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Well-Being Indicators, Social Globalization, And Unaccompanied Child Migration From Central America, Lucia Farriss

Dissertations

This research investigates the effect of well-being indictors and social globalization on the migration of Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) from Central America. The purpose of this study is to determine whether the surge in UAC that began in 2014 at the United States southern border is driven primarily by violence, or whether other factors are at play. Using data for the period 2008-2018, the apprehension of UAC serves as a proxy for measuring unaccompanied child migration to the United States. The four countries of focus are El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico as they contribute the largest numbers of child …

An Assessment Of The Impact Of Maritime (In)Security In The Gulf Of Guinea: Special Emphasis On Sao Tome And Principe, Paulo De Araújo Ribeiro De Ceita

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Being In Transit: Life, Death, And The Politics Of Migrant Journeys From Central America To The United States, Jared Patrick Van Ramshorst

Dissertations - ALL

Every year, hundreds of thousands of migrants from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua risk their lives traveling to and toward the U.S. Long before reaching the U.S.-Mexico border, however, they travel thousands of miles across Central America and Mexico, often stopping off in migrant shelters scattered along the way. Whether travelling by foot or riding atop large freight trains known as “the Beast,” migrants spend weeks, months, and even years in transit, navigating a dense landscape of hardening borders and immigration enforcement in Mexico and the U.S. while encountering incredible dangers along the way, such as assault, extortion, kidnapping, …

The Lasting Effects Of U.S. Intervention In Guatemala, Katherine A. Gaffey

University Honors Theses

Guatemala today faces a national femicide, exceedingly high rates of human trafficking and drug trafficking, as well an increase in migration to the U.S. This paper attempts to understand the current situation in Guatemala through a historical analysis of Guatemala’s tumultuous relationship with the U.S. Specifically, it looks at the role of the 1954 CIA backed coup and the United Fruit Company as key causal factors in fostering the Guatemalan Civil War and the implications of that war for ongoing crime and instability in Guatemala today.

Delinquency In The Caribbean: Stakeholder Perceptions Of Root Causes, Laura Nolterieke

Honors Theses

There is a gap in the research on juvenile delinquency within the Caribbean context. As countries such as St. Lucia, Guyana, St. Kitts, and Nevis have growing delinquency and crime rates, there is a need to bridge this gap in the literature. This research sought to examine the main causes of juvenile delinquency within St. Lucia, Guyana, St. Kitts, and Nevis, as described by juvenile justice stakeholders, such as probation officers, prosecutors, and judges, within their respective countries. Through the use of grounded theory, the data were coded and analyzed using a constant comparison method. From these data, six themes …

A Migration System In The Making: Institutional And Experiential Dynamics Of Refugees And Asylum-Seekers In Mexico, Melissa Balliet

Master's Theses

This thesis argues that Mexico’s refugee regime - its institutions, its legal instruments and its norms - are under serious pressure and, as a result of that pressure, a new refugee regime is emerging in the country. This new refugee regime is based on the notion that the movement of refugees, asylum-seekers and irregular migrants should be effectively managed and strictly controlled. Such pressure, resulting in an aggressive border enforcement strategy implemented by the Mexican state, has come directly from the United States government. New policies and contractual agreements emerging from the United States and Mexico (2018-2019) have made it …

All Hail The Market: Immigration And Economics In A Post-Cold War Western Hemisphere, Jorge Ambriz

Master's Theses

The end of the Cold War lifted the United States to the role of the sole economic superpower, and an opportune moment to address hemispheric issues was presented to Washington policymakers. By the end of the 1980s, hemispheric forced migration was on the rise, with a large portion of those forced to flee from Central America. This moment coincided with the decade characterized by an increasingly connected world, where globalization in the form of economic linkages were being proposed in the Summit of the Americas, hemispheric meetings that began in the 1990s in hopes of addressing hemispheric issues. While the …

The Mexican Voter Transformed: Morena Success In The Wake Of Party System Failure, Madeline Gegg

Honors Theses

Over the last two decades Mexican politics have been in constant change and instability after the fall of the PRI. In 2014, MORENA was founded and began to make its presence known with the legislative elections in 2015, winning 35 seats in the legislature. Despite only winning less than 10% of seats in their first national election, MORENA built off these victories to win the national general election and the presidency with former PRD candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). While easy to attribute this historic victory to the global rise of populism, this project argues that the Mexican case …

Cuba’S Use Of Political Imagery In Creating Societal Gender Norms: 1940-1980, Matthew Wingfield

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The gendering of Cuba began during the power imbalance during the colonial era. Gender is an important way in which the relationship of Cuba to Spain, to the United States, and of 1959 Cuban revolution has been expressed. However, the practice of the United States gendering Cuba became commonplace after the end of the Spanish-American War. During this period Cuba was often portrayed in US popular culture as a gendered Orientalized other in ways that reflect what scholar Edward Said defined as Orientalism elsewhere. This will be defined later in the introduction. Gender intersected with racial ideologies in many of …

Organized Crime And Development In Low And Middle-Income Countries, Katie Kelshaw

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

The presence of organized crime is common across all income levels, but the effects of organized crime differ between low-income and middle-income countries. Institutionally, socially, and economically, criminal organizations make contributions which affect the states they are in. This paper theorizes that the contributions made by organized crime help development in low-income countries, then later harms development in middle-income countries. Empirical tests find that the direct effects of organized crime are not significant in low and middle-income countries. The indirect effects of organized crime – corruption in the public sector — have a negative effect on development.

Why Families Flee: A Study Of Family Migration Patterns From The Northern Triangle Of Central America, Claire Williams

Honors Theses

The past decade has witnessed an unprecedented increase in migrant families from the Northern Triangle, the region of Central America comprised of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. The mass influx in family migration has important consequences for destination countries like the United States and Mexico as well as the countries which they leave behind. This study aims to answer the question of how family migration patterns in the Northern Triangle of Central America have changed in the past decade and why. I outline the migration decisions of families through a qualitative and quantitative lens. I use newspapers and NGO reports …

Cruces, Carlos Mario Tobon Franco

Theses

Cruces is a multimedia installation depicting immigrant conditions and experiences throughout landscapes, Latinx communities, and borderlands. Made during the last two years, it is constructed as a multivocal ethnography of immigrants with varying legal statuses, countries of origin, and stages in their journey. The imagery, sounds, and narratives are composed of the distributed yet relational geographies of immigrants’ experience and the pieces are structured to highlight the constitutive elements of human mobilities, such as trains, rivers and immigration hubs, as well as the natural obstacles they face in their perilous transit, such as forests and deserts.

The fieldwork was carried …

Decolonizing Human Trafficking: A Case Study Of Human Trafficking In Edo State Nigeria, Oyinkansola Adepitan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Every year, governments and globally acclaimed international organizations alike develop policies, sanctions and other control mechanisms in terms of prevention, protection and prosecution in an attempt to abate the current human trafficking problem which appears to be worsening by the year. This thesis will explore the relationship of colonial legacies to the current human trafficking dilemma, assessing the impact of post-colonial cultural and structural practices that continue to persist and proliferate the movement of human beings across borders and facilitates their sub-human treatment. By analyzing the underlying elements that have caused the current international system to operate and be structured …

Identifying Markers Of Transit States Embedded In International Drug Trafficking Networks, Citlalik Ibarra Figueroa

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Illicit drugs can travel across multiple borders before reaching their intended retail market. International drug trafficking is important because it introduces a large quantity of foreign sourced illicit drugs into domestic drug markets. Of utmost importance are countries that lie along the transshipment paths used by international drug trafficking operations that facilitate the movement of illicit drugs. Understanding the characteristics of countries operating as transit states is necessary to combat transshipment operations. The study investigates social, economic, geographic, and political factors that have the potential to account for nations being positioned as transit states in illicit drug transshipment networks generated …

Victims Of Child Sex Trafficking: Are U.S. Pediatricians Ready To Identify, Assess, Treat And Protect Them?, Bidisha Sinha

Dissertations

The trafficking of children for commercial sexual exploitation is a gross violation of human rights and a global, public health issue that is rapidly growing and prevalent. Due to the clandestine nature of this crime and the general lack of public knowledge about it, identifying and protecting victims of child sex trafficking (CST) is fraught with challenges. Therefore, it is imperative that healthcare professionals - often the only professionals with whom CST victims come in contact while in captivity - are properly educated and trained on this topic. A literature review reveals there is little knowledge about pediatricians' education and …

The Threat Of Terrorist Activities To The International Financial System, John Conor Engel

Theses and Dissertations

Terrorist and Criminal Activities pose a major threat to the international

financial system and society. To fund these criminal organizations, they typically acquire their funds from terrible crimes and corruption. These organizations then introduce their funds into the international financial system to continue to fund their organizations. In this research I examine the trends in which terrorist organizations use to exploit the international financial system, and what Governments and financial institutions are doing to stop these organizations from manipulating the system. I will compare the number of crimes committed and see how effective the laws and security

have been and …

The Experience Of Guatemalan Women Who Seek Asylum In United States Courts: A Legacy Of Paternalism And Gendered Violence, Nina E. Harris

Honors Papers

Karen Musalo, a leading asylum attorney, explains,“In the United States, few refugee issues have been as controversial as that of gender asylum.” Despite perceived progress, inconsistent judicial decisions engender doubts about the viability of gender-based asylum cases. The U.S. courts continue to see violence against women as a personal or family matter rather than a pattern of accepted social behavior supported by the political and legal authorities. Using cases from Guatemalan women seeking asylum, my research scrutinizes the asylum system, and shows how the U.S. furthers a colonial, paternalistic narrative—allowing U.S. judges, adjudicators, and policymakers to decide who is worthy—or …

Sin Papeles: The Experiences Of Undocumented Central American Immigrants In The United States, Elizabeth Jarquin

Department of Family Therapy Dissertations and Applied Clinical Projects

In the United States, the topic of immigration represents a source of intense debate, which has escalated in recent years. Research indicates that Latinx immigrants are negatively impacted by current immigration policies— they are feeling afraid, angry, exhausted, defeated, overwhelmed, and concerned about themselves and their family (Castrellón, Rivarola, & López, 2017; Wray-Lake et al., 2018). This research, however, has largely neglected the Central American subgroup and the experiences of undocumented immigrants. The purpose of this study was to understand the experiences of undocumented Central American immigrants and their families within the current sociopolitical context. I utilized interpretative phenomenological analysis …

Associations Between Sex Work And Stimulant Use By Gender Among People Who Use Methamphetamine In The Mexico-U.S. Border, Itzahi Rodela

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

BACKGROUND: The literature indicates that there is a strong association between sexual risk behaviors for sexually transmitted infections and drug use, specifically sex work and stimulant use, respectively. Along the Mexico-U.S. border, Cd. Juarez and Tijuana are cities with high rates of drug use and availability due to lying on major drug trafficking routes into the U.S. There is minimal literature available on sex work among men not exclusively men who have sex with men, and stimulant use in the border region. AIMS: The aim of this study is to (1) summarize the measures for sociodemographic characteristics, sexual risk behaviors, …

Honduras: Factors Underlying Immigration To The United States, Annika M. Meurs

UVM Patrick Leahy Honors College Senior Theses

This thesis examines the relationship between out-migration from Honduras, US policy, and conditions in Honduras. More particularly, it examines the violent and repressive conditions in Honduras along with US Military Assistance from 1980 to 2017. I look at the impact of US immigration policy on migration flows into the United States. Using data from World Bank databank, the US Foreign Aid Greenbook, the World Development Report, the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), and the Political Terror Scale (PTS), I argue that violent conditions in Honduras, US military aid, and US immigration policy have significantly contributed to the ongoing exodus from Honduras …

The Immigration Crisis Under The Trump Administration, Angelica Elizabeth Merino Monge

Senior Projects Fall 2020

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Hasta Que Haya Justicia: Responses To The 2014 Forced Disappearance Of The Students Of Ayotzinapa, Mexico, Olivia Mozdzierz

Senior Projects Fall 2020

This paper examines responses to the 2014 forced disappearance of 43 university students from Ayotzinapa, Guerrero by Mexican authorities and criminals working together, for reasons that remain unknown. Rather than accept the losses as yet another consequence of official corruption and impunity, Mexican civil society rebelled. The people sustained protests, enlisted the support of international organizations, and exposed the government’s crimes and attempted cover-up. This study concludes that, despite the failure in the following years to locate the missing and bring the perpetrators to justice, the victims’ families and their allies demonstrated their power to hold the government to account …

The Work Of Sex Work: Legislative Failures, Societal Prejudices, And Their Disparate Outcomes In The Fight For Sex Workers’ Rights, Abigail Yvonne Swartvagher

Senior Projects Spring 2020

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Corruption And Anti-Corruption Agencies: Assessing Peruvian Agencies' Effectiveness, Kia R. Del Solar

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Corruption has gained attention around the world as a prominent issue. This is because corruption has greatly affected several countries. Following the exploration of various definitions and types of corruption, this thesis focuses on two efforts to rein in “grand corruption”, also known as executive corruption. The thesis is informed by existing theories of corruption as well as anti-corruption agencies and then situates Peru’s experience with corruption in its theoretical context and its broader Latin American context. This work conducts a comparative analysis and follows a process-tracing approach to examine and evaluate Peru’s recent anti-corruption agencies and their effectiveness in …

Antecedents Of Tendency To Help The Victims Of Human Trafficking From The Perspective Of High-Contact Service Employees In The Lodging Industry, Melissa Farboudi Jahromi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-

International Labor Organization estimated that 40.3 million people were victims of human trafficking in 2016. The high rate of human trafficking has drawn policymakers' attention to this issue and made them enforce anti-trafficking laws and regulations. However, their legal measures have not been based on solid empirical evidence due to the lack of academic research on human trafficking. The scant research available on human trafficking has been mainly descriptive or an investigation of sex trafficking cases to provide help to survivors. Thus, there is a need for research to explore human trafficking as a human rights issue through various perspectives …

Barriers And Access To Services For Female Victims Of Violence In The Dominican Republic, Catalina Hooper Armenteros

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Violence against women has presented a challenge for those tasked with addressing crime and victimization. It is a complex phenomenon that exists between the private and public spheres of society affecting nearly all aspects of a victim’s life, as well as those close to them. The Dominican Republic began to address domestic and gender violence in the past few decades, and victim services have emerged in efforts to assist Dominican women and girls escaping abuse. This study reviews the existing literature regarding violence against women and girls, and service provision in global, regional, and national contexts, and analyzes qualitative data …

“Bosques Si, Tala No”: The Uprising Of Cherán K’Eri, Ray Tarango

Honors Projects

In the spring of 2011, the indigenous community of Cherán K’eri in western Mexico rose up to protect their forests. Organized crime, and its allies, had taken over this town during the previous decade and had logged significant portions of its communal forests in the surrounding hills. This thesis examines the following questions: How do townspeople recall their experience under a narco state? What pushed this indigenous community to organize to protect the forest despite the threat of violence? What was it about this landscape in particular that brought people together? Previous research into this uprising has overlooked the …