Political Science Commons^™

Diaspora As Development Actors: A Source Of Human And Social Capital For Local Development In Turkey, Meryem Senay Ataselim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation provides an analysis of Turkish-American diaspora philanthropy - done through social and human capital transfers - and its role in impacting local development in Turkey. The study offers the consideration of a new kind of diaspora philanthropy, namely innovative philanthropy, which channels ideas, skills and experiences that have the potential to impact social change in local communities through social and human capital transfers.

The dissertation presents and analyzes two cases that have been supported by the Turkish-American diaspora. Case studies show that even though diaspora philanthropy towards Turkey is still relatively new and small in financial terms, there …

For Right And Might: The Militarization Of The Cold War And The Remaking Of American Democracy, Michael Brenes

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines how Cold War defense spending shaped the evolution of American political culture and public policy from the 1940s until the 1990s. It argues that the Cold War economy contributed to the realignment of American politics in the postwar era. The fight against global communism abroad altered the structure, purpose, and public perception of the federal government following World War II, but also subsidized corporations, suburban communities, and individuals affected by defense spending. The militarization of the Cold War therefore created various dependents of America's military and defense apparatus that continuously pressed for more defense spending during the …

Leaders, Ideas, National Interests, And Economic Strategies: Explaining The Regional Integration Decisions Of Mexico And Brazil, Roberto Genoves

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Regional integration agreements (RIAs) facilitate economic integration by allowing member countries access to each other's markets and by removing or reducing trade and investment barriers. Their increasing influence on international patterns of trade and investment flows has stimulated substantial academic work. Yet, scholars note that we lack an adequate comprehension of the factors that cause governments to seek RIAs, and why they prefer a particular type of integration arrangement. These are important questions because they speak to the forces that shape cooperation among states, a vital issue in international relations with implications for global governance.

Using an eclectic analytical approach, …

Occupy Mall Street? How The Court Conditioned Public Space Where People Go, Anthony Maniscalco

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis explores the tension between practicable space and property rights. That tension has frequently animated legal contests over political expression in privately owned, publicly accessible marketplaces in the United States. Do American marketplaces function as marketplaces of ideas? Should they? In order to examine those questions, I survey the Supreme Court's considerations of expressive activity on public and commercial property, in particular, shopping centers. I begin by developing indications of public space, as well as noting the challenges for civic inclusion within the modern political sphere. Next, I survey historical practices of public space within (Western) marketplaces. Those practices …

Engaging Bad Governments: Resource Groups And Patterns Of Engagement In Bangladesh, Nayma Qayum

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Bangladesh's governments have pursued an aid-based neoliberal development agenda since the 1980s, which has allowed new resources and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to permeate rural society. These NGOs operate programs through resource groups, small groups of impoverished women who gather at the village or ward levels. This dissertation argues that resource groups have built new citizen-state relationships and enabled new forms of engagement between citizens and their governments. These new transactional relationships are governed simultaneously by informal institutions of accountability and informal institutions of exchange; the former allow actors to reinforce formal rules when badly-performing institutions deviate from them, and the …

Becoming Transnational Citizens: The Liberian Diaspora's Civic Engagement In The United States And In Homeland Peacebuilding, Janet Elizabeth Reilly

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the relationship between civic participation in homeland peacebuilding and immigrants' political incorporation and integration in their local communities in the United States. It explores the impact of state (U.S. and Liberia) policies and local context on individuals' civic participation locally and in transnational activities. The study demonstrates the mechanisms through which state policies and local context influence Liberians' political participation in the United States and their transnational citizenship, defined as full legal membership and civic participation. The relationship between civic engagement in the United States and in transnational activities is not an adversarial one. Engagement with the …

Albert Camus' Political Thought: From Passion To Compassion, Angel López-Santiago

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The present work analyzes the political thought of Albert Camus, specifically the challenges of the justice ideal, and Camus' prioritization of the concepts of limits and compassion. Although Camus is not usually considered part of the traditional canon of political philosophy, I organized his thought into three major areas: a sub-theory of the human being, a sub-theory of institutions, and a sub-theory of political change. This method, I demonstrate, is ideal for extracting and organizing the political ideas of non-traditional political writers. In the case of Camus, he advocates for an international and democratic `civilization of dialogue' as part of …

South Africa And The United Nations Human Rights Council, Eduard Jordaan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This article assesses South Africa's foreign policy commitment to human rights, by studying the country's role in the United Nations Human Rights Council, which began its work in 2006. South Africa's behavior is evaluated in terms of its participation in four aspects of the Council's work: the institution-building phase that took place during the body's first year, country-specific human rights issues, thematic human rights problems, and the Universal Periodic Review. It is concluded that, South Africa has become a defender of unpalatable regimes and an obstacle to the international promotion of human rights.

Political Thought, Political Development, And America’S Two Foundings, Elvin T. Lim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The relationship between American political thought (APT) and American political development (APD) as phenomena as well as subfields in American Politics has not been sufficiently theorized. This essay takes up what I call the Second Founding of 1787–89 as the critical case for examining the close relationship between APT and APD. The statesmen of that era were thinkers and developmentalists of the first order; they understood the inseparable link between political justification and political change. This dynamic relationship between American political thought and development practiced in 1787–89 can be used as a blueprint for understanding the entwined cycles of political …

Game Theory Meets The Humanities And Both Win Or Book Review: Game Theory And The Humanities: Bridging Two Worlds, By Steven J. Brams, Karl-Dieter Crisman

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

This review discusses Brams' wide-ranging book Game Theory and the Humanities and gives some basic examples of the methodology and style, including how the Theory of Moves contributes to understanding such games.

Elections And Election Campaigns, 1918 (Sc 1278), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scans (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 1278. Campaign letter, 25 October 1918, of President Woodrow Wilson urging voters to elect a Democratic U.S. House and Senate; also campaign letter, 29 October 1918, of Kentucky Congressman R. Y. Thomas, Jr., to voters of the Third Congressional District asking for support.

Political Ecology, Joshua Defriez, Justine Larsen, Nicholas Hilton

Research on the Hill (Salt Lake City)

Environmental legislation is commonly accepted as an altruistic approach to land management. A closer examination however, reveals that political incentives and flawed arguments consistently shape U.S. environmental policy at high public costs. As student fellows at the Institute of Political Economy at Utah State University, we have had the opportunity to research this subject under the direction of Professor Randy Simmons. Political Ecology is his upcoming book that explores a variety of environmental policies, the incentives that created them, and their effects on both public lands and taxpayers. Our research contributions to this overall project specifically explore three separate case …

Truman, Kennedy, And Reagan: The Impact Of Assassination Attempts On The Culture Of The U.S. Secret Service, Briana Bowen

Research on the Hill (Salt Lake City)

The U.S. Secret Service (USSS), one of the most elite security agencies in the world, is charged with protecting the President of the United States at any cost. Three American presidents fell to assassins’ bullets before the USSS was assigned the role of presidential protection; one more would later be slain despite USSS protection. This study examines the organizational culture of the USSS, employing the methodology of cultural topography to identify the agency’s norms, values, identity, and perceptual lens. We review three of the most impactful twentieth-century assassination attempts— two failed, one successful—and their formative effect on USSS organizational culture. …

Public Opinion On Global Climate Change In Developed Countries: Five Case Studies, Adam Durfee

Research on the Hill (Salt Lake City)

Developed countries are more likely to be high emitters of green-house gases, and it is important that these countries are aware of the issue of global climate change and possible human contributions to that problem. Given their status as developed countries, one would think that public opinion on the sources of global climate change would be similar across nations, but this is not true. There is a lack of consensus among countries about the effects of human activity on global temperature variation, as opposed to natural fluctuation in global climate. Using case studies of the United States, France, Canada, Japan, …

The Reception Of Western Legal Reform In Bulgaria A Qualitative Study, Paul Edwards, Dr. Vanya Illieva Kalaidjieva

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The research I did ultimately seeks to answer the question whether the door to the West is open for Bulgaria. Bulgaria is not a Western country, even though it is in Europe. In fact it has never been a Western country.

Update On Germany: Shifting Priorities And Overcoming Crises, Anna Lisa Ohm, Austin Eighan

Forum Lectures

With globalization, the traditional postwar Atlantic Alliance between the U.S. and Germany is crumbling, the Holocaust narrative, which dominated the public discourse in the postwar period, is being disrupted by a greater willingness on the part of Germans to speak openly about their own victimization in the Third Reich, and, despite huge investments in former East Germany since unification in 1989, Germany remains Europe's most economically powerful and relatively most politically stable nation. Germany's place is demonstrated in part by the re-election of Angela Merkel's party in September 2013 and her third term as chancellor. Despite the somewhat shaken Euro, …

Internal Security, External Solutions: Reevaluating The Formation Of The Gulf Cooperation Council, Brock Evans Taylor, Dr. Donna Lee Bowen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The formal organization of the Gulf Cooperation Council began on February 4, 1981. After a ceremonial reading of a Qu’ranic Surah the heads of state of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, and Oman agreed in principle to facilitate cooperation between their respective countries. During the subsequent months, a formal charter was drafted and ratified by each government, legislating formal cooperation in economic, social, and political spheres. Since its formation, critics have reviewed the behavior and effects of the GCC’s, analyzing the fruits of the union.

Electoral Rules And The Democratic Party Of Japan, Benjamin D. Seal, Dr. Ray Christensen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Political scientists continue to debate the effect of electoral rules on electoral outcomes. One area of intense study is proportional representation versus single-member districts, and single member districts versus multi-member districts. This research tests the effects of electoral rules on election results for the Democratic Party of Japan in the 1996 House of Representatives election and in the 1998 House of Councillors election. Analysis focuses specifically on how the Democratic Party, a minor party during the two elections covered, benefits from proportional representation (PR) and suffers in single-member districts (SMD).

International Justice: The Origin Of International Criminal Courts, Rachael Deceuster, Dr. Darren Hawkins

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The purpose of my research was to discover the origins of the recent international criminal tribunals in Yugoslavia and Rwanda to prosecute persons accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity. I focused on the Yugoslav tribunal because it was the first since the Nuremburg and Tokyo tribunals after WWII. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was the first in a series of international tribunals, including the newly formed and controversial International Criminal Court (ICC).

Urban-Rural Interaction In The Utah State Senate, Lael Cox, Dr. Jay Goodliffe

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Within a broader question of minority representation in democratic systems, this study shows how the maturity of legislators allows rural interests to be satisfied so as to avoid serious factional contention in the Utah State Senate.