Why do women protest? Why do women protest “as women”? Why do some women participate in protests but not others? In the wake of the Women’s March of 2017, perhaps the largest single day protest event in history, these questions are particularly timely and deserve scholarly attention. One important but understudied and undertheorized motivation for women’s protests is state sanctioned violence, particularly repression. This dissertation explicitly theorizes about how state perpetration of violence, particularly state use of repression, both motivates and shapes women’s protests on a global scale. In this dissertation, I argue that one key motivation for women’s protest is repression by the state, and I theorize that women will protest more frequently when the state uses repression. Repression negatively impacts members of the population, particularly relatives, friends, and communities of those targeted by the state, and this motivates those people to protest. However, I argue that the type of repression, and more specifically how gendered the state practices repression, matters. The more that gender plays a role in determining who states target with repression, the more gender matters in the societal response to repression. In particular, I examine the use of forced disappearances. Based on historical and contemporary accounts, I show that forced disappearance largely targets males, and thus motivates women’s protests but has no effect on protests by other groups. When the state makes use of forced disappearances, some women are motivated to protest due to their connections to victims of repression. Furthermore, opportunities to protest in these circumstances are more available to women than to men, due to their relatively lower likelihood of being targeted, as well as women’s distinctive positions in society and their ability to organize themselves as women. Not only do women have additional space relative to men to protest when the state is repressive, but individual women recognize that their gender can serve as a resource in such contexts. Thus, individual women are more likely to participate in protests themselves when the state uses repression, closing the gender gap in protest participation between men and women. I test my theory of women’s protest using two unique approaches. First, utilizing unique new data on women’s protests that is globally comprehensive for all countries from 1990-2009, I show that women’s protests are more frequent when the state is repressive, and that forced disappearances in particular motivate women’s protests, specifically, but do not have an observable effect on general protests. Second, I utilize regionally comprehensive data on citizens in Latin America from 2006 and 2008 to show that women are more likely to participate in protests when the state uses forced disappearances, but that men are not more likely to participate in protests in repressive contexts.

The central theory guiding my research is that interstate conflict, at least as covered in mass media, leaves residual cultural attitudes that can shape the political context in which elites formulate policy. Specifically, U.S. interventionism in the Middle East has given rise to fundamental hostilities, founded on misguided biases, that shape involvement in the region today. I focus on one step within that broader theory, to test it empirically: the hypothesis that anti-Muslim stereotypes, when activated, will shape an individual’s foreign-policy preferences. I begin by considering competing accounts that link 1) ethnocentrism or 2) targeted stereotypes with support for the use of military force in the Middle East. After careful review of the group-based and social-identity theories that undergird the two accounts, I synthesize them. My more-complete theory can be summarized as: Someone will exhibit an ethnocentric response toward an out-group when negative stereotypes about the group combine with an individual’s in-group identity to result in perceived threat. Applying the logic of that hypothesis to Muslims and American foreign policy, I argue that, for American whites, Muslims are uniquely situated to be perceived as realistic and symbolic cultural threats to their core national identity because they may differ in terms of ethnicity, culture, and religion. Mass media portray Muslims as violent and encourage Americans to evaluate them in terms of such cultural dissimilarity. On the other hand, Muslims present little identity threat to blacks, whose core in-group identity typically revolves around their status as a racial minority in the United States. Even blacks who identify with the nation will not view Islam as incompatible with their national identity because that identity is typically not predicated on looking, living, or believing a certain way. I develop these ideas into testable hypotheses and investigate how anti-Muslim attitudes shape opinion about important contemporary Middle East issues. Using survey and experimental data, I find compelling evidence linking anti-Muslim attitudes – among whites – to support for using military force (rather than diplomacy) against Iran and against Islamists. Those attitudes also predict opposition to accepting Syrian refugees. Finally, I turn from this narrative of negativity to argue that the anti-Muslim stereotypes many citizens bring to bear when forming judgments of Middle East policy can be shifted. I base this optimistic expectation on media framing theories, which suggest that issue frames can shift opinion when they emphasize strong and credible arguments. After constructing frames from debate statements during the 2016 Presidential Election, and an original frame that affirms counterstereotypes of Muslims, I expect and find evidence that strong frames emphasizing the obligations of American identity and factual counterstereotype-affirming information can shift those who oppose accepting refugees to more moderate positions. Broadly, my research offers a theoretically-grounded schematic for how stereotypes and identity construction operate together cognitively to shape public opinion. My methods offer leverage to those endeavoring to explain how these idea elements shape opinion in other issue domains. I also divulge important nuances about how specific actors (i.e., whites) propagate a cycle of anti-Muslim attitudes, warfare, and terrorism. I contribute to rivalry theory in international relations by explaining how cultural biases shape an enduring rivalry of the grandest scale: the perpetual U.S.-Middle East conflict. My framing research offers both academic and practical contributions by providing evidence on behalf of existing theory and by suggesting how media and political elites – by describing issues in unbiased ways – could knock off course the perpetual cycle of American interventionism, retaliatory terrorism, and resulting anti-Muslim stereotype generalizations.

To what extent do unexpected, apolitical events affect governors’ popularity? Individuals’ attitudes towards government are often random, and executives at both the state-level and national-level are held accountable for events that they have little control over. In this study, I seek to understand how these unplanned events affect support for elected officials. Specifically, I examine the effect of the declaration of a State of Emergency on gubernatorial approval. I use an ordinary least squares (OLS) model and data from FEMA as well as the United States Officials Job Approval Ratings dataset to answer such questions. The results indicate that not only do natural and manmade disasters NOT have a negative effect on governors’ popularity, there is actually no correlation between the two variables at all. Instead, I find that relative to one another, major disaster declarations have a stronger negative effect on a governor’s approval ratings than emergency declarations. Though surprising, I suggest that these disasters simply do not affect enough individuals for a long enough time to have an impact on gubernatorial popularity.

This dissertation examines the role of extreme media (i.e. political talk radio and cable news opinion shows) on the political attitudes of viewers and listeners. I investigate whether extreme media has both positive and negative externalities for democratic citizenship. Specifically, I use laboratory experiments, national survey data, and qualitative interviews to test the impact of extreme media on viewers' political knowledge, trust in government, efficacy, and political tolerance. I use laboratory experiments in controlled settings to uncover the impact of viewership on political knowledge, trust in government, and efficacy. I confirm these lab findings with the national survey data, by using propensity score matching and ordered probit models to demonstrate that exposure to extreme media produces political knowledge and efficacy, but decreases trust in government. I further use process tracing to ascertain the motivations individuals use to choose to view extreme media. Finally, through subject interviews conducted as part of the self-selection portion via a 1 x 3 self-selection experiment, I find subjects seek out entertaining media specifically from ideologically similar outlets. This project advances the media and politics literature by demonstrating the capacity for extreme media to alter political behavior, attitudes, and information processing.

This study examines the process of state gender policy reform. It seeks to explain legal changes in gender issues in Venezuela across time. The study entails observations of state policy changes in gender issues during specific periods of the Punto Fijo era (1958-1998) characterized as those of democratic consolidation and deconsolidation, and during the transition towards a new type of democracy, the Chávez era (1999-2007). The policies considered are the ones addressing women’s equality at home and at work, reproductive rights, women’s economic rights and political participation. The analysis shows that gender policy reform by the state depends on the degree of opening of the institutions and on the combination of certain configurations of state institutions and elite interests. In addition, women’s groups’ capacity to influence state gender policy change depends on their organizational capacity as well as the institutional opportunities provided by changes in state structures, elite interests, and allies of the movement.

This study examines the effect that divided or unified government, in the United States of America, has on the delegation of trade authority to the President. Using a qualitative analysis approach, I examine competing views and formulate an independent opinion based on the peoples’ preferences and evaluation of the principles of America’s Constitutionalism. I conclude that overemphasis on the impact of divided government is misleading because trade issues provide the primary mechanism which determines the implementation of America’s trade policies, and the principles of Constitutionalism are valuable guidelines. Blended with the discussion is the awareness of an American ethos which challenges formulation of trade agreements in an era of increased globalization.

This paper examines the history of electronic surveillance for national security purposes within the United States and relates the statutory and constitutional law to the current, post September 11th practices. An extensive examination of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and the recently leaked, classified Terrorist Surveillance Program shows that the FISA Court, within its narrow jurisdiction, adequately accounts for constitutional standards, yet the TSP—including recent reforms—is in clear violation of constitutional and statutory law.

This research examines the impact of formal democracy on the construction of an effective civil society in Ghana. The theoretical and policy role of civil society has received a great deal of attention in the literature. Especially for democratization theorists, the focus has been on the democracy enhancing qualities of civil society—qualities often credited with playing key roles in democratic transitions in Africa. However, the question of what happens to civil society after a democratic transition has not received much attention in the literature. Using a historical institutionalist approach, the study examines how democratic institutions and institutional arrangements affect the development of civil society. After Ghana’s return to formal democracy in 1992, democratic openings, though not immediately transformative, created an expansion in civil liberties and political rights necessary for the emergence of civil society. Paradoxically, state institutions remained weak and it was such weakness—not the strength, as some of the literature suggests, that allowed civil society to develop. Within the legislative and bureaucratic arenas, persistent institutional weakness became an opportunity for civil society to mobilize resources from foreign donors to strengthen the capacity of state institutions. Through programs aimed at enhancing the capacity of state institutions, foreign donors played a critical role in framing the relationship between civil society and the state. A major finding from this research is the symbiotic relationship between civil society and the state. As the case of Ghana demonstrates, where the state provides opportunities for civil society to develop, an effective civil society in turn contributes to building the democratic state. Findings from this research provide theoretical implications for the literature on civil society and democracy by highlighting the role of democratic institutions in strengthening civil society.

This research examines the impact of formal democracy on the construction of an effective civil society in Ghana. The theoretical and policy role of civil society has received a great deal of attention in the literature. Especially for democratization theorists, the focus has been on the democracy enhancing qualities of civil society—qualities often credited with playing key roles in democratic transitions in Africa. However, the question of what happens to civil society after a democratic transition has not received much attention in the literature. Using a historical institutionalist approach, the study examines how democratic institutions and institutional arrangements affect the development of civil society. After Ghana’s return to formal democracy in 1992, democratic openings, though not immediately transformative, created an expansion in civil liberties and political rights necessary for the emergence of civil society. Paradoxically, state institutions remained weak and it was such weakness—not the strength, as some of the literature suggests, that allowed civil society to develop. Within the legislative and bureaucratic arenas, persistent institutional weakness became an opportunity for civil society to mobilize resources from foreign donors to strengthen the capacity of state institutions. Through programs aimed at enhancing the capacity of state institutions, foreign donors played a critical role in framing the relationship between civil society and the state. A major finding from this research is the symbiotic relationship between civil society and the state. As the case of Ghana demonstrates, where the state provides opportunities for civil society to develop, an effective civil society in turn contributes to building the democratic state. Findings from this research provide theoretical implications for the literature on civil society and democracy by highlighting the role of democratic institutions in strengthening civil society.

Conventional wisdom holds that constitutions shape behavior, structures, and institutions. Looking at provisions in the constitutions of 19 Latin American countries, I show the level of judicial independence exercised by a country’s courts and judges is a function of constitutional provisions.