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Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

This U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) database provides access to information legal, legislative, and regulatory information produced on multiple subjects by the U.S. Government. Content includes congressional bills, congressional committee hearings and prints (studies), reports on legislation, the text of laws, regulations, and executive orders and multiple U.S. Government information resources covering subjects from accounting to zoology.

The Roaring Lion Of Berlin: The Life, Thought, And Influence Of Eugen Dühring, Arden Roy

Undergraduate Research Symposium

The life and influence of 19th-century German polymath Eugen Dühring remain but a mere footnote in the history of ideas, being primarily relegated to the status of little more than a theoretical rival to Marxism in the German socialist movement and the occasional object of Freidrich Nietzsche's rhetorical flogging. Despite the current consensus on the subject, Eugen Dühring was a scholar of vast, remarkable learnedness, contributing greatly to philosophy, economics, and the natural sciences. The aim of this talk will be to clear the fog surrounding the life and work of the controversial blind scholar and give an account of …

National Integration And Institution Building, Haiwen Zhou

Economics Faculty Publications

The mutual dependence between national integration and institution building is established in a formal model. It is shown that a decrease in transportation costs, but not necessarily an increase in population size, reduces the equilibrium number of states and the adoption of rule-based institutions. With endogenous transportation costs or endogenous population size, the unification process can feed on itself. The model is illustrated by the state of Qin's unification of China in 221 BC. During this process of national integration, transformations from relation-based governance to rule-based governance happened.

The Challenges Of Writing The History Of Localities That Were Under Colonial Rule In The Early Phase Of European Expansion: An Investigation Into Writing The History Of Negombo (Sri Lanka) In The Sixteenth And Early Seventeenth Centuries, Chandra R. De Silva

History Faculty Publications

Local history has been conventionally defined as a chronicle of a limited geographical area. The study of local history can have positive outcomes including reconstructing our ancestor’s everyday lives and providing opportunities for students to develop investigative research skills, develop linkages with locals and to also motivate students to improve their basic skills of reading, writing and critical thinking. Unlike in the West, however, where local historians use old records of their locality, local historians of lands colonized by Westerners have problems finding source material. For example, in Sri Lanka, the Portuguese occupying the southwest lowlands destroyed Buddhist and Hindu …

Divided By Design? Urban Renewal’S Differential Impacts On Economic Outcomes By Race, Derik Suria

CMC Senior Theses

I study city-level effects of the federally and state-sponsored urban renewal program that aimed to improve living conditions for residents in blighted areas and slums. I use an interdisciplinary approach to estimate urban renewal effects on measures of income, property value, poverty, and employment. I first replicate the methodology and estimates of urban renewal effects on city outcomes in 1980 from Slum Clearance and Urban Renewal in the United States (Collins and Shester 2013). I extend this research by looking at a longer time horizon (1990, 2000, 2010) and incorporating race-based outcomes. From 1980 to 2010, estimated effects on property …

Architects Of War: The Economic And Industrial Strategies Of The Third Reich And United States Under Albert Speer And William Knudsen, Spencer David Taylor

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis presents a chronological narrative that delves into the economic and industrial underpinnings of the Second World War, focusing on the contrasting war machines of Germany and the United States. By examining the strategic decisions and outcomes shaped by two central figures, Albert Speer of Germany and William S. Knudsen of the United States, this study highlights how their approaches to war production profoundly influenced the overall trajectory and outcome of the war. Knudsen’s embodiment of the American industrial spirit and Speer’s manipulation of Germany's constrained resources illustrate the crucial roles that economic strategies played alongside military operations. The …

The Philippine Economy During The Japanese Occupation, Jasper Lem

Asian Studies: Student Scholarship & Creative Works

The economy of the Philippines was derailed by the Japanese occupation during World War II. As an American colony before World War II, the Philippines had close amicable ties with the United States highlighted by promises of independence on July 4th, 1946. The Philippines also maintained a beneficial economic relationship with the States at this time through extensive foreign trade. However, because of the Japanese invasion, the Philippine economy was robbed of this profitable foreign trade and the promise of independence, severely crippling the island nation and her morale. The first policies implemented by Japan were designed to control the …

Liquid Border, Yingfan Jia

Masters Theses

A River is a mighty and constantly-evolving force, leaving behind an intricately designed and constantly changing system. Not just a river, the Rio Grande stretches all the way from Colorado before intersecting with the US-Mexico Border in southern Texas - a point where the powerful forces of nature now merge with a clearly-defined political boundary. The outcome of this is a unique ecological niche, which may often go unnoticed despite its distinctiveness.

Texas is famous for its farms and ranches, and the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas was once an agricultural hub. However, urbanization and the depletion of water …

From Solidarity To Shock Therapy: Examining The Role Of Neoliberalism In The Transition From Socialism To Capitalism In Poland, Benjamin Murphy

History Honors Papers

No abstract provided.

The Road That Never Existed: Orientalist Myth Making Within The Historiography Of The Silk Road, Margaret Kathryn Curtin

History - Master of Arts in Teaching

I. Synthesis Essay………………………………....4

II. Primary Documents and Headnotes………....28

III. Textbook Critique……………………………...40

IV. New Textbook Entry………………………......45

V. Bibliography…………………………………....48

Unwilling Gamblers And Loaded Dice: Considering Recession And Crisis As A Natural Effect Of Financial Capitalism, Darlene N. Moorman

The Downtown Review: An Interdisciplinary Journal Written and Peer-Reviewed by Mandel Honors College Students at Cleveland State University

Under financial capitalism, ordinary people are increasingly becoming 'unwilling gamblers' of a risky and unstable system. This paper explores the social and institutional change behind the neoliberal movement and considers how the politics and policies of neoliberalism have contributed to a certain environment of financial instability. Looking at the changing nature of the economy, the rapid expansion of the financial sector, and the persisting issue of moral hazard underlying risky and speculative behaviors among other items, reveals a financial system in which recessions and crises can be considered a natural, although not inevitable, effect.

The Limits Of Financial Equity: The Federal Reserve, The Depression Of 1921, And The End Of Wilsonian Progressivism, Terril Hebert

LSU Master's Theses

The Limits of Financial Equity: The Federal Reserve, the Depression of 1921, and the End of Wilsonian Progressivism is an examination of monetary policy and centralized macroeconomic planning in the American economy during the inflationary spiral of the 1910s that culminated in the Depression of 1921. Put forward for consideration is the successful populist campaign for agricultural credit equity by the burgeoning Federal Reserve System; set against a backdrop of intentional inflation, world and domestic citizens competed against as the price and supply chain distortions perpetuated by the policing of American commerce by the Food Administration, A. Mitchell Palmer’s Department …

While Waiting For Rain: Community, Economy, And Law In A Time Of Change, John Henry Schlegel

Books

What might a sensible community choose to do if its economy has fallen apart and becoming a ghost town is not an acceptable option? Unfortunately, answers to this question have long been measured against an implicit standard: the postwar economy of the 1950s. After showing why that economy provides an implausible standard—made possible by the lack of economic competition from the European and Asian countries, winners or losers, touched by the war—John Henry Schlegel attempts to answer the question of what to do.

While Waiting for Rain first examines the economic history of the United States as well as that …

The Demise Of The Beef Industry, Natalie Powers

Undergraduate Research Symposium

Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is a neurological disorder commonly found in cows. The hypothesis for the causation of BSE surrounds a protein known as the prion protein. For the most part, prion proteins are not harmful to cattle. Yet, when it mutates, the protein begins attacking the central nervous system. The protein causes the infected cattle to lose coordination and become violent. This is where it gets its nickname, mad cow disease. The research in this project explores the economic impact of mad cow disease. The reactions from consumers surrounding BSE started the downfall of the economy. It also almost …

The Shirt Of Nessus: International Debt As A Tool Of Hegemonic Control, Omar Hamed Ghannam

Theses and Dissertations

International debt has been a fixture of the global economy and state financing for centuries. The economic logic of accruing international debt and its management is rarely questioned in the literature, even as sovereign debt crises abound. These crises offer a point of examination, re-assessment, and negotiations concerning allocating the burdens. This paper aims to study these debt crises to interrogate the issue of international debt, the depoliticized economic mantras that govern it, their validity, sincerity, and the political and social implications on the indebted polity. This is done by looking at the origins of debt crises, and examining how …

Cotton: A Historiographical And Instructional Exploration: 1835-2020, Chad Joseph Rosenbloom

History - Master of Arts in Teaching

I.Synthesis Essay……………………………...2

II.Primary Documents and Headnotes……...36

III.Textbook Critique…………………………...45

IV.New Textbook Entry………………………..49

V.Bibliography………………………………….53

Courting American Capital: Public Relations And The Business Of Selling Ivorian Capitalism In The U.S., 1960-1980, Abou B. Bamba

History Faculty Publications

This chapter is an invitation to reimagine the roles assigned to players in the history of capitalism on the global stage. It challenges aspects of the historiography of capitalism in the twentieth century, which tend to center on historical actors and institutions of the Global North. Even when actors in the Global South are discussed, it is usually to portray them as passive victims of an intractable system. By focusing on the Ivory Coast and its economic diplomacy toward the United States, I seek to destabilize this general picture.

Missouri Soybean Exports And The Democratizing Market Force, David D. Hammons

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

A commonly held assumption of America’s post-Cold War place in the world is that prolonged contact with American capitalism and democracy will lead to the adoption of these systems in all nations that participate in international trade. This paper attempts to verify or disprove that assumption by examining a specific traded commodity between two specific nations, the institutions that support this trade, and the people actively participating in it. The growth of soybean exports from the state of Missouri provides this vehicle for examining the trade history between the United States of America and China, and provides evidence that disproves …

A Workers' Paradise: Re-Integrating Newfoundland Into Colonial American History, Elena Hynes

Electronic Theses & Dissertations

The island of Newfoundland is conspicuous in colonial British and North American histories, most particularly and paradoxically, in its absence, a state of affairs which this study aims to help address. Multiple factors, including a paucity of documentary sources and various historiographic trends, have traditionally contributed to Newfoundland’s marginalization within colonial historical narratives. However, developments in recent years have made Newfoundland’s potential integration into the broader colonial dialogue more feasible including the advent of the Atlantic perspective, the expansion of available sources, and the work of multiple regional historians who have challenged enduring historiographic trends characterizing Newfoundland colonial settlements as …

A Lot On My Plate: Family Dishware Serving Up A History Of Global Commercialization, Grace Thanasiu

Student Projects from the Archives

The “Hearthside” shaped plate was created by the Homer Laughlin China Company sometime between 1963 and 1973. My family owns such a plate, and ours originally belonged to a set of plates that was “purchased” by my grandmother, Mary Ruhlin, with books and books full of redemption stamps. Redemption stamps were literal stamps that stores distributed to customers, who could later redeem them for cash or merchandise at affiliated redemption centers that partnered with grocery stores and businesses; redemption stamps functioned as a precursor to the modern loyalty card! The need for a reputable pottery company like Homer Laughlin to …

Financial Factors And The Propagation Of The Great Depression, Gustavo S. Cortes, Bryan Taylor, Marc D. Weidenmier

Business Faculty Articles and Research

We investigate the role of forward-looking financial factors in propagating the Great Depression. We find that a new hand-collected bank stock index is better at predicting the onset of the Great Depression than the aggregate stock market or failed bank deposits. The bank stock index explains almost one-third of the fluctuations in industrial production after five years. Analysis disaggregated at each Federal Reserve district shows that bank stocks capture forward-looking information about debt defaults and credit. Our results suggest that future studies of the credit channel during the Great Depression should incorporate bank stocks to better identify the impact of …

Greening The Archive: The Social Climate Of Cotton Manufacturing In The "Samuel Oldknow Papers, 1782-1924", Bernadette Myers, Melina Moe

Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies

This article re-examines the records and correspondence of Samuel Oldknow, a late eighteenth century textile manufacturer, within the context of the environmental humanities. Oldknow’s papers, a portion of which are held at Columbia University, are most often used by economic historians to date the beginnings of the factory wage labor system. We highlight, instead, the environmental implications of Oldknow’s cotton enterprise by juxtaposing documents related to the global reach of Oldknow’s empire with evidence of his transformation of the local landscape of northern England. This process of re-scaling captures a sense of what we call the “social climate” of the …

The Cultural Transmission Of Trust Norms: Evidence From A Lab In The Field On A Natural Experiment, Elira Karaja, Jared Rubin

Economics Faculty Articles and Research

We conduct trust games in three villages in a northeastern Romanian commune. From 1775–1919, these villages were arbitrarily assigned to opposite sides of the Austrian and Ottoman/Russian border despite being located seven kilometers apart. This plausibly exogenous border assignment affected local institutions and late-18th century migration in a manner that likely also affected trust. Conditional on trust norms being affected by these centuries-old historical circumstances, our experimental design tests the degree to which such norms are transmitted intergenerationally. Consistent with theoretical predictions, we find that participants on the Austrian side that also have family roots in the village are indeed …

An Inferentially Robust Look At Two Competing Explanations For The Surge In Unauthorized Migration From Central America, Nick Santos

Dissertations

The last 8 years have seen a dramatic increase in the flow of Central American apprehensions by the U.S. Border Patrol. Explanations for this surge in apprehensions have been split between two leading hypotheses. Most academic scholars, immigrant advocates, progressive media outlets, and human rights organizations identify poverty and violence (the Poverty and Violence Hypothesis) in Central America as the primary triggers responsible. In contrast, while most government officials, conservative think tanks, and the agencies that work in the immigration and border enforcement realm admit poverty and violence may underlie some decisions to migrate, they instead blame lax U.S. immigration …

Battling Youth Unemployment In France: Can Macron Put Young People To Work?, Adriana C. Bolivar

Senior Honors Projects, 2020-current

High unemployment has been a persistent struggle for the French economy, especially over the last 30 years under presidents Mitterrand, Chirac, Sarkozy, Hollande, and now Macron. In recent years, this problem has particularly plagued young workers making them the “lost generation” of Europe. This paper studies the history of youth unemployment in France and assesses the impact of government policies and cultural norms on young workers. Additionally, it highlights the trade-off between workers’ rights and economic growth in an attempt to draw attention to the importance of culture and context in development.

The factors that have driven French structural youth …

Are Small Businesses The Framework For A Successful U.S. Economy?, Carson Clevenger

Accounting Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis will investigate the impact of small businesses on the United States’ economy. I will be assessing several impact areas including gross domestic product, employment, and local economy contribution. This thesis will cover a study from the time periods of 1998-2014 of the gross domestic product and employment levels and will use numbers from the years of 2018- present for other impact areas. Furthermore, I will be analyzing certain sectors of the economy, comparing small businesses contribution to corporate contribution, in order to discuss if small businesses are necessary for our country’s successful economy.

The World’S Largest Airline: How Aeroflot Learned To Stop Worrying And Became A Corporation, Steven E. Harris

History and American Studies Articles

Similar to sex, the Soviet Union did not have corporations. The famous utterance from the Gorbachev era about a sexless Soviet existence suggests how we might approach what happened to the corporation in Soviet history. Like explicit sex in Soviet culture, the workers’ state formally eradicated the dreaded incorporated bodies of capitalism and gave them no quarter in subsequent ideological battles. But just like sex, the behaviors and practices of corporations kept cropping up in the oddest places to help sustain the Soviet economy, while the West remained a source of inspiration for new ways to do it. To examine …

Byzantine Empire Economic Growth: Did Climate Change Play A Role?, Thomas E. Lambert

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Different chroniclers of the history of the Byzantine Empire have noted various economic data gleamed from historical documents and accounts of the empire at different periods of time. Research for this paper has not uncovered any estimates of long term, annual macroeconomic data (gross domestic product (GDP), national income (NI), etc.) for the empire during its existence. Such data has been estimated to one extent or another for other nations and societies that have existed during the middle ages. This paper attempts to provide conjectures on approximate real GDP per capita trends for the empire over its existence from AD …

Mapping Renewal: How An Unexpected Interdisciplinary Collaboration Transformed A Digital Humanities Project, Elise Tanner, Geoffrey Joseph

Digital Initiatives Symposium

Funded by a National Endowment for Humanities (NEH) Humanities Collections and Reference Resources Foundations Grant, the UA Little Rock Center for Arkansas History and Culture’s “Mapping Renewal” pilot project focused on creating access to and providing spatial context to archival materials related to racial segregation and urban renewal in the city of Little Rock, Arkansas, from 1954-1989. An unplanned interdisciplinary collaboration with the UA Little Rock Arkansas Economic Development Institute (AEDI) has proven to be an invaluable partnership. One team member from each department will demonstrate the Mapping Renewal website and discuss how the collaborative process has changed and shaped …

Backfire: How The Rise Of Neoliberalism Facilitated The Rise Of The Far Right, Jacob Fuller

Capstone Showcase

The U.S. far right has become increasingly mainstream in contemporary American politics. In this paper, I analyze the theory that the far right has gained ground due to a backlash from neoliberal policies beginning in the 1980s under Ronald Reagan. Using Process tracing, I operationalize claims made by those arguing that the white working class has moved towards the far right due to their loss of status, as well as the theory that specific wealthy actors have mobilized these groups and altered the movement against neoliberalism to suit their interests. I find that these arguments have merit, and further the …