American Politics Commons^™

Unanswered Questions Of A Minority People In International Law: A Comparative Study Between Southern Cameroons & South Sudan, Bernard Sama Mr

Bernard Sama

The month July of 2011 marked the birth of another nation in the World. The distressful journey of a minority people under the watchful eyes of the international community finally paid off with a new nation called the South Sudan . As I watched the South Sudanese celebrate independence on 9 July 2011, I was filled with joy as though they have finally landed. On a promising note, I read the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon saying “[t]ogether, we welcome the Republic of South Sudan to the community of nations. Together, we affirm our commitment to helping it meet its …

Welfare And Foreign Aid Practices In The Contemporary United States: A Governmentalstudy, Philippe Fournier

Philippe Fournier

This article aims to expose the main governmental shifts in recent Americanhistory (1961-2000) by examining two programs: the Assistance to Families with DependentChildren (AFDC) and the Agency for International development (US-AID). Through the ex-ploration of primary and secondary sources, we analyse the production, organisation andcirculation of governmental practices in the realms of both domestic and foreign policy. In theAmerican context, practices of government typically revolve around freedom, efficiency mo-dels and individual responsibility. Throughout the analysis, we find that the general critiqueswhich have guided reforms and experiments in both areas converge around the same ele-ments. This testifies to the fact that …

Is Minnesota Gop Voter I.D. Proposal Sabotage Dressed As Integrity?, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

A Palin Entry Could Upend Bachmann And Benefit Pawlenty In Iowa, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

Will Tim Pawlenty Go From Honestly Boring To A Lying Bore?, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

Tweets Are The First Trimesters Of Thoughts, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

All That Gingrich Glitter Is Not Gold: Newt Pranked In Minneapolis, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

Huckabee's Cat Scratch Fever: Pawlenty Or Bachmann's Gain?, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

Bachmann V. Myers: Is Michele Bachmann Smarter Than A 10th Grader?, Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

No abstract provided.

Developing Focal Point Networks For State-Centered Genocide Prevention, Alon Hillel-Tuch

Alon Hillel-Tuch

While genocide, at times, appears to be sporadic in its emergence; it, in fact, requires diligent planning, strategy, and execution; inferring potential prevention through effective response. Within the last decade, there has been an increased attention on the need for governments to respond effectively to potential genocides. One manifestation of this concern has been an effort to construct governmental systems that can foresee the development of such politics (early warning) and transmit this information for decision makers to respond effectively to the threat (early action).

Through qualitative data analysis of a United States’ case study, this paper explores the influences …

Written Statement Submitted To Senate Judiciary Subcommittee On The Constitution, Civil Society And Human Rights “Protecting The Civil Rights Of American Muslims”, Muqtedar Khan

Muqtedar Khan

This testimony describes the nature of the new Islamophobia on the rise in the US.

Bureaucracy And The U.S. Response To Mass Atrocity, Gregory Brazeal

Gregory Brazeal

The U.S. response to mass atrocity has followed a predictable pattern of disbelief, rationalization, evasion, and retrospective expressions of regret. The pattern is consistent enough that we should be skeptical of chalking up the United States’ failures solely to a shifting array of isolated historical contingencies, from post-Vietnam fatigue in the case of the Khmer Rouge to the Clinton administration’s recoil against humanitarian interventions after Somalia. It is implausible to suggest that the United States would have acted to mitigate or end mass atrocities but for the specific historical contingencies that happen to accompany each outbreak of violence. This essay …

How Much Does A Belief Cost?: Revisiting The Marketplace Of Ideas, Gregory Brazeal

Gregory Brazeal

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. is often credited with creating the metaphor of “the marketplace of ideas,” though he did not use the exact phrase and his argument for free speech was not based on distinctively economic reasoning. Truly economic investigations of the marketplace of ideas have progressed in step with developments and trends in the law and economics literature. These investigations have tended to be one-sided, with writers focusing primarily either on the production of ideas (for example, Posner) or their consumption (for example, behavioral law and economics), without considering in depth how producers and consumers interact. This may …

Cognitive Dissonance In A Recession: Minnesota Gop Attacks Marriage Equality In Land Of "Gayest City In America", Aaron J. Shuler

Aaron J Shuler

Despite a tradition of progressive thinking on civil rights and recent specific gains for gays in Minnesota, the State's Republican party is trying to place an anti-marriage equality amendment on the 2012 ballot.

Collective Choice, Justin Schwartz

Justin Schwartz

This short nontechnical article reviews the Arrow Impossibility Theorem and its implications for rational democratic decisionmaking. In the 1950s, economist Kenneth J. Arrow proved that no method for producing a unique social choice involving at least three choices and three actors could satisfy four seemingly obvious constraints that are practically constitutive of democratic decisionmaking. Any such method must violate such a constraint and risks leading to disturbingly irrational results such and Condorcet cycling. I explain the theorem in plain, nonmathematical language, and discuss the history, range, and prospects of avoiding what seems like a fundamental theoretical challenge to the possibility …

Capture In Financial Regulation" Can We Channel It Toward The Common Good?, Lawrence G. Baxter

Lawrence G. Baxter

“Regulatory capture” is central to regulatory analysis yet is a troublesome concept. It is difficult to prove and sometimes seems refuted by outcomes unfavorable to powerful interests. Nevertheless, the process of bank regulation and supervision fosters a closeness between regulator and regulated that would seem to be conducive to “capture” or at least to fostering undue sympathy by regulators for the companies they oversee. The influence of very large financial institutions has also become so great that financial regulation appears to have become excessively distorted in favor of these entities and to the detriment of many other legitimate interests, including …

Party Politics & Enactment Of “Obamacare”: Another Look At Minority Party Influence, Elizabeth Rigby, Jennifer Hayes Clark, Stacey Pelika

Jennifer Hayes Clark

Despite President Obama’s early calls for a bipartisan approach to health reform, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 passed with no Republican votes in either the House or the Senate. Its passage was accompanied by intense criticism that the reform was “rammed through” the legislative process by the majority party, whereas the administration emphasized the extensive, year-long debate over health reform and argued that the final bill represented a compromise of good ideas from both parties. We examine these conflicting claims, drawing on real-time accounts of the policy debate published in the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call. …

Why The Demands Of Formalism Will Prevent New Originalism From Furthering Conservative Political Goals, Daniel Hornal

Daniel Hornal

Proponents of New Originalism propose that their modifications solve the indeterminacy and predictability problems inherent in early conceptions of originalism. This paper argues that excluding extrinsic evidence and relying only on the formal implications of the text merely switches one indeterminacy and predictability problem for another. Rules inherently carry implications unknown to rule writers. In the case of open-textured rules such as those in the Constitution, a broad reading can occupy whole fields of law, whereas a narrow reading can have almost no real-world effects. Because they must ignore extrinsic evidence, new originalists are almost unbound in their choice of …

Constrained By Statute: Why We Have Statutes Of Limitations, Braden W. Johnson

Braden W Johnson

The recent, high profile cases of sexual abuse in collegiate athletics have uncovered many alleged evildoers. Some of them, like Syracuse University Assistant Coach Bernie Fine, have escaped prosecution based on statutes of limitations. This article explains more about such statutes.

The Hatch Act And The Political Process, Braden W. Johnson

Braden W Johnson

Jon Greiner, the Chief of the Ogden Police, has been indicted for violating the Hatch Act of 1939. This article provides some insight into the way that this law affects the political process.

Mandatory Minimum Sentences In Utah: Does The Punishment Fit The Crime?, Braden W. Johnson

Braden W Johnson

An analysis concerning the effect that Congress' Comprehensive Crime Control Act had on state imposed mandatory minimum sentences, and considering the pros and cons with shifting this judicial responsibility onto the legislature.

The Fox News Effect: Does Polarized News-Media Fill Traditional News Roles?, Braden W. Johnson, Professor Richard Davis

Braden W Johnson

In this study, I use qualitative and quantitative methods to gauge the effect that consumption of highly polarized news-media (i.e. Glen Beck, Chris Matthews, etc.) has on its consumers. Using PEW survey data, I compare those who frequently consume such media against those who do not, and I find that consumers of polarized media are more likely to score highly on a current events test, and are more likely to be registered to vote, with 95% confidence.

Judging Women, Stephen J. Choi, G. Mitu Gulati, Mirya R. Holman, Eric A. Posner

Mirya R Holman

Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s assertion that female judges might be better than male judges has generated accusations of sexism and potential bias. An equally controversial claim is that male judges are better than female judges because the latter have benefited from affirmative action. These claims are susceptible to empirical analysis. Primarily using a dataset of all the state high court judges in 1998-2000, we estimate three measures of judicial output: opinion production, outside state citations, and co-partisan disagreements. For many of our tests, we fail to find significant gender effects on judicial performance. Where we do find significant gender effects for …

Gender And Regime Politics In U.S. Cities, Mirya R. Holman

Mirya R Holman

The scholarship on urban politics often focuses on the political economy provided by regimes, or long-term coalitions between local politicians and private actors like the business community. Notably absent from the regime scholarship is any substantial investigation of the role that urban regimes play in the promotion of the interests of women living in urban areas. A comparison of the priorities of urban regimes with the interests of women in politics suggests substantial conflicts. The implications for women serving in urban governance are explored, as are the consequences for urban politics, women in politics, and democracy.

Evaluating Political And Environmental Behavior In The Face Of A Green Crisis: An Experimental Analysis, Mirya R. Holman, Travis G. Coan

Mirya R Holman

Incidents such as the Japanese Nuclear Meltdowns and the British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico remind us that environmental issues can be central to activating political activity and influencing political opinions. While the literature suggesting a relationship between environmental risk and action is extensive, few scholars directly examine the relationship between perceived environmental threat and political behavior, and even fewer adopt research designs appropriate for making causal inferences. Building on a growing literature in political psychology that examines the effects of crises and emotions on political opinions, we examine the relationship between environmental threat and political behavior …

Gender And Power In American Cities: Investigations Of The Effect Of Mayoral Gender On Deliberation, Representation, And Policymaking In U.S. Cities, Mirya R. Holman

Mirya R Holman

The representation of historically marginalized groups in the democratic policy process serves many purposes, including introducing new and differing perspectives to the policymaking process, opening the policymaking process up to disenfranchised groups, and changing the deliberative process of urban policymaking. In this paper, I investigate the effect of gender on policy priorities and policy outcomes of mayors in U.S. cities. Using a combination of interview data and coded city council minutes, I examine the effect of mayoral gender on the discussion of issues of importance to female constituents, the nature of deliberation in city councils, and the engagement of the …

Race, Colorblindness And Equality In Recent Supreme Court Jurisprudence: Assessing An Evolving Standard, Steven V. Mazie

Steven V. Mazie

This essay weighs the merits of the ascendant interpretation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment: a colorblind reading of equality that received a boost in the Court’s Ricci v. DeStefano decision of 2009. In Ricci, the Court concluded that the City of New Haven had acted illegally when it scrapped a promotion exam for firefighters on which whites had vastly outperformed black and Hispanic candidates. The article opens by surveying the major twists and turns of the Supreme Court’s view of racial classifications since the 14th Amendment was adopted in 1868. It updates that history through an …

Cancun Climate Negotiations, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

The United Nations Climate Change Conference, held from November 29 to December 11, 2010, in Cancún, Mexico, relaunched the United Nation's multilateral facilitation role.

Tribes As Essential Partners In Achieving Sustainable Governance, Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Prof. Elizabeth Burleson

Indigenous peoples have modeled sustainable development around the world. Incentivizing the innovation and instillation of wind, solar, and other renewable energy sources can come in the form of public funding, including renewable portfolio standards, feed in tariffs and green tag programs. This article analyzes ways in which tribal communities are helping to expand cooperative good governance.

American Constitutional Law, Otis Stephens

Otis Stephens

No abstract provided.