Political Science Commons^™

Rationalizing Voter Suppression: How North Carolina Justified The Nation's Strictest Voting Law, Megan C. Raymond

Scripps Senior Theses

In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in instances of Republican-dominated state legislatures proposing changes to election law that some see as protecting electoral integrity and others understand as intended to suppress votes of traditionally Democratic constituencies. This thesis is a detailed collection of the rationales used to justify these changes, as examined through a case study of North Carolina’s enactment of the omnibus Voter Information Verification Act of 2013 (VIVA). By also including the arguments proffered during the legislative process by opponents of the law, and after evaluating the merits of the arguments on both sides, I …

The Discrimination Of The Ethnic Chinese In Indonesia And Perceptions Of Nationality, Amanda Walujono

Scripps Senior Theses

Since the established literature is mostly political, economic, and social histories of modern Indonesia, my thesis will establish motivations behind the context of the discrimination of the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia with particular attention on how it affects the perception of ethnic Chinese Indonesian’s nationality. Most of the times in the established literature, the history, motivations, and consequences behind the discrimination of the ethnic Chinese are briefly summarized or put in as an afterthought. Most of the present day established literature is focused on how the now-allowed Chinese imports are starting to influence Indonesian culture and how post-Suharto regimes have …

Sex, Slaves, And Saviors: Domestic And Global Agendas In U.S. Anti-Trafficking Policy, Chelsea L. Thompson

Scripps Senior Theses

In this thesis, I problematize the United States’ response to the global phenomenon characterized as human trafficking. The framing of trafficking as policy issue takes place in the context of politicized claims about the nature and prevalence of trafficking, its relation to the sex industry, and the kind of response that is required. U.S. anti-trafficking policy was built and shaped in the context of fears about immigration, global labor, and the sex industry. As a result, trafficking has been used to justify oppressive domestic reactions such as border crackdown, scrutiny of immigrant and sex worker communities, and victim “protection” that …

A Hope That’S Not So Hollow: How The Supreme Court’S Decisions In Windsor And Perry Alter The Political Environment In Which Marriage Equality Activism Operates, Emma Brillhart

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis looks at the state of marriage equality activism in the wake of the Supreme Court’s June 26, 2013 decisions in United States v. Windsor and Hollingsworth v. Perry. Some scholars, such as Gerald Rosenberg, argue that Supreme Court decisions can never affect “significant social change,” either directly or indirectly, while others argue that such decisions can be hugely important in directly affecting policy. My focus is on how activist organizations, which have a substantial track record of directly affecting policy, are influenced by changes to the political environment stemming from major Court decisions regarding social issues. After …

"Sea Water Fish In A Freshwater Pond:" An Institutional Approach To Understanding Cooperative Scarcity In The United States, Caroline E. Malone

Scripps Senior Theses

There is remarkable cooperative organization scarcity in the United States. Particularly in the credit union and worker cooperative sectors, this scarcity is not satisfactorily explained by neo-classical economic models that assume competitive conditions and profit-maximizing organizations. This paper supplements the conventional economic understandings of credit union and worker cooperative scarcity with an institutional analysis. Mechanisms of coercive, mimetic, and normative institutional isomorphism developed in DiMaggio and Powell’s theory of organizational isomorphism are applied to provide greater understanding of credit union and worker cooperative scarcity in the US. It appears that these forces of isomorphism work in conjunction with one another, …

An Intersectional Approach To Environmental Political Theory: A Case Study On Modern Andean Bolivian Indigenous Forms Of Resistance And Communal Democracy In Relation To Water Rights, Julia E. Seward

Scripps Senior Theses

Considers Bolivian Andean indigenous forms of democracy and resistance to neoliberal water privatization in Cochabamba. Incorporates environmental identity into the intersectional theoretical framework with principles rooted in Indigenous grass roots theory, Marxist critiques on capitalism, Latin American Neomarxist scholars, and Environmental Justice. Focuses on intersections of ethnicity, gender and class identities with environmental identity to understand the extent to which environmental injustices cannot be addressed in isolation from other sources of inequality.

Reconciliation And The Rule Of Law: The Changing Role Of International War Crimes Tribunals, Oriana H D Lavilla

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis explores the relationship between international war crimes tribunals and peacebuilding in post-conflict societies. The aim of the present study was to examine how the role and function of international tribunals has changed since the establishment of the Nuremberg tribunal in the early years after World War II. Due to the evolving nature of international law and the international criminal legal system, international tribunals have become increasingly recognized as an integral component of peacebuilding processes in the aftermath of conflict. As the first international tribunal mandated to restore international peace and security, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former …

A Meso-Level Examination Of Cross-Border Governance In The Paso Del Norte Region: Political And Economic Perspectives, Pamela Lizette Cruz

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

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Stable And Unstable Dictators: Examining The Effects Of Authoritarian Regime Classifications On Domestic Terrorism, 1972-2008, Yahve Gallegos

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This Thesis examined four authoritarian regime types and their relationship with domestic terrorism. It is argued that military authoritarian regimes are more likely to experience civil strife than other forms of authoritarian regimes. In addition, this Thesis challenges the notion that multi-party authoritarian regimes and civil strife are positively correlated. This study also demonstrates the relationship between regime type and domestic terrorism when controlling for when the country is experiencing civil war. To conduct this research, I used data from the Global Terrorism Database, Correlates of War, and Hadenius and Teorell's "Authoritarian Regime Types Revisited". The results demonstrate that military …

Three Essays On Social/Political Structures And Icts Use, Seungeui Ryu

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

My research identifies how social structures affect the use of the Internet and/or a mobile chat application and how the Internet impacts the political structure of a nation. In my first essay of the 3-essay Dissertation, I am designing three models based on social structure theory that are used to study the Internet and a popular mobile chat application's use by managers in South Korea, with the help of a survey instrument. In my first essay, the contribution is on i) testing a model of manager's personal behavior on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) use at the individual level involving …

Operational Code And Al-Ikhwan: An Assessment Of The Evolution Of The Muslim Brotherhood's Operational Code And Possible Public Diplomacy Options For The United States, Robert Kevin Thomson

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The primary aim of this Thesis is to provide the reader with a firm understanding of the evolution of the Muslim Brotherhood's operational code from the early 2000s to 2013. Specifically, this research will address and analyze the evolution of the Brotherhood's political rhetoric from its historical context to the present. The Brotherhood's political rhetoric will be analyzed utilizing Operational Code Analysis. The secondary aim of this research is to provide a potential framework for policymakers and diplomats to utilize public diplomacy and strategic communication strategies to engage and constrain the influence of the Brotherhood in a globalized society. This …

The Spillover Effects Of Conflict On Economic Growth Along The U.S.-Mexico Border, Karen Elizabeth Trevino

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The violence and insecurity that Mexico has suffered since former President Calderon's war on drugs has come at a grave economic cost to the cities most affected. Businesses and citizens in counties that shared a border with the United States, however, have the ability to move their capital and businesses in search of regaining profits that had been lost due to the insecurity in their cities. These specific counties are considered to be interdependent borderlands, which signify that these borders are in a border region where one nation is symbiotically linked with the border region of an adjoining country. This …

North Korean Supernotes: Nuclear Arms Financed By Counterfeit Currency, Michael Yatskievych

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Michael Yatskievych, University of Texas at El Paso

Abstract of Master's Thesis, Submitted 21 May 2014:

North Korean Supernotes: Nuclear Arms Financed By Counterfeit Currency

The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate whether DPRK is producing high quality counterfeit US currency, supernotes, and has determined to what extent supernotes are financing North Korea's emerging nuclear arms program.

The application of Analysis of Competing Hypotheses, ACH, satisfied this study's purpose by meeting the following objectives: the development of multiple hypotheses in an attempt to explain a supernote-nuclear arms program link, assessing evidence from assorted sources, providing a diagnostic weighing …

The Darfur Name Game: Use Of Realpolitik By The United Nations In Decision-Making And Intervention, Angela Overton

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

Violence has plagued the westernmost region of Sudan, known as Darfur, since 2003. The conflict contains elements of political and ethnic divisiveness, desertification, and resource scarcity. The violence there continues to date. Many have declared genocide in Darfur while others maintain that the conflict is instead a crime against humanity. The labeling of the conflict is critical because this process determines the interventions available. This paper focuses on the decision-making process of the United Nations and its Security Council to determine if the labeling of the conflict impacted the discourse and intervention decisions by those bodies. Discourse analysis results indicate …

What Constitutes The Success Or Failure Of Multinational Corporations (Mncs) In Foreign Markets? A Case Study Of Chinese And American Mncs, Shiwei Jiang

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Scholars have identified multinational corporations (MNCs) as increasingly important and influential actors in international politics. However, mainstream international studies scholarship has failed to explain why MNCs succeed or fail in entering foreign markets. Market entry is a particularly vexing question for U.S. and Chinese firms seeking to compete for each other's consumers. As this study shows, surprising differences in success among U.S. firms in China, as well as Chinese firms in the U.S., suggest that statist and market factors interact with corporate strategies in confounding ways. Through case studies in the internet, automobile and fast food industries, this dissertation builds …

Provocation In The Political Theories Of Plato, Rousseau And Nietzsche, Aaron Martin

Wayne State University Dissertations

I devise a theoretical model that provides an interpretive framework to define and describe the concept of provocation as well as to analyze and explain the theoretical provocations in Plato, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Friedrich Nietzsche's works. I assess their works as well as a wide-ranging body of scholarship both on the concept and the theorists, to show that--despite Plato, Rousseau and Nietzsche's many peculiarities both in terms of their lives and works--the three separate theoretical projects similarly use the conceptual language of provocation as an integral part of an overall rhetorical strategy to articulate their philosophical systems as ones of …

Election Reform: Does Early Voting Impact Turnout In Municipal Elections?, Gayle Alberda

Wayne State University Dissertations

Turnout in the United States is low, especially in municipal elections. Early voting laws, which have been adopted by over half of the states within the United States, offer voters a chance to cast a ballot over a longer period of time thereby lowering the cost of voting. Early voting includes no excuse absentee voting, in person early voting, and/or vote by mail elections. Many of the previous studies on early voting have focused on national or statewide elections. What has been largely understudied is the impact of early voting laws on voter turnout in municipal elections, where voter turnout …

The Rise Of The Social And The Change In The Political: A Consideration Of Arendt, Habermas, And Foucault, George Tyler

Wayne State University Dissertations

I explore parallels within the work of Hannah Arendt, Jürgen Habermas, and Michel Foucault. I examine the unexamined connections and commonalities among the works of these three preeminent political theorists with the aim of understanding our common, contemporary construction of "the political." Specifically, I examine the way that each of these theorists describes a condition wherein the very concept of "the political" has undergone significant changes. I demonstrate how these thinkers converge around the notion that what was once understood as "the political," has come to include concerns, modes of thought, and forms of action that were previously considered unpolitical. …

Absentee Soldier Voting In Civil War Law And Politics, David A. Collins

Wayne State University Dissertations

During the Civil War, twenty northern states changed their laws to permit absent soldiers to vote. Before enactment of these statutes, state laws had tethered balloting to the voter's community and required in-person participation by voters. Under the new laws, eligible voters - as long as they were soldiers - could cast ballots in distant military encampments, far from their neighbors and community leaders. This dissertation examines the legal conflicts that arose from this phenomenon and the political causes underlying it.

Legally, the laws represented an abrupt change, contrary to earlier scholarship viewing them as culminating a gradual process of …

Nuclear Security Complexes: An Alternative Approach To Nuclear Nonproliferation, Beyza Unal

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Existing literature examines nuclear proliferation from a regional or a national perspective but nuclear issues are inherently transnational. The literature also often focuses on single-state policies for deterrence purposes. Following tailored (single-state) policies, however, is too narrow because these policies are bilateral and based on national interest; they do not include global concerns. In response to the literature, this dissertation proposes to examine states grouped according to their state characteristics in terms of threat existence, democracy level in the nuclear field, and membership in nuclear organizations and compliance with major nuclear treaties. The focus here is to ask: "Does regional …

Robust Regression Methods For Massively Decayed Intelligence Data, Akiva Joachim Lorenz

Wayne State University Dissertations

Homeland Security, sponsored by governmental initiatives, has become a vibrant academic research field. However, most efforts were placed with the recognition of threats (e.g. theory) and response options. Less effort was placed in the analysis of the collected data through statistical modeling. In a field that collects more than 20 terabyte of information per minute though diverse overt and covert means and indexes it for future research, understanding how different statistical models behave when it comes to massively decayed data is of vital importance.

Using Monte Carlo methods, three regression techniques (ordinary least squares, least-trimmed, and maximum likelihood) were tested …

Truth And Reconciliation Commissions: The Road To Democracy And Rule Of Law?, Julie Ann Keil

Wayne State University Dissertations

TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSIONS: THE ROAD TO DEMOCRACY AND RULE OF LAW?

by

JULIE A. KEIL

December 2014

Advisor: Dr. Sharon Lean

Major: Political Science

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

Every year millions of dollars are spent on Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRC) designed to bring about post-conflict resolutions in states through a formal process. This paper explores the major TRCs comparatively to assess the relationship between TRCs and the growth of democracy and rule of law in post conflict societies and compares that performance to a control group of states that experienced a conflict but did not conduct a TRC. …

Ben Judah: Fragile Empire Study Guide, 2014, Steven Alan Samson

Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Eva Brann: The Music Of The Republic Study Guide, 2011-2014, Steven Alan Samson

Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Terry L. Anderson And Peter J. Hill: Birth Of A Transfer Society Study Guide, 2014, Steven Alan Samson

Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Duty: Memoirs Of A Secretary At War, By Robert M. Gates, Michael A. Genovese

Political Science and International Relations Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Book Review: The Good Neighbor: Franklin D. Roosevelt And The Rehetoric Of American Power, Michael A. Genovese

Political Science and International Relations Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Eleventh Hour: The Politics Of Policy Initiatives In Presidential Transitions, By David M. Shafie, Michael A. Genovese

Political Science and International Relations Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Nation Of Devils, By Stein Ringen, Michael A. Genovese

Political Science and International Relations Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Book Review: The End Of Authority: How A Loss Of Legitimacy And Broken Trust Are Endangering Our Future, By Douglas E. Schoen, Michael A. Genovese

Political Science and International Relations Faculty Works

No abstract provided.