Digital Commons Network^™

Planification Against Extractivism: Towards A Democratic Agroecological Planification Against Agrarian Capitalism In A Estrada (Galicia, Spain), Jacobo Rivas Sanmartín, Rubén Camilo Lois González, Paula Noya Vázquez

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

This article analyses the expansion of vineyards in the parish of San Xiao de Vea, in the municipality of A Estrada (Galicia, Spain), as a concrete manifestation of extractive agrarian restructuring under contemporary capitalism. Drawing on land-use data, socio-metabolic indicators, and qualitative testimonies, it shows how financialization, speculative land practices, and state selectivity reorganize rural space, degrade mixed farming systems, and intensify contradictions between capital accumulation and the ecological and social conditions of reproduction. The article argues that existing green planning frameworks, shaped by market logics and technocratic indicators, are structurally incapable of confronting these dynamics. As an alternative, it …

From Models To Modules: Towards A Change Of Approach In Postcapitalist Political Economy, Simon Tremblay-Pepin

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

In this article, I take for granted the existence of a field of social sciences called postcapitalist political economy. This field of research emanates from the critique of capitalism and seeks to establish, in theory and practice, alternative political and economic systems to capitalism. I argue that in its late and post-Soviet period (1988 – 2012), this field has mostly, but not solely, been based on debates between all-encompassing models. Analyzing its contemporary period (2013 to now), I will sustain that we are partly witnessing a transfer from a model-based approach to a modular one. I present six arguments to …

Genocide In Gaza? Social Media Discussions Of Violence In Israel And Gaza, Timothy Williams, Andreas Dafnos

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This article conducts social network and topic analyses of German-language posts on X that discuss genocide and terrorism in Israel and Gaza in the first six months after the October 7 attacks and compares these to broader English-language discourses on the platform. The comparison reveals subtle differences in how Israeli violence and governance and Palestinians are discussed and who is seen as complicit in supporting violence. Markedly, German-language posts discuss what constitutes antisemitism more and employ a more restrained language towards Israel as a state and its political actors than English-language posts. We tie these findings back to the idiosyncrasies …

Genocide By Algorithm In Gaza: Artificial Intelligence, Countervailing Responsibility, And The Corruption Of Public Discourse, Branislav Radeljić

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

The accelerating militarization of artificial intelligence (AI) has transformed the ethics, politics, and governance of warfare. This article interrogates how AI-driven targeting systems function as epistemic infrastructures that classify, legitimize, and execute violence, using Israel’s conduct in Gaza as a paradigmatic case. Building on interdisciplinary debates in security studies, critical technology studies, and international law, the paper advances the concept of "genocide by algorithm"—a mode of technologically mediated extermination in which opaque computational systems automate and rationalize mass violence. The study argues that these systems collapse distinctions between military and civilian targets, and between intentional and accidental harm, thereby eroding …

U.S. Public Opinion During The Rwandan Genocide And The Power Of Executive Detachment, Carly Schmitt, Matthew L. Bergbower

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

We examine U.S. public opinion during the Rwandan genocide in the spring and early summer of 1994. Drawing on more than a dozen public opinion polls fielded during this period, we analyze Americans’ levels of knowledge about the violence in Rwanda, their views on United Nations involvement, support for U.S. military intervention, and evaluations of President Bill Clinton’s handling of the crisis. Longstanding theory recognizes public opinion as an important variable in explaining foreign policy choices during international crises. In the case of U.S. policy toward the Rwandan genocide, our analysis reveals widespread public unfamiliarity with a distant African conflict …

Myth, Spirituality, And Thought Patterns In Two African And Brazilian Ritual Dramas, Dele Layiwola

Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies

This essay conceptualizes and historicizes the phenomena of religion, custom, and belief systems by utilizing two celebrated dramatic texts and performances as practical illustrations of the complex roles they play in the social, political, and cultural lives of human beings, irrespective of their geographical locations. The arguments demonstrate that religion or spirituality is a given phenomenon in the personal and public lives of the denizens of various societies. It possesses its own logic and rules, which may not be mutually compatible, nevertheless constitute a constant universal principle. The paper employs dramatized examples to show that in classical or modern times, …

Situating Everybody Hates Chris (Ehc): The Appeal Of The Show, Elizabeth Johnson, Donald Culverson

Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies

"Everybody Hates Chris" (EHC) achieved critical success by employing comedy to address significant social issues, distinguishing itself in early-2000s television. Unlike earlier and contemporary series such as "Moesha," "The Hughleys," and "The Cosby Show," EHC offered a nuanced portrayal of Black family life, engaging an audience often overlooked or misrepresented by mainstream media. This article examines shifts in the television industry from the late 1990s to the early 2000s that facilitated EHC's innovative approach. The series departed from traditional family sitcoms, functioning not merely as entertainment but as a social commentary on the complexities of the family as a societal …

Christian Missions’ Medical Work In The Colonial Ilorin Province, 1900 To 1960, Rasheed Onagun

Global Africa: Journal of African and African Diaspora Studies

A scarcity of labor and the pursuit of optimal profit maximization led to the colonial government's collaboration with Christian missions to disseminate and expand Western healthcare to the populace. In Ilorin Province and Nigeria as a whole, missions undertook the majority of colonial medical work and public health initiatives. For the first time in the history of Ilorin Province, missionary endeavors introduced Western medicine as an alternative healthcare source to many, necessitating a historical examination. This paper explores existing literature, oral testimonies, and extensive archival documents to analyze the impacts of missionary medical work on the well-being of the people …

Upright: Zheng 正 And The Semantics Of Political Legitimacy, Kaz Wegmuller

Open Educational Resources

This article examines the semantic structure of the left-right political binary in contemporary Anglophone discourse. It argues that the fusion of “right” as directional orientation with “right” as moral correctness produces a form of semantic over-determination that complicates the articulation of democratic legitimacy in periods of political crisis. The claim is not that directional metaphors determine political outcomes, but that they furnish a discursive resource that can be mobilized in struggles over authority, order, and rectitude. To illuminate the contingency of this fusion, the article turns to the East Asian concept of zheng 正 (uprightness), whose semantic independence from handedness …

Iran’S Development Of Criminal Foreign Policy Capabilities In The United States From 2013–2020, Scott James Harr

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Iran’s development of criminal foreign policy capabilities in the United States represents an emerging phenomenon that is transforming the U.S.-Iran foreign policy relationship from a national security issue, primarily executed abroad, into a homeland security threat located within the United States. As an emerging dimension of the U.S.-Iran foreign policy relationship, this behavior by Iran must be thoroughly understood to aid U.S. policymakers in developing relevant policies to address the issue. However, Iran’s motivations for its international behavior are hotly debated among scholars of international relations (IR) theory. Some see Iran’s behavior as ideologically based, while others claim Iran’s behavior …

Cv: Justin Delacour (Political Science), Justin Delacour

Political Science Department Faculty Curricula Vitae

No abstract provided.

Domestic Gastrodiplomacy In The U.S. During The Great Depression And International Relations Theory, Leah Tucker

Hatfield Graduate Journal of Public Affairs

International Relations scholarship has generally treated food as an outward-facing instrument of soft power, leaving its domestic political functions comparatively underexamined. This paper argues that, during periods of systemic crisis, food policy can also operate inwardly as a mechanism of regime stabilization with broader political implications. Using New Deal food programs during the Great Depression as a case study, it introduces the concept of “domestic gastrodiplomacy” to describe how the management of subsistence can reinforce confidence in governing institutions when that confidence is under strain.

The paper evaluates this claim through realist, liberal, and constructivist perspectives. Each highlights a different …

Mucho Ruido Y Pocas Nueces? Rethinking Mexico's Judicial Reform In Comparative Perspective, Oscar Serratos

Notre Dame Journal of International & Comparative Law

Mexico's 2024 judicial reform, which made it the first country to elect all judges by popular vote, has generated widespread criticism for allegedly threatening judicial independence and democratic governance. This Article challenges the prevailing narrative by arguing that many of these concerns overstate the reform's practical effect. Through a comparative analysis of Mexico's new constitutional framework and judicial electoral systems in the United States, the Article demonstrates that the reform incorporates structural safeguards—including balanced nomination powers, nonpartisan elections, restrictions on campaign financing, and continued judicial training—that set it apart from comparable American models. While acknowledging legitimate concerns regarding implementation and …

The Pope, American Politics, And The Battle For Tolkien’S Soul In The Twenty-First Century, Kelsey A. Fuller-Shafer

Journal of Tolkien Research

This essay considers the contemporary ramifications of the use of Tolkien’s works and personhood in the political and cultural dialogues of the United States. Tolkien’s fiction was recently cited by Pope Leo XIV, the first pope from the United States, in his encyclical letter in May of 2026 reacting to artificial intelligence, in the same era that tech billionaires are selecting names for their AI companies from Tolkien’s legendarium. These actors find themselves not just in a dispute about ethical usage of AI, but also as commentators on and subjects to the growing political divide in the United States, and …

Universal Injunctions And The Executive-Judicial Relationship In America, Jeremy Kang

Senior Honors Theses

This thesis examines a specific type of legal controversy surrounding the Trump administration’s dealings with the judicial branch. Central to the matter is the concept of universal injunctions: how a federal court can enjoin even non-parties to a case from behaving in certain ways.

The history of universal injunctions, from pre-Enlightenment England to modern America, is initially discussed. Then special attention is given to their use against President Donald Trump in particular, culminating in the Supreme Court curtailing them, and district court judges ignoring the high court’s ruling. Finally, previous examples of conflict between the American executive and judicial branches …

Mapping Minority Investigative Powers In Congress, David Rapallo

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

“Shut down the Senate . . .” “Roll over and play dead . . .” In the first hundred days of President Donald Trump’s second term, these were the rallying cries of two far ends of a debate among Democrats about how to respond to the administration’s unprecedented actions. This debate, which rages on today, has been marked by a lack of specificity about the various oversight tools available to members of the minority party in Congress, particularly when they investigate whether the Executive Branch is faithfully executing the laws Congress passes. Scholarship too has focused little on the full …

Pinochet’S Upswing: The Demise Of A Democratic Society In Chile, Jacob Behnk

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

In the United States, we tend to view democracy as an inviolable tenet of political life. Our nation’s founding is even romanticized as a heroic fight for liberty against the wicked tyranny of the British monarchy. It is unthinkable that democracy could ever be destroyed, let alone have the citizens cheer on those who engineer its destruction—yet this is the very situation that Chile found itself regarding Augusto Pinochet, a brutal dictator who ruled the country with an iron fist from 1973 to 1990. Pinochet would be voted out of power in a 1988 plebiscite, but still managed to win …

Demographic Trends And Far-Right Party Support In Europe: The Role Of The Cordon Sanitaire, Maxwell Curry

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

This study examines whether cordons sanitaires, institutional exclusionary arrangements common in Western and Central Europe on the part of mainstream political actors aimed to prevent far-right political parties perceived as posing a threat to liberal democratic order from entering into governing coalitions or otherwise participating in mainstream political life, condition the relationship between immigration-related demographic change and support for far-right political parties. Contemporary scholarship has extensively examined the relationship between immigration and support for far-right political parties, but comparatively little research has examined the institutional factors that potentially condition such a relationship. In an analysis of parliamentary election data …

A World Without Literature? Tagore’S Words For His Times And Ours, Salmoli Choudhuri

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In 1907, Rabindranath Tagore delivered a lecture on world literature to an audience in Calcutta, the then capital of British India. Amid powerful and intersecting forces—colonialism and nationalism, industrial modernity and mass poverty—Tagore’s position on literature was neither disengaged nor defensive, insofar as he related it to the human condition and the capacity for world-making. Far from staking a representational claim to world literature on behalf of Indian or Bengali literature, I argue in this article, Tagore reconceptualized the idea from its earlier canonical formulation by Goethe. He departed from dominant nineteenth-century philosophies that conceived the world as a spatial—and …

Reconsidering Karl Marx’S Concept Of World Literature, Kenneth Cheng

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

It is widely assumed that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels regarded world literature as an epiphenomenal product of the capitalist world market, and therefore as a symptom of rather than potential cure to the crisis of modern society. However, this conflicts with the fact that they designated the Communist Manifesto itself as a world-literary production—the joint work of communists of various nationalities—and opposed it to the national limitations of German socialist literature. This article challenges existing interpretations by outlining how Marx and Engels incorporated the humanistic idealism of the Goethean Weltliteratur tradition into the theoretical framework of historical materialism. It …

Governing Algorithmic Attention: Attention Safeguard Models And The Cognitive Attentional Standard As System Level Interventions In Human Computer Interaction, Behavioral Economics, And Artificial Intelligence, Delante Clark

Graduate Scholarship and Creative Works

Algorithmic recommendation systems and interface designs shape attention by combining visually salient cues with uncertain reward timing and low friction interaction. These conditions can sustain anticipatory checking, extend time on task, and reduce natural disengagement points through patterns such as infinite scrolling and autoplay. This paper synthesizes research across neuroscience, human computer interaction, behavioral economics, and artificial intelligence to argue that attention capture is a predictable outcome of incentive driven design rather than an individual failure of self regulation. It advances the Attention Safeguard Models and the Cognitive Attentional Standard as system level interventions that regulate exposure conditions, pacing, and …

Preserving The Family In The Globalized Era: Explaining State Discouragement Of Women’S Rights And The Gap Between Law And Family Realities In Tajikistan, Ivy Alexandra Raines

Dissertations - ALL

This dissertation is guided by a two-part research question, which begins by asking why Tajikistan exhibits low levels of gender equality within the family despite strong international commitments and a formally secular legal framework. The second question builds on the first by asking why a state that offers legal guarantees in line with its international commitments, as outlined by Article 16 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), invests significant energy in discouraging divorce rather than in safeguarding women’s rights that would support their ability to leave harmful marital situations. Employing qualitative discourse …

Papers On American Elections, Murat Abus

Dissertations - ALL

The transfer of executive power through free and fair elections is the cornerstone of democracy. However, losers' consent is a fundamental requirement for the peaceful transfer of power through elections. In advanced democracies, due to the long series of free and fair elections and frequent electoral turnovers, there is an implicit assumption about the status of elections as the mechanism to shape the structure of representative government and resolve societal conflicts. Voters naturally occupy a central role in the maintenance of this societal consensus. Therefore, factors that affect the voter experience - voter satisfaction and voter confidence - are normatively …

Data Governance In Local Government: Evidence From Spatial Data Initiatives, Maame Efua Q. Arthur

Capstone Projects – Politics and Government

The adoption of modern digital applications and tools enables community development organizations to improve public services and community well-being. In response to the data surge, several local governments in the U.S. are converting spatial data into user-friendly geospatial products, including maps, dashboards, web, and instant apps. Research suggests that while these tools enhance operations for municipalities, they also increase public accountability and data transparency. However, developing data-driven tools is dependent on structured data governance practices that ensure data accessibility, accuracy, reliability, and security. Using the City of Bloomington, Illinois, as a case study, this study assesses the city's data-driven initiatives, …

The 1778 Fort Pitt Treaty: U.S. Relations With The Lenni-Lenape Nation And The Unraveling Of Early Promises, Veronica E. Riddle

Masters Theses

This study examines the Treaty of Fort Pitt (1778), signed in present-day Pittsburgh, as the first formal diplomatic agreement between the United States and the Lenape (Delaware) Nation during the American Revolutionary War. Formed amid the military and political instability of the Revolution, the treaty promised mutual military assistance, recognition of Lenape sovereignty west of the Alleghenies, protection from settler encroachment, and the unprecedented possibility of Native representation within the emerging American confederation. However, following the deaths of key Lenape leaders, escalating frontier violence, and the failure of the Continental Congress to ratify or uphold critical provisions, the treaty rapidly …

From Hashtags To Regime Change: How Ai-Driven Social Media Algorithms Fueled Youth Protests Against Authoritarianism In Bangladesh But Stalled In Pakistan (2020-2025), Rafia Nishan Abbasi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this research, it has been investigated that how and why youth protests were amplified by AI based social media algorithms in Bangladesh; however, their impacts resulted in occasional and isolated resistance in Pakistan during 2022-25, taking in account the differences in state regulations, platform governance, and civil society networks. While utilizing Mixed-methods approach, this study employs comparative discourse analysis, a structured survey (N=466), semi-structured interviews, legal and policy tracing, and platform data. This research has proposed a novel theoretical framework of Algorithm Regime Mediation (ARM). ARM considers platform algorithms as politically intermingled intermediaries which can determine socio-political outcomes by …

Articulating The Future: How The Techno-Optimist Manifesto Constructs Ai Hegemony, Christian Noel Yeomans

Master's Theses

This paper analyzes two recently published digital manifestos—the Techno-Optimist Manifesto (TOM) by Marc Andreessen and the Bitcoin Whitepaper (BW) by Satoshi Nakamoto—and how they articulate political visions for the respective rising technologies of artificial intelligence (AI) and cryptocurrency. I apply Laclau and Mouffe’s discursive articulation theory to both manifestos, analyzing how they contribute to the formation of hegemonic ideological visions among the elites of these two technological sectors. In the context of AI elites, TOM transforms an existing Silicon Valley ideology, techno-optimism, into a radical new form of accelerationism, which I coin t/opt. This shift is examined within the context …

Bridging The Gender Gap In Ghanaian Local Governance: Key Enablers And Pathways, Martin Brantuo, Victor Fannam Nunfam, Joseph Akanganngang Asitik, Ebenezer Afrifa-Yamoah

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

This qualitative study examines factors facilitating women’s election to District Assemblies in Ghana through social capital and supply–demand theoretical frameworks. Through interviews with thirteen female Assembly members and four officials, the research identifies four critical enablers: financial resources, political affiliations, community relationships, and educational qualifications. Financial resources emerged as crucial for campaign management and voter mobilization, while political party support provided strategic advantages despite the nonpartisan nature of local elections. Strong interpersonal relationships within communities proved vital for building voter trust, and educational background enhanced candidates’ credibility. The findings inform recommendations for implementing gender quotas, establishing campaign funding mechanisms, voter …

“The Blue Party? No, Wait, Is There Really A Blue Party?” A Study Of Young Norwegian Children’S Perceptions Of Politics, Stine Johansen Utler

Democracy & Education

The study investigates Norwegian primary school children's immediate responses to “What do you think of when you hear the word ‘politics’?” It examines children’s perceptions of the concept of politics, their emphasis, and how they communicate their perceptions, providing information about children’s political socialization, knowledge, and understanding as well as early conceptual learning. The data come from group interviews with 36 children (20 second-graders and 16 fourth-graders). The study was not longitudinal but emphasized differences in the content of children’s perceptions. The analysis identifies four different categories of children`s perceptions. These vary according to their emphasis, their apparent associative political …

The Contentious Politics Of Abortion: Understanding The Black Protests And Women’S Strikes In Poland, Taubie Sanders

Undergraduate Theses, Capstones, and Recitals

In 1993, the Polish Parliament, the Sejm, passed a law called ‘The Abortion Compromise’ permitting abortion only in cases when there is a serious threat to the life or health of the woman, pregnancy is the result of a crime, or prenatal tests show the fetus to be severely or incurably damaged. The current abortion laws in Poland are the most restrictive in all of Europe. Poland’s abortion laws have undergone much contestation in recent years. In 2016, the Black Protests erupted across the country in opposition to a proposed total ban on abortion. In 2020, the Women’s Strikes commenced …