Political Science Commons^™

Editor's Note, Padraig O’Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

In this edition of the journal several articles address a range of important, and in some cases too often overlooked policy issues, too broad in scope for their conclusions and recommendations to be encapsulated adequately in a brief paragraph. Their diversity, however, highlights a key characteristic of the New England Journal of Public Policy – that of being open to publishing articles that have insightful bearings on how public policy is addressed, not only in the New England states, but throughout the country and in the international community – a community of nations increasingly interdependent with constraints on national sovereignty …

Protecting The Stranger: The Origins Of Us Immigration Regulation In Nineteenth-Century New York, Brendan P. O'Malley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

From 1847 to 1890, a state authority--not a federal one--oversaw the entry of most immigrants arriving in the United States. The New York State Board of the Commissioners of Emigration supervised the landing of over eight million newcomers in nation's busiest entry point, the Port of New York, during the second half of the nineteenth century. Most were processed at the Board's Castle Garden Emigrant Depot in Battery Park, which opened in 1855. This study demonstrates why and how New York State developed a complex regulatory regime well before the federalization of immigration authority in 1882.

The establishment of this …

The Archdiocese Of New York: Transition From Urban Powerhouse To Suburban Institution, 1950-2000 A Case Study, Henry A. Sheinkopf

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

From 1850-1950, the New York Archdiocese welcomed newly arriving Irish and Italian Catholics and forged a political block that influenced local, state and national politics with political leverage sufficient to influence the city's commercial sectors. This mobilization transformed the once penniless and discriminated-against Irish, and later Italians, by enabling the Archdiocese of New York, through the power of the vote, to promote its religious interests as its adherents rose to positions of political and economic power. The Archdiocese of New York became the owner of vast real estate, a provider of social and educational services, and an arbiter of morality …

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, …

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 …

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 …

Administrative Relationships, Agency Theory, And The Summer Work Travel Program: 2012-2013, Mark Reardon

All Dissertations

This study discusses the ability of the Summer Work Travel Program (SWTP) to meet the objectives outlined in its authorizing legislation, the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act of 1961. These goals include educational exchange between participants and the U.S. community, cultural exchange between participants and the U.S. community, and the promotion of peace exemplified by SWTP operators and the U.S. community. The study adopts agency and transaction cost theory to guide its discussion of the administrative relationship between the U.S. State Department and those designated as Summer Work Travel Sponsors. This study's findings include instances of informational and preference …

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.

Gay Marriage Laws In Europe Compared To The United States, Megan Stamm

Honors Theses

The issue of same-sex marriage has been the hot social issue of the decade, even of the generation. This social issue has been debated to and fro in countries around the world. Each country has differing policies towards same-sex marriage. Certain countries in the Middle East hold same-sex relationships as crimes punishable by death. Some countries in Europe hold same-sex marriage as completely equal to heterosexual marriage. Each country is different. Each country is made up of different cultures and this plays a huge role in the debate. This thesis will compare and contrast European countries with the United States …

Defeating Isis: The Need For A Cooperative Effort, Sabrina Chikhi

Journal of Interdisciplinary Conflict Science

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of a collective approach in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria also known as ISIS. The approach of the international community had been doomed to failure because it excluded key players in the region. In order to annihilate this terrorist group and the threat it poses to international security, this article proposes a revision of the approach to the resolution of this problem through the inclusion of all the parties susceptible to secure an efficient contribution to that endeavor before the situation becomes irremediable. In order …

Guide To The 1948-1990 Archive Of The Inter-University Case Program, Edwin A. Bock

Public Administration - All Scholarship

Between 1948 and 1990, the Inter-University Case Program (ICP)—named during its early years “The Committee on Public Administration Cases” (CPAC)—published five case books and 170 individual studies of government policy-making and administration. The Program was created by educators who had spent over three years working in Washington wartime agencies. They wanted to show their post-war university students an aspect of public administration that was largely ignored by prewar textbooks: namely, the civil servant’s role in the making and carrying out of public policies. And they wanted to demonstrate to professors of public administration who had not had personal experience at …

Target Zero: Why States Choose To Eradicate Infectious Diseases And How They Succeed, Gifty Abraham

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Realism has remained the dominant paradigm within international relations for most of the modern era, emphasizing the competitive nature of the international arena and the unlikeliness of states to within it to cooperate. The attempts and further still, successes, by states to eradicate infectious diseases--which remain among the most cooperative enterprises--present a number of challenges to realism's assumptions, particularly with respect to the unlikely world historical-times during which the eradication campaigns took place. As such, a two-part puzzle arises. First, why would states, which are natural competitors, cooperate to eradicate infectious diseases given structural and situational incentives not to do …

Implementing (Environmental) Justice: Equity And Performance In California's S.B. 535, Meagan Tokunaga

Pomona Senior Theses

This thesis evaluates the equity performance of a recent state environmental justice policy, California’s Senate Bill 535 (S.B. 535). “Environmental justice” refers to the disproportionate environmental harm imposed on low-income and minority communities. S.B. 535 uses competitive grants to provide funding to these communities. The research is centered around two questions: (1) to what extent has S.B. 535 experienced successful implementation in its first year of operation, and (2) how can policy actors improve implementation while balancing performance and equity goals? In regards to the first question, I utilize a case study of the policy’s implementation within 17 local governments …

Measuring Happiness To Guide Public Policy Making: A Survey Of Instruments And Policy Initiatives, Laura Musikanski

Journal of Sustainable Social Impact

This author examines subjective indicators of well-being as they relate to the happiness movement, a global effort to create a new economic paradigm. The essay focuses on the prominent international institutions that are developing happiness metrics as well as agencies exploring the use of happiness data for crafting supportive public policy. A definition of happiness metrics, based on international institutions, identifies the primary questions that compose perceived happiness and how this data can be used.

Age Is Just A Number: Using Economic And Social Models In The Millennial Generation To Predict Policy Support And Political Beliefs, Lindsey E. Juszczak

Masters Theses

Generational succession is an interesting phenomenon that occurs in all social sciences. The human generations overlap one another, but researchers have defined several generations to which a certain age belongs: Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y, and the Millennials. Being born in a particular time frame could affect the attitudes, beliefs, and values a person holds in general. This paper looks at the generational variable to predict six policy areas, asking the question: is there a millennial age difference that predicts policy support for Social Security spending, military spending, abortion, same-sex marriage, environmental spending, and climate change? Using data from …

Legislating For American Empire : The U.S. Congress And Territorial Policy, Timothy Lindberg

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The United States has always administered territorial governments and the primary entity entrusted with this authority is the United States Congress. This dissertation, using an American Political Development framework, seeks to uncover the variety of ways in which Congressional decision-making over territorial policy has shifted. The goal is to understand how the United States Congress worked toward establishing and maintaining an American Empire via the use of territorial policy. A variety of causal mechanisms causing are investigated, including the demographic targets of policy, partisan conflicts, changing norms and rules of Congress, pressures from other branches or the states, national security …

A Quantum Congress, Jorge R. Roig

Scholarly Works

This article tries to address the problem of a corrupt and broken electoral system that has been captured by special interests through big money spending in political campaigns, while at the same time preserving the spirit of the Free Speech Clause of our Constitution. In doing so, this article first reviews and summarizes the different alternatives proposed as potential fixes for the campaign finance problem. It then explains why none of the proposed alternatives can accomplish the dual goals set out above. Finally, the article briefly sketches a proposal for a fundamental reworking of our representative democracy by substituting legislative …

Public Corruption In Liberian Government, Stephen H. Gobewole

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

There is a widespread public perception of corruption in Liberia's election process, yet there is little documentation on the characteristics of voters and their perceptions of electoral corruption. The purpose of this correlational study was to explore the relationship between gender, ethnicity, physical location, and perceptions about political activity during the 2005 national election. Roderick Chisolm's conceptualization of the internalist view of justification served as the theoretical construct. Data were acquired from the Afrobarometer survey (n = 1,200), which used a representative cross-sectional sample design, and were subjected to cross-tabulation analysis, a chi-square test, and a correlation analysis. The results …

Beyond Elections: Ghana's Democracy From The Perspective Of The Citizenry, Ransford Osafo-Danso

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Ghana's democracy has been hailed by scholars, practitioners, and the international community in recent years as a shining example in the West African subregion as a result of the country's record of organizing successive elections with minimal or no violence. However, the evaluation of Ghana's democracy has predominantly focused on the elections and disproportionately captures the views of the political elite; conspicuously missing is the perspective of the ordinary Ghanaian. This presents an incomplete picture of Ghana's democracy, given the relevance of citizens' participation in democratic societies. To address this gap in knowledge, this qualitative case study explored the practice …

Cultural Diplomacy Strategies For Mexico In The Xxi Century, Alejandro Siqueiros

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Thesis analyzes cultural diplomacy (CD) and how the utilization of the strategies of inserting Mexico into foreign cultures, using cultural activities based on similarities and differences, and expanding CD into other areas, may have the ability to positively influence Mexico`s political, economic, social and cultural foreign policy objectives.

Exploring Potential Associations With The Presidential Discretionary Power Of Fema Funds Dispensation, Matthew Thomas Eagles

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

US presidential approval of Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) funding has been the subject of much research that largely has been inconclusive or contradictor as it relates to whether funds may have been distributed in a biased way through the use of presidential discretionary power. The purpose of this study was to explore if or to what degree US presidents acted in a potentially biased manner with the approval of FEMA approvals during election years in election battleground states. This study was an exploration of whether there was presidential political favoritism in approving FEMA funding from 1996-2012. The theoretical constructs …

Three Essays On Public Organizations, Changgeun Yun

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

Organizations play key roles in modern societies. The importance of organizations for a society requires an understanding of organizations. In order to fully understand public organizations, it is necessary to recognize how organizational settings affect subjects of organizations and organizing. Although public and private organizations interrelate with each other, the two types are not identical. In this dissertation, I attempt to describe public organizations in their own setting by discussing three important topics in public organization theory: (1) innovation adoption in the public sector; (2) representative bureaucracy; and (3) decline and death of public organizations.

In Chapter II, I scrutinize …

Understanding Presidential Voting Motivation By Factors Of Agency, Sharlene Wilson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The President of the United States sets the tone for policy and has significant power in adopting and implementing policy. Despite this acknowledged power, prior studies, have not examined whether or not agency theory is predictive of voting in U.S. presidential elections. Agency theory is important in the scope of voting behavior as it identifies the relationships which support significance in practicing the activity. This correlational study examined the statistical impact of personal agency, social agency, and sociocultural agency on predictive voting behavior. This study used secondary data originally collected between 1956 and 2008 by the American National Election Study …

Deconstructing The Third Rail: An Analysis Of The Issue Of Poverty In The United States Through The Lens Of Social Security, Nikita Mehandru

CMC Senior Theses

The ongoing debate over welfare in the United States is rooted in the long-standing tension between the nation’s commitment to providing for its most vulnerable and a deep-seated belief that such support can corrupt its recipients. Social Security has struck this balance and appeals to the masses with its pay-as-you-go system and universally distributed benefits. Yet, the solvency of Social Security is threatening the program that has attempted to guard against old age and disability for the last eighty years. This paper examines how the perception of poverty in the United States is a hindrance when tackling social welfare policies. …

California's Foreign Relations, Christopher Gaarder

CMC Senior Theses

Globalization has significantly increased the number of stakeholders in transnational issues in recent decades. The typical list of the new players in global affairs often includes non-state actors like non-governmental organizations, multinational corporations, and international organizations. Sub-national governments, however, have been given relatively little attention even though they, too, have a significant interest and ability to shape the increasing flow of capital, goods, services, people, and ideas that has so profoundly influenced the global political economy in recent decades. California, arguably the most significant among sub-national governments – its economy would be seventh or eighth in the world at $2.2 …

Would You Like It Hot Or Cold? An Analysis Of U.S.-China Climate Policy, Alice Chang

CMC Senior Theses

As the world’s largest emitters and economies, the United States and China play a critical role in global climate mitigation. Using Putnam’s two-level game showcases how the domestic political context of each country impacts their international policies. However, Putnam’s framework does not differentiate between bilateral and multilateral circumstances. The clarity and concentration of perceived costs and benefits for the United States and China from climate policies lead to differing outcomes on the multilateral and bilateral stage. Fear of the free-rider effect makes players assume payoffs that resemble the Prisoner’s Dilemma during multilateral climate negotiations, whereas bilateral negotiations usually result in …

Twelve Years Later: Afghan Humanitarian Aid Workers On War On Terror, Emmanuel C. Ogwude

Department of Conflict Resolution Studies Theses and Dissertations

Using narrative research study founded in social constructionism, I explored the lived experiences of thirty Afghan humanitarian aid workers in Kabul, Afghanistan, to discover how they experienced the war on terror. Ten participants were individually interviewed and their stories, personal experiences, perceptions, and voices have been presented in this study. I also facilitated a focus group of twenty Afghan NGO directors, and their views are echoed in the study. The participants represented a diversity of different humanitarian service specialties that cater to Afghan individuals, communities, and government agencies in areas such as education, human rights and good governance, food and …

Framing The Question, "Who Governs The Internet?", Robert J. Domanski

Publications and Research

There remains a widespread perception among both the public and elements of academia that the Internet is “ungovernable”. However, this idea, as well as the notion that the Internet has become some type of cyber-libertarian utopia, is wholly inaccurate. Governments may certainly encounter tremendous difficulty in attempting to regulate the Internet, but numerous types of authority have nevertheless become pervasive. So who, then, governs the Internet? This book will contend that the Internet is, in fact, being governed, that it is being governed by specific and identifiable networks of policy actors, and that an argument can be made as to …

Employees' Perceptions About The Deterrence Effect Of Polygraph Examination Against Security Compromises, Joshua Lee Cook

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Controversy continues over the use of polygraph testing to deter and detect potential leakers as critics argue that the technique is based on faulty assumptions. The purpose of this descriptive and exploratory research study was to determine whether there was a perceived deterrence effect related to the use of polygraphs between a group of participants who were subjected to a polygraph examination within the past year compared to those who have not experienced a polygraph examination within the same time period. Paternoster and Simpson's, as well as Vance and Siponen's, rational choice models and Bandura's social learning theory served as …

Racism Vs. Social Capital: A Case Study Of Two Majority Black Communities, Bruce W. Strouble

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Several researchers have identified social capital as a means to improve the social sustainability of communities. While there have been many studies investigating the benefits of social capital in homogeneous White communities, few have examined it in Black homogeneous communities. Also, there has been limited research on the influence of racism on social capital in African American communities. In this dissertation a comparative case study was used within a critical race theory framework. The purpose was to explore the role of racial oppression in shaping social capital in majority African American communities. Data were collected from 2 majority Black communities …