Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Star Political Candidates In Canada, Mateo Larrazabal

Undergraduate Student Research Internships Conference

A brief overview of the work that I completed over the Summer of 2021. I examined star political candidates in Canada, a field in political science that has not been researched thoroughly nationally. I discuss a few of the key findings in my blog post and offer a brief overview of everything in my video.

The Urban-Rural Divide In Canadian Federal Elections, 1896–2019 (Preprint), Dave Armstrong, Jack Lucas, Zack Taylor

Western Urban and Local Governance Working Papers

Using a new measure of urbanity for every federal electoral district in Canada from 1896 to the present, this article describes the long-term development of the urban-rural in Canadian federal electoral politics. We focus on three questions: (1) when the urban-rural divide has existed in Canada, identifying three main periods – the 1920s, the 1960s, and 1993–present – in which the urban-rural cleavage has been especially important in federal elections (2) where the urban-rural divide has existed, finding that in the postwar period the urban-rural cleavage is a pan-Canadian phenomenon; and (3) how well urbanity predicts district-level election outcomes. We …

Conscientious Women: The Dispositional Conditions Of Institutional Treatment On Civic Involvement, Amanda Friesen, Paul A. Djupe

Political Science Publications

Current thinking about the effect of religion on civic engagement centers on “institutional treatment”—the development of resources, social pathways to recruitment, and motivation that occurs in small groups and activities of congregations. None of this work has yet incorporated the personality traits that may shape the uptake of institutional treatment. Following a growing line of research articulating how individual predispositions condition political involvement, we argue that gendered personality differences may moderate civic skill development. With new data, we find that women do not develop skills from religious involvement at the same rate as men and that this pattern is largely …

Republican Nationalism: Nations, Cultures, And Politics, Bojan Ratkovic

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This project deals with the ongoing importance of nations, cultures, and politics in the modern world, and with the complex and layered relationships between them. Despite the expanding phenomenon of globalization, which promises to open up borders and tear down the boundaries between peoples, nations remain the most important actors in international politics and nationalism continues to be a potent force throughout the world. This project explores the significance of nations and cultures for politics, with special emphasis on the importance of nationalism and nationalist theory in the twenty-first century. I argue that there are significant gaps in the literature …

Theorizing An Online Politics: How The Internet Is Reconfiguring Political Space, Subjectivity, Participation, And Conflict, Trevor G. Smith

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This work considers how politics can be reinvigorated through the use of the internet. The argument consists of two parts, the first of which develops a theoretical understanding of politics, meant to differentiate it from the anti-political status quo, which draws on the theories of participatory and agonistic democracy. It then precedes to develop and adapt this understanding of politics to the context of the internet. This is done by breaking politics up into four terrains of contestation which can be configured to be more or less political.

Politics requires, first of all, a common place to gather. Drawing on …

The Politics Of Denying Communion To Catholic Elected Officials, William D. Blake, Amanda Friesen

Political Science Publications

In his 2004 presidential campaign, John Kerry, a Catholic, was threatened with being denied Holy Communion because of his pro-choice voting record. This article investigates the extent to which communion denial impacted Catholic elected officials and analyzes public attitudes regarding communion denial for Kerry. The results of our analysis suggest that, despite heavy media coverage, few bishops endorsed the communion denial and few pro-choice Catholic officials were threatened. While the data also indicate there are meaningful political implications for public attitudes on communion denial, the tactic does not command support from many Catholics.

Religion, Politics, And The Social Capital Of Children, Amanda Friesen

Political Science Publications

Using a national data set, this study demonstrates that religious traditionalism and political conservatism are positively related to family size and the interactions between these measures result in increased political participation. Combining the social capital of children and religiosity, these findings suggest that choosing to have more children may be based on beliefs about traditional gender roles and the importance of family in society, which in turn result in political engagement around these issues.

The Physiology Of Political Participation, Michael W. Gruszczynski, Amanda Friesen, Carly M. Jacobs, Kevin B. Smith, John R. Hibbing

Political Science Publications

Political involvement varies markedly across people. Traditional explanations for this variation tend to rely on demographic variables and self-reported, overtly political concepts. In this article, we expand the range of possible explanatory variables by hypothesizing that a correlation exists between political involvement and physiological predispositions. We measure physiology by computing the degree to which electrodermal activity changes on average when a participant sequentially views a full range of differentially valenced stimuli. Our findings indicate that individuals with higher electrodermal responsiveness are also more likely to participate actively in politics. This relationship holds even after the effects of traditional demographic variables …

Life Beyond Politics: Toward The Notion Of The Unpolitical, Inna Viriasova

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This study presents a critique of post-foundational political thought, suggesting that it lacks a positive account of the unpolitical, of a radical outside of politics. I argue that political thought that oscillates around the distinction between “politics” and “the political” is correlationist and totalizing, resulting in the forgetting of its “Great Outdoors.” This critique is advanced through a close analysis of texts by Carl Schmitt, Michel Foucault, Jacques Rancière, and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy. Against this background stand out Massimo Cacciari's and Roberto Esposito's categories of “the impolitical,” and Giorgio Agamben's notion of “bare life.” “The impolitical” is positively …

The Political Left Rolls With The Good; The Political Right Confronts The Bad: Physiology And Cognition In Politics, Michael D. Dodd, Amanda Balzer, Carly M. Jacobs, Michael W. Gruszczynski, Kevin B. Smith, John R. Hibbing

Political Science Publications

We report evidence that individual-level variation in people's physiological and attentional responses to aversive and appetitive stimuli are correlated with broad political orientations. Specifically, we find that greater orientation to aversive stimuli tends to be associated with right-of-centre and greater orientation to appetitive (pleasing) stimuli with left-of-centre political inclinations. These findings are consistent with recent evidence that political views are connected to physiological predispositions but are unique in incorporating findings on variation in directed attention that make it possible to understand additional aspects of the link between the physiological and the political.

Beyond The “Three Bs”: How American Christians Approach Faith And Politics, Amanda Friesen, Michael W. Wagner

Political Science Publications

While it is well-known that religiosity measures inform modern political alignments and voting behavior, less is known about how people of various religious orthodoxies think about the role of religion in society. To learn more about this veritable “black box” with respect to whether and why people connect their spiritual life to the political world, we conducted several focus groups in randomly selected Christian congregations in a mid-sized Midwestern city. Our analysis offers confirmatory, amplifying, and challenging evidence with respect to the “Three Bs” (believing, behaving, and belonging) perspective on how religion affects politics. Specifically, we show that while contemporary …

"Ça Devient Une Question D’Être Maîtres Chez Nous”: The Canadiens, Nordiques, And The Politics Of Québécois Nationalism, 1979-1984, Terry Gitersos

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation analyzes the discourses produced by the selected newspaper coverage of the Montréal Canadiens and Québec Nordiques, two professional hockey clubs based in the province of Québec, from 1979 to 1984. Sport has long provided a medium for national identification, and constitutes one the most effective institutions through which the nation is imagined. This is especially true of Canada, where ice hockey has been celebrated as the country’s national game and a window into the Canadian soul. However, sport is a malleable institution; in Québec, hockey has long served as a symbol, speaking to French Canadian national identity, imbued …

Gender And Physiological Effects In Connecting Disgust To Political Preferences, Amanda Friesen, Carly M. Jacobs

Political Science Publications

Sensitivity to disgust predicts social attitudes, but this relationship can shift depending on gender and whether response to disgust is measured through surveys or physiological tests. We are interested in exploring the relationship between gender, political preferences, and different measures of disgust. Methods We systematically evaluate these interrelationships by comparing self-reported disgust sensitivity and changes in skin conductance while viewing disgusting images, accounting for gender and attitudes toward gay marriage. Results We find that although there is no physiological difference between genders, opponents of gay marriage conform to gender-role expectations in self-reports, with women reporting higher levels of disgust than …