Public Policy Commons^™

The Invisible Costs Of Privatizing Welfare: Administrative Burdens In Contracted Medicaid, Soyun Jeong

Electronic Theses & Dissertations (2024 - present)

Why do governments favor contracting out social services? Do private actors guarantee a better service experience for citizens? How should we understand the trade-off between efficiency and high-quality service delivery? These are the central questions that motivate this dissertation. Focusing on Medicaid, one of the largest social safety net programs in the United States, this dissertation investigates the impact of outsourcing Medicaid delivery to private health insurance companies. It explores how this privatized structure generates administrative burdens and shapes policy feedback effects. Theoretically, this project seeks to bridge the administrative burden and policy feedback literature by examining how burdensome policy …

Improving Understanding And Connections For Preparedness, Mitigation, Response, And Recovery For Tornado And Straight-Line Wind Events In Virginia: Summary Of The Inaugural Virginia Tornado And Straight-Line Wind Summit, Wie Yusuf, Monica Arul, Joshua Behr, Kaleen Lawsure, An Huy Pham, Henry Attivor

School of Public Service Faculty Publications

Background

The Virginia Tornado and Straight-Line Wind Summit, the first of its kind in the Commonwealth, was held on October 15, 2025 in Isle of Wight County, Virginia. The Summit had several goals, including:

• Understanding Virginia’s wind risk and learning the science behind it.
• Hearing lessons learned from emergency managers who have experienced extreme wind events.
• Learning about practical steps to prepare, mitigate, and respond to severe wind events.
• Learning best practices for timely and actionable communication with the public before and after events.
• Strengthening interagency coordination and connecting with others to share resources, align priorities, and coordinate resilience planning. …

Gods Guns: Why Firearms And Firearm Culture Remain Sacred To Rural Americans, Thomas Westrick

West Chester University Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Final Projects

With ample evidence demonstrating a link between low levels of gun regulation and high levels of firearm fatalities, it seems intuitive that Americans would want to increase the level of firearm regulation to bring down the level of violence. However, the target population, white males living in rural areas of the State of Indiana and practicing the Christian Evangelical Protestant tradition, display high levels of resistance to new firearm regulation. This study sought to explore that resistance through the lens of the rural gun culture with an interpretivist qualitative design using reflexive thematic analysis to answer the research question: How …

Caretaker Of Captors: The Experience Of Role Conflict Among State Correctional Officers, Camille M. Botticelli-Pohl

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

A variety of policies at the national level over the last 70 years have resulted in the mass incarceration of various marginalized populations, inclusive of individuals with mental health problems or severe mental illness. Although Constitutional mandates require that psychology staff be available at all state and federal facilities, these providers spend a fraction of the time with incarcerated people than correctional officers do. Correctional officers seem to play an important, if often overlooked, supporting role in the management of the day-to-day lives of people in custody, including elements of their mental health care. They are also, theoretically, tasked with …

Corruption And Foreign Direct Investment In Ghana: Empirical Assessment Of The Mediating Role Of Institutional Quality And Political Stability, Isaac K. Yeboah

Graduate Research Posters

Background: Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) provides more than just capital; it introduces technology and managerial expertise, contributing significantly to economic growth. However, corruption, measured by the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), deters inflows. This study examines how Ghana’s CPI relates to FDI, with institutional quality and political stability as mediators accounting for GDP, inflation, and exchange rates as covariates.

Methods: A non-experimental quantitative design that adopts a multivariate deductive approach is used to test the theoretical propositions, and uses data from 1995 to 2022. CPI data are sourced from Transparency International, FDI from the IMF, and institutional quality and …

Journey To Well-Being: An Exploration Of Thrivership Post-Domestic Violence, Kader Gumus

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Domestic violence profoundly affects multiple facets of a survivor’s life. While most existing literature on survivorship addresses the immediate aftermath of domestic violence, this study delves into the extended process following the trauma of abuse to attain “thrivership,” a new concept in the scholarly and practice literature that emphasizes enduring well-being and flourishing. This dissertation examines the journeys from surviving to thriving for 13 women who transformed themselves and their lives to achieve well-being after traumatic domestic violence. Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory was applied to examine the multiple layers of environmental influences on an individual’s development, including the micro, meso, …

Black Birth Work As Radical Praxis: A Hermeneutic Phenomenological Inquiry Of Leadership Among Black Birth Workers, Lesa C. Clark

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

This hermeneutic phenomenological study explores the leadership experiences of Black birth workers (BBWs), revealing critical insights into leadership dynamics within maternal healthcare. Through a theoretical framework integrating African feminism, Black feminism, and anti-racist feminism, the research examines how BBWs conceptualize and enact leadership through embodied, relational, and liberatory approaches. This study addresses a significant gap in leadership literature, particularly regarding generational knowledge and practices of BBWs, which remain understudied despite their vital role in Black maternal healthcare. This study reveals distinct leadership perspectives and methodologies through in-depth interviews with eight BBWs and a detailed interpretive analysis. The findings contribute to …

Ethical Imperatives For Rational Paternalism In Advisor-Client Relationships, Igor A. Zey

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

This study seeks to understand the role of ethics and rational paternalism in the practice of financial advising. A significant amount of research examines the effects of rational paternalism on the governmental and institutional levels. Very little research has addressed the issues associated with rational paternalistic behavior by advisors toward their clients. Investopedia (2013) focuses on advisors’ ethics and moral responsibilities, underscoring the ethical standards clients should expect from their financial advisors. However, practically none of the literature examines the ethics, morals, and practical aspects of individual paternalism. In response, this study examines the concept of rational paternalism in advisor-client …

Officers’ Perceptions Of Body-Worn Cameras: An Exploratory Study Of Small Police Departments In Upstate New York, Stefan A. Dela Riva

Electronic Theses & Dissertations (2024 - present)

The aim of this exploratory study is to examine how police officers perceive the impact of body-worn cameras (BWCs) on their use of discretion when communicating with members of the public. In this context, “discretion” refers to an officer’s authority to make independent judgments while enforcing the law; deciding whether to issue a warning, make an arrest, or resolve an incident informally when legality permits. To understand officers’ opinions, a cross-sectional, quantitative online survey was distributed to various police departments and sheriff’s offices in upstate New York. Participants completed a series of Likert-style survey items addressing their general views on …

The Position Of The United States Of America Vis-A-Vis The Question Of Western Sahara: Assessing The Role Of Think Tanks In The Conflict, Hamid Baadeche

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

ABSTRACT

The Position of the United States of America Vis-à-vis the Question of Western Sahara: Assessing the Role of Think Tanks in the Conflict

Hamid Baadeche

Think tank organizations, particularly in the United States, have become a prominent feature of the political landscape. They act as advocates for specific policies that they consider beneficial for the country or a particular societal group. They function as a primary source of information, which they then aim to transform into well-informed policies and sound decisions. They are referred to as "the revolving doors," "idea brokers," and "idea factory." As such, their foremost objective …

Securitization Of African Migrants In Europe And North America, Chick Edmond

Political Science & Geography Faculty Publications

The securitization of African migrants in Europe and North America refers to the framing of immigrants as an existential security threat rather than a socioeconomic or humanitarian concerns. This discourse driven by political rhetoric, media narratives, and policy measures, often depict African migrants as risks to national security, cultural identity, and economic stability. Governments in host countries employ stringent border controls, detention and deportation policies often justified by counterterrorism and crime prevention frameworks. However, critics argue that securitization exacerbates xenophobia, violates human rights, and fails to address root causes of migration, such as conflict, poverty, and climate change. This paper …

Nuclear Deterrence Strategies And The Balance Of Power In Europe, Chick Edmond

Political Science & Geography Faculty Publications

The beginning of the Cold War era indubitably defines nuclear deterrence strategies in Europe by reinforcing and re-strategizing security dynamics amongst European States. The balance of power in Europe has been geopolitically influenced by NATO and Russia in a quest to avoid any kind of security dilemmas from either side. In order to maintain a strategic deterrence balance posture, this complex security navigation scenario therefore act as stabilizing factor in the region as well as preventing any future conflict on the Europe continent resulting from security imbalances. NATO eastward enlargement has maintained a significant strategic balance of power in the …

Why Domestic Violence Offenders Don't Give Up Their Guns, Natalie Nanasi

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

Perpetrators of intimate partner violence are barred by federal law and many states' laws from possessing firearms. While such prohibitions enjoy popular support, they are sporadically and inconsistently enforced, placing the lives of survivors at risk when offenders do not voluntarily comply. Many experts, including this author, have offered legal and policy solutions to increase the likelihood that perpetrators of domestic violence will either willingly relinquish their guns or otherwise be dispossessed of them. But these proposals may have been premature.

This Article is the first to take a step back and inquire why offenders do not surrender their firearms …

A Comparative Analysis Of Artificial Intelligence Regulation: Implications For Singapore, Cheng Kit Kit Pang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In relation to artificial intelligence (“AI”) regulation, Singapore presently adopts a wait-and-see approach, refraining from implementing any hard regulation before 2026. This article is directed at making recommendations for Singapore’s future AI hard regulation and conducts a comparative analysis of the hard AI regulation in the EU, the People’s Republic of China (“China”) and South Korea. This article draws lessons specifically from Asian jurisdictions with similar socio-legal and commercial considerations. In particular, China and South Korea are at the forefront, actively pushing for hard regulation. Key takeaways include the potential drivers for a shift towards hard regulation, the scope and …

The International Risk Governance Council: Reflections On A 20-Year Experiment In Support Of Improved Risk Governance, M. Granger Morgan, Marie-Valentine Florin, Igor Linkov, Kenneth A. Oye, Arthur C. Petersen, Ortwin Renn, Jonathan B. Wiener, Lan Xue

Faculty Scholarship

The International Risk Governance Council (IRGC) was a nonprofit foundation, based first as an independent, freestanding Swiss foundation in Geneva from 2003 to 2012, and then affiliated with École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Lausanne from 2012 to 2023. IRGC's mission was to identify and improve the governance of emerging and systemic risks that have, or could have, impacts on human and environmental health, the economy and society, and overall sustainability. In this paper, we recount IRGC's history, describe its many reports, workshops, and conference activities (including tables referencing the many published products), and provide six brief case histories of …

Ineligible Partners: Tribal Nations And Cooperative Federalism In The Historical Development Of National Forest Law And Policy, James H. Baker

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Lands within the National Forest System (NFS), like all federal public lands, are rooted in Aboriginal Title and were once exclusively inhabited by Indigenous peoples and communities. Through the process of treaty-making, the federal government amassed millions of acres of ceded Tribal lands, many of which are now managed by federal public land agencies, including 194 million acres managed by the U.S. Forest Service (USFS). Several Tribes reserved various use and property rights on these lands that are protected by the U.S. Constitution’s Treaty and Supremacy Clauses. The federal government also has an overarching trust obligation to Tribes – a …

Overcoming Obstacles To Equitable Energy Transitions And Promoting Energy Sovereignty For Us Tribal Nations, Don Lee

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

This dissertation explores the potential of equitable energy transitions guided by the tenets of energy justice with a focus on Tribal energy sovereignty through renewable energy development. It contributes to the literature on the social acceptance of energy systems, public perceptions of renewable energy transitions, the ramifications of US federal Tribal law on Tribal energy development and sovereignty, and the implications of conforming to capitalist logics in the energy justice literature.

To understand the importance of building reciprocal and collaborative relationships, our team of researchers and Tribal members collaborated on the development of a methodology to survey respondents in a …

Effectiveness, Coherence, And Justice Implications Of Clean Energy Policies In The United States, Josephine Amponsem

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Public policies have been adopted and implemented at various government levels in the United States, aiming to facilitate the clean energy transition process. This dissertation examines three distinct but related dimensions of clean energy policies: policy effectiveness, policy coherence, and distributional policy impact. First, I evaluate the impact of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA) on clean energy adoption at the utility level using a quasi-experimental design: the Difference-in-Difference estimation. Secondly, I use the state of California as a case study to investigate the role of policy coherence in public policy success. Thirdly, I investigate whether communities with different …

Cyber Warfare And The Future Of Conflict, Victor A. Mercado

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

This thesis examines whether cyber warfare now poses a more immediate threat to U.S. national security than weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Cyber operations have become a dominant instrument of contemporary conflict, with malicious actors operating in a persistent “grey zone” that blurs traditional boundaries between war and peace. These operations target military and civilian entities, both directly and often as collateral damage due to the uncontrollable nature of cyber threats. WMDs, despite their catastrophic destructive potential, remain largely constrained by established deterrence frameworks.

The evolving nature of cyber warfare warrants comparison to WMD effects and impact, as cyber capabilities …

Civilian Manufacturing And National Defense: Strategic Planning For Globalization's Challenges, Izeck Kohler

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

This thesis examines the interconnection between civilian manufacturing and national defense within the context of globalization. The study aims to identify the challenges faced by the United States in maintaining its manufacturing capabilities and to propose strategic solutions to address these challenges. Through a comprehensive analysis of historical data, case studies, and policy recommendations, the research highlights the critical role of specialized and process manufacturing sectors towards national defense. The findings suggest that the creation of a federal executive department, strategic investment, diversification, policy re-evaluation, and collaborating with allies are essential for sustaining national defense capabilities. The study concludes with …