Political Theory Commons^™

Book Review: Constructing Genocide And Mass Violence: Society, Crisis, Identity, Carola Lingaas

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

No abstract provided.

The Endgame: America’S Exit From Syria, Gray Thompson

Masters Theses

Ever since the 2011 Arab Spring protests in Syria fueled civil war costing nearly half a million lives to date, the US response has been cautious indecision. Syria became a proxy war with Russia, Iran, Hezbollah, the Turks, ISIS, the Kurds, and the local Syrian opposition all competing to support or oust Assad. All but the Kurds and select Syrian resistance groups opposed America. With billions spent on questionable war efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq, President Obama, the American public, and most of the military establishment were leery of direct US involvement in Syria. Apart from supporting the fight against …

A Challenge To Socio-Ecological Resilience: Community Based Resource Management Organizations’ Perceptions And Responses To Cannabis Cultivation In Northern California, Yvonne Everett

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

Local nonprofit organizations in the Pacific Northwest have stepped up to fill a leadership void in forest management since the Timber Wars of the 1980s and 1990s. Community based resource management groups (CBRM) have focused on stewardship of ecosystem services, and leading efforts to employ local workers to restore forest ecosystems and watershed functions. In Northern California, even as CBRM capacity has grown since the Timber Wars, a new transformative challenge threatens community and landscape adaptive capacity. Cannabis cultivation, which can have significant environmental and social impacts, has become a pervasive economic driver. I used interviews to explore CBRM leaders’ …

Betraying Revolution: The Foundations Of The Japanese Communist Party, Matthew J. Crooke

Master's Projects and Capstones

With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 and China’s restoration of capitalism, it is easy to dismiss the relevancy of socialism today. Yet, the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) has enjoyed success at the polls and recognition as a serious opponent of the government of Abe Shinzō. The JCP however is not making a push for power. Instead, it supports liberal opposition parties, most recently throwing its weight behind the new Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) in the October 2017 general election. A future CDP government in Japan could include the JCP as a coalition partner. Does …

Paranormal Beliefs And Their Effect On American Fears And Political Identification, Tyler James Ferrari

Political Science Student Papers and Posters

Urban legends and conspiracy theories have been a cornerstone of American culture for many years, and these stories and theories have permeated into many aspects of society, from tourism to pop culture, but how have these stories and theories affected politics? Conspiracy theories and urban legends all revolve around the distrust of institutions, ranging from governments to the media, but there is very little research to indicate how beliefs in these types of phenomena affect political self-identification, and fear in real-world disasters. This paper seeks to answer the following: How do paranormal and abnormal beliefs influence political identification? And how …

An Illiberal Union, Sonu Bedi

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Article breaks new ground by applying the philosophical framework of liberal neutrality (most famously articulated by John Rawls) to the United States Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on marriage. At first blush, the Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges—the culmination of marriage rights—seems to affirm a central principle of liberalism, namely equal access to marriage regardless of sexual orientation. Gays and lesbians can finally take part in an institution that celebrates the union of two committed individuals. But perversely, in its attempt to expand access to marriage, the Court has simultaneously entrenched values that are antithetical to the basic tenants …

Non-Traditional Transitional Justice Mechanisms And Perceptions And Symptoms Of Victimization Among Diasporic Individuals: Members Of The Coptic Christian Diaspora In The United States As A Case Study, Samy S. A. Gerges

Doctor of International Conflict Management Dissertations

Transitional justice measures are state-centered measures articulating atrocities committed by officials and occurring within the borders of a specific state. Questioning members of a Diaspora about the impact of transitional justice on their self-classification as victims and their experienced symptoms of victimization may therefore support attempts to expand the field of transitional justice. This study contributes to a body of work promoting understanding of the possibilities and constraints of transitional justice mechanisms, in the context of hate crime against Copts by Muslims in Egypt. To analyze the impact of restored relationships on self-classified victimhood and experienced symptoms of victimization, the …

We Love Big Brother: An Analysis Of The Relationship Between Orwell’S Nineteen Eighty-Four And Modern Politics In The United States And Europe, Edward Pankowski

Honors Scholar Theses

In recent months since the election of Donald Trump to the Presidency of the United States in November 2016, George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four has seen a resurgence in sales, and terms invented by Orwell or brought about by his work, such as “Orwellian,” have re-entered the popular discourse. This is not a new phenomenon, however, as Nineteen Eighty-Four has had a unique impact on each of the generations that have read it, and the impact has stretched across racial, ethnic, political, and gender lines. This thesis project will examine the critical, popular, and scholarly reception of Nineteen Eighty-Four since its …

The Presbyterian Enlightenment: The Confluence Of Evangelical And Enlightenment Thought In British America, Brandon S. Durbin

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

Eighteenth-Century British American Presbyterian ministers incorporated covenantal theology, ideas from the Scottish Enlightenment, and resistance theory in their sermons. The sermons of Presbyterian ministers strongly indicate the intermixing of enlightenment and evangelical ideas. Congregants heard and read these sermons, spreading these ideas to the average colonist. This combination helps explain why American Presbyterians were so apt to resist British rule during the American Revolution. Protestant covenantal theology, derived from Protestant reformers like John Calvin and John Knox, emphasized virtue and duty. This covenant affected both the people and their rulers. When rulers failed to uphold their covenant with God, the …

Networks Of Isolation: The Case Of Donald J. Trump, Facebook, And The Limits Of Social Movement Theory, Carol L. Stimmel

Sustainability and Social Justice

The 2016 election that catapulted Donald J. Trump to the U.S. presidency has raised questions for how Facebook may have enabled the emergence and coalescence of a social movement among traditionally improbable voters. The research in this paper engages with contemporary social movement theory, assessing its adequacy for explaining the role of Facebook as a primary method for facilitating a social movement among the civically-alienated, who are the most unlikely of all Americans to join an organized collective for change. From a methodological perspective, the exploration takes up the case as a strategy of inquiry to explore social movement theory …

Why No Democracy In Egypt?, Mary Levine

Honors Program Contracts

This paper will work to discover why the attempt at democracy in Egypt was a failure. It will analyze the aspects and features of democracy, and look at the features that Egypt lacked that made their democracy fail. It will also look at the results of the Arab Spring, and how that played a role in the deterioration of a democracy. Lastly, it will discuss what regime Egypt is currently under, and what it will need in order to become a functioning democracy. Through the use of scholarly articles, this paper will be able to better understand what is currently …

Degrowth Lessons From Cuba, Claire S. Bayler

Sustainability and Social Justice

Cuba is the global leader in practicing agroecology, but agroecology is just one component of a larger climate-ready socio-economic system. Degrowth economics address the need to constrain our total global metabolism to within biophysical limits, while allowing opportunity and resources for "underdeveloped" countries to rebuild themselves under new terms. Degrowth recognizes the role of overdeveloped countries in surpassing the ecological limits of our planet at the cost of wellbeing for billions of dispossessed people within and between countries. Cuba's circumstances during and following the Special Period exemplify both sides of the degrowth scenario, as well as demonstrating policy and grassroots …

“The Time Is Always Now:” James Baldwin In Trump’S America, Chase Stowell

Senior Theses

Gone is the optimism regarding race relations that dominated the early years of Obama’s presidency. Trump’s meteoric rise has given Americans pause, and in this time of potential reflection, it is important to re-examine James Baldwin. This essay analyzes Baldwin’s understanding of race from the inception of racism in America until its theoretical end, combining Baldwin’s novels and essays to propose practices that will help America move beyond the racial problem that has haunted its history. James Baldwin’s demand of individual reflection upon one’s system of reality necessitates the end of political demonology, as well as a reframing of rhetoric …

Consumer Involvement In Japanese Pornography Production, Yukino Yamamoto, Caroline Norma, Ruwan Dep Weerasinghe

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The authors examined two pornographic film series produced in Japan in the first decade of the twenty-first century, as well as their DVD box cover advertising copy. Additionally, and crucially, these data were examined in light of online forum posts made by the producers and consumers of the two film series before, during and after their production. These posts indicate consumer-producer cooperation and collaboration in all aspects of the series’ planning and execution, in addition to consumer involvement in the perpetration of the filmed sex acts and abuses themselves. The discussion of the article emphasizes the accelerating effect of online …

Polarization And The Supreme Court, Kyla Duffy

Senior Honors Projects

Political polarization has been commonly observed in American politics and has drawn scholarly interest. In recent years, trends of polarization have appeared to increase in Congress, with Democrats and Republicans drifting further and further apart. Americans appear to be deeply split on many social issues which have resulted in culture wars in American politics. According to the legal model of judicial decision making, decisions handed down by the Supreme Court should be unaffected by these trends of polarization. However, recent scholarship, most notably the attitudinal model of judicial decision making, calls into question the legal model of decision making. It …

Eland's "Eleven Presidents: Promises Vs. Results In Achieving Limited Government" (Book Review), Carl P. Olson

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Ilsup's "Just Debt: Theology, Ethics, And Neoliberalism" (Book Review), Rebekah Phillips

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Galli's "Karl Barth: An Introductory Biography For Evangelicals" (Book Review), Joshua M. Avery

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Exploring Creative Problem Solving In Public Policy, Jade A. Costello

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project explores the connection between creativity and public policy-making through guided facilitation. In this exploration, there are several products that have been developed. The first is an index that provides definitions, charts, and process explanations for creativity, facilitation and public policy. The second is a completed facilitation plan that incorporates both the FourSight model for group facilitation (Miller, Vehar, Firestein, Thurber & Nielsen, 2011a) and Marvin Weisbord’s (1992) exploration of creative strategies for discovering common ground through policy conferences. The third product is an evaluation matrix, which would be used post-facilitation to understand the strengths and weaknesses from the …

Human Trafficking: Flying Under The Radar, Amber L. Hulsey

Dissertations

The global hegemon, the United States encompasses roughly 57,000 to 63,000 of the roughly 45.8 million slaves present across the world today (Walk Free Foundation 2016a). This dissertation research uses the theoretical lens of Human Security as a unique approach in that it is people-centered, focusing on the individual, rather than the more traditional theories in international relations that emphasize the state as the central actor. This dissertation focuses on the understudied area of human trafficking into and within the United States. More specifically, the objective of this research examines the movement of trafficked persons via air and details actions …

Political Accountability And Determinants Of Governance Under Principal-Agent Theory, Matthew Bluem

Dissertations

This study examines the theory that quality of governance is largely dependent upon political accountability, and that the effect of political accountability on governance varies based on three main determinants: level of democracy, level of information available to the public, and diversification of the economy (Adserà et al. 2003). With quality of governance, represented by the World Bank’s World Governance Indicators (WGI), as the dependent variable, this study considers how these three independent variables, and several control variables, affect governance quality. Incorporating data from 2010 – 2015 for 143 countries in both cross-sectional OLS and fixed effects panel regression analysis, …

Merging Subsistence Perspective And Buen Vivir: An Alternative To Damming The Mekong, Aaron B. Eisenberg

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper will examine the planned development on the Mekong by looking at the historical, political, and economic reasons why largescale hydroelectric dams are now being pushed upon the river. It will then critique the international state sovereignty system focusing directly on the Mekong River Commission and ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) for their inabilities to mitigate environmental impact while pursuing development. I analyze how the “global city” discourse cannot rationally be applied to Southeast Asia and how the urban-rural divide in Southeast Asia creates only greater problems as dam production on the Mekong accelerates. I propose an alternative …

Politics As Loot: Reflections On Theories Of Decline In Political Thought, Milo Ward

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis responds to the perennial theories of political decline in Western political thought by reimagining politics as a part of the loot plundered by the victors of history. It unpacks and critiques prognostications of the impending end of politics, specifically those of theorists Wendy Brown and Hannah Arendt, by dredging up the colonial and the capitalist logics that covertly underpin assumptions that politics is something that can be exclusively possessed. The forensic treatment of narratives of political decline reveals the unmistakable tracks of the rationality of property relations behind laments over the fate of political traditions that also withhold …

Venezuela: Oil And Madness. Politics, Propaganda, And Realities Of The Chavista Era, Alvaro E. De Prat

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis is an interdisciplinary exploration of Venezuela’s political paradoxes and their consequences during the Chavista years. On a concrete level, in this work I propose how the manner in which Hugo Chávez implemented his at first apparently benign redistributive politics in fact precipitated the country's current humanitarian crisis and what I will argue are the times of starkest inequality in modern Venezuelan history. Integral to this, although on a more philosophical level, here I also offer a theory of how and why Chávez’s representations might have been so misinterpreted.

The list of eminent political thinkers who have vouched for …

Dolls Who Speak: Sex Robots, Cyborgs And The Image Of Woman, Victoria E. Pihl Sorensen

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis examines the emerging phenomenon of sex robots from a feminist materialist perspective. I explore the current scholarly and popular debates on sex robots, and suggest a reading of sex robots in their machinic, literary and cinematic expressions to move beyond the moral-ethical impasse that seems to dominate sex robot discussions. Employing Donna Haraway’s “Cyborg Myth” on a methodological and theoretical level, I argue for an interdisciplinary approach to studying sex robots, which proceeds carefully so as to avoid contributing to sex panic, and which thinks critically about what it might mean to assess sex robots from a feminist …

Political Journalists Tweet About The Final 2016 Presidential Debate, Hannah Hopper

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Past research shows that journalists are gatekeepers to information the public seeks. Using the gatekeeping and agenda-setting theory, this study used a content analysis of tweets from political journalists during the final 2016 presidential debate to examine social media usage in efforts to convey information to followers and whether social media has allowed for journalists to present a more transparent view of candidates to the public. This study used feminist political theory to further analyze whether the tweets from political journalists portrayed Hillary Clinton, the female candidate, with stereotypical “female” traits, such as more emotional and more trustworthy. Applying these …

Is All Politics Local? Determinants Of Local And National Election Campaigns, Colm A. Fox

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In recent decades election campaigns have shifted their focus from the local to the national level, increasingly featuring party leaders, labels, and national platforms. Despite this trend, there remains significant variation in the local/national orientation of campaigns across countries and parties. This article tests several propositions on why campaigns adopt a local or national orientation by analyzing a unique collection of more than 12,000 geocoded Thai election posters. Specialized software was used to measure the spatial proportions of visual and textual content on each poster. Using Thailand’s mixed electoral system to enable a controlled comparison of electoral rules, I demonstrate …

Deliberation Or Simulated Deliberation?, Peter Levine

Democracy & Education

The work of Crocco and her colleagues, "Deliberating Public Policy Issues with Adolescents," combines two important fields—deliberative democracy and discussion as a pedagogy—with a study of policy deliberations in three classrooms. Their article yields valuable insights. As the authors note, the results are disappointing. This may be because the students were not actually asked to deliberate, if "deliberation" means discussing in order to make a decision. After all, the students could not decide US policy on immigration. Their discussion was a kind of simulated deliberation. Evidence suggests that we may see better results from real deliberations that occur within student-led …

A Democratic Critique Of The Common Core English Language Arts (Ela) Standards, Nicholas Tampio

Democracy & Education

Parents, educators, and students have criticized the Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects for expecting students to regurgitate evidence from assigned texts rather than think for themselves. This article argues that this popular critique is accurate and that the Common Core, regardless of its advocates’ intentions, has undemocratic consequences. Initially, the essay considers a democratic argument for the Common Core. Then, I show that the standards themselves, faithfully implemented, lead to assignments and assessments that give students few opportunities to articulate their own thoughts or responses. I argue that …

Coca, Capitalism And Decolonization: State Violence In Bolivia Through Coca Policy, Margaret A. Poulos

Political Science Honors Projects

I approach Bolivian coca policy under Evo Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous President, as a site to examine the broader issue of decolonization. My paper argues that the new General Law of Coca, passed in March 2017, is part of a larger systemic pattern of violence towards historically disenfranchised communities in Bolivia, despite Morales’ indigenous Aymara identity and pro-coca activism. Drawing on interviews I conducted and a postcolonial theoretical framework, I analyze how although Morales has rhetorically advocated for indigenous communities and decolonizing Bolivia, colonial legacies supplanted in the subjectivity of Bolivians and institutions of its government have persisted. I suggest …