hobbes, and Karl Marx, in the context of the emerging trend around the world today of searching for a new social, economic, and political order. It aims to demonstrate how the works of Marx may open a path to rectify the limitations of the traditional thinking of power and …

The Impact Of Utilitarian Public Policies On Minority Communities: A Comparison Of New York City And New South Wales, Australia., Nicholas Reyes

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this thesis is to highlight and critique the ways in which utilitarianism manifests itself in comparative public policy. While public policy studies tend to focus on national levels, cities, and states can also be major sites of theoretical and policy formulation that are adopted globally. The moral ethics that are involved in public policy are especially important because these policies have a direct impact on society. Utilitarianism encompasses the logic of utility maximization: the ends justify the means and the idea that the moral ethical choice is the one that will produce the greatest good for the …

Finding Autonomy Under The Russian Bear: Explaining Central Asia’S Response To The Invasion Of Ukraine, Ryan Hitch

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Russian invasion of Ukraine was one of the most important geopolitical events of the 21^st century, which will have lasting effects on the international community. While the responses of the United States and Europe to Russia’s invasion have been extensively covered, the response of Central Asia has received relatively less attention. Russia’s extensive investments in multilateral regional organizations and Central Asia’s heavy reliance on Moscow for security and economic assistance should predict that Central Asian states would bandwagon with Russia. However, the region has thus far remained officially neutral towards the war and certain states are openly antagonizing …

Extremism In America: Explaining Variations In Ideologically Motivated Fatal Violence, Celinet Duran

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation uses data from the United States Extremist Crime Database (ECDB) to assess the nature of extremist violence between left-wing, far-right and al-Qaeda and associated movements (AQAM) inspired ideological fatal violence. It extends the empirical literature on extremist violence in three significant ways by: (1) expanding an existing database to provide a comparative component that is both timely and policy-relevant and conveys a more complete picture of the nature of domestic extremism in the U.S.; (2) systematically comparing extremist violence across the left-wing, far-right and AQAM ideologies to better assess the nuances of extremist violence; and (3) applying empirical …

Civil Society Organizations Serving Children In Vietnam: Opportunities And Constraints Working With Government Agencies, Trang P. Kelly

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

When Vietnamese civil society organization (CSO) administrators manage their relationships with government authorities to ensure children receive social services, they operate under Vietnam’s complex political, socioeconomic, and cultural constraints in environments where the Vietnamese government employs soft power to control CSOs and their donors. This study adds to the literature on the nature of CSO in Vietnam. It details the current imbalance of power between state-sponsored organizations (SSOs) and non-SSOs and provides an updated view of how Vietnamese non-SSOs mix social, economic, and political roles as employers and advocates.

Combining a qualitative exploratory and interpretative case study, I address a …

David Versus Goliath: The Power Of Weakness In Asymmetric Warfare—Lessons From History, Nicholas K. Petaludis

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Under what conditions do violent nonstate actors (VNA) succeed against states? Why does David sometimes beat Goliath? Since at least the time of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian Wars, the realist narrative in international relations measures power primarily in relative, coercive, and deterrent terms. Strong states should accordingly face fewer constraints and enjoy more options while pursuing their national interests. Unconventional warfare, and its subsets of terrorism and insurgency, should—given these circumstances, end in VNA failure. Sometimes, however, VNAs find success. By comparing the literature on historical and current case studies, I propose that a set of preconditions and two mechanisms …

Language And Conjuncture In Populist Strategy: Podemos And Contemporary Spanish Political Thought, Francisco J. Fortuño Bernier

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In recent times, emergent political movements have sought to construct a project of political renewal based upon the search for such a new language, renaming and rewording both the political world and their own traditions. One such is the Spanish political party Podemos, whose sudden rise and success has already made it a referent for contemporary radical politics. This group has articulated a political strategy based upon what I call a politico-linguistic conjecture: the idea that an effective political strategy is dependent on finding the right words for the moment, on an appropriate fit between conjuncture and discourse. The production …

The Impact Of Overseas Study Experiences On Chinese Students’ Attitudes Toward The United States, Xufeng Fang

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The extent to which overseas study experiences increase Chinese students’ positive attitude toward the United States has triggered debates because of Chinese government’ overwhelming influence on Chinese students studying overseas, the instability of U.S.-China relations and the especially complex characteristics of Chinese students’ attitudes themselves. I will use value theory, belief system theory, and self-categorization theory to explain the unstable character of these attitudes, and the important roles of values and identity that determine attitudes’ change. After making three key hypotheses based on these theories, this paper conducts a survey on three groups of Chinese students both in China and …

Notes On Insurgent Universality In Ambedkar’S Social And Political Thought: A Critique Of Postcolonial Anti-Universalism, Sitharthan Sriharan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this thesis, we seek to take steps towards problematizing postcolonial theory and its frequent anti-universalism. Towards this end, my initial focus will be some of the productive and problematic aspects of what Getachew and Mantena term the “decolonization of political theory”. Here, we highlight how some comparative political theory scholars have methodologically overemphasized ‘difference’ in their studies of non-western political thought as an overcorrection to Eurocentrism. In supporting this claim, we review literature in comparative political theory, postcolonial theory, and modern South Asian history and historiography in order to demonstrate that a more philosophically robust, but still historically informed, …

The Moral Economy Of Ordinary Belarussians And A Critical Examination And Re-Evaluation Of The 2020 Post-Electoral Uprising, Geoffrey Blank

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study is three studies in one: First, a qualitative study of the moral economy of ordinary Belarussians based on E.P Thompson’s class-based economic conception of moral economy, as applied to complex socio-economic systems by Reinarman (1987). Second, a critical and broad examination and re-evaluation of the August 9, 2020 post-electoral uprising. And third, an examination of both the West’s hostility toward Belarus’ largely state-owned socially-oriented economic model (often considered market socialism) and toward President Lukashenka, and, of the West’s commitment to overthrowing President Lukashenka and Belarus’ largely state-owned socially-oriented economic model, through its sponsorship of color revolution, “democratization,” regime …