Other Political Science Commons^™

A Political Ecology Of Information: Media And The Dilemma Of State Power In China, Michael L. Miller

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I employ a Weberian concept of social power in order to theorize the challenges posed by, and the varieties of state response to, the dilemma of state power: the need of all states to empower societies with social capacities that may, in turn, threaten state interests. Through a comparison of traditional and new forms of media in China, I show that rather than posing qualitatively new types of challenges to authoritarian states, new media exacerbate the dilemma of state power. They do so because along each of three dimensions of social control, new media shift the relationship …

Back To Square One: Understanding The Role Of The Egyptian Armed Forces, Ahmed A. Ahmed

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Six years ago, in 2011 the Egyptian youth took to the streets across Egypt demanding freedom from the corrupt, autocratic, and authoritarian Mubarak government. Within days, tens of millions of Egyptians demanded the resignation of President Mubarak, who had ruled the country for 30 years. Millions of Egyptians were fed up with the rampant corruption of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). Democratic activists warned that presidential election slated for September 2011 were not going to be competitive, rather successional so that Mubarak’s son Gamal would be president. Most analysts argue that the vast masses of protests severely damaged the …

Egypt’S 2011–2012 Parliamentary Elections: Voting For Religious Vs. Secular Democracy?, H. Ege Ozen

Publications and Research

This study investigates whether individuals’ attitudes towards democracy and

secular politics have any influence on voting behavior in Egypt. Based on data

from a survey conducted immediately after the Egyptian parliamentary elections

in January 2012, this study finds that Egyptians’ attitudes towards democratic

governance were quite negative around the parliamentary elections, yet Egyptians

still endorsed democracy as the ideal political system for their country. However,

empirical findings suggest that support for democracy has a limited impact on

electoral results. On the other hand, the main division in Egyptian society around

the first free and fair parliamentary elections was the religious-secular …