American Politics Commons^™

Political Indifference And The Withering Of Democracy In Alabama, Noe Alexander Aguado

Politics, Justice, Law, and Philosophy

Alabama’s 1901 Constitution was drafted to codify white supremacy by removing African Americans from the voter rolls. Alabama did not invent voter suppression, nor does it have a monopoly on policies that deny African Americans, minorities, and poor people the right to vote. This chapter provides examples of how and to what effect disenfranchisement has been used in Alabama and other communities throughout the United States. This chapter also chronicles Alabama’s unique constitutional feature that centralizes policymaking in the capitol – further suppressing democracy at the local level to the advantage of affluent interest groups entrenched in Montgomery. Consolidating policymaking …

Challenging Beliefs: Examining The Efficacy Of Corrections For Conspiratorial And Partisan Misinformation, Ava Zwolinski

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The threat of misinformation is widely acknowledged among researchers and laypeople (NORC, 2021). When misinformation coalesces with conspiracy theories, the repercussions can be especially dangerous, sometimes even fatal. Events such as the January 6th insurrection and the Buffalo Tops Supermarket shooting were both, in part, inspired by misleading information and conspiracy theories (Burke, 2022; Dawsey, 2023). While misinformation involving conspiracy theories is recognized as possibly posing a greater threat to correction efforts (Lewandowsky, 2021a), no study has yet experimentally manipulated the presence or absence of conspiratorial elements within misinformation. This dissertation explores whether conspiratorial misinformation is more difficult to correct …

From G.R.I.D. To Aids & Covid-19 To Long-Covid: Naming And Defining Biological Threats, J. Ricky Price

Emancipations: A Journal of Critical Social Analysis

This article uses the history of the early U.S. case definition of AIDS to question the imperatives in the newly developed Long-COVID (LC) definition. Doing so allows us to think through the role of case definitions in producing meaning in our world and to consider what we can learn about the politics of knowledge creation. By examining the porous boundaries of identity, institutions, and AIDS and placing this history in relation to LC, I argue that the state is doing more than describing and diagnosing these institutional practices, but that hybrid identities are produced by the state through these practices …

Scla 521 Ai In Society, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides access to information resources on societal impacts of artificial intelligence from multiple libraries databases covering multiple disciplines including government information resources.

Analysis Of America, China, And Indonesian Conflict Styles In The South China Sea 2018-2023, Amril Ahz Hanif Zaki

Global: Jurnal Politik Internasional

This research aims to analyse the factors contributing to the ongoing conflict in the South China Sea between China, Indonesia, and the United States. China's aspiration to control the Natuna Islands has been evident since the 1990s, with a marked escalation since 2009. The authors used a mixed methods approach, including a literature review and bibliometric analysis, to analyse 49 documents from the Scopus database. Data were analysed using the 50 Conflict Resolution Activities framework by Jonamay Lambert and Selma Meyers. The study reveals that China exhibits a “Pit Bull” conflict style in 2019 documents, while the United States and …

Us Restrictions On Science And Technology Venture Capital Flows To China: Impacts On High-Tech Industrial Development And Strategic Responses, Yuan Zhou, Zhiqing Wang, Yuchen Gao, Lan Xue

Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Chinese Version)

Science and technology venture capital (STVC) provides financial and operational support for enterprise’s technological innovation, effectively mitigating risks in entrepreneurial activities. Foreign STVC, represented by that from the United States, has ever played a crucial role. The technology sector has emerged as the primary battleground in Sino-US strategic competition, with tightened restrictions on US-led STVC flows to China becoming a critical tool for suppressing Chinese technological advancement. The study systematically analyzes the key provisions of a series of U.S. legislative acts imposing sanctions on China’s science and technology innovation investments and assesses the characteristics of restriction measures during the Trump …

Sexual Surveillance: Morality Policing Of Greeks And Italians In The Early 20th Century, Isabella Ferrell

Digital Legal Research Lab

The Petitioning for Freedom Project under Dr. Jagodinsky is a database of habeas corpus use in the West. It examines legal action by marginalized individuals. This project focuses on how Greek and Italian petitioners used habeas to challenge sexual policing in a xenophobic context.

Research poster titled Sexual Surveillance: Morality Policing of Greeks and Italians in the Early 20th Century; presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Advisors: Katrina Jagodinsky and William Thomas

The Harding Brothers And Underage Enlistment In The Age Of American Expansion, 1851–1857, Ryan Minton

Digital Legal Research Lab

The Petitioning for Freedom Project is an NSF funded database project that seeks to collect and encode carceral, institutional, and interpersonal habeas corpus petitions from county, state, and federal courts all throughout the American West.

This research project explores and analyzes the twenty-four habeas corpus petitions that were submitted between 1851 and 1857 to the Saint Louis County Law Commissioners Office to challenge the enlistment of underage recruits stationed at Jefferson Barracks.

Research poster titled The Harding Brothers and Underage Enlistment in the Age of American Expansion, 1851–1857; presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of …

Maternal Chains: Black Women's Legal Battles For Freedom In Pre-Emancipation America, Roshawnna Brinkley

Digital Legal Research Lab

This research examines the use of habeas corpus petitions by Black Women in antebellum America to secure freedom for themselves and their children. Given that slave status was inherited matrilineally, these legal actions had implications for generational freedom. In Dr. Jagodinsky’s Petitioning for Freedom project there are numerous cases of Black Women utilizing Habeas Corpus. This study focuses on these Women's agency in navigating a hostile legal system.

Research poster titled Maternal Chains: Black Women's Legal Battles for Freedom in Pre-Emancipation America; via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Advisors: Katrina Jagodinsky and …

To Have And To Hold: Habeas Corpus And The Mobilization Of Female Petitioners, 1832–1924, Miranda Martinez

Digital Legal Research Lab

Dr. Jagodinsky’s Petitioning For Freedom (PFF) is an open-access database of habeas corpus petitions from the American West. It aims to further our understanding of the United States legal landscape in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Research poster titled To Have and To Hold: Habeas Corpus & the Mobilization of Female Petitioners, 1832–1924; presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Advisors: Katrina Jagodinsky and William Thomas

Profiled Pickpockets: Seattle's Black Community & 1890s Habeas Mobilization, Zoë Williams

Digital Legal Research Lab

The Petitioning for Freedom project examines habeas corpus in the American West, 1812–1924 to highlight the legal mobilization of marginalized people. This study uses habeas petitions to identify Black people's response to racial profiling in Seattle.

Research poster titled Profiled Pickpockets: Seattle's Black Community & 1890s Habeas Mobilization; presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Advisors: Katrina Jagodinsky and William Thomas

Legal Proxies And Advocates: Exploring Inter-Case Relationships In 19th- And 20th-Century Habeas Corpus, Ethan Reiter

Digital Legal Research Lab

• The Petitioning for Freedom Project (PFF) is an open access database that details the use of habeas corpus in legal proceedings in the American West from 1812 to 1924.

• A writ of habeas Corpus is a challenge by a petitioner that alleges that someone is detained unlawfully.

• In certain instances. a petitioner is petitioning on behalf of someone who is held illegally. This study examines the nature of the relationships between petitioner and bound party and how those relationships reflect historical and legal developments over time.

Research poster titled Legal Proxies and Advocates: Exploring Inter-Case Relationships in 19th- and 20th-Century …

Equal Protection Of Life, Liberty, And Labor: Habeas Corpus & The 14th Amendment, 1901–1904, Madison Mendiola

Digital Legal Research Lab

Presents and synthesizes three cases demonstrating the use of habeas corpus in the contect of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution between 1901 and 1904.

Research poster titled Equal Protection of Life, Liberty, and Labor Habeas Corpus & the 14th Amendment, 1901–1904, presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Advisors: Katrina Jagodinsky and William Thomas

Teaching To The Heart: A Grounded Theory Exploration Of Elementary Educators’ Journey Toward Teaching Mathematics For Social Justice, Breána Victoria-Delgado

Education (PhD) Dissertations

The current sociopolitical context of the United States has created a divide among the nation which has transpired into Kindergarten-12th grade public school settings. Throughout the United States school boards of education have banned books and Critical Race Theory while attacking social justice teaching pedagogies. Presently, there is growing empirical research on teaching mathematics for social justice in public elementary schools. This study explored the ways in which public elementary educators experience teaching mathematics for social justice in their classrooms across Southern California. Through qualitative research, this study utilized constructivist grounded theory methodology and methods to gain insight of the …

A Theory Of Conditional Party Opposition, Samuel Nelson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

This paper takes a critical look at executive power in the United States. Recent years have shown an increase of executive power that many people including: scholars, media, and the public have become skeptical of. The new norm has been for the executive to bypass Congress in order to accomplish policy goals. Traditionally the separation of powers between the executive, legislative, and judicial branches has been the remedy to executive power. This thesis, however, argues that scholarship has largely ignored the role of political parties in government. Due to this, scholarship has misunderstood the role parties play in the separation …

"Huddled Masses:" The Immigration Act Of 1917 In Habeas Corpus, Chikamso Chijioke

Digital Legal Research Lab

Research poster titled "Huddled Masses:" The Immigration Act of 1917 in Habeas Corpus; presented via the Digital Legal Research Lab NSF REU Site, University of Nebraska–Lincoln, August 2024.

Introduction

Dr. Jagodinsky's Petitioning for Freedom is a collection of habeas corpus petitions in the American West and examines marginalized peoples’ use of habeas to challenge detention. This project explores the role of the Immigration Act of 1917 in these cases. The Immigration Act of 1917, passed due to xenophobic tensions surrounding WWI, restricted immigration of people from Asia and the Pacific while implementing an English literacy test for those over 16 …

How Threat Mobilizes The Resurgence And Persistence Of Us White Supremacist Activism: The 1980s To The Present, Pete Simi, Robert Futrell, Adam Burston

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Despite a centuries-long history of violent mobilization, white supremacist activism (WSA) has received relatively little sociological attention outside a small, specialized subfield. Disciplinary interest began to change after Trump's 2016 election; the 2017 violent attack in Charlottesville, Virginia; and the January 6, 2021, insurrection. In recognition, this review article focuses on what has been learned about contemporary WSA since the 1980s. We categorize studies by their unit of analysis—individual or micro, meso, and macro levels—to highlight analytic commonalities and distinctions and to underscore the central role that threat plays in the ebb and flow of WSA. As part of our …

Democracy's Ruling Hand, Steven L. Winter Walter S. Gibbs Distinguished Professor Of Constitutional Law

Law Faculty Research Publications

The claim of liberal constitutionalism is that a text-like object or a ‘diplomatically abstract’ set of principles can work a deflection of disagreements within a pluralist polity. But this project assumes both that pluralism remains amenable to reason and that reason is a capacity independent of the profound differences of meaning, value, and forms of life that shape those disagreements. Neither assumption is correct. Differences in norms, values, and forms of life inevitably undergird and structure differences in meaning, perception, and interpretation. Consequently, a constitution (even when written and accompanied by judicial review) will necessarily unfold in an ongoing process …

Looking To The Past And Abroad To Enhance U.S. Presidential Debates, Jacob W. Justice, Talya P. Slaw, John Koch

Studies in Debate and Oratory

Presidential debates are a valuable, but flawed, method of educating voters about policy issues and candidates. Growing dissatisfaction with presidential debates, and polling evidence suggesting they are failing to inform audiences, creates exigence to reconsider the format of future debates. In this essay, we propose modifications to the format of United States presidential debates, in the interest of facilitating greater clash and audience education. To improve U.S. presidential debates, we draw upon two sources of inspiration: the history of U.S. presidential debates and international experiences with political debates. We recommend exploration of new debate formats that include (1) a narrow …

How Ballot Measure Wording Affects Preference-Consistent Voting: Experimental Evidence From The United States, William M. Pierce

Political Science Honors Projects

Why do some people vote for ballot measures that are inconsistent with their policy preference while others do not? It is important to explore this question in order to understand how well direct democracy translates the will of the people into policy outcomes. Drawing on electoral theories and cognitive science, I hypothesize that people are more likely to vote against their policy preferences when the language of a ballot measure is more complex. I test this hypothesis, along with causal mechanisms and heterogeneous treatment effects, using a survey experiment on a quasi-representative sample of voters in the United States.