Political Science Commons^™

Democracy And Income Inequality: Measurement And Modeling Of The Western Hemispheric Experience, Ross E. Burkhart

Political Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

What is our understanding of the relationship between democracy and income inequality in the Western Hemisphere? This paper specifies a nonlinear relationship between democracy and income inequality in multivariate non-linear models across different regions and time points of the Western Hemisphere as well as the hemisphere based on a common literature (Acemoglu and Robinson 2006, Barro 1999, Boix 2003, Burkhart 1997, Houle 2009). While the literature has rigorously tested these relationships within Latin America (Huber et al. 2006), there has not been a similar test of all of the Western Hemispheric countries, including the industrialized economies of Canada and the …

Breaking The Iron Law : Robert Michels, The Rise Of The Mass Party, And The Debate Over Democracy And Oligarchy, Peter Albert Lavenia, Jr.

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This is a reexamination of Robert Michels' work Political Parties: A Sociological Study Of The Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy and its place in the debate over the rise and role of the mass political party in democracy and democratic thought. It examines Michels' involvement with the German Social Democratic Party and the syndicalist faction around Georges Sorel's Le Mouvement Socialist, as well as his friendship with Max Weber, and his experiences with socialist electoral politics that led him to write Political Parties and explore the nature of political parties and the tension between democracy and oligarchy within them. Time …

Child Soldiers, Armed Conflicts, And Tactical Innovations, Robert Tynes

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Most armed conflicts in the late 20th and early 21st century involve the use of child soldiers. Children have been used in wars before the modern era, but this study argues that a shift has occurred in contemporary conflicts. Child soldier use has become a tactical innovation. Fighting factions utilize children as soldiers in order to gain an advantage on the battlefield. Several different analytical approaches are used in order to test the argument. First, a large-N regression analysis (1987-2007) reveals that depending on the dyadic relationship between government and opposition forces, intensity of war, military expenditures per GDP, political …

Stakeholder, Organizational And Environmental Influences On Nursing Home Regulatory Enforcement : A New Perspective, Tamika R. Black

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

This dissertation proposes a conceptual framework that integrates stakeholder and compliance theory and employs a multi-method approach to examine the influence of stakeholders, bureaucratic discretion and external environment on nursing home inspections and enforcement. Negative binomial regression analysis was conducted on a population of 655 nursing homes in New York to identify determinants of variation in compliance and enforcement (as measured by deficiency citations). As hypothesized, organizational characteristics (i.e., nursing home bed capacity, sponsorship, occupancy rates and Medicaid revenue) were significant predictors of regulatory compliance and quality of care. Nursing home complaints, the presence of family councils, political party of …

The Loud Public : The Case Of User Comments In Online News Media, Naama Nagar

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In the pre-internet era most members of the public did not have the ability to express their opinions on political issues via the mass media. This dissertation illustrates how the internet changed that by providing average citizens with endless opportunities to be heard. In particular, I analyze user comments on mainstream news sites as a vehicle that enables individuals to have a voice.

Summary Report: Workshop On International Environmental Governance: Grounding Policy Reform In Rigorous Analysis, Center For Governance And Sustainability At Umass Boston

Center for Governance and Sustainability Publications

From June 27 to 28, 2011, the Federal Office for the Environment of Switzerland, the Global Environmental Governance Project of the Center for Governance and Sustainability at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and the World Trade Institute at the University of Bern hosted a workshop on International Environmental Governance: Grounding Policy Reform in Rigorous Analysis. The workshop started a dialogue between academics and researchers on one hand and policymakers on the other in order to provide analytical input to the political negotiations on institutional reform in the run-up to the UN Conference on Sustainable Development in 2012.

The workshop focused …

Global Governance In The 21st Century: Rethinking The Environmental Pillar, Maria Ivanova

Conflict Resolution, Human Security, and Global Governance Faculty Publication Series

The United Nations was created in 1945 without an environmental body. Almost thirty years later, in 1972, governments established UNEP. Twenty years later, in the early 1990s, when rethinking the institutional arrangements, they created the Global Environment Facility and the Commission on Sustainable Development, as well as several core conventions (on climate, biodiversity and desertification). Despite the attempts to bring about further governance reform over the last decade, however, progress has been limited. While governance discussions continued, they were never explicitly on the political agenda. Now, for the first time since the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, a clear political opportunity …

The 2008 Us Presidential Campaign As Represented In The Online Edition Of The Korea Times, Sherri L. Ter Molen

Communication Faculty Research Publications

Because public opinion has been found to influence government policy (Page & Shapiro, 1983, p. 185) and because media are cultural products that “mirror society” and “contribute to the reconstruction of the culture” (Czarniawska, 2006, p. 250), I conducted a rhetorical analysis of the coverage of the 2008 US presidential campaign in the online edition of the English language newspaper, The Korea Times. Using Entman’s (2007) concept of framing bias in the media as a means to influence the distribution of power, I found that The Korea Times used the deictic expression ‘we’ to express and (re)construct nationalistic views of …

Cocina Peruana Para El Mundo: Gastrodiplomacy, The Culinary Nation Brand, And The Context Of National Cuisine In Peru, Rachel Wilson

Exchange: The Journal of Public Diplomacy

Gastrodiplomacy, or the use of food in the construction of a nation brand, is one of many tools that a government can employ in its broader strategy of cultural diplomacy. The idea of pleasing the global palate while at the same time improving a country's image lies at the core of any culinary diplomacy initiative, and the case of Peru is no exception. By utilizing the promotional campaign "Cocina peruana para el mundo" ("Peruvian cuisine for the World"), the Peruvian government is attempting to construct a national brand centered on its cuisine. This paper investigates the specific context of the …

The Power Of Culture In Diplomacy: The Case Of U.S. Cultural Diplomacy In France And Germany, Sofia Kitsou

Exchange: The Journal of Public Diplomacy

Cultural diplomacy represents a facet of diplomacy that has not been utilized completely in building better diplomatic relations and, although it could serve as a linking bridge toward better relations, it has been underestimated, if not neglected. Foreign positive perceptions of the United States declined considerably especially during the George W. Bush administration, as a result of various actions taken by the United States in the international arena that were unpopular. Anti-Americanism reached its peak in Europe because of the unilateral decision to proceed with the war in Iraq while the transatlantic rift between traditional partners such as the United …

Transnational Ngos: A Us Perspective, George E. Mitchell

Political Science - Dissertations

This study examines how leaders of transnational NGOs (TNGOs) across the United States understand transnational activism and the roles their organizations play in world affairs. Three roles are identified: alleviation, realization and environmentalism. Analysis suggests that scholarship in international relations focuses disproportionately on the least common and least resourceful types of TNGOs and routinely mischaracterizes a small number of highly visible organizations as exemplary. Leaders' perspectives on organizational mission, activities, autonomy, collaboration, effectiveness and obstacles reveal that the most numerous and resourceful TNGOs are technocratic agencies favoring a materialistic, ameliorative approach to transnational activism. Moreover, to the extent that TNGOs …

The Effects Of Settlement Policy On Refugee Political Activism: Sudanese Refugees In Australia And The Us, Hannah Allerdice

Political Science - Dissertations

South Sudanese refugees are strongly motivated to effect change in South Sudan. After resettlement to the US, this motivation has resulted in much transnational political activism on their part. In Australia, Sudanese refugees have concentrated primarily on domestic political and social integration. Why? In this project I examine the possible causes of this difference, including the institutions, the policies, and the agents who implement settlement programs. I argue that refugee settlement policies of host countries directly shape the political activities of their refugees. When a host country provides assistance to integrate refugees, the government's policies and the individuals who implement …

A More Global Court? Judicial Transnationalism And The U.S. Supreme Court, Angela G. Narasimhan

Political Science - Dissertations

For many decades, Supreme Court justices and legal scholars have argued over the validity of different tools in constitutional interpretation, including social science data, public opinion and, most recently, laws and standards of decency from abroad. Although several of those currently on the bench maintain that foreign laws have no place in American constitutional adjudication, the larger universe in which their institution operates has become increasingly transnational since the end of the Cold War. The term judicial transnationalism has been coined to describe this phenomenon, characterized by unprecedented levels of interaction and exchange between foreign courts and legal activists. This …

Taxes, Welfare And Democratic Discourse: Mainstream Media Coverage And The Rise Of The American New Right, Matt Guardino

Political Science - Dissertations

Research demonstrates that news media can shape mass opinion on specific public policy issues in politically consequential ways. However, systematic and critical empirical analysis of the ideological diversity of such news coverage is rare. Scholars have also illuminated how and why U.S. economic and social welfare policy has shifted rightward in recent decades, but they have failed to consider media's role in shaping public opinion to democratically legitimate this major reorientation of political economy to favor business and upper-income constituencies. I combine neo-Gramscian theorizations of hegemony, popular common sense and articulation with social scientific research on framing, priming and psychological …

Mujeres Y Bienestar: Un Estudio Comparativo De Chile Y Uruguay, Jennifer Pribble

Political Science Faculty Publications

Es ampliamente reconocido por economistas, cientistas políticos y sociólogos que las mujeres constituyen una proporción muy alta de la pobreza mundial. A pesar de las marcadas diferencias de género entre los pobres latinoamericanos, los análisis de los Estados de bienestar de Ia región se han concentrado primordialmente en explicar las diferencias en los niveles del gasto socialo total. Este enfoque ha dejado de lado una variable importante en los regímenes de bienestar latinoamericanos: el carácter de género en las políticas sociales. Este trabajo pretende cubrir esa brecha. Mediante un análisis comparativo de Chile y Uruguay, las páginas que siguen exploran …

Republicanism, Richard Dagger

Political Science Faculty Publications

Republicanism is an ancient tradition of political thought that has enjoyed a remarkable revival in recent years. As with liberalism, conservatism, and other enduring political traditions, there is considerable disagreement as to exactly what republicanism is and who counts as a republican, whether in the ancient world or contemporary times. Scholars agree, however, that republicanism rests on the conviction that government is not the domain of some ruler or small set of rulers, but is instead a public matter - the res publica - to be directed by self-governing citizens.

Social Contracts, Fair Play, And The Justification Of Punishment, Richard Dagger

Political Science Faculty Publications

In recent years, the counterintuitive claim that criminals consent to their own punishment has been revived by philosophers who attempt to ground the justification of punishment in some version of the social contract. In this paper, I examine three such attempts—“contractarian” essays by Christopher Morris and Claire Finkelstein and an essay by Corey Brettschneider from the rival “contractualist” camp—and I find all three unconvincing. Each attempt is plausible, I argue, but its plausibility derives not from the appeal to a social contract but from considerations of fair play. Rather than look to the social contract for a justification of punishment, …

Entrapment Or Freedom: Enforcing Customary Property Rights Regimes In Common-Law Africa, Sandra F. Joireman

Political Science Faculty Publications

This chapter examines customary property rights and the role of customary leaders in enforcing those property rights from an institutionalist perspective. The issue of societal benefit is at the forefront of this chapter, which proceeds in three parts. Subchapter 13.2 discusses the pervasiveness of customary tenure and customary authority structures throughout Sub-Saharan Africa and their genesis in the colonial era. Subchapter 13.3 notes the lack of consistency between statutory law and customary law, which leads to a pluralistic legal setting. This part also identifies the winners and losers within customary legal systems. Subchapter 13.4 discusses how we can evaluate customary …

Cultivating Justice For The Working Poor: Clinical Representation Of Unemployment Claimants, Colleen F. Shanahan

Faculty Scholarship

The combination of current economic conditions and recent changes in the United States' welfare system makes representation of unemployment insurance claimants by clinic students a timely learning opportunity. While unemployment insurance claimants often share similarities with student attorneys, they are unable to access justice as easily as student attorneys, and as a result, face the risk of severe poverty. Clinical representation of unemployment claimants is a rich opportunity for students to experience making a difference for a client, and to understand the issues of poverty and justice that these clients experience along the way. These cases reveal that larger lessons …

The Anglo Politics Of Latino Education: The Role Of Immigration Scripts, Edmund T. Hamann

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

In the 41 states without a substantial historic Latino population, large-scale schooling of Latinos is a comparatively new issue and the nature of that schooling is fundamentally shaped by how the more established (usually Anglo) populations understand this task. This chapter describes the understandings that led to, but also limited, one particularly comprehensive attempt in Georgia to respond to Latino newcomers. In that sense, this is a study of the cosmologies that can undergird the politics of schooling of Latinos. This chapter utilizes the concept of the script, or broadly shared storylines about how things are or should be, to …

The Flaws Of Foreign Affairs Legalism, Daniel Abebe, Eric A. Posner

Faculty Scholarship

Foreign affairs legalism, the dominant approach in academic scholarship on foreign relations law, holds that courts should abandon their traditional deference to the executive in foreign relations, and that courts and Congress should take a more activist ole in foreign relations than they have in the past. Foreign affairs legalists believe that greater judicial involvement in foreign relations would curb executive abuses and promote adherence to international law. This Article argues that foreign affairs legalism rests on implausible assumptions about the incentives and capacities of courts. In U.S. history, the executive has given more support to international law than the …

Responses To The Ten Questions, Aziz Rana

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This essay responds to a question posed by the William Mitchell Law Review for its annual national security issue: Has Obama Improved Bush's National Security Policies? I maintain that Obama Administration practices have been marked by striking continuities with those of the previous Administration. I then attempt to explain these continuities by discussing how American policymakers across the political spectrum share basic assumptions about the concept of national security and the need for an aggressive and interventionist foreign policy.

Populism And Human Rights In Theory And Practice: Chavez's Venezuela And Fujimori's Peru, Joseph P. Braun

Department of Political Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Despite ample literature on the topic of populism itself, much less has been written on the specific relationship between populism and human rights. First, I discuss the relationship between populist ideology and human rights in theory. I argue that populism is inconsistent with human rights accounts because of its rejection of pluralism and vilification of the ‘other.’ Second, I explore the relationship between populism as a political strategy and its impact on human rights under two Latin American regimes. I argue that despite its tendency to produce short-term gains in economic and social development, a review of the two cases …

Returning Attention To Policy Content In Diffusion Study, John M. Fulwider

Department of Political Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Policy diffusion research pays virtually no attention to policy content. Yet we should expect content to shape the adoption of any policy--this is what legislators and policy makers, after all, fight about. Thus the extent and speed of diffusion likely critically depend on policy content, which the current literature virtually ignores. This dissertation shows how we can better understand policy diffusion by taking policy content seriously. Paying attention to policy content, including how it is debated and understood by legislators, has immediate payoffs in the sense that two literatures largely ignored until now by diffusion researchers-- policy typologies and policy …

The Impact Of Political Corruption On Social Welfare In The Federal Republic Of Nigeria, Heather Crowe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to understand to what extent political corruption affects social welfare in Nigeria using a qualitative case study design. This thesis argues that political corruption leads to a concentration of wealth among a minority of elite government officials, resulting in extensive deficiency of social welfare. In addition, political corruption has secondary and tertiary effects throughout society that further exacerbate social welfare conditions. For this study, social welfare is measured by a comprehensive range of social indicators including but not limited to: level of poverty, income inequality, level of infrastructure, and health. Political corruption can only …

Explaining The Support Of The British National Party (Bnp) In The 1999, 2004, And 2009 European Parliament Elections, Jonathan Richard Willis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the past decade, there has been a surge of interest in extreme right Western European parties. Well-established parties such as the National Front (FN) in France, Vlaams Belang (formerly Vlaams Blok) in Belgium, and Lega Nord in Italy have been scrutinized. However, extreme right parties that have just recently begun to experience electoral successes such as the British National Party (BNP) have received less evaluation and discussion in the literature. Therefore, this study examines the BNP‟s electoral fortunes in the European elections of 1999, 2004, and 2009. I explore the support for the BNP using the traditional variables of …

Non-State Actors In Jamaican Economic Policy, Matthew W. Jarrett

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The relevance in understanding local dynamics or political culture is that as Neuman has pointed out, many traditional theories have not taken them into account and have thus failed in explaining political occurrences in the lesser developed world. For example as she has stated, "domestic factors" have not been considered into "systems theories". (Neuman, 1995, p.16) On this basis, it is necessary to point out these local factors, and furthermore, the role of non-state actors within the realm of internal dynamics, since international relations theory also aims to understand the formation and motivation behind economic policy. Therefore, to produce a …

Eliminating The Glass Ceiling How Micro-Financing Empowers Women And Alleviates The Effects Of Poverty In Developing Countries, Garcia, Meldin Graziani

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

It is widely accepted as fact that the creation of a stable financial system is the catalyst which facilitates economic development and prosperity. However, developing countries which embark on a path of change often forget the cardinal rule: addressing the needs of those who suffer from poverty, inequality, and political strife. In other words, change starts from the ground up; not the other way around. First among the challenges facing these countries, is the need to change the lending rules followed by traditional financial institutions- banks and other private lenders- who are unwilling to provide their services to individuals with …

Rawls's Theory Of Justice A Necessary Extension To Environmentalism, Andrew Greene

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

John Rawls‟s stated intergenerational justice scheme, known as the just-savings principle, does not include an institutional concern for the environment and is therefore incomplete and incapable of maintaining meaningfully just relations between generations. The theory‟s emphasis on economic theory and capital accumulation demonstrates a misinterpretation of environmental issues and concerns as well as their underlying causes and repercussions. This lapse in Rawls‟s intergenerational scheme exposes flaws in his larger theory of justice by leaving the stability of society in question and placing arbitrary burdens on generations and peoples without institutional recourse. However, by supplementing justice as fairness (JAF) with Rawls‟s …

Connecticut's Fourth Congressional District: History, Politics, And The Maverick Tradition, Gary L. Rose

Sacred Heart University Press Books

Connecticut's Fourth Congressional District: History, Politics, and the Maverick Tradition is a case study of one of the most unique congressional districts in the United States. Located in Fairfield County, the fourth district is a bedroom community close to New York City. The district's close proximity to Wall Street, the tendency of the district's constituents to elect free-thinking congresspersons, and the wealth and celebrity status of many district residents have resulted in a setting which can be described as an anomaly in the larger context of congressional politics. Contents: Introduction -- Connecticut's Fourth Congressional District: geography and demographics -- A …