Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Teaching Chinese Politics In The “New Cold War”: A Survey Of Faculty, Sara A. Newland

Government: Faculty Publications

How have worsening US-China relations affected faculty teaching Chinese politics in the US? This paper presents results from a 2022 survey of political science faculty. While student interest in Chinese politics remains high, faculty report a range of new challenges arising from increasingly nationalistic sentiments among both Chinese and American students, negative effects of both US and Chinese government policies, and an increase in anti-Asian bias. This article documents faculty experiences teaching Chinese politics, and offers recommendations for addressing common challenges.

Introduction To The Symposium: China And The Campus, Sara A. Newland

Government: Faculty Publications

The US-China relationship has worsened dramatically in recent years. After decades of pro-engagement policies toward China, a bipartisan consensus began to emerge around 2016 that engagement had neither accomplished US policy goals (such as encouraging China to liberalize politically) nor served US citizens well.1 At the same time, political changes within China have pointed to a declining appetite for engagement with the United States and sidelined the domestic constituencies who remained interested in cooperation and exchange. Further restrictions have shrunk the already limited space for media, civil society groups, and academic exchange in China. Pandemic-related border closures eliminated in-person exchanges …

Direct Election, Bureaucratic Appointment, And Local Government Responsiveness In Taiwan, Sara A. Newland

Government: Faculty Publications

Does local democracy induce better service to citizens? While elected officials can be punished at the ballot box if they fail to address citizens’ needs, appointed bureaucrats may have policy knowledge that enables them to better serve citizens. Employing a multimethod design, this paper uses variation in local political institutions in Taiwan to assess the relative merits of direct election and bureaucratic appointment for local government responsiveness. While democratic institutions are often thought to induce responsiveness, I find that in Taiwan, with its historically strong bureaucracy and relatively new democratic institutions, the picture is somewhat more complicated. Elected and appointed …

A Diffusion Network Event History Estimator, Jeffrey J. Harden, Bruce A. Desmarais, Mark Brockway, Frederick J. Boehmke, Scott J. Lacombe, Fridolin Linder, Hanna Wallach

Government: Faculty Publications

Research on the diffusion of political decisions across jurisdictions typically accounts for units’ influence over each other with (1) observable measures or (2) by inferring latent network ties from past decisions. The former approach assumes that interdependence is static and perfectly captured by the data. The latter mitigates these issues but requires analytical tools that are separate from the main empirical methods for studying diffusion. As a solution, we introduce network event history analysis (NEHA), which incorporates latent network inference into conventional discrete-time event history models. We demonstrate NEHA’s unique methodological and substantive benefits in applications to policy adoption in …

Institutional Design And Policy Responsiveness In Us States, Scott J. Lacombe

Government: Faculty Publications

There is significant disagreement on the moderating role of institutions on policy responsive- ness, yet overwhelmingly research in state politics has focused on single institutions. This project leverages a new aggregate scale of state institutions to evaluate if the collective insti- tutional context moderates the influence of public opinion on policy. I use a recently released latent scale of institutional context and find that high levels of accountability pressure strongly strengthen public opinion’s influence on policy for both economic and social policy, while the strength of a state’s checks and balance system is largely unrelated to policy responsiveness. These results …

The Link Between Democratic Institutions And Population Health In The American States, Julianna Pacheco, Scott Lacombe

Government: Faculty Publications

Context: This project investigates the role of state-level institutions in explaining variation in population health in the American states. Although cross-national research has established the positive effects of democracy on population health, little attention has been given to subnational units. The authors leverage a new data set to understand how political accountability and a system of checks and balances are associated with state population health. Methods: The authors estimate error correction models and two-way fixed effects models to estimate how the strength of state-level democratic institutions is associated with infant mortality rates, life expectancy, and midlife mortality. Findings: The authors …

Response To Paul A. Passavant’S Review Of Seeing Like An Activist: Civil Disobedience And The Civil Rights Movement, Erin Pineda

Government: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A New Measure Of Digital Economic Activity And Its Impact On Local Opportunity, Karen Mossberger, Scott Lacombe, Caroline J. Tolbert

Government: Faculty Publications

Online businesses and platform work can create the impression that the digital economy is ephemeral and placeless. But the digital economy is experienced locally, and its effects are spatial. Measuring them requires better community-level data on economic activities online. While new government data measures broadband subscriptions down to neighborhoods, existing public data do not measure how broadband is used in local communities, and whether this digital activity affects economic outcomes. We analyze new monthly data on over 20 million domain name hosts/websites in the United States from November 2018 to November 2020 drawing on customer data. Surveys show that 3 …

Ethnic Identity And Local Government Responsiveness In Taiwan, Sara A. Newland, John Chung En Liu

Government: Faculty Publications

Countless studies have shown that local officials are less responsive to ethnic minority citizens. Surprisingly, we find no similar pattern of discrimination by Taiwanese local officials. In an online contacting experiment, we send citizen service requests to the websites of 358 township and district chiefs, randomly varying the name of the putative citizen to reflect an indigenous or an ethnically Chinese identity and collecting data on officials' responses. We find that officials are equally responsive to both identities. Drawing on in-depth interviews and nonparticipant observation in government service centers, we attribute this surprising finding to institutional elements of Taiwan's local …

The Ties That Bind Us: The Influence Of Perceived State Similarity On Policy Diffusion, Christine Bricker, Scott Lacombe

Government: Faculty Publications

In this paper, we propose a new measure to understand policy connections between the states. For decades, diffusion scholars have relied on the largely untested assumption that contiguous states are more similar than noncontiguous states, despite evidence that similarity is more complex than geographic proximity. We use a unique survey of citizens’ perceptions of other states to construct a national network of similarity ties between the states. We apply this new measure with a data set of state policy adoptions in a dyadic and monadic event history analysis and find that similar state adoptions are a reliable predictor of policy …

Civil Disobedience, And What Else? Making Space For Uncivil Forms Of Resistance, Erin Pineda

Government: Faculty Publications

Theorists of political obligation have long devoted special attention to civil disobedience, establishing its pride of place as an object of philosophical analysis, and as one of a short list of exceptions to an otherwise binding obligation to obey the law. Yet all of this attention to civil disobedience has left the broader terrain of resistance to injustice relatively under-theorized. What other forms of action are justifiable – even required – in the face of systemic injustice? Candice Delmas’ A Duty to Resist: When Disobedience Should Be Uncivil offers an original and powerful defense of the idea that we have …

Information And Policy Innovation In U.S. States, Scott J. Lacombe, Caroline Tolbert, Karen Mossberger

Government: Faculty Publications

Information is a critically important, yet hard to measure, component on policy innovation across state governments. Widespread use of broadband has made it easier for governments to observe other actors, increasing the amount of policy information, while also diversifying the sources of information available to policymakers. This should translate into making governments more innovative over time and quicker to adapt to challenges. At the same time, the Internet may disrupt previous existing flows of information by decreasing the importance of geographic proximity and creating more nationalized or global information networks. We argue that the growth of broadband has made states …

Machiavelli On Liberty, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

As an attribute of the people, liberty is self-protection from the abuse of power. It further is republican government, the rule of law, and civic independence, or it is the result of the same. Meanwhile, intelligence is an attribute of the great, and oppression is the goal of their ambitions. Machiavelli designates the people as the guardian of liberty. He appears to be their champion and the champion of republican constitutionalism. But Machiavelli is also an inveterate admirer of expansionist Rome, designating it the republic most worthy for imitation by moderns. He takes this position despite admitting that Rome destroyed …

The Initiative Process And Policy Innovation In The American States, Scott J. Lacombe, Frederick J. Boehmke

Government: Faculty Publications

We utilize a new policy adoption database with over 500 policies to test whether the initiative process influences the timing of policy adoption. Prior studies have produced both supportive andnullfindings of theeffect ofthe initiative, but typically examine policies one policy or a single composite score at a time. Theoretical accounts suggest that the initiative process should have heterogeneous effects on policy outcomes depending on the configuration of public and governmentpreferences. By pooling hundreds of policies weare able toestimate the average effect of the initiative process on state policy adoption more systematically while also evaluating variation in its effect. We find …

Critical Dialog: Response To Rachel M. Gillum’S Review Of The Politics Of The Headscarf In The United States, Bozena C. Welborne, Aubrey L. Westfall, Özge Çelik Russell, Sarah A. Tobin

Government: Faculty Publications

A Critical Dialog between the reviewer, Rachel M. Gillum, of The Politics of the Headscarf in the United States and the authors, Bozena C. Welborne, Aubrey L. Westfall, Özge Çelik Russell, and Sarah A. Tobin. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018. 264p.

Review: Women And The Egyptian Revolution: Engagement And Activism During The 2011 Arab Uprisings, Bozena Welborne

Government: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Spid: A New Database For Inferring Public Policy Innovativeness And Diffusion Networks, Frederick J. Boehmke, Mark Brockway, Bruce A. Desmarais, Jeffrey J. Harden, Scott Lacombe, Fridolin Linder, Hanna Wallach

Government: Faculty Publications

Despite its rich tradition, there are key limitations to researchers' ability to make generalizable inferences about state policy innovation and diffusion. This paper introduces new data and methods to move from empirical analyses of single policies to the analysis of comprehensive populations of policies and rigorously inferred diffusion networks. We have gathered policy adoption data appropriate for estimating policy innovativeness and tracing diffusion ties in a targeted manner (e.g., by policy domain, time period, or policy type) and extended the development of methods necessary to accurately and efficiently infer those ties. Our state policy innovation and diffusion (SPID) database includes …

“Climate Refugees”—A Useful Concept?, Gregory White

Government: Faculty Publications

Book review essay of:

Behrman, Simon, and Avidan Kent, eds. 2018. “Climate Refugees”: Beyond the Legal Impasse? New York: Routledge.

Miller, Todd. 2017. Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration, and Homeland Security. San Francisco, CA: City Lights.

Wennersten, John R., and Denise Robbins. 2017. Rising Tides: Climate Refugees in the Twenty-First Century. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

John P. Mccormick, Reading Machiavelli: Scandalous Books, Suspect Engagements, And The Virtue Of Populist Politics, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Salient Ballot Measures And The Millennial Vote, Scott J. Lacombe, Courtney Juelich

Government: Faculty Publications

We explore the relationship between ballot measures on issues salient to Millennials and their turnout in presidential and midterm elections. Both scholars and observers in the media have worried about decreasing levels of citizen participation, particularly among young voters. We demonstrate that one way to engage Millennials into traditional forms of political participation is through ballot measures that focus on issues salient to their generation (marijuana liberalization and higher education reform). We show that not only do these measures increase Millennial voting, but they erase difference in turnout levels between Millennials and older generations. This effect is primarily concentrated in …

Activism, Revolution And War: Mujeres Libres Addressing The Personal And The Political, Martha A. Ackelsberg

Government: Faculty Publications

Mujeres Libres, an organization of anarchist women established during the Spanish Civil War, was characterized by a dual focus on capacitación (empowerment) and captación (mobilization): (a) empowering women to enable them to recognize and act on their own potential and (b) mobilizing them into the organizations of the broader libertarian movement. An exploration of the activist biographies of two of its three founders (Lucía Sánchez Saornil and Mercedes Comaposada), as well as of two of its younger activists (Soledad Estorach and Sara Berenguer), makes clear how reflecting on personal experience within a larger political frame led to the creation of …

The Proportional Representation Debate At The Constitutional Convention: Why The Nationalists Lost, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

Representation in the national legislature, whether proportionate to people or equal for all states, was the signature issue of the Constitutional Convention of 1787. The resulting Great Compromise was the signature achievement. This article argues that the nationalists’ loss on proportional representation cannot be explained simply as a pragmatic accommodation in the face of obdurate opposition by small-state delegations. Such obduracy existed, and it mattered. But it was met by obduracy in kind and in defense of a position that was inherently stronger. Why then did the nationalist coalition fail? It failed, the article contends, because, in addition to the …

Gaming The Framing: A New Way To Teach The Convention, The Constitution, And The Founding, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

Why study the Constitution through the medium of role-play? Students playing roles will better appreciate the difficulties of framing a constitution and better understand what was at stake and what was possible for the delegates who gathered in Philadelphia—better than if they simply heard or read about the event.

Innovators And Implementers: The Multilevel Politics Of Civil Society Governance In Rural China, Sara A. Newland

Government: Faculty Publications

Early literature on China's civil society focused on organizations' autonomy from the state. However, the precise ways in which these organizations are dependent on the state - and on individual officials - are less well understood. I argue that NGOs depend on different types of officials whose career incentives vary, with significant implications for relationships with non-state actors. One set of officials, innovators, seeks rapid promotion and uses civil society partnerships to gain higher-level attention. Innovators' career goals lead them to provide support for NGOs; however, excessive reliance on innovators can force organizations to stray from their mission and can …

The Framers’ Coup: The Making Of The United States Constitution, By Michael J. Klarman, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

America’S Machiavellian: Gouverneur Morris At The Constitutional Convention, John Patrick Coby

Government: Faculty Publications

While generally a steady ally of James Madison and the nationalists, Gouverneur Morris, delegate from Pennsylvania, worked from a different conception of republican politics. Morris's republicanism was more old than new, relying on the divided sovereignty of a mixed regime to protect the rights of citizens and minorities. This conception, it is argued here, bears the stamp of Machiavelli, especially regarding the relationship of the classes and the role of the executive. Like Machiavelli—but unlike Madison—Morris wanted to underscore society's class divisions, organizing the representatives of rich and poor into two distinct, and hostile, chambers of the legislature. And like …

Japan’S Proactive Multilateralism, Dennis T. Yasutomo, Tomoaki Ishigaki

Government: Faculty Publications

Japan’s 2013 UN Arms Trade Treaty diplomacy exhibited neither the standard minimalist, subservient negotiating style nor policymaking restricted to the usual actors. Juxtaposition of the treaty and the 2014 arms export policy revision illustrates how traditional ‘‘peace diplomacy’’ can evolve into ‘‘proactive pacifism.’’

Islamic Headcovering And Political Engagement: The Power Of Social Networks, Aubrey Westfall, Özge Çelik Russell, Bozena Welborne, Sarah Tobin

Government: Faculty Publications

This article explores the relationship between headcovering and women’s political participation through an original online survey of 1,917 Muslim-American women. As a visible marker of religious group identity, wearing the headscarf can orient the integration of Muslim women into the American political system via its impact on the openness of their associational life. Our survey respondents who cover are more likely to form insular, strong ties with predominantly Muslim friend networks, which decreased their likelihood of voting and affiliating with a political party. Interestingly, frequency of mosque attendance across both covered and uncovered respondents is associated with a higher probability …

Which Public? Whose Goods? What We Know (And What We Don't) About Public Goods In Rural China, Sara A. Newland

Government: Faculty Publications

What have we learned from a decade of research on the provision of public goods in the Chinese countryside? This review article surveys the literature in political science, economics and Chinese area studies. It describes the three dominant types of explanations for variation in the quality of public goods: Local elections, social sanctioning and economic policies. It then argues that these findings are plagued by a set of common problems. Scholars mean different things when they use the term public goods, making their findings difficult to compare. Furthermore, the most common measures of public goods ignore the ways in which …

The Specter Of Climate Refugees: Why Invoking Refugees As A Reason To “Take Climate Change Seriously” Is Troubling, Gregory White

Government: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.