Digital Commons Network^™

Coming Full Circle: The International Legal Status Of The International Olympic Committee, William Thomas Worster

University of Miami International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

The 2024 Defence Policy Update And Its Predecessors: Why The Caf Is In A “Death Spiral”, Allan English

Canadian Military History

In March 2024 the Minister of National Defence characterised the Canadian Armed Forces’ (CAF) inability to attract new members as a “death spiral” for the force. While the latest defence policy update, Our North, Strong and Free: A Renewed Vision for Canada’s Defence, recognises the seriousness of the CAF’s personnel crisis, it provides no concrete actions to solve it. However, this defence policy update is just the latest in a series of actions used by the CAF to manage perceptions of its personnel problems rather than addressing their root causes. This article examines the latest defence policy in the …

On National Defence: A Contemporary Evaluation Of The Canadian Armed Forces, Kyle Pritchard, Paul Esau

Canadian Military History

This article examines the contemporary history of the Department of National Defence (DND) and the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) from peacekeeping to the most recent update to Canadian defence policy, highlighting their historical roles and contemporary challenges. It discusses the evolving purpose of the CAF, which has shifted from conventional defence to supporting and reinforcing a western-led international order. It explores issues such as defence spending, procurement challenges, peacekeeping endeavors, veterans’ support, diversity and inclusion within the CAF. Moreover, it explores emerging threats in cyber, space and Arctic domains, including the rise of artificial intelligence threats, and emphasises the need …

Now You Have It, Now You Don’T: Taxing Crypto, Part 1, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

The latest rise in the value of bitcoin has rekindled the debate on whether cryptocurrencies perform a useful function. For example, a recent article in the Financial Times argued: Have we learnt the lessons from the disastrous 2022 crash in digital assets? To judge from recent action in the crypto market, the answer appears to be no. Since hitting bottom after FTX collapsed into bankruptcy with a $9bn-ish hole in its balance sheet in November 2022, crypto market values have roughly tripled. Bitcoin’s price rose above $70,000 this week to touch record highs. A new wave of enthusiasm is growing, …

Comparing The Us Response To The Soviet Invasion Of Afghanistan And The Russian Invasion Of Ukraine: Learning From The Past And Planning For The Future, Zachary Hogan

Undergraduate Theses, Capstones, and Recitals

As the Russo-Ukrainian war continues to rage, the decisions of the present are of paramount importance. In order to make the most positive and well-supported decisions in this ongoing conflict, it would be wise to look to past instances of similar situations. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan is such an instance. The parallels between the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the past Soviet invasion of Afghanistan are extensive and, more importantly, informative for U.S. foreign policy. It is with this lens that this paper will pursue a historical foreign policy analysis of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, its circumstances and …

The Banner - V. 159, No. 6 - (June 2024), Christian Reformed Church In North America

The Banner

No abstract provided.

Small Island Risks: Research Reflections For Disaster Anthropologists And Climate Ethnographers, Crystal A. Felima

UK CARES Faculty Publications

Disasters and climate-related events, including tropical storms, droughts, coastal erosion, and ocean acidification, threaten small island nations. Given the urgency of reducing disaster risks and the effects of climate change on vulnerable populations, this reflection essay pursues three objectives. First, it highlights the role of anthropology, ethnography, and multi-sited research in exploring disaster impacts, climate crises, and public policy in island communities. It then highlights national planning and inter-regional activities to build awareness of various risk reduction efforts by island nations and multi-governmental organizations. This article concludes with discussion prompts to engage researchers, scholars, students, and practitioners studying and working …

Radical Visions For The Law Of Peace: How W.E.B. Du Bois And The Black Antiwar Movement Reimagined Civil Rights And The Laws Of War And Peace, Andrew J. Lanham

Washington Law Review

This Article reconstructs the history of Black antiwar activism in the twentieth-century United States and argues that Black antiwar activists played a significant but largely forgotten role in the development of both modern civil rights law and the international law of war and peace. The Article focuses on the career of W.E.B. Du Bois, tracing how he built coalitions between civil rights and antiwar organizations to pursue a series of shared legal campaigns. Du Bois’s antiwar work was also representative of a larger tradition, and his career illuminates how a range of Black activists and civil rights lawyers like Pauli …

An Investigation Into Teaching Sports Analytics, Josh Havstad

Master's Theses

Sports analytics arrived in the mainstream media through the novel and film Moneyball. However, its origins date back to operations researchers following World War II. Often considered a subdiscipline of statistics, sports analytics draws from statistics but also includes concepts from data science, communication, and marketing. As a passionate fan of sports, I have pursued statistics in my undergraduate and graduate education with the dream of working in sports for my career. However, educational opportunities in sports analytics are limited nationwide, and more specifically, there is no educational opportunity at my university, California Polytechnic State University in San Luis …

It’S Not A Few, It’S All: How Political Elites Create And Construct The Meaning Of Terrorism And Apply It To An Entire Group, Jamarne Mcgill

Publications and Research

In the aftermath of the September 11th terror attacks, we witnessed political elites make adequate use of coded language in order to justify the implementation of an aggressive and punitive foreign policy in the Middle East. Terror attacks are disruptive, catastrophic events that tend to produce feelings of racial resentment and a desire for collective punishment toward an entire group of people. Although the perpetrators of a terror attack do not represent or speak for the majority of a much larger group, the general population of the nation or state that was attacked may not feel this way. Therefore, an …

Military Climate Emissions, Nadia B. Ahmad

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

High-Power Microwave Antenna Design, Luke C. Chase

Electrical Engineering

High-power microwave antennas are essential for defense industry radar systems, cyber warfare, and power transmission. The US Department of Defense a SBIR proposal specifying the need for a high-power phased-array microwave antenna for the US Air Force.

Vivaldi antennas, invented in 1978 by Peter Gibson, have been widely adopted for radar applications due to their high bandwidth and gain performance. Considerable amounts of research exists on designing Vivaldis for different applications ranging from radar to communications. Using antenna theory and past research, a new Vivaldi antenna was designed to meet the requirements mandated by the DoD research contract.

This project …

Southeast Asian American Tongues: The Sustainability And Growth Of A Vietnamese Dual Language Immersion Program In The Wake Of California’S Proposition 58, A Qualitative Study, Joseph Matthew Marquéz Manluco

Social Justice in Educational Leadership EdD Dissertations

This dissertation investigates the sustainability and growth of a VDLI program in Silicon Valley. The program was established in response to the 2016 passage of California’s Proposition 58, which reversed restrictions that inhibited the implementation of K12 bilingual programs. The study explored concepts related to the initial diaspora, linguistic experience, cultivation of an identity fostering a bilingual love of language, and community linguistic networks that sustained the bilingualism for research participants. Participants revealed their personal stories leading them to the VDLI from their own independent journeys in sheltering, preserving, and maintaining their linguistic heritage. The VDLI stands as a testament …

The Myth Of Slavery Abolition, Jocelyn Getgen Kestenbaum

UC Law Journal

In many countries today, slavery and the slave trade continue with impunity. International human rights law prohibits both abuses, but states are rarely held accountable and people who are enslaved or slave traded rarely receive redress. This Article offers a novel account of why international human rights law advocacy neglects slavery and the slave trade. Specifically, this Article demonstrates that the abolition of the Transatlantic and East African slave trades was achieved through a legal framework that marginalized the human rights of enslaved persons while consolidating empire. In the wake of World War II, prohibitions on slavery and the slave …

Robot Rodeo, Daniel Rickers, Tyler Vaughn, Vinayak Sharath, Berent Baysal, Promit Das Gupta

Mechanical Engineering

This document outlines the Final Design Review (FDR) for an autonomous robot developed in response to the Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC) Ship Maintenance Robot Rodeo Challenge. Through extensive analysis, we selected a design concept, built a verification prototype, and tested the prototype in the NSWC Robot Rodeo Competition. The design overview portion of this report will present the details of our design while explaining how it will function. Next, is our implementation section, which provides evidence about our procurement, manufacturing, and assembly of our product. Our design verification follows and explains the tests that we conducted on the robot …

In Pipe Biofilm Removal System, Caroline White, Abe Muldrow, Jack Catalano, Brendan Thomas Palmer

Mechanical Engineering

In many drinking water systems, biological build-up can accumulate over time and create contamination resistant to traditional chemical flushing techniques, thus creating systems that must be flushed constantly to be considered safe. The team analyzed how this biological build up occurs, the current methods of removal, and thought about different ways to remove this ENGR 459-03 7 biological buildup without further damaging the health of the water system. To do this, we preformed extensive academic research about how biofilm builds up in water systems, examined any existing products that remove containments from water systems, and developed a solution capable of …

Monopoly Capital, Militarism, And Environmental Degradation, Daniel Auerbach, Brett Clark

Denver Law Review

Research within the natural and social sciences increasingly concludes that business as usual—economic growth—is leading to significant ecological disruption. Additionally, scholars have identified militaries as a significant driver of environmental degradation. Typically, these two social institutions are understood as being separate, but operating in relation, to each other. In this article, we focus on the interrelation and integration of the military and the economy through the rise of the military-industrial complex in order to illuminate the underlying logic that amplifies the environmental impacts of these institutions. More specifically, we assess how monopoly capital’s dynamics influence the development of military weapons …

The Metaverse As A Future Threat Landscape: An Interdisciplinary Perspective, Sam T. Hunter, Alexis L. D'Amato, Joel Elson, Austin C. Doctor, Averie E. Linnell

Reports, Projects, and Research

In response to the emergence of new, paradigm-shifting technology that increases capability for the benefit and – as is the focus of this work – harm, we sought to provide contributions across three key areas. First, as a foundation, we provide a definition of the ambiguous and, at times, confusing term ‘metaverse’ and outline its unique characteristics as an emerging ecosystem. Second, we synthesise definitional framing with the violent extremist literature to offer guidance on how the metaverse can (and currently is), manifest in terrorist and extremist activities, such as recruitment, planning, finance, and malevolent creativity. We offer that while …

The President’S Authority Over Cross-Border Data Flows, Anupam Chander, Paul M. Schwartz

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This Article reveals a surprising expansion of presidential authority to control goods and services available in the United States because of the information flows that they entail. Such authority is grounded in laws focused on protecting national security, here with respect to foreign surveillance and propaganda. But broad executive powers over our information infrastructure raises significant concerns with respect to core American values of free expression and due process. Worries about unfettered foreign access to data should be coupled with worries about unfettered executive control over our information services and technologies.

Humanitarian Intervention, Its Misuse, And A Proposed Solution Throughthe International Court Of Justice, Michael Pappas

Nevada Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Bridging The Divide: Does The Eu's Ai Act Offer Code For Regulating Emergent Technologies In America?, Renee Henson

Missouri Law Review

The European Union (“EU”) has taken the remarkable step of coming to agreement to implement the first-of-its-kind comprehensive legislation regarding artificial intelligence (“AI”), the AI Act. The AI Act adopts a risk-based approach to address diverse AI system applications and potential harms associated with AI technology. The AI Act categorizes AI systems based on risk levels, ranging from unacceptable to minimal, with corresponding regulatory requirements tailored to mitigate associated risks. Efforts are underway in the United States to establish AI regulatory frameworks, as demonstrated by the Bipartisan Framework for U.S. Act, proposed by Senators Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Richard Blumenthal …

Communication Challenges In Underwater Wireless Networks: Mac Protocols And Software Solutions, Dmitrii Dugaev

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Underwater wireless networks (UWNs) represent a diverse and intriguing research domain, encompassing a wide array of scientific and industrial applications. This dissertation delves into the communication challenges at the Medium Access Control (MAC) layer within UWNs, stemming from the distinctive signal propagation conditions and the harshness of the deployment environment. The manuscript provides comprehensive coverage of key aspects of UWNs, including potential applications, communication protocols, methodologies employed in such networks, and existing software solutions that facilitate simulation, emulation, and real testbed scenarios for underwater research endeavors. Furthermore, this research introduces innovative software and communication solutions designed to facilitate the seamless …

Understanding The Knowledge Production Function Of The United Nations: The Case Of The Sahel Crisis, Hussein E. Elshaar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis aims to test the argument that the UN knowledge production on the situation in the Sahel region is internally consistent and externally valid with the knowledge produced by other entities beyond the UN, including academia and think tanks. The thesis analyzed external studies by scholars and research and academic institutions as well as UN knowledge production, mainly the UN strategic frameworks and the reports of the Secretary-General on the Sahel. The study followed an analytical framework that sought to answer specific questions about how these studies, frameworks, and reports frame the conflict in the Sahel, and what root …

Examining The Factors That Contribute To The Survival And Resilience Of The Al-Shabaab Terrorist Organization, Kevisha R. Kellar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis explores the enduring threat posed by Al-Shabaab in Somalia, examining three primary factors contributing to its resilience: the mismanagement of international intervention, inadequate government oversight and resources, and Al-Shabaab’s ability to adapt to Somalia’s socio-political environment. These factors help Al-Shabaab foster direct and indirect relationships that allow the organization to survive. Through an analysis of Al-Shabaab’s organizational structure and strategies, this study sheds light on the exploitation of political, economic, and religious dynamics, and the complexity of combatting Al-Shabaab. Al-Shabaab’s manipulation of an Islamic identity is a political tool, that fosters business networks, aids in arms acquisitions, evades …

Placemaking And Placewashing In Manhattan's Chinatown: Capitalist Vs. Community Interests, Mary Chu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Since the late 1890s, there have been internal and external placemakers in Manhattan’s Chinatown. They take the form of city government, real estate developers, and community organizations vying for space, and seeking to define what this neighborhood should be, for whom it should serve, and how it should look. Sometimes these would-be placemakers operate with neoliberal goals and overt orientalist and/or racist views. They push those narratives through via media representations and as a tactic to attract tourism, but with little regard for how it affects the community. In this work, I examine connections between historic ideas of placemaking and …

Beautiful Resistance: Nonfiction Theatre Rehearsal Processes, Politics, And Prefiguration In War, Ash Marinaccio

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Beautiful Resistance: Nonfiction Theatre Rehearsal Processes, Politics, and Prefiguration in War examines nonfiction theatre rehearsals and devising processes in and about conflict and war. I use the term “nonfiction” to refer to the vast body of collaborative theatre, facilitation, movement, puppet, and performance practices, knowledges, and techniques included under the capacious umbrella of “theatre of the real.” I propose that nonfiction theatre rehearsals are sites of prefiguration, possessing the potential to create a space where systemically oppressed communities can build alternative futures in the present. While there are multiple frameworks for understanding prefigurative politics, within this dissertation, I employ the …

From “Total Destruction” To “Total Dictatorship”: The Influence Of Ernst Jünger’S Visionary Fascism, Nick Schiff

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper seeks to answer one central question: How can the life and work of Ernst Jünger help illuminate the development of fascist ideas, culture, politics, and power across Europe from 1920-1945? The components of that question are: what were the core elements of Jünger’s aesthetics, morality, and politics? How did he synthesize these elements to create his influential vision of German fascism? What were Jünger’s interactions and exchanges with other European fascists, as well as influential Nazis including Carl Schmitt, Joseph Goebbels, and Adolph Hitler himself? How did Jünger’s new Fascist politics and aesthetics affect them? I argue that …

Performing Ero Guro: Erotic-Grotesque Bodies And Normativity In Post-Wwii Japanese And Korean Theatre, Dohyun Shin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation investigates how portrayals of erotic and grotesque bodies in post-WWII Japanese and Korean theatre responded to each nation’s image of the ideal body. Those ideal bodily images were the product of haunting modernity as well as of the following historical circumstances after Japan’s loss in WWII—the Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security between the U.S. and Japan and the attendant protests (Japan) as well as the aftermath of Japanese colonial rule, the Korean war, and Korea’s military dictatorships. Instead of uncovering the historical legacy of the early 20^th-century cultural trend Ero Guro Nansensu (Erotic, Grotesque, Nonsense) …

Social Workers Working With Intimate Partner Violence Survivors: The Influence Of Trauma Work On The Social Worker’S Intimate Relationships, Claire T. Mccue

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Working therapeutically with trauma survivors, such as survivors of Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) carries a risk of vicarious traumatization (VT) for social workers, as well as the potential for vicarious post-traumatic growth (VPTG). This phenomenological study sought to explore and understand how vicarious exposure to trauma affects social workers who treat survivors of IPV and their intimate relationships positively and negatively. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with 15 social workers working directly with survivors of IPV in New York while being involved in their intimate relationships.

Utilizing the constructivist self-development perspective, the study found social workers experienced physical, emotional, …

Faunal Use And Distribution At The Site Of Nixtun-Ch'ich', Petén, Guatemala, Jemima Georges

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation delves into the pre-Columbian Preclassic Maya civilization, examining the societal dynamics, subsistence strategies, and cultural practices at Nixtun-Ch’ich’, Guatemala through the analysis of animal bones. Animal bones are used as indicators of dietary habits, social structures, and ideological beliefs. The findings highlight a diet that evolved from favoring a complex array of strategies in the Middle Preclassic period to one that concentrated on a few mammals and freshwater resources. These decisions were influenced by sociopolitical changes from the Middle to Late Preclassic periods. Excavations of three residences (J1, C2/1, R2/1, and R1/2) and four public spaces (Mound ZZ1, …