Digital Commons Network^™

The United States Military Realignment On Okinawa, Kevin M. Evringham

Master's Theses

The United States maintains military bases in foreign countries in efforts to protect American overseas interests, whether they are economic, diplomatic or for geostrategic purposes. In Japan, where the United States has maintained military installations since the end of World War II, debate over the realignment of forces on Okinawa has caused minor, yet growing, rifts in the stable United States-Japanese alliance. Current plans to shift American military forces from Okinawa to locations throughout the Pacific do not take into account the historical or geostrategic factors for their stationing in Japan. This thesis identifies the geostrategic challenges to the current …

Deciphering A Duality: Understanding Conflicting Standards In Sex & Violence Censorship In U.S. Obscenity Law, Rushabh P. Bhakta

Political Science Honors Projects

This research examines the division in US obscenity law that enables strict sex censorship while overlooking violence. By investigating the social and legal development of obscenity in US culture, I argue that the contemporary duality in obscenity censorship standards arose from a family of forces consisting of faith, economy, and identity in early American history. While sexuality ingrained itself in American culture as a commodity in need of regulation, violence was decentralized from the state and proliferated. This phenomenon led to a prioritization of suppressing sexual speech over violent speech. This paper traces the emergence this duality and its source.

The Rise Of Asia's Democratic Space Powers How Japan And India Became The Next Space Powers In The Twenty-First Century, Shane Kunze

HIM 1990-2015

Since the end of World War II the world has seen several nations expand into the space age. Also after the Second World War, the Cold War began and many nations found themselves allying themselves with either the hegemony of the West or the Communists. Space was no exception in this dilemma, as weaker nations began to develop their own indigenous space programs and had technological diffusion from one of the hegemonies. Japan and India are two democracies that both sought support for their indigenous space programs from the west, particularly from the U.S. These two nations emerged from poverty …

Justifying Peacemaking In Afghanistan, Ethan Taylor

Honors College Theses

The situation in Afghanistan seems to be about as dire as it was in the 1980s. One major difference, though, is that Soviet forces no longer occupy the country, and at least the United States/NATO occupation is under the pretext of a humanitarian effort. Even so, the tragic process of U.S.-led state-building that has unfolded these last ten years has yielded little in terms of an effective government or infrastructure of any kind. If anything, the terrorist threat that the U.S. hoped to quell has become more elusive and determined than ever. Ethnic rivalry and warlordism are as prevalent as …

Do The Social-Psychological Dimensions Of The Armenia-Azerbaijan Conflict Over Nagorno-Karabakh Justify The Use Of Interactive Conflict Resolution?, Isabella A. Missakyan

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Using Kelman’s framework of the nature of international intractable conflict, this thesis seeks to examine thoroughly the unrelenting hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The analysis will include the history of the primary parties in context, the root causes, the key issues, the needs, fears and other social-psychological factors driving and perpetuating the conflict. Special attention will be given to the secondary actors of the dispute since they play important roles in the conflict and have their own agendas. The secondary actors include Turkey, Russia, the Armenian Diaspora, the United States, the European Union, Iran, and …

Woodrow Wilson: Examining The Scholarly Statesman Through A Rhetorical Lens, Candice Elaine Mae Radloff

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

My Capstone Project is a rhetorical and descriptive analysis of President Woodrow Wilson’s most notable speeches from 1896 to 1917. As a scholar-president, I particularly focus on Wilson’s ability to translate his personal scholarship into effective rhetoric at different points in his career. I provide the historical background and context necessary to understand the relevance and impact of the selected speeches. The six speeches that I analyze reflect his scholarship and rhetorical genius in the political arena, covering the three pivotal phases of his profession life: university scholar and president, governor, and President of the United States. I also consider …

A Cup Of Tea A Study Of The Tea Party Caucus In The United States House Of Representatives, Stephen Phillips

HIM 1990-2015

Over the course of the last few years, a new movement has taken the American political system by storm, the Tea Party. The movement has not only captivated our media but also the minds of ordinary Americans and political elites. According to popular consensus and academic opinion, the Tea Party is comprised of a group of conservative-leaning Republicans who want a smaller government and a lesser tax burden. This is what we think of the Tea Party, but is it true? It is perceived that Tea Party members differ significantly from their Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives, but …

Changing The World From Classrooms To Communities: Designing And Disseminating A Service-Learning Curriculum For Teaching In A Formal Education Setting, Amanda English

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

To change the world is a growing desire among many of today’s student populations, portrayed increasingly across the spectrum of media, social trends and career pursuits. While the demand grows among students for community-oriented and socially-responsible opportunities, the offerings in educational institutions must respond to these emerging requests with new and innovative academic programs. This text emphasizes the role of the developing discipline of service-learning in channeling these energies and providing students with deep and meaningful academic experiences. Its content seeks to combat misconceptions of service-learning as simply an extra-curricular activity and provide tangible methods for incorporating its concepts into …

Application Of Social Networks To Fundraising In The Presidential Nomination Process Of 2008, Scott Limbocker

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Campaign donations are something that scholars have examined for some time, generally treating these donations as an aggregated explanatory variable. Through technological advances in computing, size is no longer a limitation that inhibits scholars from using this information in a robust manner. First, data aggregated at the state level, shows that donations made to the presidential nomination process in 2008 distributes across the many states in a way that is highly correlated to the population of the United States. From there, additional sorting methods select the donors that appear on multiple candidates' records. A network is then created to show …

Interregionalism As A Foreign Policy Of The European Union: A Case For Soft Power?, Maxim Miroshnikov

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

This paper looks at the interregionalism as a part of the European Union's foreign policy. It argues that the EU's use of soft power can be traced within this policy. The paper proposes two methods of defining soft power in action: through presence and through purposive action. Three case studies are analyzed to support this. It is shown that indeed the EU exercised soft power toward other actors using these mechanisms. Success of these actions was however not always present.

Human Trafficking Post 9/11 Policy And Practice Beyond Cutting The Tail Off The Snake, Alexandra Caitlin Rice

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

The U.S. Department of State estimates that 600,000 to 800,000 victims are trafficked across international borders each year, approximately 14,500 to 17,500 of which are trafficked into the United States. The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 (VTVPA) was created to combat human trafficking in the country, and as a result created the T-visa to provide immigration relief to non-citizen victims of trafficking. In this work I analyze U.S. government efforts to combat trafficking in the twelve years following implementation of the VTVPA. I expand my analysis beyond T-visa distribution data to incorporate interviews with high-level government …

Hierarchical Structural Organizations Of State Political Parties, Isaac Mckay Higham

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

From August through November of 2011 I worked as an intern for the Utah Democratic state party at their state party headquarters. I started my internship around the same time as the newly elected chair of the state party, Jim Dabakis, assumed his new role as head of the party. Dabakis did not have the traditional resume of a party chair but rather had his background as an international art dealer and businessman. He had always been politically minded and involved in political causes, but he did not have the extensive partisan politics background that previous chairs had. In anticipation …

Determinants Of Tax Effort: A Cross Country Analysis, Mark Alan Mccoon

Dissertations

This paper analyzes the determinants of tax effort. Tax effort is defined as the aggregate tax level of a country divided by its Gross Domestic Product. A country‘s tax effort is an expression of the tax burden the government imposes on the economy. One of the most fundamental issues confronting a society is the size of the governmental sector. How large should the government be relative to the size of the economy? The nations of the world have crafted many different answers to that question as evidenced by the fact that tax effort and the size of government sectors varies …

The Politics Of Pentecostalism; Does It Help Or Hinder Democratic Consolidation In Brazil?, Amber S. Johansen

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Like so many other developing nations, Brazil has suffered from extreme inequality. Even though it has a healthy economy, free elections and multiple political parties, there are deep divides and unstable political institutions. The relatively recent transition to democracy has allowed a large and growing Evangelical community to emerge which is causing a religious shifting. The Pentecostal faith is providing alternative structures for social and political expression previously denied to many. Through community networks, many of Brazil's marginalized are accessing legitimacy, making them an undeniable force.

The focus of this paper is to determine if Pentecostalism undermines or strengthens democratic …

Current Controversies, Vol. Iii, Spring 2012, San Jose State University

Current Controversies

No abstract provided.

Whether A 'One-State Solution To The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: A Comparative Study Of Settler-Colonial Domination Systems In South Africa And Palestine, Hasan Saleh Ayoub

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation is to answer the question: why do ostensibly similar ethno-national conflicts within a system of settler-colonial domination see such wide variation in their outcomes? How they emerge from conflict through power sharing and social integration versus the endurance of separation and systems of domination and control? The study identifies causal paths that resulted in the decline of domination systems of this type.

Ethno-national conflicts that feature certain similarities develop in different trajectories due to certain conditions that culminate in transforming the structures of these conflicts towards integration (the establishment of a single political entity) or …

A State Within A State: The Case Of Chechnya, Hanna Zimnitskaya

International Studies Honors Projects

After the USSR's dissolution, Russia struggled to reassert its Great Power status by enhancing its internal might and territorial cohesion. Futile military campaigns against the rebellious Chechen people pushed the Kremlin to strike a bargain with an unorthodox warlord: Ramzan Kadyrov, who was to become a faithful ally, while in return Chechnya received an unprecedented level of autonomy. This thesis examines the dynamics of Kadyrov's ascent to power, specifically the Islamization of public space and the monopolization of Chechen security forces, and concludes that, in the long run, the unwavering consolidation of his rule menaces Russia's re-emerging 'greatness'.

Linking Social Capital To Disaster Recovery, Ryan Gregoire

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Reluctance Or Power Hunger: Whom Do Voters Prefer? A Test Of The Wary Cooperator Theory And Evolutionary Political Behavior, Timothy Collins

Department of Political Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Do voters prefer political candidates who express reluctance to seek office, or do voters prefer candidates who express great ambition and an implicit hunger for power? This study uses an experimental design to test overall support of reluctant or power-hungry candidates, and discusses which people would select which candidate and why. While limited by the survey design, the evidence suggests that there is no significant overall mean difference for overall support of either candidate. However, personality traits and the degree to which participants perceived certain descriptive attributes of the candidates both play a role in vote likelihood and candidate favorability …

The Effects Of Tribal Governments On Reservation Poverty Rates, Heather Raisch

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Poverty rates on Indian reservations are far higher than the national average. Since Tribal Governments have at least some control over these reservations, to what extent are they to blame for these higher than average poverty rates? I look at each reservation and their type of government, constitution, policies and demographics to analyze the causes of their poverty as it relates to tribal government. There are many other pieces of research that are similar to this, but none looking specifically at the overall effects the government has on its community. My hypothesis is that communities with higher poverty rates tend …

Anarchy, Play, And Carnival In The Neoliberal City: Critical Mass As Insurgent Public Space Activism, John Andrew Blue

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Nato Expansion During The Cold War And After, Evan Jaroff

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

No abstract provided.

Civil Society And Local Activism In South Korea's Local Democratization, Yooil Bae, Sunhyuk Kim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Recent studies on causes of intergovernmental transformation in old and new democracies have found that decentralization is often the outcome of negotiations between national and local political interests. South Korea is commonly believed to be an exception because local elections and institutions introduced in the early 1990s were, by and large, the product of negotiations among political elites at the centre, without significant inclusion of local actors. However, this article attempts to explicate a hitherto ignored aspect of decentralization reform in Korea: the role of civil society and local activism in the politics of decentralization. In the 2000s, several ‘triggering …

Eu's Common Foreign Policies Towards Russia: Past, Present And Future, Yigit Canay

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

No abstract provided.

Icy/Hot: Norwegian And Finnish Policy Toward The European Union, Mia Bennett

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

No abstract provided.

Signifying The Place Of Unforgettable Memory: Atrocity And Trauma In A Post-Conflict Landscape, Ralph J. Hartley

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

After active inter-group lethal violence subsides places at which atrocities occurred are often assigned significance, reflecting an altered social topography influenced by ideology that may foster the hardening of socio-ethnic boundary distinctions. While using a comparativist approach, this paper explores the relationships between socio-cultural trauma, places of atrocity, and socio-political polarization. Two sites in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda, where highly publicized massacres occurred, illustrate the power of place significance in social environments vulnerable to flare-ups of violent conflict.

No. 10: Gender And Food Insecurity In Southern African Cities, Belinda Dodson, Asiyati Chiweza, Liam Riley

African Food Security Urban Network

This gender analysis of the findings of AFSUN’s baseline survey of poor urban households in eleven cities in Southern Africa in 2008 and 2009 has implications for urban, national and regional policy interventions aimed at reducing urban food insecurity. By comparing female-centred and other households, light is shed both on the determinants of urban food insecurity – which relate fundamentally to income, employment and education – and on the manifest gender inequalities in access to the largely income-based entitlements to food in the city. These insights can be used to design and implement practical and strategic interventions that could simultaneously …

The California Political Precinct Index: A Detailed Tool To Help Understand California Politics (Update For 2012), David Latterman

McCarthy Center Faculty and Staff Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Fleeing North: An Examination Of U.S. Refugee And Asylum Policy Towards Nicaragua, Anthony Jensen

Political Science Student Work

This project examines the way in which the United States forms its asylum and refugee policies. Specifically, it examines the case of asylum and refugee policy towards Nicaragua from 1979 to 1989. The question posed is the following: Why and how does the United States government create asylum and refugee policies? Traditionally the United States’ asylum and refugee policies have largely been understood as being “receptionist” to individuals fleeing states deemed hostile by the United States government and “restrictionist” to individuals fleeing states deemed non-hostile. The case of Nicaragua complicates this picture, though, as asylum and refugee acceptance rates throughout …

Illusions Of Unity: The Paradox Between Mega-Sporting Events And Nation Building, Terrance Carroll

Exchange: The Journal of Public Diplomacy

This article presents an investigation into the use of "nation building" rhetoric as a motive to host mega- sporting events. Previous literature regarding mega-events presents the potential for such events to be used for uniting a nation. Moreover, nation building has been conceived in public relations research as consisting of two main components; national identity and national unity, both of which can be tied to image crafting. However, examining the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and the planning for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil demonstrates a paradox that exists between the concept of nation building and the actual …