Public Policy Commons^™

Federal Earmarks In The State Of Georgia, Jeffrey Lazarus

Georgia Journal of Public Policy

Earmarks have been controversial ever since becoming a prominent part of the congressional spending process. Critics charge that earmarks fund projects with little or no economic value (for instance Ted Stevens’ “Bridge to Nowhere,”) but instead allow Congress members to direct government spending to campaign contributors (the charge leading to a federal investigation of the now-defunct lobbying firm PMA Group). On the other side of the controversy, congressional earmarks do fund a number of community improvements which are very valuable, at least locally. In Georgia, the fiscal 2010 appropriations bills included earmarks which allocated $450,000 to update College Park’s emergency …

The Effect Of U.S. State Taxes On State Economic Prosperity, Casey Dainsberg

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Policy makers today are faced with trying to create solutions for economic troubles that become increasingly more complex and foreboding. Tax cuts and tax hikes are proposed and considered as possible solutions to various economic problems. However, the question still remains regarding which policies are most effective. The purpose of this research is to asses these competing claims. It seeks to find evidence that will shed light on one of these views. I have done this by accumulating tax and economic data from the fifty U.S. States between the years 2001-2009. Previous research has concluded that taxes do affect the …

He's Our Son Of A Bitch, Robert Funk

Human Rights & Human Welfare

It is said that Franklin Delano Roosevelt defended the US tendency to support dictators by remarking, “He may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch.” The recent events in Tunisia and Egypt indicate that almost seventy years later, this unfortunate phrase seems to continue to guide US foreign policy.

A Little Respect, Please, Christina Cerna

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Simon Tisdall suggests that last month, when Mohammed Bouazizi (twenty-six years old), “an unemployed graduate, set himself on fire outside a government building in protest at police harassment,” his act became the “rallying cause for Tunisia’s disaffected legions of unemployed students, impoverished workers, trade unionists, lawyers and human rights activists.” The reaction to his act of self-immolation and death on January 4th led to the flight of President Ben Ali ten days later to Saudi Arabia and to the end of Ali's twenty-three-year rule of Tunisia. Time reported the event as follows: “When Mohamed Bouazizi set himself alight on Dec. …

Abeyance And Spontaneity In Tunisia, Louis Edgar Esparza

Human Rights & Human Welfare

On August 16, 1819, tens of thousands of workers gathered in what is now St. Peter’s Square in Manchester to demand suffrage. Entire families, parishes, and townships assembled, fueled by increasing commodity prices and political disenfranchisement. They had spread the word from town to town, and from church to church, that this previously banned meeting was indeed to occur. It was the culmination of months of agitation on the part of common people to achieve economic and political reform. The government responded violently to the challenge of its authority, as governments so often do, leading to a score of deaths …

Those Pesky Winds Of Change..., Walter Lotze

Human Rights & Human Welfare

When a police officer slapped a fruit seller by the name of Mohammed Bouazizi in the Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid, nobody could have anticipated that a revolution had commenced. Bouazizi, a twenty-six-year-old computer science graduate unable to find work, had resorted to selling fruit from a street cart in an attempt to support himself and his seven siblings. Slapped by the police officer and ordered to pack up his goods, Bouazizi himself snapped. He marched to the local governor’s office and demanded an appointment, threatening to set himself alight if the governor did not meet with him. In frustration, …

Pledge Your Body For Your Bread: Welfare, Drug Testing, And The Inferior Fourth Amendment, Jordan C. Budd

Law Faculty Scholarship

Proposals to subject welfare recipients to periodic drug testing have emerged over the last three years as a significant legislative trend across the United States. Since 2007, over half of the states have considered bills requiring aid recipients to submit to invasive extraction procedures as an ongoing condition of public assistance. The vast majority of the legislation imposes testing without regard to suspected drug use, reflecting the implicit assumption that the poor are inherently predisposed to culpable conduct and thus may be subject to class-based intrusions that would be inarguably impermissible if inflicted on the less destitute. These proposals are …

Anastasia Tataryn On The Deportation Regime: Sovereignty, Space, And The Freedom Of Movement. Edited By Nicholas Degenova And Nathalie Peutz. Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2010. 520pp., Anastasia Tataryn

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

The Deportation Regime: Sovereignty, Space, and the Freedom of Movement. Edited by Nicholas DeGenova and Nathalie Peutz. Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2010. 520pp.

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 …

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 Existence, Perpetuity, And Proliferation Of Payday Loans: Impact On Vulnerable Populatons And The Regulatory Policy Process In Texas, Azuri Lizeth Gonzalez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

If you have ever driven by a street, typically not in a very wealthy neighborhood, where a store front displayed signs with words like "Instant cash!," "No Credit Check," "First loan free," then you likely witnessed the marketing of a product called a payday loan. Payday loans are a form of a short-term loan product that is usually grouped with other loan products within the subprime lending industry, alternative financial resources, or fringe economy markets. This loan product has been the focus of a number of controversial debates among consumer protection groups, financial institutions, state regulatory entities, and legislators, regarding …

Relationships Between Political Competition And Socioeconomic Status In The United States, Trevor K. Smith

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Over the past 30 years there has been an increase in socioeconomic inequities between Black and White persons in the United States. Some research suggests that political ideology, which in turn impacts political competition levels, may at least partially explain these disparities, though the body of academic literature in this area is sparse. Little is known about how Black political ideology is formed by perceptions of inequality. The purpose of this study was to examine the phenomenon of Black political ideology, political competition, and socioeconomic status to determine how political competition relates to social inequities between Blacks and Whites. The …

Conference Schedule, University Of Nevada, Las Vegas, Brookings Mountain West

The Political Demography and Geography of the Intermountain West Conference

The Intermountain West region, including Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah, is the new swing region in American politics. Many national observers and commentators have only a superficial understanding of the profound economic, political, and social changes that continue to reshape this region. Brookings Mountain West is pleased to offer a collection of contemporary research papers on recent demographic trends that alter this region and its politics. These studies, including a public opinion survey that explores attitudes on state and national politics, alternative energy, education, deficits, health care, immigration, and other topics illuminate the political landscape of this …

The Intermountain West Today: A Regional Survey, Ruy Teixeira, Karlyn Bowman

Brookings Mountain West Publications

What does it mean to live in the Intermountain West today? What issues are most and least important to the region’s residents? Do Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah have a collective identity or are state-level differences too great? Is there an identifiable Intermountain West personality? Today we will present the results of a unique survey that attempts to answer these questions.

The Politic 2010 Fall, The Politic, Inc.

The Politic

No abstract provided.

The Oecd And Economic Governance: Invisibility And Impotence?, Richard Woodward

Books/Book Chapters

Chapter 3 sketches the OECD's role in economic governance, in particular the pursuit of its obligation to promote policies which maximize economic growth. While the OECD's work in the economic field evolves, its mechanisms of economic governance have barely altered. Richard Woodward argues that the OECD exerts ‘subtle discipline’ over the trajectory of economic governance through the use of its soft law mechanisms such as surveillance and peer review. These mechanisms can lead to convergence in national policies and, occasionally, outbreaks of international policy coordination. Ultimately, however, the proliferation of international mechanisms of governance and the internal politics of the …

Through The Looking Glass: Finding And Freeing Modern-Day Slaves At The State Level, Michelle L. Rickert

Faculty Publications and Presentations

This article delves into the interaction between federal and state laws prohibiting human trafficking. The article advocates for comprehensive human trafficking laws at the state level, including police training, victim aftercare, forfeiture, and prosecution as essential elements. It looks comprehensively at the existing state laws prohibiting human trafficking. Additionally it examines the five existing models for state law and suggests benefits and potential improvements for each model. The article concludes y advocating a holistic law prohibiting human trafficking in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

The Chilean Left In Power: Achievements, Failures, And Omissions, Evelyne Huber, Jennifer Pribble, John D. Stephens

Political Science Faculty Publications

In his introduction to this volume, Weyland locates the administrations of Socialist Presidents Ricardo Lagos (2000-06) and Michelle Bachelet (2006- 2010) closest to the moderate pole among current leftist governments in Latin America. We concur and hope to contribute to the discussion by elucidating the sources of this moderation and examining the performance of these governments in the areas of political management, economic policies, and social policies and labor market reforms. The Lagos and Bachelet governments have pursued similar market-friendly economic policies to their predecessors. Although both presidents have made important progress in overcoming the political institutionallegacies of Augusto Pinochet's …

Cooperative Strategies On Parallel Tracks: The Nepad And Agoa Initiatives, Guelmbaye Ngarsandje

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

In July 2001, at the 37th of the former Organization of African Unity, African heads of states launched the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), a combination of the Omega Plan from Abdoulaye Wade and The Millennium African Renaissance Partnership initiated by Thabo Mbeki, respectively presidents of Senegal and South Africa. This was an achievement of tasks given by their peers in Algiers in 1999. Previously to that, the Clinton administration initiated the African Growth and Opportunity Act passed in law in 1998. Though the two programs aim at African development, they did not take in account each other.

This …

A Positive View Of The Trajectory Of The Human Rights Movement, David Akerson

Human Rights & Human Welfare

In 1988, during the waning days of apartheid in South Africa, I was a young American lawyer working for South African Lawyers for Human Rights in Pretoria. On one occasion, I accompanied some of my African colleagues to a conference, the purpose of which was to begin visualizing post-apartheid South Africa. While the apartheid regime was still in power, it was clearly in hasty retreat, and it was equally clear that its days were numbered. The African majority would soon be taking over the reigns of power, and they were excited to begin visualizing what freedom and human rights might …

Welfare Benefits After The 1996 Reform Act: A New Look At The Idea Of States As Welfare Magnets, Erin Sollund

Political Science Theses and Capstones

The focus of this research is to find the differences of how each state’s welfare policies have changed since the welfare reform act of 1996, and also how recipients have responded to this change. In my analysis I combined data from the U.S Department of Health and Human Services, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the U.S. Department of Commerce. Preliminary results suggest that states with a higher percentage of recipients on welfare before the reform showed a greater change in number of recipients than states starting with a lower percentage as did states with stronger Democratic leanings, a more …

Creating A Comprehensive Profile Of The Academic Competitiveness Grant, Kelsea Klein

Political Science Theses and Capstones

The recent push for more Americans to attend postsecondary institutions has led to the development of numerous and far-reaching government student financial aid programs. These programs have aimed at supplying the whole of the population with financial assistance regardless of color, gender, or age. However, the distribution of the aid has encountered many problems as critics argue that the recipients of the aid are primarily limited to a narrow subgroup of the population. A new program created under the Higher Education Reconciliation Act of 2005 called the Academic Competitiveness Grant is no exception. Preliminary logit analysis of the reception rates …

Taking Money: The Politics Of Asset Forfeiture In The State Of Minnesota, Chad Hedman

Political Science Theses and Capstones

Is there a reason why a particular county might use asset forfeiture more than others? Asset forfeiture, in short, is law enforcement confiscating any items used in the act of committing a crime. As many governments face more budget crunches and deficits all means of revenue will become more vital to everyday operations. Everything gets reported back to the Minnesota State Auditor, where I was able to get complete data on every county. For variables such as education, race and others I drew from numerous government websites. I wanted to see if certain variables correlated with higher incidence of forfeiture. …

The Politic 2010 Spring, The Politic, Inc.

The Politic

No abstract provided.

Integrated Water Resources Management: A Theoretical Exploration Of The Implementation Gap Between The Developed And Developing Worlds, Jennifer S. Schiff

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

As part of its Millennium Development Goals, the United Nations acknowledges that solving the world's water woes requires giving one billion additional people access to safe and affordable drinking water, while also noting that this is a difficult goal to achieve considering present environmental challenges. Amidst this atmosphere of vanishing freshwater, the legislative policy community has begun to encourage diverse discourse on the topic of efficient resource management, but the form and function of such a solution present unique political and theoretical challenges for policymakers and scholars alike. The current consensus among water managers is that a multifaceted policy framework …

New York State And Mid-Hudson Valley Nonprofits: The Impacts Of Late Contract Payments, Jodi Fernandes

Master in Public Administration Theses

No abstract provided.

The Politic 2010 Winter, The Politic, Inc.

The Politic

No abstract provided.

Revolt Against The Czars: Why Barack Obama’S Staffing Critics Are (Mostly) Wrong, José Villalobos, Justin Vaughn

Selected Works Temporary Series

Rather than view the alleged proliferation of “czars” in recent presidential administrations as a threat to the constitutional order, we consider it part of an ongoing reorganization of the presidential branch designed to maximize leadership capacity as presidents continue to take more responsibility for policy development and implementation, a phenomenon driven as much by congressional abdication as presidential zeal for power. The real debate lies over whether the president can delegate his constitutional authority to those who work beneath him. We posit that presidents may choose to delegate within their own discretion, so long as it is within the limits …

White House Staff, Justin Vaughn, José Villalobos

Selected Works Temporary Series

The White House Staff provides the bureaucratic framework that makes presidential leadership possible. Even though modern presidents continue to face constraints by the constitutional structure and political reality in successfully straddling the expectations gap that continues to enlarge, the staff presents the president with his best opportunity to anticipate and exploit leadership opportunities in the best case and manage crisis and cope with challenges in the worst. In recent decades, scholarly efforts to analyze the influence and importance of the White House staff has continued apace the institution’s own evolution. In this chapter, we evaluate the state of these efforts …

Locating Xenophobia: Debate, Discourse, And Everyday Experience In Cape Town, South Africa, Belinda Dodson

Geography & Environment Publications

In May 2008, South Africa experienced an outbreak of violence

against foreign Africans living in the country. Political

leaders expressed shock and surprise, but there has in reality

been long-standing and well-documented hostility toward

African immigrants in South Africa. Several competing explanations

have been put forward, with debate gaining urgency

and polarization since the xenophobic attacks of 2008. After

a selective review of the relevant literature to sketch the

contours of that debate, this paper presents findings from

research conducted with African immigrants living in Cape

Town. Their experiences provide further evidence that antiimmigrant

attitudes and behaviors on the part …