UNT Theses and Dissertations - 338 Matching Results

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An Assessment of the Attitudes of the Personnel of Welfare-Oriented Governmental Agencies Toward the Poor
This study explores and assesses the attitudes of the personnel of welfare-oriented governmental bureaucracies toward the poor. To fulfill these goals, a treatment and a control group were selected to compare their attitudes toward this group. They were measured by a disguised-structured instrument using the survey approach. It was found that the majority of respondents in both groups have a pro-poor attitude but it is more prevalent among the bureaucrats than among the students. In light of the knowledge we have of the effect of attitudes on the execution of policies, these results suggest that the policies governing the different programs studied are being executed to the advantage of the client.
Balance-of-Power Theory and the Ethiopian-Somali Conflict of 1977- 1978
Balance-of-Power theory was tested by examining the 1977-1978 Ethiopian-Somali conflict and its outcome. The theory, according to Waltz (1979), claims to explain the international outcome arising from realpolitik or power politics, namely, the formation of balances of power. Given the close fit between the major developments leading to the eruption of conflict and the principal propositions of balance-of-power theory, the outcome of the conflict was expected to be consistent with that posited by the theory. This expectation was borne out by the study's finding which indicated that the conflict has produced a similar result. Confirmation of the theory was achieved by further subjecting the finding to the verification test established by Waltz.
Beggars, Brides, and Bards: The Political Philosophy of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew
To do justice to Shakespeare’s comprehensive moral and political thought this paper seeks to discover what we can learn from the political philosophy of his largely neglected comedy, Taming of the Shrew. Not only does this endeavor provide a valuable forgotten link within the critical analyses of the theorists, but it also corrects the various misinterpretations of the play among contemporary critics. I argue that the play surveys various key themes that are rooted in classical political philosophy – such as education, the problems of anger, and the dynamic between nature and convention – and takes into consideration how they apply to modern man. Shakespeare borrows Plato’s idea that eroticism is central to education and explicitly references Ovid’s love books to reexamine our conceptions about one’s formation of character, the proper standards for judging the ideal mate, and the effects of these issues on the stability of the community. I also submit an innovative explanation of the relation between the induction and the main plot. Taken together they exhibit a critique of the role of the poet and his art in modern civil society.
Beyond GNP: Economic Freedom as a Determinant of Basic Human Needs.
Research concerning ‘basic needs' in the Human Rights literature has consistently found a positive and significant relationship between measures of wealth and basic needs provision. This study utilizes a relatively new measure of economic freedom to test hypotheses regarding general macro-economic policy decisions and basic needs outcomes. A pooled dataset of 138 countries over four years is examined using OLS panel regression controlling for both' year' and ‘country,' in a standard basic needs model. Consistent and systematic differences between economic freedom effects in OECD nations and non-OECD nations are revealed. The Economic Freedom Index has both theoretical and empirical advantages over previous measures of wealth and economic freedom, allowing human rights scholars to test specific economic policy decisions as they affect basic needs outcomes.
A Black/Non-Black Theory of African-American Partisanship: Hostility, Racial Consciousness and the Republican Party
Why is black partisan identification so one-sidedly Democratic forty years past the Civil Rights movement? A black/non-black political dichotomy manifests itself through one-sided African-American partisanship. Racial consciousness and Republican hostility is the basis of the black/non-black political dichotomy, which manifests through African-American partisanship. Racial consciousness forced blacks to take a unique and somewhat jaundiced approach to politics and Republican hostility to black inclusion in the political process in the 1960s followed by antagonism toward public policy contribute to overwhelming black Democratic partisanship. Results shown in this dissertation demonstrate that variables representing economic issues, socioeconomic status and religiosity fail to explain partisan identification to the extent that Hostility-Consciousness explains party identification.
The Blessed and the Damned: Peacemakers, Warlords, and Post Civil War Democracy
This thesis seeks to explain how democracies emerge out of the ashes of civil wars. This paper envisions transitions to democracy after a civil war largely as a function of the peace process. Democracy is thought of as a medium through which solutions to the problems and issues over which the civil war was fought can be solved without violence. Transitions to democracy are more likely if there is a large bargaining space and the problems of credible commitments to democratization can be solved. Democratization is more likely if four conditions exist in a state after the civil war: a negotiated settlement, credible commitments via international enforcement, demobilization, and a cooperative international environment. The hypotheses derived are tested through an event history analysis for two different standards of democracy. The results suggest that factors indicative of all four theoretical concepts contribute to the likelihood of democratization after a civil war.
The British Withdrawal from the Arabian Gulf and Its Regional Political Consequences in the Gulf
This study has a twofold purpose: to demonstrate the causes of and various responses (British domestic, Iranian, Arabian, American, and Soviet) to the British decision to withdraw and to illustrate the regional political consequences of that withdrawal. The British Labour Government decision resulted primarily from an economic crisis. The various responses to the decision seem to have been motivated by national self-interest. Some of the Gulf states-- Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait--predicted that the consequences of the withdrawal would be desirable while others--Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates-- predicted that the consequences would not be beneficial. In some ways, both sides were correct in their predictions.
Canadian Supreme Court Decision-making, 1875-1990 : Institutional, Group, and Individual Level Perspectives
Since its creation in 1875, the Canadian Supreme Court has undergone several institutional transitions. These transitions have changed the role of the Court toward a more explicit and influential policy making role in the country. Despite this increasingly significant role, very limited attention has been given to the Court. With this perspective in mind, this study presents several analyses on the decision making process of the Canadian Supreme Court. At the institutional level, the study found that within the stable workload, the cases composition has shifted away from private law to public law cases. This shift is more significant when one concentrates on appeals involving constitutional and rights cases. The study found that this changing pattern of the Court's decision making was a result of the institutional changes shaping the Supreme Court. Statistically, the abolition of rights to appeal in civil cases in 1975 was found to be the most important source of the workload change.
Canadian Supreme Court Decision-Making: The Personal Attribute Model in Explaining Justices' Patterns of Decision-Making, 1949-1980
This study has two purposes: first, to test the validity of the personal attribute model in explaining judicial voting behavior outside its original cultural context; second, to explain the variation in justice's voting behavior in the Canadian Supreme Court. For the most part, the result arrived in this study supports the validity of the model in cross-cultural analysis. The result of multiple regression analysis shows that four variables, region, judicial experience prior to appointment, political party of appointing Prime Minister, and tenure account for 60 percent of the variations in justice's voting behavior. This result, hence, provides an empirical finding to the development of the personal attribute model in explaining justices' voting behavior.
The Causes of Revolution: A Case Study of Iranian Revolution of 1978-79
This study investigates the causes of the Iranian revolution of 1978-79. To this end, the different theories of revolution are reviewed in Chapter One. Chapter Two provides a discussion of the historical background of the country and the role the clergy played in shaping its political development. Socioeconomic and political factors which contributed to the outbreak of this revolution are examined in the following two chapters. Finally, an attempt is made to draw some conclusions on whether existing theories of revolution can fully explain the Iranian upheaval of 1978-79 or not. For the preparation of this study United States government documents and Iranian and English language scholarly works were consulted.
Changing Ideological Boots: Adaptive Legislator Behavior in Changing Districts
Congressional roll-call votes are often used to investigate legislative voting behavior. To depict adaptive roll-call behavior in response to demographic changes that occur during redistricting, I use issue specific interest group scores from the ADA, NFU, and COPE. This exploits the bias in the selection of the issues that interest groups utilize to rate U.S. representatives, by using them to reflect changes in response to significant demographic fluctuations in the constituency population. The findings indicate that while party is the most significant factor in whether legislators adapt their voting in favor of certain groups, they do notice group composition changes within district and adapt their voting accordingly. This illustrates the impact of redistricting on policy and legislators' adaptation to changes in district composition.
Child Soldiers and Intrastate Armed Conflicts: An Analysis of the Recruitments of Child Soldiers in Civil Wars Between 2001 and 2003.
This thesis examines why some governments and rebel organizations but not others recruit children to be child soldiers. The theory posits that if a country fights in a civil war of long duration, armed groups are more likely to recruit children as soldiers. I find that the probability of child soldier recruitment increases when a country experiences following conditions: a longer duration of civil war, a large proportion of battle deaths, a large number of refugees, a high infant mortality rate, and the presence of alluvial diamonds. An increase in education expenditures and civil liberties would decrease the probability of child soldier recruitments.
Clenching the Fists of Dissent: Political Unrest, Repression, and the Evolution to Civil War
Previous scholarship has long concentrated on the behaviors of belligerents during regime-dissident interactions. While much of the progress in the literature concentrated on the micro-level processes of this relationship, little research has focused on providing a theoretical reasoning on why belligerents choose to act in a particular manner. This project attempts to open the black box of decision making for regimes and dissidents during regime-dissident interactions in order to provide a theoretical justification for the behaviors of the belligerents involved. Moreover, this project argues that there is a relationship between the lower level events of political violence and civil war as the events at earlier stages of the conflict influence the possible outcome of civil conflict. Regimes and dissidents alike are strategic actors who conduct themselves in a manner to ensure their survival while concurrently attempting to succeed at achieving their respective goals. Although all authoritarian regimes are similar in their differences to democracies, there are significant differences between the regimes, which influence the decision making of the regime leader to ensure the survival of the political institution. In addition to influencing the decision calculus of the regimes, the behavior of the regimes impacts the probability of civil war at later stages of the interaction. Conversely, dissidents also perform as strategic actors in an attempt to gain their preferred concessions and outcomes. Although their comprehension of the coercive capacity of a regime is limited, their knowledge of the repressive capacity of the regime provides them with the understanding of their future fate if they escalate to violence against the regime. This project is conducted using two theories on regime and dissident actions and responses, two large-N empirical analyses of regime and dissident behaviors during nonviolent and violent dissident campaigns from 1945-2006, and two historical case studies of Egypt and Syria …
Collaboration among Conflict Management Practitioners and Human Rights Advocacy Groups
In a civil war, conflict management practitioners are concerned with bringing the conflict to an end and providing security for civilians. Similarly, human rights advocacy groups are also concerned with minimizing civilian harm. Given the similar intentions of these actors in civil war states, this dissertation explores under what circumstances conflict management practitioners and human rights advocacy groups collaborate. First, I compare to what extent mediation and peacekeeping cases differ with regards to showing signs of interaction; second, I compare how the level of interaction changes depending on whether peacekeeping missions are deployed by the United Nations or regional intergovernmental organizations. I find that human rights groups are more likely to interact with peacekeeping missions, especially when the missions are deployed by the United Nations. Moreover, I analyze to what extent the interaction between human rights groups and peacekeeping operations impacts how human rights groups carry out their advocacy efforts. The findings reveal that the way human rights groups use their advocacy efforts depend on whether the third parties providing peacekeeping operations respond to their requests.
The Commander's Sword & the Executive's Pen: Presidential Success in Congress and the Use of Force.
Post-force congressional rally effects are presented as a new incentive behind presidential decisions to use diversionary behavior. Using all key roll call votes in the House and Senate where the president has taken a position for the years 1948 to 1993, presidents are found to receive sharp decreases in both presidential support and success in Congress shortly after employing aggressive policies abroad. Evidence does suggest that presidents are able to capitalize on higher levels of congressional support for their policy preferences on votes pertaining to foreign or defense matters after uses of force abroad. But, despite these findings, diversionary behavior is found to hinder rather than facilitate troubled presidents' abilities to influence congressional voting behavior.
Communication Flow, Information Exchange and Their Impact on Human Rights Violations
Although international human rights declarations exist, violations of human rights are still sad but also common facts around the world. But for repressive regimes, it becomes more and more difficult to hide committed human rights violations, since society entered the "Information Revolution." This study argues that the volume of international information exchanged influences a country's human rights record. A pooled cross sectional time series regression model with a lagged endogenous variable and a standard robust error technique is used to test several hypotheses. The findings of this study indicate that the flow of information can be related to a country's human rights index. The study also suggests that more empirical work on this topic will be necessary.
A Comparative Study of Terrorism in Southwest Asia 1968-1982
This study assumes that political terrorism results from conscious decision-making by groups opposing a governing system, policy or process. The kinds of terrorist activity employed depend upon such factors as the philosophy, goals, objectives, and needs of the terrorist group. This presents a comparative analysis of three types of terrorists in southwest Asia: Palestinians, Marxist-Leninists, and Muslims. The first section summarizes and compares the three groups' motivational causes, philosophies, histories and sources of inspiration. The second section compares their behavior from four perspectives: trends and patterns, level of violence, tactical preferences, and lethality. The third section identifies and categorizes socioeconomic, political and military variables associated with tactic selection and acts of terrorism.
A Comparison of Thailand's Relations with the United States and China, 1965-1975
This thesis compares Thailand',s relations with the United States and China from 196541975, The realist as-sumes that the structure of power in the internationall system determines overall relations between states' First, this study describes the power situation in southeast Asia in 1965, The next steps are concerned with the study of Thai-U, S. relations and Thai-Chinese relations, The thesis finds that Thailand's relations with the United States and China are determined by the structure of power. When a major power like the United States changes its policies to accommodate China, Thailand, which is a small country, turns to be more friendly with China, These attitudes correlate with the realist assumption,.
A Comparison of the Performance of the Radical and Conservative Models of Economic Development in the Carribean Basin
The present study is an attempt to compare the performance of two competing models of economic development-- the conservative and radical models. The conservative model is represented by the Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras; the radical model is represented by Cuba. The following chapters focus on a comparison of these models as they have manifested themselves in the Carribean basin. The analysis of the performance of the models is conducted by comparing socioeconomic variables of the countries representing the models. The study looks at the time period 1960 - 1980 which coincides with the adoption of the two models in the respective countries.
Concerning Millennials: Exploring Generational Cohort Effects on Racial Linked Fate, Religion and Politics, and Support for American Civil Liberities
This research examines the political implications of the Millennial generation on American politics by exploring the interaction of generational cohort with race, social issues, and civil liberties. Relying on the 2016 Collaborative Multiracial Post-Election Survey and the 2018 General Social Survey, I examine (1) Millennial attitudes toward race and ethnicity by looking specifically at racial linked fate, (2) how Millennials interact with race and evangelical Christianity and how this interaction influences social policy preferences, and (3) how generational factors influence Millennial attitudes toward American civil liberties. I find that there are measurable effects of generational cohorts on the predicted value of Linked Fate for racial minority groups in the United States. My results suggest that Millennials are significantly more likely to have higher levels of linked fate for Latino and Asian Americans. However, I do not find sufficient evidence to suggest that African Americans' level of linked fate is affected either positively or negatively for Millennials. Second, for the investigation on social policy, the results suggest that those who sit at the intersection of the three groups- the Latino-Millennial evangelicals- hold policy preferences that contrast from those who are solely either Latino, Millennial, or evangelical. Latino-Millennial evangelicals are significantly more likely to hold liberal policy preferences on issues of climate change but more conservative attitudes on aid to the poor. Lastly, on issues of American civil liberties, the results indicate that Millennials are far more likely to support free speech (even for controversial actors), than both the Boomer generation and Generation X. Millennials are also more likely to oppose governmental intervention in religion and are significantly more likely to support abortion rights for women.
Contemporary Patterns of Democratic Norms and Political Participation in Mexico
Mexico's cultural norms have been the subject of repeated inquiries because democratic and authoritarian patterns appear concomitantly. However, few have focused on the potential demographic and contextual sources of these divergent results. This study attempts to clarify the sources of Mexico's political culture, and then determine the extent to which these factors affect political participation. Statistical analysis of a LAPOP dataset from 2006 makes limited progress to this end. The sources of Mexican political culture remain somewhat a mystery, although some intriguing results were found. Most notably, demographic traits appear to have little influence on political culture variables and political participation rates in Mexico. In fact, political culture norms and political participation appears consistent across Mexico's infamous social and economic lines.
Context Matters: How Feminist Movements Magnify Feminist Opinion of Progressive Policies in South America
What explains the inconsistency of female empowerment in South America, despite high levels of institutional inclusion? Generally, the social sciences tend to lean on the tenets of liberal feminism in order to measure the development of gender-inclusive policy changes; however, their findings indicate that higher levels of institutional inclusion does not necessarily translate into the empowerment of women as a group. Further, within political science, there is little research addressing the relationship between feminist movements and the feminist opinion of individuals within a state. I argue that strong feminist social movements provide a context in which feminist opinion is magnified, and where individuals will be more likely to support progressive policy changes. Using questions from the World Values Survey, I operationalize progressive policies as the Justifiability of Abortion. My primary independent variables are the presence feminist movements and the presence of feminist opinion, which is measured by support for female sexual freedom. After using a multilevel mixed-effects linear regression, I find support for my hypotheses, indicating that feminist opinion is magnified by the presence of feminist movements.
Contextualizing the Law: Sentencing Decisions of Sexual Assault Cases of Dallas County, 1999-2005
The incidence of sexual assault inundates the courts with many cases each year. Given the unique nature of the crime, judges and juries are faced with an array of different scenarios to which they are required to make fair, justifiable and consistent decisions. I examine child sexual assault cases of Dallas County 1999-2005, I look at both legal and extralegal factors including case characteristics, institutional characteristics and characteristics of the defendants and the victims. First, I examine the impact of the independent variables on sentence length using regression analysis to determine influences on sentencing for judges and juries. Second, I examine the same factors using Probit analysis to determine which characteristics make a life sentence more probable for those decision-makers.
Cost of Issuing Debt: An Analysis of the Factors Affecting the Net Interest Cost of State Bonds
The major purpose of this dissertation is to explore the determinants of interest cost for state bonds. Various kinds of variables pertaining to issue characteristics, market characteristics, economic conditions, and political variables were statistically tested to assess their impact on the interest cost of state bonds. This research examines the variables found to be significant for local bonds, as well as some factors unique to state bonds, e.g., the types state agencies issuing debt and the effect of different state income tax policies.
The Counterinsurgency Dilemma: The Causes and Consequences of State Repression of Human Rights in Civil Wars
In this project a theory of adaptive differential insurgency growth by the mechanism of repression driven contagion is put forth to explain variation in the membership and spatial expansion of insurgencies from 1981 to 1999. As an alternative to the dominant structural approaches in the civil war literature, Part 1 of the study proposes an interactive model of insurgency growth based on Most and Starr's opportunity and willingness framework. The findings suggest that state capacity, via its impact on state repressive behavior, plays an important gatekeeping function in selecting which minor insurgencies can grow into civil war, but contributes little to insurgency growth directly. In Part 2 of the study, I directly examine variation in insurgency membership and geographical expansion as a function of repression driven contagion. I find that repression increases the overall magnitude of insurgency activity within states, while at the same time reducing the density of insurgency activity in any one place. Despite an abundance of low intensity armed struggles against a highly diverse group of regimes around the world, I find an extremely strong and robust regularity: where repression is low - insurgencies don't grow.
Court-Curbing in the Ninetieth Congress
This study seeks to analyze quantitatively the Court-curbing tendencies of the Ninetieth Congress.
A Critical Analysis of the Writings of Samuel P. Huntington on Political Stability and Violence
Samuel P. Huntington has argued that political stability is dependent on the degree of institutionalization of participation in the political system. Critical analysis of hypotheses reveals serious flaws in his logic. His concepts were shown to be very hard to make operational and to test. The main hypothesis of a direct relationship between institutionalization and stability was shown to be influenced most likely by additional intervening variables. This study seeks to survey and analyze some of the problems which have arisen with the present state of theory in comparative politics. However, this thesis is particularly interested in .Huntington's work which covers the evolution of his thinking regarding the relation of violence and of political stability, i.e., the degree of government and not the form, with the institutionalization of participation.
Crossing Over: Essays on Ethnic Parties, Electoral Politics, and Ethnic Social Conflict
This dissertation analyzes several topics related to political life in ethnically divided societies. In chapter 2, I study the relationship between ethnic social conflict, such as protests, riots, and armed inter-ethnic violence, and bloc partisan identification. I find that protests have no effect on bloc support for political parties, riots increase bloc partisan identification, and that armed violence reduces this phenomenon. In chapter 3, I analyze the factors that influence the targeting of ethnic groups by ethnic parties in social conflict. I find some empirical evidence that conditions favorable to vote pooling across ethnic lines reduce group targeting by ethnic parties. In chapter 4, I analyze the effects of ethnic demography on ethnic party behavior. Through a qualitative analysis of party behavior in local elections in Macedonia, I find that ethnic parties change their strategies in response to changes in ethnic demography. I find that co-ethnic parties are less likely to challenge each other for power under conditions of split demography. In fact, under conditions of split demography, I find that co-ethnic parties have political incentives to unite behind a single party because intra-group competition jeopardizes the group's hold on power.
The Czech Republic's Transition: The Environment and Human Rights
This exploratory case study considers the Czech Republic from 1993 thru 2002 by examining two links: first, between transition and the environment.; second, between the environment and human rights. The study examines data from the Czech Ministry of Environment, the European Union, the World Bank, and Freedom House. The purpose of this study is to better understand the Czech Republic and to generate hypotheses that might be used in future cross-national studies. Chapter III provides the underlying theory linking the environment and human rights. Chapters IV, V, and VI discuss the data and the two links and suggest hypotheses for future research. Chapter VII draws conclusions about states in transition, the environment, and human rights and encourages future integrative research.
The Dallas Morning News' View Towards International Relations
The purpose of this study is to determine, if possible, North Central Texas views or attitudes toward international relations. These attitudes will be compared to studies on Southern attitudes to determine any similarities or dissimilarities. Literature on Southwestern attitudes is sparse; therefore, all data will be compared with that compiled by political scientists on Southern attitudes.
Dangerous Changes? The Effect of Political Regime Changes on Life Integrity Violations, 1977-1993
This study develops a model of different types of political regime changes and their effect on life integrity violations. The data covers 147 countries from 1977-1993. Basic bivariate analyses and multivariate pooled cross-sectional time series analyses employing Ordinary Least Squares regression with panel-corrected standard errors are used. The results show that political regime change in general has no effect on state-sponsored violence. Looking at different types of regime changes, the regression analysis indicates that change from democracy to anocracy is positively correlated with levels of repression at the level of p < .001. A change toward democracy from autocracy is negatively related to human rights violations at the level of p < .01, once relevant control variables are considered.
Dealignment Decades on: Partisanship and Party Support in Great Britain, 1979-1996
This dissertation surveys electoral change in Great Britain during the period between 1979 and 1996. It analyzes the long-term factors and the short-term dynamics underlying the evolution of three aspects of the electorate: party identification, voting intentions and party support in inter-election periods. Drawing on cross-sectional and panel data from the British Election Studies and public opinion polls, I investigate the impacts of long-term socialization and short-term perceptions on voters' political decisions. I hypothesize that, over the last four elections, perceptual factors such as evaluations of party leaders and issues, particularly economic concerns, emerged as the major forces that account for the volatility in electoral behavior in Britain. Accordingly, this study is divided into three sections: Part I probes into the evolution in party identification across age cohorts and social classes as illustrated in trends in partisanship. Part II focuses on changes in voting intentions as affected by perceptual factors and party identification. Part III investigates the public's support for governing parties by analyzing the dynamics of aggregate party support during inter-election periods.
Decentralization, Privatization, and Economic Development in Developing Countries : A Theoretical and Quantitative Analysis
This study focuses on clarifying the relationships among decentralization, privatization, and economic development in developing countries.
Decision-Making at the Court of Appeals Level Involving Religious Liberty Cases
Many studies have been completed on factors affecting judicial decisions. Studies have focused on civil rights cases, economic cases, criminal cases, sexual discrimination and obscenity cases, but no work has specifically looked at religious liberty cases. This work examines the factors affecting United States Courts of Appeals judges' decision-making in religious liberty cases. I hypothesize that gender, race, religious background, prior judicial experience, circuit, region and litigant status will all influence the way judges vote in religious liberty cases. The explanatory power of this study is relatively low, but the results indicate that judges follow the law when making decisions in religious liberty cases.
Democratic Pantheism in the Political Theory of Alexis de Tocqueville
According to Alexis de Tocqueville, humanity is entering a new age of political and social equality, a new epoch in which the human race has no historical example or experience. As a result, he holds humanity's future will be largely determined by the political and moral choices made in this transitional time. For Tocqueville, the new egalitarian era is a forgone conclusion, but for him, the pressing question is whether humanity will choose a future in which it enchains itself to new forms of tyranny, or, whether the human race can establish the political and moral institutions designed to assure human freedom and dignity. In Tocqueville's view, liberty or slavery are the two choices modern men and women have in front of them, and it is the intent of this dissertation to explore Tocqueville's warning in regard to the latter choice. Tocqueville warns us that modern democratic peoples must beware of the moral and political effects of a new type of political philosophy, a political theory he terms democratic pantheism. Democratic pantheism is a philosophic doctrine that treats egalitarianism as a "religion" in which all social and political striving is directed toward realizing a providentially ordained strict equality of conditions. To attain this end, modern humanity gives up its right to self-government to an all-powerful "representative" state that will unconsciously (and as a result, unjustly) force equality on unequal human beings. Because this philosophy informs the core "soul" of a pantheistic social state, the vast majority of individuals are blissfully unaware that their humanity is diminished and their freedom is lost. The effect is a political and intellectual torpor wherein democratic citizens fall prey to a deterministic and insipid existence; and any thoughts of true independence and freedom of action are eventually extinguished--all due to the unknowing acceptance of a …
Democratization and the Information Revolution: A Global Analysis for the 1980s
Comparative studies of democratization point to a multitude of explanatory factors, while often lacking empirical evidence and theoretical foundation. This study introduces the revolution in information technology as a significant contributor to democratization in the 1980s and beyond. Utilizing a cybernetic version of an evolutionary interpretation of democratization an amended model for 147 countries is tested by bivariate and multiple regression analysis. The focus of the analysis is on how the first-ever use of an indicator of information technology explains democratization. The overall findings show that information technology is a meaningful element in the study of democratization today.
Dependence Upon Oil and its Influence on Foreign Policy
This investigation is concerned with determining what influence, if any, results from the dependence upon foreign sources of petroleum by the United States, France, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. The influence that petroleum plays upon the changing attitudes of these four nations towards Israel and the Arab nations is ascertained by the utilization of primary and secondary sources. The study analyzes all the resolutions that have been adopted by the United Nations Security Council in the years between 1948 and 1976 dealing specifically with the Arab-Israeli conflict. Other chapters analyze each of the four nations to which attention is being directed. This study concludes that the growing and continuing dependence upon Arab oil has influenced the foreign policies the four nations have assumed toward the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The Destruction of a Society: A Qualitative Examination of the Use of Rape as a Military Tool
This thesis explores the conditions under which mass rapes are more likely to be incorporated into the strategy of military or paramilitary groups during periods of conflict. I examine three societies, Rwanda , the former Yugoslavia , and Cambodia in a comparative analysis. To determine what characteristics make societies more likely to engage in rape as a military tool, I look at the status of women in the society, the religious cultures, the degree of female integration into the military institutions, the cause of the conflicts, the history of the conflict, and finally, the status of minority ethnic groups in each of these societies.
The Determinants of Federal Spending for the Administration of Justice
This study develops and empirically tests a model of the determinants of federal spending for crime-fighting policies. An inter-disciplinary approach to building the model is utilized that merges ideas from budgeting, policy analysis and criminology. Four factors hypothesized to impact federal spending for the administration of justice are operationalized as eight variables and tested using ordinary least squares regression analysis on time series data. The factors hypothesized to impact federal spending in this area are economic constraints imposed on government spending, the ideological makeup of Congress and the president, the actual crime rate, and the public's attitude toward crime. Five of the eight variables demonstrated statistical significance at the.10 level or better.
Determinants of International Terrorist Group Formation, 1968-1999
Terrorism has become a focus of much political thought over the past few years, and with good reason, yet most quantitative studies of terrorism investigate the likelihood of a terrorist incident while ignoring the precursors to terrorist group formation. I examine cases of new terrorist group formations between the years 1968 and 1999 as a function of domestic demographic, geographic, governmental and societal factors. This is done by Poisson regression analysis, which determines the significance of the independent variables on a count of new international terrorist group formations per country year. The results indicate that higher levels of material government capability, high levels of political freedom, the availability of low-cost refuge, and a cultural tradition of terrorism all have a positive impact on the number of new terrorist group formations, while a higher degree of governmental durability has a negative impact.
Developing Capacity: The IMF's Impact on State Capacity
The purpose of this thesis is to examine the impact of International Monetary Fund (IMF) loans since the adoption of the governance mandate on overall government capability. The study will explore whether the presence of IMF loans in developing countries enhances state capacity. Administrative capacity is of particular importance because it is a requisite for the integration of state and society in the national political arena and encourages joint involvement of government and citizenry in overall representation of societal interests. The model designed to test the two primary hypotheses is comprised of a simultaneous system of equations. Despite criticisms of IMF conditionality arrangements, it appears that these programs are largely effective at increasing administrative capacity, an important factor in achieving economic growth and national ownership of IMF development programs.
Development and Change in International Regimes: the Case of International Lending
The present study is an attempt to better understand change in international relations through utilization of the concept of international regimes. The following chapters focus on creation of the international lending regime and change that has occurred within this regime. The work begins by reviewing the regime literature, noting definitional and conceptual problems of the approach. The review concludes with examples of regime scholarship that are utilized through the rest of the study. Examination of international lending as a regime consists of three sections: first, a profile of the creation of the United States-led, post-war multilateral lending regime; second, the replacement of U.S. geo-political concerns with a market emphasis desired by international banks; third, the more recent redirection of lending as the utility of market forces is constrained by adjustments necessary to facilitate emergency debt restructuring.
The Development and Implementation of Federal Policy Concerning Health Maintenance Organizations
There is some controversy which centers around the question of whether a particular government policy or program may be Judged successful. This dissertation takes the position, with due respect to the difficulties of such a task, that policy success can be evaluated and that it is important that such evaluations be made. Traditionally, health care in the United States has been delivered by the solo medical practitioner on a fee-for-service basis. A relatively new concept in the health care delivery system combines group practice with prepayment for services. These types of practices were designated as Health Maintenance Organizations in 1970 by the Nixon Administration.The major question of this dissertation is whether or not the HMO policy of the federal government has been a success. Along with this question the primary focus of this dissertation is upon the development and evolution of the federal HMO program.
The Dichotomy of Congressional Approval
This thesis seeks to understand how political awareness affects what information one uses to indicate their approval or disapproval of Congress and its members. More concisely, do more and less aware individuals rely on the same pieces of political information to mold their opinions of Congress? The second question of concern is what role does media consumption play in informing survey respondents about Congress. Third, I consider how survey respondents use cues like the condition of the economy and presidential job performance to help formulate their opinion of Congress Finally, by applying the Congressional approval literature to incumbent level approval, I seek to advance the theory and literature on what motivates the approval of incumbents.
A Different Kind of Political Party: The Relationship between Tabletop Role Playing Games and Political Efficacy
Tabletop role-playing games (TRPGs) present a unique opportunity to study political behavior. In educational settings, role-playing games (RPGs) of all kinds have proven to be valuable educational tools, and even when played for fun, participating in role playing games has been shown to increase one's level of confidence. Knowing this, I designed an experiment to attempt to increase internal political efficacy through the use of a politically-themed TRPG. I took inspiration from the original TRPGs of the 1970s and 1980s which were used purely for entertainment purposes to create my own game in a traditional TRPG setting with current issues woven into the story of the game (also called a campaign), and utilized quantitative and qualitative methods to analyze participants' reactions to the campaign and levels of efficacy. In doing so, I seek to determine whether players will recognize real-world issues when presented in a science fiction or fantasy-themed campaign. Furthermore, given that TRPGs have the potential to shape players' understanding of how the world works and their place in it, will players be more motivated to act on said issues presented in-game, even if they do not consciously make the connection between the real-life issues presented in the science fiction/fantasy setting and those same issues in the real world?
Discovery of Resources and Conflict in the Interstate System, 1816-2001
This study tests a theory detailing the increased likelihood of conflict following an initial resource discovery in the discovering nation and its region. A survey of prior literature shows a multitude of prior research concerning resources and nations' willingness to initiate conflict over those resources, but this prior research lacks any study concerning the effects of the discovery of resources on interstate conflict. The theory discusses the increased likelihood of conflict in the discovering nation as both target and initiator. It further looks at the increased chance of conflict in the discoverer's region due to security dilemmas and proxy wars. The results show strong support for the theory, suggesting nations making new resource discoveries must take extra care to avoid conflict.
Do As They Say, and As They Do: An Integrated Approach to the Study of Norm Influence on Truth Commission Initiation, 1976-2003
Truth commissions are bodies established in political transition, and they have the stated purpose of reckoning with human rights abuses committed by members of former regimes. The question driving this research is "Why have truth commissions increased so rapidly in the last 20 years?" This study moves beyond current research, which suggests that particular domestic political circumstances alone determine choice of transitional justice mechanisms. I argue that an international rule of behavior, the transitional restorative norm, has emerged and spread to decision-makers in countries of transition. In support of this notion, I perform a pre-theoretical historical analysis of transitional justice and develop a theory of decision-making in transition-which is later tested with quantitative statistics. This integrated approach allows for increased scientific rigor in the examination of international norms. Ultimately, the study demonstrates an interrelationship between shared ideas and political environments in the determination of domestic policy.
Do Different Political Regime Types Use Foreign Aid Differently to Improve Human Development?
Existing literature on foreign aid does not indicate what type of political regime is best to achieve human development outcomes or use aid funds more efficiently. I contend that political leaders of different regime types have personal incentives that motivate them to utilize foreign aid to reflect their interests in providing more or less basic social services for their citizens. Using a data set of 126 aid-recipient countries between the years of 1990 and 2007, I employ fixed effects estimation to test the model. The overall results of this research indicate that foreign aid and democratic institutionalization have a positive effect on total enrollment in primary education, while political regime types show little difference from one another in providing public health and education for their citizens.
Does Cultural Heterogeneity Lead to Lower Levels of Regime Respect for Basic Human Rights?
This dissertation is a cross-national investigation of the relationship between cultural heterogeneity and regimes' respect for basic human rights. The quantitative human rights literature has not yet addressed the question of whether high levels of cultural diversity are beneficial or harmful. My research addresses this gap. I address the debate between those who argue that diversity is negatively related to basic human rights protection and those who argue it is likely to improve respect for these rights. Ultimately, I propose that regimes in diverse countries will be less likely to provide an adequate level of subsistence (otherwise known as basic human needs) and security rights (also known as integrity of the person rights) to their citizens than regimes in more homogeneous countries. Using a data set of 106 non-OECD countries for the years 1983 and 1993, I employ bivariate, linear multivariate regression, and causal modeling techniques to test whether higher levels of ethnolinguistic and religious diversity are associated with less regime respect for subsistence and security rights. The analysis reveals that higher levels of cultural diversity do appear to lead to lower respect for subsistence rights. However, counter to the hypothesized relationship, high levels of diversity appear to be compatible with high levels of respect for security rights.
Does Euroscepticism Matter? the Effect of Public Opinion on Integration
This dissertation seeks to test the proposition that public opinion is a driving force in integration, and thus examines the effect of euroscepticism on EU integration. Utilizing an understanding of integration as the process of European states achieving similar legal, social, cultural, political and economic policy outcomes while ceding greater policy power to European institutions, the relationship between aggregate level euroscepticism in EU member states (the United Kingdom, Germany, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, and Sweden) and speed of compliance with EU policies is examined. More specifically, this dissertation examines the relationship between aggregate level euroscepticism in an EU member state, and the speed at which that state transposes EU directives. In testing this relationship a number of contextual conditions are examined, including the role of issue salience, domestic party systems, and electoral conditions. The findings of this dissertation suggest that the widely held belief that public opinion is driving European integration may be false.
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