Political Science Commons^™

Secularization And Women's Liberation: An Analysis Of Women's Freedoms In The Modern Era, Anna Humphrey

Political Analysis

Anna Humphrey, Seton Hall University class of 2024, is a senior Political Science major with minors in Spanish and Environmental Studies. Anna is a member of the Communications Committee for Adelante Latino/a Student Organization and is a Statistics Tutor at the Math Learning Lab on campus. After graduation, she hopes to work in legislative analysis or lobbying. She is primarily interested in environmental and immigration policy. Her thesis paper was inspired by both Professor Jeffrey Togman's research on the rise of atheism and her passion for women's rights.

Like, Follow, And Subscribe: The Potential Effect Of Social Media On The 2024 Elections, Nyada Bryant

Political Analysis

Nyada Bryant is a political science major with a minor in sociology who will be graduating in the spring of 2024. After graduation, she intends on going to graduate school and getting her masters in diplomacy as she would like to seek a career in that field of study or international affairs. For her senior thesis class, she had to focus on the 2024 election and decided to examine tactics that politicians were utilizing on social media. Thus, this paper delves into political communication, reliability and longevity in the digital world.

Table Of Contents, N/A N/A

Political Analysis

No abstract provided.

Kashmir And Conflict: The Risks Of Water Scarcity, Mael Quentin

Senior Theses

As global warming increases, natural resource scarcity consistently becomes central to interstate tensions and local dissatisfaction. As water supplies dwindle, countries are becoming more desperate to cling to any accessible water supply, often at other groups' expense. The tension that grows over water scarcity can compound with pre-existing identity-based tensions. Kashmir is an ideal region to examine these concerning patterns, as it is an essential water source tied to interstate conflicts between Pakistan and India. My goal was to analyze three water scarcity types determined by Lyla Mehta and their potential to engender conflict in Kashmir. After looking through multiple …

Refugees Or Migrants: Polish Reception To Ukrainian And Syrian Refugee Crises (2015/2022), Emily M. Friedman

Senior Theses

After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, millions of Ukrainians fled the country as refugees. The majority of which settled in the neighboring country of Poland, where they were greeted with open arms both by the government and the public. However, Poland’s kindness towards Ukrainian refugees was an outlier: during the Syrian refugee crisis in 2015, the Polish government and citizens adamantly opposed accepting refugees from Syria or other Middle Eastern countries. Their initial refusal meant they were woefully unprepared for the two million Ukrainians who chose to remain in the country both due to a lack of updated …

Evaluating Climate Migration Through Discourse Analysis Of International Policy Framework And “El Progreso” Community Blog, Olusola Akanni

Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

Environmental changes are driven by global warming, such as rising temperatures, melting ice, and increased natural disasters which directly affect the living conditions of huma thereby driving migration. This study highlights the inadequacies of current migration management policies as the United States is seeing a significant influx of migrants from Central America. The focus of this discourse analysis is on the role of inadequate policies and the failure of international efforts like the Paris Climate Agreement in addressing the issue of climate-induced migration effectively. Despite the goals set by such international agreements to mitigate the effects of climate change …

Labors Of Love And Loss: Exploring Relationships In Remitting Latine-American Families, Sequoyah Sv Hilton

Master's Theses

This paper examines the impact remittances have in Latin-American families across borders through qualitative interviews. Remittances, or international transfers of money, are a common support strategy of global migrant communities. There are divergent opinions on remittances, either positioning them as a great potential for developing lower and middle-income countries, or critiquing them as too heavily depended on by states and created as a survival support mechanism by communities to compensate for state neglect. While they are a massive cash flow at the international level, there is a greater need to blend analyses of remittances at the international level at the …

Secrets Of The Medicine Cabinet: How Big Pharma's Information Monopoly Influences Federal Public Health Regulations, Kyle James

Culture, Society, and Praxis

Pharmaceutical companies are the largest industry contributor to political activities in the United States. Instead of pursuing traditional routes of political influence, these firms concentrate their efforts within federal public health agencies. By directly intervening in the regulatory process, Big Pharma assumes control of the drug approval process, dictating the means by which pharmaceutical products enter the marketplace. This scheme is designed to strip agencies of their public interest mandate. The resulting political phenomenon, known as regulatory capture, creates a symbiotic relationship where federal agencies and industry mutually benefit from the swift commercialization of drugs. This thesis examines "how" Big …

Going Nuclear: Conflict Transformation In Asia, Hariharan Murugesan

Student Theses and Dissertations

On July 16th, 1945, codenamed “Trinity,” the world’s first nuclear bomb was detonated, releasing 18.6 kilotons of energy, morphing the sand in the Alamo Desert into green sheet glass.

International relations and its study were fundamentally changed with the creation of nuclear weapons. Mutually Assured Destruction, aptly shortened to MAD became a prevailing theory that tried to explain why countries would acquire nuclear weapons but would never use them; overtime, through various frameworks and treaties, the world tried to control the spread of nuclear weapons, and since 2006, only nine countries have succeeded in creating nuclear weapons, and yet interestingly …

One Tiger, Many Lions: Uneven Adoption Of China's Political And Economic Investment Among Democracies In Sub-Saharan Africa, Tommy Callan

Dissertations

This dissertation examines how unique qualities of democracies in Sub-Saharan Africa and their foreign policy decision making processes affect their ability to exercise state agency. Specifically, democratic qualities affect a state’s receipt of investment from China and how well those investment projects fare once accepted. It is hypothesized that a strong executive branch leads to decreased or inconsistent Chinese investment while a strong legislature may have the opposite effect. A strong executive may also lead to an increased chance of project success while a strong legislature may have the opposite effect. High levels of party contestation may lead to decreased …

Teaching And Developing Deliberative Capacities: An Integrated Approach To Peer-To-Peer, Playful, And Authentic Discussion-Based Learning, Rousiley Celi Moreira Maia, Gabriella Hauber, Danila Cal, Augusto Veloso Leão

Democracy & Education

Drawing on theories of deliberative democracy, this article analyzes initiatives in educational settings to develop deliberative capabilities—defined here as a person's motivation and abilities to explain their views based on thoughtful considerations, reciprocal engagement, and more inclusive and respectful communication. Building and expanding on previous education experiences and citizen assemblies, we propose an integrated approach that includes: (a) peer learning, (b) playful and performative activities, and (c) authentic discussions about controversial political issues in small groups. Our field experiment involving more than 500 public school students in Brazil is used to illustrate combinations of methods to develop conceptual understandings and …

Deforestation In Brazil’S Amazon And The Effects On Its Position In International Politics, Jeb Hinkle

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

Latin America is a land of potential for economic growth, the expansion of democracy, and international political influence. The United States has historically had political and economic influence in the region; however, Latin American nations have long seen the United States as imperialists, only serving their own interest at the expense of smaller Latin nations. As China’s global ambitions grow, many Latin American nations have turned towards the Chinese for investment and trade. The United States needs to combat China’s influence and the nations of Latin America wish to build a better future for themselves. The solution is strategic partnership …

The Holocaust's Legacy: Influencing Jewish Political Identity, Jordan Eskew

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis addresses the intricate relationship between the historical persecution of the Holocaust and its enduring influence on contemporary Jewish political engagement, a subject of significant contemporary relevance in political and international relations. Despite broad recognition of the Holocaust’s impact, the specific ways in which its memory affects Jewish political attitudes and actions around the world in the modern day have not been sufficiently thoroughly examined. Utilizing qualitative methods, including interviews with 20 individuals—public figures, Holocaust survivors, their descendants, and broader members of the Jewish diaspora— this study focuses on understanding the interplay between historical trauma, community cohesion, and the …

Beyond Urban Development: The Political Economy Of The Decision To Build A New Administrative Capital [Nac], Arsany Medhat

Theses and Dissertations

Following major societal upheavals, regimes often embark on grandiose infrastructure projects, particularly new capital cities. This thesis delves into the political-economic motivations behind such seemingly monumental undertaking, taking the case of Egypt's New Administrative Capital (NAC) as its prime example. Through meticulous analysis, it argues that three key drivers—legitimization, legibility, and clientelism—underpin this decision, ultimately fostering a process of power consolidation. Legitimization: The NAC serves as a potent symbol of a "new era," offering the post-upheaval regime a platform to showcase its modernity, efficiency, and commitment to progress, thereby bolstering its legitimacy in the eyes of both domestic and international …

How Local Democratic Backsliding? Single Candidate, Pragmatism And Uncompetitive Local Head Election In Indonesia, Andi Luhur Prianto, Nina Yuslaini

Jurnal Wacana Politik

This paper will examine how pragmatism has created rational choice behavior in candidate selection. Pragmatism has resulted in single candidates for local heads, which makes local democracy uncompetitive. The research method used is an explanatory approach that aims to explain how pragmatism as a rational choice behavior in the local government head election. Data were collected, compiled and analyzed using Nvivo 12 Plus software. The results showed that political parties as political institutions are very pragmatic in the selection of candidates for local heads. The incumbents utilized the support of almost all political parties based on clientelistic and programmatic relations. …

Simulation Intellectual Sign #Aniespresiden2024 In Social Media Bigdata Analysis, Yudi Daherman, Ivan Taufiq

Jurnal Wacana Politik

Talking about 2024 is of course talking about the political year in Indonesia. 2024 is the year when legislative candidates and of course presidential and vice presidential candidates will begin to fight. Currently, one of the presidential candidates from the party that is the current government party is Anies Baswedan. Based on what has been regulated in political ethics and election ethics, it is certainly not allowed to campaign by presidential candidates before the campaign period is carried out, but what happened was the emergence of social media content from Anies Baswedan containing campaigns with disguised signs and also camouflaged …

Women's Wings In Rebel Groups, Heidi Marie Stallman

Dissertations - ALL

The proceeding dissertation is a collection of three articles exploring the phenomenon of women’s wings in rebel groups. The articles ask different questions and utilize diverse methodological tools. The three abstracts are below. Paper 1 exposes the patterns of women’s wings in rebel groups through a large-N analysis of 372 rebel groups existing between 1946 and 2015. Scholarship in rebel governance has begun to identify trends of how women organize and participate in rebel groups. Patterns of women’s participation in conflict vary widely in scope, purpose, and form between, within, and after conflict. This paper focuses on patterns of women’s …

Russian Interventionism: A Case Study Of President Vladimir Putin's Personal Influence In The Syrian Civil War, Lee Holmes

Honors Theses

The most influential factors in implementing interventionist policies into vulnerable countries are widely debated depending on political factors in the international relations sphere. Russia’s decision to intervene in Syria’s civil war in 2015 while Syria collapsed from civil unrest and authoritarian corruption is a prime example. Although most literature agrees that Russia’s intervention stemmed from an attempt to solidify political influence and diplomatic relations in the Middle East, hardly any addresses President Vladimir Putin’s individual influence as a determining factor. Since national power is consolidated to the individual leader in authoritarian regimes, it is crucial to understand President Putin’s personal …

Scared To Give? A Look Into How Terrorism Affects The Flow Of Foreign Aid, Madelyn Jarjoura

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the role of formal ties to terrorism and its effect on foreign aid

from donor countries considered either democratic or not. I hypothesize that as more seats are occupied in a recipient country’s government by a known terrorist organization, the less total aid democratic donor countries will send to that country (vice versa for non-democratic donors). However, with stronger ties to terrorism, the more aid democratic donors will bypass through NGOs (vice versa for non-democratic donors). To test this, I used Hezbollah’s seats in Lebanon’s Parliament from the years 1995 – 2021 as a case study for …

Explaining Authoritarian Populist Behavior During Episodes Of Democratic Backsliding, Samantha Call

Dissertations - ALL

The world has seen an increase in backsliding states in the past 15 years, with authoritarian populist leaders concentrating power through executive aggrandizement and limitations on civil liberties (Bermeo 2016). Democratic institutions are often targeted by an authoritarian populist during episodes of democratic backsliding either directly through taking away powers from the institutions or indirectly through using rhetoric to weaken public trust in the institutions. Scholars have identified patterns that suggest targeting the court and legislature first is the most common strategy of backsliders, while other institutions are targeted later. However, there is variation among these cases, with not all …

Researching Emotional Experiences As Discursive Elements – A Suggested Qualitative Method, Magnus Danielson

The Qualitative Report

As scholars in the fields of political science, media research, and social psychology endeavor to understand crucial aspects of emotionality in the media, there is a growing need to methodologically address the communicative and discursive aspects of affective constructions in media texts. This article argues that by breaking down mediated emotional experiences represented through language in a set of identifiable elements, such as subject, emotion type, valence, intensity, proposed action, and object, those experiences could be used as workable and potent units of analysis when studying discursive and ideological media constructs of emotionality. By connecting insights from emotion science, the …

Comparative Analysis Of Sexual Harassment Policy And Implementation, Melanie Sayuri Dominguez

Political Science ETDs

Over the past three decades, as an increasing number of states have adopted sexual harassment legislation, many studies have examined the choices countries make to address and combat this issue. However, questions remain about what causes states to act while others resist change, why some countries choose to only introduce weak legislation rather than aggressively tackling the issue, and how people on the ground receive these policies. This dissertation uses a macro, meso, and micro approach to answer these questions on sexual harassment policy and implementation. First, using large-n data, I find that strong, feminist movements are correlated with the …

An Analysis Of Congressional Disgust Language On Twitter By Party Identification, Martha Nichols

Honors Theses

This thesis seeks to advance the existing work in the field of political communications through a study of congressional Twitter use. While there has been a significant amount of study focused on presidential Twitter presence, there is less existing literature on the use of Twitter by members of the U.S. Congress. This study focuses on the use of disgust language on Twitter and tests the hypothesis that Republican congressmen and women will have a higher proportion of disgust language in their Twitter presence over time. The hypothesis was unsupported, as the results produce an unexpected outcome that Democratic members of …

Lasting Impact: Analyzing The Relationship Between Colonialism And Proxy War Onset, Sydney Rehm

Honors Theses

Proxy wars are a very specific subset of war that have increased in frequency. Researchers have studied why proxy wars occur, but there are less studies specifically on to what extent, if any, colonialism has on the onset of proxy wars. To fill this gap, I write a historical analysis of past proxy wars—specifically the Vietnam War (1955-1975), Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), and Yemeni Civil War (2014-present)—to examine the effects of colonialism. Furthermore, I utilize my case studies to assess my argument’s limitations. I also utilize statistical analysis to determine the probability of proxy war if a country has a …

South Korea's Scramble For Diplomacy In African Development, Binta Fadiga

Honors Theses

This thesis analyzes South Korea’s motivations for growing engagement in African development hypothesizing that diplomacy is a main driver in Korean interest in Africa. South Korea conducts official development aid through the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA). Korea contrasts itself against conventional donors of official development aid, portraying itself as a model of economic development to emulate to recipient countries. Yet, KOICA discloses little regarding developmental methodologies it exports to recipient nations beyond its use of its development expertise and experience. I conducted qualitative analysis using country partnership strategies, official Facebook pages of KOICA Senegal and Rwanda offices, and mid-term …

The Pope And The ʿUlamāʾ: A Study Of Religious Institutions And Their Evolving Relationship To Government, Benjamin Newton

Honors Theses

How and why have religious institutions changed during historical critical junctures in their relationship with government? The literature on this topic, with notable but limited exceptions (Brown et al. 2024, Koesel 2014, Fox 2008), has tended to focus on one specific institution at a time, even if analyzing its actions within multiple states. Through this project, I focus not on the same institution in different states, but on two major religious establishments in the states in which they are based. I analyze the Roman Catholic Church and the Wahhābi establishment in Italy and Saudi Arabia, respectively, to come to a …

Ngo, Ngo-Ing, Ng-Gone: Ngos And Their Social Ramifications In Jordan, Caroline Leonard

Honors Theses

Recent literature has debated the viability and efficacy of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) when they are constrained both by written law and by regulations placed by larger funding agencies. However, there has been less research into comparisons of NGOs within a country, especially when they receive different levels of government restriction. One such case is in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, a constitutional monarchy that has three unofficial designations for its NGOs and non-profit organizations: Royal NGOs (RONGOs), quasi-governmental organizations (QONGOs), and NGOs. The relationship between these NGOs and the Jordanian Government is further complicated by Jordan’s complicated relationship with civil …

Covid-19 And Global Institutional Shift From National To Subnational Governments, Jonathan Feld-Jacobson, Armaan Rizvi, Bora Sinan

Working Papers Series

The COVID-19 Pandemic saw dramatic global shifts in legislative powers between central and local governments. With changes in the severity and duration of the pandemic, in the federations of Nigeria, Australia, and Canada, policymaking regarding border and school closures and states of emergency saw an increasing involvement of regional governments. We suggest that looking at the national and regional PPI data for our hypotheses could indicate directly the severity of the pandemic in these nations. Federalisms particularly provide a case of institutional change evidencing that COVID-era decision-making saw a change in the rules and expectations of governance in the nations …

The Impact Of Purchasing Power Parity (Ppp), Infrastructure, And Decentralization On Pandemic Restrictions, Liam Hansen, Veronica Taraskina, Jennifer Weng

Working Papers Series

This research compares a country's mandate to shift to remote work between the federal and regional levels in comparison to PPP. We focus on how economic factors determine a country's ability to move to remote work and at what level of government the decision is made. The findings suggest that while there was variation in which level of government issued work-from-home requirements, there were strong trends for most mandates to come from the federal level. Moreover, an overwhelming majority of countries issued such federal mandates regardless of PPP. We then compare PPP per capita and the stringency of public transportation …

Health, Politics, And Policy: Exploring The Interplay Of Health Status On Voting Behavior And Policy Knowledge Across Political Parties In The United States, Zoey Peters

Honors Theses

ABSTRACT

ZOEY LYNN PETERS: Health, Politics, and Policy: Exploring the Interplay of Health Status on Voting Behavior and Policy Knowledge Across Political Parties in the United States

(Under the direction of Dr. Hannah Allen)

Background. Citizens actively engaging with their politics and government is crucial for the survival of our democracy. Voting and policy knowledge are two significant indicators of citizen engagement and there are many factors that can affect whether people will vote or stay informed on relevant policy. The healthcare system in the United States is a constant topic of controversy in American politics and it impacts every …