Political Science Commons^™

Working Toward World Peace In Non-International Armed Conflict: In A World Of Uncertainty, Terrorism, And Disagreements, Is It Ossible?, Victoria Carlton

Brigham Young University International Law & Management Review

No abstract provided.

Gustavo GutiéRrez – Liberation Theology & Marxism, Todd Cameron Swathwood Jr

The Kabod

Since 1968, liberation theology has emerged as a prominent feature of religion and politics, particularly in South America. Originally stemming from the writings of Peruvian priest Gustavo Gutiérrez, this at-once theological and overtly political ideology decries the institutionalized violence of the world’s capitalist society on the poor and oppressed, and argues that God is particularly concerned with the plight of the suffering masses. Christians should therefore make assistance of these poor souls their highest priority, and advocate for any and all methods of alleviating suffering, especially those that work from the premise that society must be toppled and rebuilt for …

Strategic Behavior And Variation In The Supreme Court’S Caseload Over Time, Kenneth W. Moffett, Forrest Maltzman, Karen Miranda, Charles R. Shipan

SIUE Faculty Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Over the past sixty years, the size of the Supreme Court’s docket has varied tremendously, growing at some points in time and shrinking at others. What accounts for this variation in the size of the docket? We focus on two key strategic factors – the predictability of outcomes within the Court, and whether justices consider the potential actions of other political institutions – and assess whether these factors help to explain the variation in docket size over time. We discover that uncertainty and institutional constraints prevent the Court from choosing cases with complete freedom, even after accounting for other potential …

Keeping Pace: The U.S. Supreme Court And Evolving Technology, Brian Thomas

Politics Summer Fellows

Contemporary mainstream discussions of the Supreme Court are often qualified with the warning that the nine justices are out of touch with everyday American life, especially when it comes to the newest and most popular technologies. For instance, during oral argument for City of Ontario v. Quon, a 2010 case that dealt with sexting on government-issued devices, Chief Justice John Roberts famously asked what the difference was “between email and a pager,” and Justice Antonin Scalia wondered if the “spicy little conversations” held via text message could be printed and distributed. While these comments have garnered a great deal of …

Unintended Consequences Of Cigarette Prohibition, Regulation, And Taxation, Jonathan D. Kulick, James E. Prieger, Mark A. R. Kleiman

School of Public Policy Working Papers

Abstract Laws that prohibit, regulate, or tax cigarettes can generate illicit markets for tobacco products. Illicit markets both reduce the efficacy of policies intended to improve public health and create harms of their own. Enforcement can reduce evasion but creates additional harms, including incarceration and violence. There is strong evidence that more enforcement in illicit drug markets can spur violence. The presence of licit substitutes, such as electronic cigarettes, has the potential to greatly reduce the size of illicit markets. We present a model demonstrating why enforcement can increase violence, show that states with higher tobacco taxes have larger illicit …

Student Writing Competition

International Journal of Nuclear Security

No abstract provided.

Cover

International Journal of Nuclear Security

No abstract provided.

Masthead

International Journal of Nuclear Security

No abstract provided.

From The Editor

International Journal of Nuclear Security

No abstract provided.

Hopeful Losers? A Moral Case For Mixed Electoral Systems, Loren King

Political Science Faculty Publications

Liberal democracies encourage citizen participation and protect our freedoms, yet these regimes elect politicians and decide important issues with electoral and legislative systems that are less inclusive than other arrangements. Some citizens inevitably have more influence than others. Is this a problem? Yes, because similarly just but more inclusive systems are possible. Political theorists and philosophers should be arguing for particular institutional forms, with particular geographies, consistent with justice.

Les démocraties libérales encouragent la participation citoyenne et protègent nos libertés. Pourtant, ces régimes élisent des politiciens et décident de problèmes importants via les systèmes électoral et législatif, qui sont moins …

The Historical Amnesia Of Contemporary Federalism Debates, Anna O. Law

Publications and Research

The article explores competing interpretations of immigration federalism in the 18th century. I argue that the 1787 Constitution did not clearly place authority to manage migration with the national government. In fact the Constitution does not discuss entry/exit policy, including the power of deportation. The debates over the Alien and Sedition Acts illustrate the diversity of opinions about the proper balance of authority between the subnational and national governments in migration. Debates over the potential expansion of national power were particularly heated in the antebellum period because migration and slave policy were inextricably linked. In the end, whatever guidance the …

Creativity Inspired Community: A Practice And Process For Growing Communities Through Group Creativity, David Eyman

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project explores the use of group creativity practices to support changing attitudes and the formation of cohesive communities in civic and business settings. More specifically this project explores the use of a predetermined sequence of group creativity tools to facilitate a change in participant mentality. The attitudinal shift is from self-serving to engaged and collaborative. The ultimate outcome of using the proposed framework is the bonding of incompatibly opinionated people into a solidified community that is responsible for implementing their novel ideas. Ideas formed within this process are a reflection of the individual’s personal life objectives as they relate …

Compared To What? Judicial Review And Other Veto Points In Contemporary Political Theory, David Watkins, Scott E. Lemieux

Political Science Faculty Publications

Many democratic and jurisprudential theorists have too often uncritically accepted Alexander Bickel’s notion of “the countermajoritarian difficulty” when considering the relationship between judicial review and democracy; this is the case for arguments both for and against judicial review. This framework is both theoretically and empirically unsustainable. Democracy is not wholly synonymous with majoritarianism, and judicial review is not inherently countermajoritarian in the first place.

In modern democratic political systems, judicial review is one of many potential veto points. Since all modern democratic political systems contain veto points, the relevant and unexplored question is what qualities might make a veto point …

A Gender Approach To Vulnerability And Natural Disasters, Ema Izquierdo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A natural disaster is a major adverse event resulting from natural processes of the earth that overwhelm local response and affect the social and economic development of the affected region. Natural disasters have been seen as situations that create challenges and difficulties mainly of a humanitarian nature. Still, progressively, it has come to be recognized that a gendered approach to humanitarian response is essential for vulnerable populations such as girls and women. Even though information about particular cases is scarce, evidence indicates that women are more likely to die after a natural disaster not because of biological reasons but because …

And Then There Were Two: Why Is The United States One Of Only Two Countries In The World That Has Not Ratified The Convention On The Rights Of The Child?, Mark Engman

International Human Rights Law Journal

Twenty-five years ago, the United Nations General Assembly (‘U.N. General Assembly’) unanimously adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child (hereinafter the “CRC”), which became the most widely accepted human rights treaty in history. Today, every nation in the world is a party to the CRC – except for two: Somalia, and the United States. This article will analyze the politics behind America’s failure to ratify this treaty. That may seem a little out of place in a law journal, but in reality the United States’ (‘U.S.’) acceptance or rejection of international law is as much a matter of …

Principled Humanitarian Organizations And The Use Of Force: Is There Space To Speak Out?, Scott Paul, Elizabeth Holland

International Human Rights Law Journal

Humanitarian organizations are fundamentally concerned with addressing the suffering of civilians. The decision by an armed actor to resort to force can result in greater protection or greater harm, and has at least as significant an impact on civilian lives as any decision made during the conduct of hostilities. Yet, humanitarian organizations rarely publicly advocate for or against the use of force. This article explores the perceived and actual limitations that humanitarian principles place on the public advocacy of humanitarian organizations regarding the recourse to force. It begins with a discussion of the relevant legal framework and explication of the …

Transitional Justice In Sri Lanka: Rethinking Post-War Diaspora Advocacy For Accountability, Mytili Bala

International Human Rights Law Journal

Sri Lanka’s 26-year civil war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam came to a bloody end in May 2009, amidst allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity on both sides. Since then, Tamils in the diaspora, long accused of funding the war, have become vocal proponents for war crimes accountability. Some might label certain forms of diaspora advocacy as “lawfare” or “long-distance nationalism.” However, these labels fail to account for the complex memories and identities that shape diaspora advocacy for accountability today. In order for Sri Lanka to move forward from decades of conflict, transitional justice mechanisms to …

No Child Is An Island: The Predicament Of Statelessness For Children In The Caribbean, Catherine A. Tobin

International Human Rights Law Journal

In a region characterized by human mobility, many children in the Caribbean are born in a different country than their parents. In fact, the Caribbean is considered one of the regions with the highest percentage of people migrating. This article will analyze the root causes of statelessness for children in the Caribbean, focusing primarily on the dangerous interplay between ineffective birth registration systems and lack of safeguards for children who would be otherwise stateless. The article will also address recent shifts in migration and nationality policies in countries such as The Bahamas and the Dominican Republic that have exacerbated existing …

The Palermo Protocol: Why It Has Been Ineffective In Reducing Human Sex Trafficking, Christina A. Seideman

Global Tides

This paper analyzes why the UN’s efforts against human trafficking, specifically regarding the Palermo Protocol, have been ineffective in preventing the spread of, and reducing, the human sex trafficking network. It concludes that the broad wording of the Palermo Protocol and the UN’s lack of ability to enforce its legislation, along with statistical irregularities due to self-reporting problems, have made the Palermo Protocol ineffective, and that destination countries (countries that victims are trafficked to) have a large share of the burden to create effective legislation against trafficking. Proposed solutions include holding Palermo Protocol signatory countries accountable to change their legislation, …

Review Of Jennifer Curtis, Human Rights As War By Other Means (Philadelphia: University Of Pennsylvania Press 2014), Kubilay Y. Arin Mr

Societies Without Borders

Jennifer Curtis, author of Human Rights as War by Other Means, traces the use of rights discourse in Northern Ireland's politics from the local civil rights campaigns of the 1960s to present-day activism for truth recovery and LGBT equality. While reading this remarkable study, I asked myself to what extent her criticism of human “rights discourse has functioned as a war by other means” in Northern Ireland.

Perceptions Of Immigration In America, Manuel Cardoza

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Throughout history the United States as a nation saw many waves of immigrants who collectively shaped and helped build the America we see today. Today immigration has become a prevalent issue that is impeding progress and potentially facilitating the rise of new conflicts in a country plagued by civil injustices toward minority groups who are feeling marginalized and discriminated. Immigration desperately needs the attention of the U.S government in order to reach a solution and stop a community from being ostracized. Much of this great nation has been formed and built on the fundamental idea of immigrant forces coming together …

Judicial Activism’S Effect On Judicial Elections, Nick Fernandes

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

High profile Supreme Court cases have become increasingly commonplace, particularly with the Citizens United court decision granting unprecedented rights to corporations. Many in the media have decried these as examples of increasing “judicial activism”. This trend has trickled down to the state supreme courts as justices have increasingly played a more active role in developing policy. Gay marriage has become legalized in numerous states due to this trend. While public sentiment is unlikely to affect the appointed Supreme Court, it could have a substantial impact on state judicial elections.

This paper will specifically be looking at judicial elections in Kentucky. …

Memorandum Of Agreement Between The Department Of The Interior And The Department Of The Army Pursuant To Section 206(B) Of The Fort Berthold Mineral Restoration Act, Public Law 98-602 (1984), United States Department Of The Interior, Us Department Of The Army (Civil Works), Us Department Of Indian Affairs

US Government Documents Related to Indigenous Nations

This Memorandum of Agreement, dated May 6, 2015, from the United States (US) Department of the Interior, the US Department of the Army (Civil Works), and the US Department of Indian Affairs, outlines the process by which a portion of land that was taken from the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Fort Berthold Reservation for construction and operation of the Garrison Dam be returned to the Three Affiliated Tribes. The authority of this return is granted by the Fort Berthold Mineral Restoration Act of 1984 (Public Law 98-602).

Improving Rhode Island’S Health Care System: Lessons From The Cuban Model, Sarah R. Moffitt

Senior Honors Projects

Improving Rhode Island’s health care system: lessons from the Cuban model

Cuba is world renowned for its health care system. In regards to international health crises, Cuba is a leader in sending workers abroad and training doctors from all over the world. Within its own borders, the Cuban model provides free access to all citizens in which every individual has a primary care provider. Cuba boasts high vaccination rates, a long life expectancy, low infant mortality rate, and a population that is one of the healthiest in the western hemisphere.

The purpose of this research project is to evaluate the …

Impact Of The “Nirbhaya” Rape Case: Isolated Phenomenon Or Social Change?, Tina P. Lapsia

Honors Scholar Theses

In December 2012, a twenty-three year old college student, who was given the pseudonym “Nirbhaya” (“fearless”), was fatally gang-raped on a private bus in Delhi, India, galvanizing the country to swiftly adopt new legislative measures and catapulting the issue of violence against women in India into the international spotlight. Although assault and rape cases have made India infamous for its high volume of crimes against women, the reaction to this particular incident was much different from before. This paper investigates whether the governmental and societal responses represent social change, as indicated by changing attitudes towards violence against women in India. …

The Snowden Effect: The Conflict In A Free Society, Who Values Privacy Versus Who Values Security?, Matthew C. Blake

Political Science Theses and Capstones

The Obama Administration has come under scrutiny by both the public and Congress, since former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden made known the scope of government surveillance programs being utilized by the U.S. government to gather intelligence on domestic citizens. Snowden’s disclosures about the government’s surveillance practices to the mainstream media began in June 2013. I focus on how public opinion towards the government’s surveillance practices and an individual’s reasonable right to privacy has shifted after revelations made by Edward Snowden on the practices of the NSA. Individuals may show support for more government surveillance in the name …

Lords And Order: Credible Rulers And State Failure, Matthew Dimick

Journal Articles

Why do states fail? Why do failed states persist without collapsing into complete anarchy? This paper argues that given insurgency or weakened state capacity, rulers may find it best, paradoxically, to reduce the amount of political good it provides as a means of sustaining some amount of their rule. Moreover, although the consequence is political fragmentation and increasing levels of violence, this is not inconsistent with the continuation of attenuated central governance. To evaluate this argument, I select the case of King Stephen’s reign in medieval England. Although far removed historically from contemporary cases of state failure, the reign of …

Chinese Foreign Direct Investment In The Caribbean, Kimberly A. L. T. Stephenson

Honors College Theses

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of trade patterns and market size in a short time period, in order to identify indicators of the objectives for Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) into the Caribbean region. Key questions assessed are: What makes the Caribbean particularly advantageous for Chinese investors and how does the host country benefit? Is a higher level of trade, or wealthier markets, associated with higher Chinese FDI? Is China pursuing some foreign policy objectives with FDI in the region? I hypothesize that Chinese FDI is associated with trade, natural resources, or certain foreign policy …

Quality Of State Attorneys' Oral Arguments In Supreme Court Litigation, Kaylee Johnson

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

In my thesis, I evaluate the conventional wisdom that attorneys representing state governments performed poorly in oral arguments before the Supreme Court. This led the National Association of Attorneys General in 1982 to create the Supreme Court Clearinghouse Project. The project was implemented in an effort to improve the quality of states' efforts before the Court. Pulling from Justice Blackmun's ratings of attorneys in oral arguments, I conduct a quantitative analysis to determine whether such efforts actually led to an improvement in states' performance in Supreme Court litigation. I take the 1,142 cases in which states were involved from 1970-1993 …

Courtroom To Classroom: Judicial Policymaking And Affirmative Action, Dylan Britton Saul

Political Science Honors Projects

The judicial branch, by exercising judicial review, can replace public policies with ones of their own creation. To test the hypothesis that judicial policymaking is desirable only when courts possess high capacity and necessity, I propose an original model incorporating six variables: generalism, bi-polarity, minimalism, legitimization, structural impediments, and public support. Applying the model to a comparative case study of court-sanctioned affirmative action policies in higher education and K-12 public schools, I find that a lack of structural impediments and bi-polarity limits the desirability of judicial race-based remedies in education. Courts must restrain themselves when engaging in such policymaking.