Political History Commons^™

Film Review: The Trial Of Ratko Mladić, Iva Vukušić

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

No abstract provided.

The Ladle And The Knife: Power Projection And Force Deployment Under Reagan, Mathew Kawecki

War, Diplomacy, and Society (MA) Theses

This thesis examines the nature and impact of the Reagan administration’s self-described projection of “peace through strength.” It argues that Reagan’s defense spending surge, “Star Wars” (SDI) missile shield policy, and 1983 invasion of Grenada gave the president confidence and political cover that allowed him to withdraw U.S. Marines from Beirut in early 1984. Analysts and commentators focus on his muscular power projection like defense spending, SDI, and the invasion of Grenada, but in practice Reagan exercised a high level of restraint in troop deployment. These projections of power and the avoidance of protracted war in Lebanon gave Reagan further …

A Bridge Between Earth & Sky: How The Natural World Shaped The Civilizations Of Ancient And Early-Modern Persia, Sophia Cabana

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This project seeks to investigate the ways in which nature shaped the culture of ancient Persia through technology, architecture, agriculture, and art. Furthermore, this project investigates how the symbols and mentalities of ancient Persia were carried forward into the early-modern period. Achaemenid Persia and Babylon are studied as societies which influenced one another and combined to create the foundation of Persian culture as it is currently understood, which then combined in later centuries with other Middle Eastern and Central Asian cultural movements to produce the Safavid and Mughal Empires. The Safavids and Mughals imitated and revived Persian culture in order …

"Between Two Fires": Gender And American Socialism In The Progressive Era, Elisia Harder

Senior Theses

The Progressive Era (1890-1920) in the United States was a time of immense change in both the political and private spheres. Movements which sought to fundamentally upend the political status quo gained in popularity, including that of socialism. Socialism promised equality for workers regardless of gender, something that appealed to many American women at the time. A myriad of upper/middle-class and working-class women were thus initially drawn to the socialist movement. These women, however, would not find the salvation they were promised. Instead, they would confront the very same misogyny they experienced in mainstream political parties, as their struggle was …

Review Of Religion As Resistance: Negotiating Authority In Italian Libya, Shira Klein

History Faculty Articles and Research

A review of Eileen Ryan's Religion as Resistance: Negotiating Authority in Italian Libya.

Stop Talking About Sorrow: Nixon’S Communications Strategy After Lam Son 719, Dominic K. So

War, Diplomacy, and Society (MA) Theses

March 1971 was tough for President Richard Nixon. The American people were tired of the Vietnam War, with many still recovering from the violent anti-war protests of 1970. Congress had just passed an amendment prohibiting U.S. ground troops from operating outside of the borders of South Vietnam. Both the public and secret negotiations with Hanoi were stalled. Confidential channels with Beijing and Moscow about diplomatic initiatives had gone cold. Moreover, Lam Son 719, the joint U.S. and South Vietnamese incursion into Laos that began in February, was turning out to be a failure. The operation, Nixon’s military gamble to prove …

Chapman's Berlin Wall As A Display Of Tribal Victory, Cameron Steiner

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

From early contact between hunter-gatherer tribes, through the Middle Ages and to even modern times, societies in conflict would frequently engage in the intimidation tactic of severing the heads of their rivals and placing them upon spikes or poles. More than a means to warn away those who came upon it, these displays would exhibit the power and superiority of one tribe over the other. While the most explicit forms of this custom are no longer in widespread use, their gestures of dominance continue to be practiced in objects and figures that are given symbolic significance, typically representing the victory …

From Carver To Carter: The Political Economy Of Peanut Cultivation In The South, 1945-1976, Hayden Noel Mcdaniel

Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on the creation of a robust peanut industry in the South during the twentieth century, tracing its growth from a minor, local subsistence commodity to an agribusiness contributing to mass consumption. This study argues that local groups, constituents of peanut producing regions, and their representation in Congress worked together to establish a national peanut culture. Because peanuts’ rise in importance happened nearly simultaneously with the escalation of federal agricultural policies, studying peanuts rather than other traditional crops best demonstrates the interconnected relationship between federal policy and agricultural politics in the South.

Contrasting And Synthesizing Perspectives On Late Stage Capitalism And The French Revolution, Alyssa Allen

Jessie O'Kelly Freshman Essay Award

The modern-day American wealth inequality epidemic coupled with the effective silencing of the masses through superdelegates and the Electoral College fosters conditions akin to Pre-Revolutionary France with the bourgeoisie being oppressed through wealth inequality and the Estate System.

Making Discrimination Legal: A Comparison Of The Penal Laws In Ireland And The Nuremberg Laws And Other Laws In Nazi Germany, Gage Overton

Honors College Theses

The Penal Laws and the Nuremberg Laws were sets of legal codes which stripped away basic rights and civil liberties from Irish Catholics in the seventeenth and eighteenth century and German Jews in the 1930s and 1940s respectively. My research into these laws has allowed me to discover that the methods used by the English Crown and the Nazi German state to separate the groups targeted by their laws, as well as the circumstances which led to their implementation, were eerily similar, nearly identical. Besides this, they ultimately used this strategy as a way to justify the elimination of the …

Free Spirit Meets Gilded Cage: Betty Ford As Second Lady 1973-1974, Caroline Marie Dickey

Masters Theses

Betty Ford has a rich legacy as a pioneer and trailblazer, but her transition into politics was far from smooth. 1973-1974, or her time as Second Lady, was a critical training ground that solidified her beliefs and character for the rest of her life in the spotlight.

Special Relationships: Anglo-American Latin America Policy And The Redefining Of National Security, 1969-1982, Benjamin Jared Pack

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

From 1969–82, the United States and Great Britain redefined national security in a distinctive way, separating the notion of national security from its traditional foundations in realist thought. The way the two powers come to define national security was the result of more than a century of historical interaction with Latin America and their own historical experience with ideology, imperialism, and colonialism. As such, the way the United States and Great Britain perceived their respective special relationships influenced the way they chose to intervene in matters of national security, particularly in Latin America’s Southern Cone countries of Chile and Argentina. …

Thinking Beyond The Führer: The Ideological And Structural Evolution Of National Socialism, 1919-1934, Athahn Steinback

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Much of the discussion of German National Socialism has historically focused on of Adolf Hitler as the architect of the Nazi state. While recognizing Hitler’s central role in the development of National Socialism, this thesis contends that he was not a lone actor. Much of the ideological and structural development National Socialism was driven by senior individuals within the party who were able to leverage their influence to institutionalize personal variants of National Socialism within broader party ideology. To explore the role of other ideologues in the development of Nazi ideology, this thesis examines how Hitler’s leadership style perpetuated factionalism, …

A People So Different From Themselves: British Attitudes Towards India And The Power Dynamics Of The East India Company, Eric Gray

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

Today, many characteristics of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century British Raj are well ingrained in the public consciousness, particularly Victorian Era Britons’ general disdain for numerous aspects of the many cultures found on the Indian Subcontinent. Moreover, while many characteristics of the preceding East India Company’s rule in India were no less exploitative of Indian peoples, evidence shows a much different relationship between British and Indian cultures during the East India Company’s hegemony over India than those of the later Raj. Prior to the nineteenth century, many Britons, both those who traveled to India and those who did not, appeared to …

American Bolsheviki: The Beginnings Of The First Red Scare, 1917 To 1918, Jonathan Dunning

Steeplechase: An ORCA Student Journal

A consensus has developed among historians that widespread panic consumed the American public and government as many came to fear a Bolshevik coup of the United States government and the undermining of the American way of life beginning in early 1919. Known as the First Red Scare, this period became one of the most well-known episodes of American fear of Communism in US history. With this focus on the events of 1919 to 1920, however, historians of the First Red Scare have often ignored the initial American reaction to the October Revolution in late 1917 and throughout 1918. A study …

Freedom Triumphant: Embracing Joyful Freedom But Facing An Uncertain, Perilous Future, Thomas L. Tacker

Publications

The newly freed slaves had almost nothing—no money, no education, and no strong social institutions, including marriage which had often been prohibited, rarely supported by slaveholders. Discrimination was rampant and government was often the worst discriminator. Yet, somehow, they triumphed. They built marriages that were actually slightly more stable than those of white families. The newly free went from virtually zero literacy to at least 50% literacy in a generation. They worked incredibly hard and increased their income about one third faster than white workers. The newly free, anchored in their strong faith, were amazingly forgiving and optimistic. Economics Professor …

Seeing Like A Citizen : Decolonization, Development, And The Making Of Kenya, 1945–1980, Kara Moskowitz

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

In Seeing Like a Citizen, Kara Moskowitz approaches Kenya’s late colonial and early postcolonial eras as a single period of political, economic, and social transition. In focusing on rural Kenyans—the vast majority of the populace and the main targets of development interventions—as they actively sought access to aid, she offers new insights into the texture of political life in decolonizing Kenya and the early postcolonial world.

Using multisited archival sources and oral histories focused on the western Rift Valley, Seeing Like a Citizen makes three fundamental contributions to our understanding of African and Kenyan history. First, it challenges the widely …

Andrew T. Hatcher: Press, Public Information & Perception For A Nation In Transition Historical Content Analysis On The First African American To Serve As A White House Associate Press Secretary, Nayita Wilson

LSU Master's Theses

Andrew T. Hatcher rose to one of the highest positions in U.S. government when he became the first African American to serve as associate White House press secretary in 1960 under the administration of President John F. Kennedy and during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement. This is a historical content analysis that analyzes Hatcher’s role through primary sources, presidential archives, and select national, local, and minority newspapers.

The overarching purpose of this study was to ascertain Hatcher’s role as associate White House press secretary during civil rights. This study provides further insight into: 1) to what extent did …

Making The War Colleges Better, Richard A. Lacquement Jr

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

Educating Strategic Lieutenants At Sandhurst, An Jacobs

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

This article examines how well military education at the Royal Military Academy of Sandhurst delivers lieutenants capable of coping with the complexities of their operational environment and the strategic implications of their decisions.

Article Index, Usawc Press

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

Book Reviews, Usawc Press

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

No abstract provided.

Australia's Lessons, Rhys Crawley

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

This article analyzes Australia’s contribution to the Afghanistan War from 2001 to 2014. It recommends policymakers and practitioners consider applying a whole-of-government approach, embedding personnel in coalition headquarters, and limiting reliance on Special Forces soldiers in future interventions.

Educating Strategic Lieutenants At West Point, Scott A. Silverstone

The US Army War College Quarterly: Parameters

This article argues West Point responded to the changing strategic environment from the end of the Cold War through the post-9/11 period by innovating its curriculum. Over the past several decades, however, the academy’s educational model has remained remarkably stable, rooted in an enduring commitment to a rigorous liberal education as the best preparation for officers confronting the inherent uncertainties of future wars.

Glocalized Apartheid: Global Apartheid, The Global Implications Of Local South African Resistance Movements, And The Creation Of Counter Globalization, Alexis Butts

History in the Making

This paper seeks to explore numerous local cases of resistance in South Africa and their connection to global social inequality. The paper links historical and current localized resistance movements to a greater global struggle referred to as “global apartheid.” It shows that similar struggles are ongoing all over the “developing” world, where sentiments of social justice are present, creating a “counter globalization” movement tied to the struggle against global apartheid. This paper also speculates on the overall effectiveness of the notion of global apartheid and its associated movements, and the complications associated with using this term.

Benedict Anderson, Jingqiu Zhang

History in the Making

No abstract provided.

The Women On The Frontlines Of The Revolution, Raquel Holguin, Lark Winner

History in the Making

No abstract provided.

In Dependence: Haiti In The Period Of Neoliberalism, Mckenzie Kelly

History in the Making

Haiti is often considered to be one of the least developed and unstable countries in the world today. However, many scholars have failed to look into the cause of Haiti’s lack of development in comparison to other countries in similar situations. While some have addressed the colonial history of Haiti, and others have discussed the role of neoliberalism in Haiti’s development, this paper aims to connect the two ideas. The current predicament that Haiti finds itself in did not occur in a vacuum, but instead was the result of colonial and post-colonial foreign policy, the shift to neoliberal policies following …

Unconditional Surrender: The Rise Of President Erdogan And The End Of Kemalist Turkey, Amelia Sullivan

History in the Making

In October 1923, Mustafa Kemal, or Ataturk, became leader of Turkey. Over the next decade and a half, Kemal used his considerable political power to reform the nation. He modernized infrastructure, reorganized government, and led an aggressive campaign to westernize and secularize Turkish society. By the time Kemal passed in 1938, Turkey rose from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire and reestablished itself as a democracy. Almost eighty years later, Ataturk’s legacy is in jeopardy. In 2017, the Turkey held a constitutional referendum to radically restructure the nation’s government and place an unprecedented degree of power in the office of …

Horn Campaign For Kettering City Council Leaflet

Charles F. Horn Selected Materials

A political campaign brochure urging Kettering, Ohio voters to elect Charles Horn to the Kettering city council. Horn was elected to the council in 1963, and he remained a councilman until he became Kettering mayor in 1969. Circa 1962-1967.