Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The 2018 Mid-Term Election: Estimated Voter Participation Rates By Race And Age In Arizona, Florida, Georgia And Texas, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: The razor thin margins separating the Democratic and Republican candidates for senator and governor in Florida; in the Georgia governor’s race; in the senatorial election in Arizona; and the strong showing by Beto O’Rourke in the senatorial race in Texas, mask the extraordinary problems faced by the Democratic Party as it turns to the presidential election scheduled for November 2020.

Methods: This study highlights these problems by examining the turnout rates by race/ethnicity and age in Arizona, Florida, Georgia and Texas using 2017 IPUMS data with The New York Times and CNN Exit polls for each state.

Results: In …

The Intentional De-Cohesion In Deportability, Talha Issevenler

Publications and Research

A critical exploration of loss or decohesion of political agency in deportability.

Research Note: Have Puerto Ricans Experienced Increased Voter Registration Rates In Florida Since The November 2016 Presidential Election?, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

This research note analyzes the demographic change of Puerto Ricans and Hispanics in Florida combined with voter registration rates using the Florida Department of State Voter Registration Reports from July 2018. Despite both populations growing in selected counties, which in turn has increased the voter registration rates for Hispanics in the State, there is no conclusive evidence that voter registration rates among Puerto RIcans experienced a significant rise between 2016 and 2018.

Race And A Southern Governorship. Can Stacy Abrams Make History In Georgia? An Examination Of Georgia Voter Registration Lists, Voting Participation Rates, Race, And Age, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: The nomination by Democratic voters of Stacy Abrams, an African-American woman, to run for governor of Georgia puts the state in the front lines of a possible new approach to elections by progressive Democrats across the nation. She will face the current Secretary of State, Brian Kemp who was nominated by Republican voters after using the same anti-immigrant dog whistle strategy adopted by his mentor in the White House who supported his candidacy.

Methods: All tables on registered voters in Georgia were derived from the Georgia Secretary of State, Voter Registration Statistics, Active Voters by Race and Gender as …

Can Beto O'Rourke Defeat Ted Cruz In The November 2018 Texas Senatorial Race? Race, Age, Voter Registration And Participation Rates In The Lone Star State, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report studies the voter registration rates in face of the upcoming Texas Senatorial elections in November 2018.

Methods: Using the latest voter registration data by race and party in Texas and the Population Estimates of the Census Bureau, this report analyzes demographic change in the state and its relationship with the presidential elections of 2016.

Results: The Texas senatorial race between Ted Cruz and Beto O’Rourke will be decided by voter participation rates of both Republican and Democratic constituencies. Unfortunately, for O’Rourke young people between 18 and 24 years of age, African-Americans, and especially Latinos, have the lowest …

The Politics Of Race And The Florida Gubernatorial Election Of November 2018, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report studies the voter registration rates in face of the new Florida Gubernatorial elections in November 2018.

Methods:Using the latest voter registration data by race and party in Florida of July 30, 2018, this report provides an accurate statistical profile of the actual registered electorate. It also utilizes the U.S. Census Bureau’s data on the presidential election of 2016 and the November 2014 mid-term election, to indicate voter participation and voting rates by race and age.

Results: While nearly 64% of eligible non-Hispanic white voters went to the polls and supported the Republican candidate for president in 2016 …

Insecure Hegemony: The Cultural Construction Of 'Righteous Retaliation' In The Hunt For Osama Bin Laden, Marisa Tramontano

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the American “authorized discourse” about the hunt for and killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden to better understand it as an episode in American cultural hegemony maintenance. Through a structural hermeneutic analysis of presidential speeches and widely-circulated national strategy documents, high distribution news coverage, and entertainment media, alongside one-on-one interviews and focus groups, I illuminate the symbolic mechanics by which the death of Osama bin Laden was constructed as righteous and legitimate retaliatory violence in response to the unprompted, offensive violence of the 9/11 attacks.

Drawing on an array of theoretical approaches including classical sociologists Karl …

The Politics Of Service: Affectivity, Social Relations, And The Power Of Tipping In The Restaurant Industry, Jacqueline A. Ross

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The #MeToo movement and the growing spotlight on sexual harassment and misconduct has increasingly brought industries and individuals into the public eye. The restaurant industry is one such industry to receive this spotlight. While most of the coverage has stemmed from celebrities, the misconduct of celebrity chefs has been paralleled by the stories of servers and their customers. The NY Times published several articles on harassment in the restaurant industry and some specifically focusing on the abuses that tipped workers face. Often these workers were women. When asked about experiences of harassment, responses were often that servers felt that they …

Quasi-Experimental Comparison Design For Evaluating The Mayor’S Action Plan For Neighborhood Safety. Map Evaluation Update Number 1., Sheyla A. Delgado, Wogod Alawlaqi, Richard A. Espinobarros, Laila Alsabahi, Anjelica Camacho, Jeffrey A. Butts

Publications and Research

This is the first of six updates presenting interim findings from the evaluation of the NYC Mayor’s Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety (MAP). As part of an evaluation of the New York City Mayor’s Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety (MAP), the John Jay College Research and Evaluation Center created methods to assemble various outcome measures about participating NYCHA MAP developments. The team also utilized statistical procedures to select a matched comparison group of NYCHA housing developments not participating in MAP. Differences in outcomes between the 17 MAP and 17 non-MAP housing developments will serve as the statistical basis for estimating …

Gun Violence Is Not An “Inner City” Problem, Jeffrey A. Butts

Publications and Research

Policy debates about gun violence often focus on cities. This data bit showed how 33 states in the U.S. compare regarding gun violence rates, demonstrated how gun violence rates are not an issue exclusive to cities, and tested whether states conform to the conventional narrative of "urban gun violence."

Facebook As A Social Outreach And Advocacy Tool In Intersex/Dsd Groups, Emelie J. Ali Ms

Publications and Research

My project includes a netnography of a Facebook intersex group called Families and Friends of Intersex People. I observed the group’s forms of communication within the group and which topics they discussed. It appears one of the major concerns the group has is the use of nonconsensual, sex assignment surgery on infants to “correct” their body to match a gender identity. I have also discovered a link between being intersex and affiliated with the LGBT+ community. Since the 20th century, intersex people have been stigmatized due to their assumed ability to engage in sexual, same-sex relations. I have concluded that …

Due Process And The Right To Legal Counsel For Unaccompanied Minors, Marielos G. Ramos

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Unaccompanied minors arriving to the United States fleeing violence and seeking protection are apprehended, detained in facilities, and placed in removal proceedings in accordance with U.S. immigration laws. Like adults, these children have to appear in immigration court to fight deportation and must apply for any form of legal relief for which they may be eligible. However, removal proceedings work as a civil and not a criminal process, and immigration laws have established that while noncitizens have the right to an attorney, they are not entitled to legal counsel at the government’s expense. This thesis examines how the denial of …

Progressive Commemoration: Public Statues Of Historical Women In Urban American Cities, Melanie D. Chin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Women who made notable accomplishments are underrepresented in commemoration. Some American cities have brought women to the forefront of becoming visible through commemoration in statues. This thesis compares the commemoration of historical women in four different American cities. Stakeholders hold the key to implementing and changing public policy to increase the visibility of women and people of color in public monuments. Cities which lack representation of women and people of color may learn from and follow the efforts of a leading city to achieve lasting and effective change in representing those who historically been underrepresented.

Persistence Of Cultural Heritage In A Multicultural Context: Examining Factors That Shaped Voting Preferences In The 2016 Election, Anna M. Schwartz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The prevailing discourse about the myth of the “melting pot” of American culture implies that heritage cultures are eliminated in favor of a homogenous “American” norm. However, this myth belies the persistence of our cultural heritage in forming our attitudes, morals, and habitual patterns of thought, each of which shape how we participate in our democracy through voting. By contextualizing voting predictors such as authoritarianism, social dominance, and sexism in developmental and ecological theories, this dissertation shows how they are shaped by culture and transmitted through consumption of media and interaction with members of one’s community and family. In an …

Black Business As Activism: Ebony Magazine And The Civil Rights Movement, Seon Britton

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the fight for justice, equality, and true liberation, African American organizations and institutions have often acted as a voice for the African American community at large focusing on common issues and concerns. With the civil rights movement being broadcast across the world, there was no better time for African American community and civil rights organizations to take a role within the movement in combatting the oppression, racism, and discrimination of white supremacy. Often left out of this history of the civil rights movement is an analysis of black-owned private businesses, also giving shape to the African American community. Black …

Venezuela: Oil And Madness. Politics, Propaganda, And Realities Of The Chavista Era, Alvaro E. De Prat

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis is an interdisciplinary exploration of Venezuela’s political paradoxes and their consequences during the Chavista years. On a concrete level, in this work I propose how the manner in which Hugo Chávez implemented his at first apparently benign redistributive politics in fact precipitated the country's current humanitarian crisis and what I will argue are the times of starkest inequality in modern Venezuelan history. Integral to this, although on a more philosophical level, here I also offer a theory of how and why Chávez’s representations might have been so misinterpreted.

The list of eminent political thinkers who have vouched for …

Weaponization Of Data For Governmentality, Juliana Son

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Who is a citizen? Who is a threat to public safety? Who is worthy of protection? What it means to be a valued body in the United States has been written into code, where the state and corporations have embraced an algorithmic approach to national security. Algorithms, previously praised for their neutrality, have been taking a neoliberal turn.

This thesis will examine how data is used by the state as a governance practice, specifically looking at how such practices have left certain communities more precarious and vulnerable than others. My aim is to show how the weaponization of data is …

Out Of The Shadows: Women Of The Fmln Guerrilla Army In El Salvador’S Civil War, 1979–1992, Erica Gonzalez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Over the course of a century, revolutionary movements have emerged every few years across the region of Central America, movements that fought for overturning dictatorships and confronting socio-economic inequalities. Women experience higher levels of poverty, human rights violations and discrimination due to gender inequalities. Representing 30% of the FMLN guerrilla army, women in El Salvador took a quantum leap into one of the most horrific and violent armed conflicts in the history of the country (Montgomery 123). Theorists have sought to explain why women became involved in the war. Experts of insurgent collective action agree that women's participation played a …

"Homosexuals Are Revolting": Stonewall, 1969, Erin Siodmak

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Exploring The Roots Of Chronic Underdevelopment: The Colonial Encomienda And Resguardo And Their Legacy To Modern Colombia, Pedro Bossio

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Colombian society has been historically marked by socioeconomic inequality, restricted social mobility, and institutional weakness. In order to understand the reasons for the country´s continuous struggle to achieve inclusive economic progress and stability since its independence from Spain in 1819, it is necessary to understand its colonial history. Central to this were the two most important colonial economic institutions, the encomienda and the resguardo, both designed for the exploitation of unfree Indian labor. Even when these were slowly replaced by more modern haciendas worked by free farm workers, the economic and political life of the country continued to be …

Flap Of A Butterfly's Wings, Gary E. Rotter Ii

Dissertations and Theses

The goal of this thesis is to draw attention to the often overlooked work that is done by activists and their networks when it comes to influencing international policy and law. The case study looks at the “Comfort Women” issue, an unresolved conflict from when the Japanese Imperial Army forced women from its colonies into sexual slavery during World War II. It is a fiercely debated topic throughout Asia, specifically between South Korea and Japan. Here I argue that not only do non-state actors have great influence over the debate and direction this issue takes in international forums, but that …

Symptomatic Leadership In Business Instruction: How To Finally Teach Diversity And Inclusion For Lasting Change, Linda L. Ridley

Publications and Research

Are business faculty complicit in mythologizing business concepts by ignoring historical precedence?

The refusal to examine in totality the history of discrimination and racism allows us to perpetuate a mythology of white supremacy that is enhanced through impotent diversity programs repeated throughout corporate America. This paper examines the importance of demythologizing the business curriculum through symptomatic thinking, which allows faculty and students to untangle the quagmire of diversity and inclusion in corporate America. Students are thereby equipped with tools for behavior transformation in the workplace that uses a symptomatic, rather than symbolic approach, to decision making and problem solving.

Recent Futures: Classical Antiquity As Biopolitical Tool, Despina Lalaki

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Feminism After May '68, Despina Lalaki

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Introduction: For Better Or For Worse? Relational Landscapes In The Time Of Same-Sex Marriage, Michael W. Yarbrough

Publications and Research

As same-sex marriage has become a legal reality in a rapidly growing list of countries, the time has come to assess what this means for families and relationships on the ground. Many scholars have already begun to examine how marriage is helping some same-sex couples, but in this introduction I call for a broader and more critical research agenda. In particular, I argue that same-sex marriage crystallizes a key tension surrounding families and relationships in many contemporary societies. On the one hand, strict family norms are relaxing in many places, allowing more people to form more diverse types of caring …