Political Science Commons^™

Presidential Use Of Diversionary Drone Force And Public Support, Scott S. Boddery, Graid G. Klein

Political Science Faculty Publications

During times of domestic turmoil, the use of force abroad becomes an appealing strategy to US presidents in hopes of diverting attention away from internal conditions and toward a foreign policy success. Weaponized drone technology presents a low cost and potentially high-reward option to embattled presidents. While generally covert operations, drone strikes are frequently reported in the media, making them a viable diversionary tool. To gauge whether drone strikes are in fact capable of diverting the public’s attention, we surveyed 1198 Americans and find that a successful drone strike increases presidential approval despite a weak and sagging economy, and the …

Court-Packing And Democratic Erosion, Thomas Keck

Political Science - All Scholarship

When faced with an incumbent party that is deliberately tilting the electoral and institutional playing field, under what conditions should small-d democracy advocates respond with hardball tactics such as Court-packing? This paper surveys the comparative literature on democratic erosion for key lessons regarding the role of courts in polities where democratic erosion is underway. The literature suggests that independent courts may sometimes operate as guardrails of democracy, but that once captured by anti-system parties, courts may also serve as effective agents of democratic erosion. The paper then draws on the history of Court-packing in the United States in an effort …

Islamic Ngos Under Different Authoritarian Regimes, Rana Aly

Theses and Dissertations

The state-civil society relationship has always been a highly controversial sphere specially when it comes to the Middle East. The exceptional complexities of the region make the dynamics of this relationship more questionable. The case of Egypt is a salient manifestation of these complexities where NGOs used to function under some variants of authoritarianism. Precisely, Islamic charities used to be one of the main social services providers for many decades in Egypt and which were tolerated to a great extent by the previous regimes in order to compensate for the lack of the services provided by the regime. Having these …

Backsliding To Autocracy: The Case Of Turkey Under Erdoğan, Yasmina Khaled Elazazi

Theses and Dissertations

Democratic backsliding is a gradual process that results from changes in formal political institutions and informal political practices that significantly affect how citizens engage with the state. Even though such a phenomenon may occur in different types of democracies, there is always a threshold that determines whether the state will completely backslide to autocracy or conserve being a “minimal democracy”. For instance, a current model of democratic backsliding is Turkey; a state which has been experiencing a decline in basic civil liberties, political rights and freedoms. According to Freedom House, from 2002 to 2020, Turkey’s “political environment” has decreased from …

“She Blinded Me With Science”: The Use Of Science Frames In Abortion Litigation Before The Supreme Court, Laura Moyer

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

While much of the work on amicus briefs focuses on whether such briefs affect Supreme Court outcomes or doctrine, much less is known about the content of these briefs, particularly how groups opt to frame issues as part of their litigation strategy. In this study, I leverage an approach to content analysis that has previously been used to analyze judicial opinions and use it to assess the frames used by amicus groups in a single policy area over four decades. Using an original dataset of amicus briefs filed in Supreme Court cases on the right to abortion, I test the …

Conflict, Consensus And Modernizing Trajectories In Sub-Saharan Africa, Charles Themba Tuthill

Dissertations - ALL

Research on the political economy of African states has often focused on explaining the roots of socio-political disfunction or has been pre-occupied with successful cases like Botswana, whose demography and social structures differ markedly from other states on the continent. This dissertation takes a different approach; it seeks to understand the developmental dynamics of successful African states whose peoples and societies largely reflect the majority of states on the continent south of the Sahara. The research question first asks why Ghana and Kenya succeeded in creating growth-enhancing economic institutions. Next it examines why, in the post-Cold War era, Ghanaian economic …

As A Matter De Facto: State Capacity Dynamics And Their Role In Shaping Sovereignty For Unrecognized States, Angely Martinez

Dissertations - ALL

What explains de facto states that do not pursue statehood? Why do we see examples of unrecognized states pushing for reintegration after a period of time? Why do some de facto states seem content with the status quo? Previous examination of de facto state strategies highlighted the role that the international system plays in granting independence. For the most part, de facto states, by default secessionist movements who have sundered from the parent state, are unlikely to be granted independence by the very system which holds a taboo against secession. The exceptions to this came after a long time of …

Judicial Deference To Administrative Statutory Interpretation In The Modern American Administrative State, Rachel Marie Macmaster

Dissertations - ALL

The American administrative state of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries is defined by deference by federal courts to administrative agencies. The political science and (especially) legal literatures have long discussed how federal courts defer to agencies, but little attention has been dedicated to how to identify deference and why courts defer. This dissertation redefines deference, a term that has been topic of extensive discussion in the last forty years but that was missing a key feature: the intent of the deferrers. Using administrative courts as the proxy for agencies at large, this dissertation suggests three reasons why judges may defer. …

Advancing A Sustainable Career Model For Political Science Students: Implications For Career Development Research And Practice, Tashfeen Ahmad

Journal of Global Awareness

This paper aims to assist lecturers, universities, and their administrators in improving the relevance of political science undergraduate degree programs in the context of globalization and the Fourth Industrial Revolution era. This paper will reflect on how to tailor the political science degree to achieve a sustainable career and improve students' employability in the future. The latest theoretical frameworks incorporating the concept of "sustainable" career development were used in advancing the model of employability in the political science field. The author relies on a qualitative approach and the literature review with implications for practice in advancing the notion that competency-based …

Authoritarianism And The Rentier State - Venezuela And Nigeria, Victoria Zobeida Castillo

Senior Theses

The oil states scattered throughout the developing world are no more democratic or peaceful than they were at the beginning of the twentieth century's natural resource era. In fact, some countries are worse, tainted by civil unrest, plummeting per capita income, and rising inflation. These socioeconomic ailments are often referred to as the Resource Curse or Dutch Disease. Mineral wealth, however, should not be confused with the dangers of sole oil wealth. The oil states are significantly more likely to be governed by authoritarian leaders. The irony of oil's unusual properties of fluctuating prices and secretive contracts do not solely …

Judicial Deference To Administrative Statutory Interpretation In The Modern American Administrative State, Rachel Marie Macmaster

Dissertations - ALL

The American administrative state of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries is defined by deference by federal courts to administrative agencies. The political science and (especially) legal literatures have long discussed how federal courts defer to agencies, but little attention has been dedicated to how to identify deference and why courts defer. This dissertation redefines deference, a term that has been topic of extensive discussion in the last forty years but that was missing a key feature: the intent of the deferrers. Using administrative courts as the proxy for agencies at large, this dissertation suggests three reasons why judges may defer. …

Bridging The Realms Between Cyber And Physical: Approaching Cyberspace With An Interdisciplinary Lens, Lena Andrea Rose

Senior Theses

This project investigates the use of cyber technology as a political tool through the investigation of the following case studies: (1) The Sony Pictures Hack in the United States in 2014, (2) The Qatari News Hack in 2017, and (3) China’s enactment of the Hong Kong National Security Law in 2020. These three case studies depict that rapid technological advancement has led to greater cyber warfare between state powers. The Sony Hack examines political coercion, the Qatari Hack examines disinformation, and the Hong Kong National Security Law examines surveillance and suppression of opposition. As a result of an increasingly complicated …

Vox And The Legacy Of Franco: A Study Of The Rise Of The Populist Radical Right In Spain, Daniel Robert Berenston

Senior Theses

Populist radical right parties succeeded electorally across Europe since the start of the 1980s. However, until 2018, the populist radical right was electorally irrelevant in Spain even as the populist radical right gained traction in the rest of Western Europe. There is very little literature explaining how Vox overcame obstacles in Spain to be the first party of its kind to have success in Spain. In this thesis, I examine how Vox fits into previous academic literature that explains the populist radical right and whether that literature applies to the case of Vox. I argue that the previous literature cannot …

Breaking Point: How Migrant Crises Have Influenced The Rise Of Far-Right Parties In Italy, Germany, And The Uk, Theadora Serena Petropoulos

Senior Theses

Far-right politics in Europe did not die with Adolf Hitler in 1945. In the early 21st century, populist parties had a somewhat quiet existence beneath Europe’s political surface and did not find much success in elections. However, as refugees and asylum seekers fled the Syrian Civil War and North Africa beginning in 2015, and as Eastern and Central Europeans flocked to the UK, European far-right parties found themselves with a new opportunity to mobilize support. Now in 2020, far-right parties have become legitimate contenders in both national parliaments and the European Parliament. The migrant crisis is perhaps one of the …

The Role Of International Factors In Electoral Volatility In Latin America: An Examination Of Structural Adjustment, Michelle Kuenzi, Hafthor Erlingsson, John P. Tuman

Political Science Faculty Research

Does structural adjustment increase party system instability in Latin America? We employ the Latin American Presidential and Legislative Elections (LAPALE) database (http://www.lapaledata.com) and our own original data set for structural adjustment to assess the effects of structural adjustment and other economic, social, and political variables on legislative volatility in 18 Latin American countries during the period of 1982 to 2016. The results of our study indicate that structural adjustment results in higher levels of within-system electoral volatility and support a broad version of economic voting theory. Extra-system electoral volatility is driven primarily by institutional and demographic factors. Our findings also …

As A Matter De Facto: State Capacity Dynamics And Their Role In Shaping Sovereignty For Unrecognized States, Angely Martinez

Dissertations - ALL

What explains de facto states that do not pursue statehood? Why do we see examples of unrecognized states pushing for reintegration after a period of time? Why do some de facto states seem content with the status quo? Previous examination of de facto state strategies highlighted the role that the international system plays in granting independence. For the most part, de facto states, by default secessionist movements who have sundered from the parent state, are unlikely to be granted independence by the very system which holds a taboo against secession. The exceptions to this came after a long time of …

Conflict, Consensus And Modernizing Trajectories In Sub-Saharan Africa, Charles Themba Tuthill

Dissertations - ALL

Research on the political economy of African states has often focused on explaining the roots of socio-political disfunction or has been pre-occupied with successful cases like Botswana, whose demography and social structures differ markedly from other states on the continent. This dissertation takes a different approach; it seeks to understand the developmental dynamics of successful African states whose peoples and societies largely reflect the majority of states on the continent south of the Sahara. The research question first asks why Ghana and Kenya succeeded in creating growth-enhancing economic institutions. Next it examines why, in the post-Cold War era, Ghanaian economic …

Constitutional Crisis And The Tenth Amendment: Civil Disobedience, Founding Principles, And The State’S Responsibility, Travis Younce

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

This past year we have seen an unprecedent grab of power from the State to the federal levels. This has caused many Americans to voice their concerns through civil disobedience. Yet, as we have seen from the summer of 2020 to the electoral vote on 6 January 2021, many Americans have gone beyond civil disobedience and rioted, causing loss of life and destruction of property for their beliefs.

The Founding Fathers were concerned with a central government that exceeded its powers and destroying the powers at the local or State level in favor of federal rule. In Federalist no 45 …

Relations Of The Catholic Church And The Government Of The Republic Of Lithuania Relations During The Crisis Of Covid-19: Partnership Or Dispute?, Audris Narbutas

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

The religious liberty is one of the most profound and fundamental deep freedoms in the West World. The vast majority of the modern democracies recognize the people’s right to worship God according to the particular traditions and norms of the different religious communities.

The state of Lithuania belongs to this family of democracies where the religious liberty plays a significant role in the legal system of the Lithuania. The rights to express and practice each one’s faith are established in the Article 26 of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania[1] and in the bilateral treaties with the Holy …

The Effect Of International Level Covid-19 Stay-At-Home Orders On Death Rates, Valeriia Manchak, Annalisa Stoll, Kyle Conniff

Helm's School of Government Conference - 2021-2024

In this paper, we document and compare data gathered from more than 50 countries with different demographic characteristics, lockdown policies, health systems, and different varying timelines to combat COVID-19. After discussing the variables and their impact on the mortality numbers, we will make a recommendation concerning the different lockdown policies for future use. The main objective of this paper is to investigate connections between government policies, population age, age density, smoking rate, IQ air pollution, forms of greeting, death rate, obesity/health index, mean age, face coverings, contact tracing, international travel control level, etc. and how these independent variables might affect …