International Relations Commons^™

Under Pressure: Explaining Backlash Against Civil Society In The Andean Community, Noah Anders Levine

Pomona Senior Theses

In this thesis, I consider the trend of increasing backlash against civil society around the world. I focus on Ecuador and Peru, both democratic countries that have placed restrictions on NGOs receiving foreign funding. I examine both countries in terms of changes over time in the regulatory environment for NGOs. I ask: What factors motivated these changes? I analyze the countries with respect to three possible explanations: defending sovereignty against foreign powers, stifling internal dissent, and seeking rents. In answering this question, I draw upon the laws in question, press releases, and news reports as well as interviews with NGO …

Dangerous Delegation: Explaining The Rationales And Outcomes Of State Sponsorship Of Terrorism Through The Principal-Agent Framework, Jeremy M. Berkowitz

Graduate Dissertations and Theses

State sponsorship of terrorism, where a government deliberately provides resources and material support to a terrorist organization, is common in the international system. By conceptualizing state sponsorship as a relationship between a principal and agent, I develop a consistent theoretical model that explains why states pursue this foreign policy strategy, as well as how they rationally attempt to minimize the inherent risks of delegating to violent non-state actors. I test my model by using a novel dataset on sponsorship behaviors that improves on the range, detail, and temporality of previously used measurements. My dissertation is organized into three distinct papers, …

Just War: New Customary International Law To Combat Violent Non-State Actor Groups?, Lisa Marie Holz

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The issue that this study focused upon was the legitimacy of military interventions by a state against a violent non-state actor group located within another state's territory. The research sought to answer how interventions by the United States and its allies have evolved during the post 9/11 era. It additionally explored if the justification for military interventions had changed. This study used data from the Uppsala Conflict Data Program and the United Nations Security Council to create a hybrid data-set and analyzed the data for the location and number of states participating in operations against violent non-state actors ("VNSAs"). This …

Inclusion Of Blocking Power For A Complete Voting Power Analysis In The Imf, Shiwani Varal

Senior Independent Study Theses

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) calculates the voting power of a country by dividing the total of one member's votes by the total of all members' votes. This method of calculating the power of a state judges power as voting weight. However, voting weights are the total number of votes a country has in an institution, while voting power is the influence a country has on a policy decision. A better approach to calculate this voting power within an institution is by using voting power indices. However, literature only calculates the winning power, while voting power is defined as the …

Factors That Influence Mexican Emigration To The United States: The Role Of Economics, Education Quality, Crime, And Violence, Kristina Aiad-Toss

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This study explores the factors that influence Mexican emigration to the United States. By determining the relationship between emigration and different economic, social, and demographic variables, this paper seeks to determine the relative importance of factors that drive Mexicans to leave their country. This paper looks at the following emigration push and pull factors: home-country economic conditions, employment opportunities, education quality, crime, drug-cartel related violence, social ties in the U.S., gender, age, and income. Using a nationwide survey opinion data from 2015, the perceptions of Mexican individuals support the hypotheses that social ties, home-country education quality, gender, and age are …

Navigating Risks Across Borders: The Lived Experiences Of Central American Women Migrants, Carla Angulo-Pasel

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The journey for ‘unauthorized’ migrant women from the Northern Triangle of Central America (NTCA) through Mexico dangerous and violent. In hopes of achieving safe passage to the United States (U.S.), women migrants will have to navigate borders. In this dissertation, I use the concept of borders to reveal the gendered experiences of (im)mobility. I argue that navigating borders throughout the migratory journey is not simply about experiencing the risks and vulnerabilities associated with restrictive border enforcement policies and practices implemented by the nation-state. (Im)mobility for women migrants is equally about the boundaries and/or barriers that are created by oppressive systems …

Good Works And The Great Commission: An Exploration Of Religious Influence In Evangelical Faith-Based Organisations In Canada And India, Ravi Gokani

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

By the mid-1990s, the post-war, Keynesian welfare state that had typified much the landscape of service provision in North America had already begun seriously to corrode in the presence of a resurgent classical liberalism. This meant, among other things, an increased role for civil society organisations in the provision of social welfare to citizens in need. As part of this restructuring of the welfare state, faith-based organisations found a renewed place, bolstered in part by favourable legislation, political support, and the revival of a once-recluse evangelicalism. Today, with decades of maturity and the aide of technology, evangelical faith-based organisations are …

Defence In Depth: An Anatomy Of Containment From Quarantine To Resilience, Jessica West

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This dissertation investigates the logic of resilience as a prevailing mode of national security. Struck more by its familiarity than its novelty, I turn my attention to public health as a way of better understanding what resilience does and how it works. Using interpretive methods to read resilience theoretically as a function of complex systems and concretely as a set of homeland security policy practices in the United States, I situate the emergence and implementation of resilience as a redeployment of long-standing motifs and modes of “containment,” recast as an immune system. Specifically, I claim: 1) containment is a spatial …

Two Awakenings, One Process: Implications From The Sunni Realignment In Iraq, 2006-2007, Diane Maye Zorri

Publications

There are several competing beliefs regarding how political factions at the sub-state level choose to align and realign during a state of armed conflict. This research draws upon current literature to provide a framework for comparing the Anbar and Baghdad Awakenings of 2006–2007. This research concludes that alignment and alliance building is a process based on structural constraints only at the point of institutional maturity, therefore the critical point in the realignment process for the U.S. military is at a point between an individual’s realignment and the wider community’s perception of their success.

Prelude To Genocide: Arusha, Rwanda, And The Failure Of Diplomacy, David Rawson

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

As the initial US observer, David Rawson participated in the 1993 Rwandan peace talks at Arusha, Tanzania. Later, he served as US ambassador to Rwanda during the last months of the doomed effort to make them hold. Despite the intervention of concerned states in establishing a peace process and the presence of an international mission, UNAMIR, the promise of the Arusha Peace Accords could not be realized. Instead, the downing of Rwandan president Habyarimana’s plane in April 1994 rekindled the civil war and opened the door to genocide.

In Prelude to Genocide, Rawson draws on declassified documents and his own …

Measuring Vulnerability Interdependence: To What Extent Do Chinese Investments In Africa Make China Vulnerable?, Nurullah Ayyilmaz

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

The pace of Chinese investments in Africa accelerated after the 2000s as one of many consequences of China’s “going out” policy. The importance of Sino-African investment relationship has been signified by conveying large-scale tri-annual collective dialogue forum, named Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), first in 2000. It is generally assumed that Africa needs China, mostly due to being recipient of Chinese investments, but what about the opposite and what would that mean for China? This dissertation looks at the bilateral relationship between China and Africa from the perspective of creating vulnerability for the investor party. Accordingly, the research questions …

Unequal Influence: The Impact Of Inequality On Trade Policy, Brian William Fitzpatrick

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Trade was a central issue in the 2016 US presidential election, with both major party candidates debating how trade impacts American workers. However, the current literature on trade policy outcomes and inequality has insufficient measures of public opinion on trade. I examine the varying roles the public and interest groups play in the trade policy formation process as inequality changes in democratic societies. I expect, as inequality increases, the public and mass based interest groups will have less resources to expend on influencing policymakers. Also, as inequality increases economic elites’ and business interest groups’ resources will increase, and they will …

College Teachers' Perceptions About Teaching Global Competency, Izabela Agata Majewska

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

National and international organizations emphasize the importance of teaching global competence in American higher education as a way of preparing students for the rigors of a globalized workforce. Lack of nation-wide educational initiatives aimed at providing institutional guidelines for assessing international relations (IR) courses for this skill acquisition requires colleges to rely on their own resources and ingenuity. Presently, no course assessment methods for gauging global competency attainment exist at Florida College. The purpose of this study was to investigate faculty perceptions of instruction and learning of global competence. Mezirow's transformative learning theory was the conceptual framework that guided this …

Policy Implications Of News Media Coverage Of The Islamic State Of Iraq And Syria., Godfred A. Ababio

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) garnered global news media attention in Summer 2014 when it seized a significant section of land in Iraq and Syria. The group then mishandled and executed its captives. There is a lack of consensus among the international community, led by Russia and the United States, on how best to address the threat posed by ISIS. An understanding of the function of Russian and U.S. news media coverage of the ISIS threat is an appropriate research topic. The purpose of this qualitative content analysis study was to explore how the U.S, Russian, and …

An Analysis Of Servant Leadership In Russian-American Nongovernmental Organization Partnerships, Frederica Doctor

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Despite Russia's foreign agent law and a plethora of literature on the deterioration of Russia's civil society, there is a scarcity of research about the breakthroughs and transformation of Russian-and-American (RA) nongovernmental organization (NGO) partnerships. Accordingly, the research goal of this qualitative case study was to explore the tenets of servant leadership theory exhibited by foreign aid organizations for the restoration of RA NGO partnerships. The research questions addressed the influence and dominance of servant leadership tenets within United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and its collaborating agencies. A content analysis was conducted using online publicly available data such …

การทูตธุรกิจ : อิทธิพลของบรรษัทข้ามชาติต่อความสัมพันธ์สหรัฐฯ-อินโดนีเซีย 2009 ถึง 2018, ชญานิศวร์ เมธาสิทธิ์รวิกุล

Chulalongkorn University Theses and Dissertations (Chula ETD)

วิทยานิพนธ์ฉบับนี้มีวัตถุประสงค์เพื่อศึกษาอิทธิพลของบรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันต่อการกำหนดนโยบาในประเทศของอินโดนีเซีย และอิทธิพลที่ส่งต่อความสัมพันธ์ระหว่างสหรัฐฯ-อินโดนีเซีย ในช่วงปีค.ศ. 2009-2018 โดยใช้ระเบียบวิธีวิจัยเชิงคุณภาพ ซึ่งสังเคราะห์และวิเคราะห์จากเอกสารราชการของอินโดนีเซียและของสหรัฐอเมริกาที่เผยแพร่ออนไลน์ งานวิชาการด้านเศรษฐกิจการเมืองอินโดนีเซีย ข่าวสารที่เกี่ยวข้อง และข้อมูลบรรษัทที่เข้าไปลงทุน จากการศึกษาพบว่า การที่บรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันเข้ามามีอิทธิพลทางเศรษฐกิจของอินโดนีเซียส่งผลให้บรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันมีบทบาททางการเมืองและสังคมในประเทศอินโดนีเซีย กล่าวคือ การลงทุนของบรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันเป็นส่วนหนึ่งในการพัฒนาความมั่งคั่งทางเศรษฐกิจของอินโดนีเซีย จนทำให้บรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันมีบทบาทสร้างความเจริญเติบโตทางเศรษฐกิจของอินโดนีเซีย ในทางการเมือง บรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันมีบทบาททางการทูตผ่านการรวมกลุ่มเพื่อใช้ในการเจรจากับรัฐบาลอินโดนีเซียเพื่อเสนอข้อตกลง หรือเพื่อเสนอข้อแลกเปลี่ยนผลประโยชน์ระหว่างอินโดนีเซียและบรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกัน ในทางหนึ่งอินโดนีเซียเองก็เลือกเจรจากับบรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันเพื่อหาแนวทางสร้างผลประโยชน์ร่วมกัน ในทางสังคม บรรษัทข้ามชาติอเมริกันมีบทบาทในการพัฒนาคุณภาพชีวิตประชาชนอินโดนีเซียผ่านการสร้างความรับผิดชอบต่อสังคม (Corporate Social Responsibility: CSR) จนส่งผลให้บรรษัทข้ามขาติอเมริกันกลายมาเป็นผู้ทำงานร่วมกันกับรัฐบาลอินโดนีเซีย

Presidential Control Over International Law, Curtis A. Bradley, Jack L. Goldsmith

Faculty Scholarship

Presidents have come to dominate the making, interpretation, and termination of international law for the United States. Often without specific congressional concurrence, and sometimes even when it is likely that Congress would disagree, the President has developed the authority to:

(a) make a vast array of international obligations for the United States, through both written agreements and the development of customary international law;

(b) make increasingly consequential political commitments for the United States on practically any topic;

(c) interpret these obligations and commitments; and

(d) terminate or withdraw from these obligations and commitments.

While others have examined pieces of this …

Free Trade, Fair Trade, And Selective Enforcement, Timothy Meyer

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

U.S. Manufacturing Sector Strategies For Effective Offshoring To China, Timothy Byron Klatte

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

U.S. manufacturing companies' offshoring of investments to China over the past 4 decades before 2017 has played a significant role in China's economic growth. However, as China's economy expands and the country's standard of living improves, U.S. manufacturing executives are required to take a refreshed look at current investment strategies to adjust for rising costs and a tighter regulatory environment. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore economic strategies that U.S. manufacturing leaders used to offshore effectively to China. The study included in-person interviews of 9 purposeful sampled manufacturing leaders, fluent in English, from 2 U.S. organizations …

Social Media And Terrorist Organizations: Observing Success Of Recruitment Through Social Media, Vincenzo Cibra

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The Internet is an instrument that has revolutionized the world and the society since its introduction. Today, over 4 billion people around the world have access to it. While this technology comes with several positive innovations, it can also be used negatively by terrorist organizations to more efficiently spread propaganda messages. More so, the development of social media has fostered new methods of recruitment that allows to reach a broader audience anonymously and outside of the geographical area of operation of a terrorist organization.

The purpose of this research is to analyze the relationship between social media development and changes …