<p>This study is an exploration of why policy outcomes in the sectors of child care and unemployment insurance, between the time period 1972 to 1996, did not meet the policy goals of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC) in Canada and the National Women's Council of lreland (NWCI). Specifically, this study sought to explain why successive governments in Canada and Ireland persistently resisted the implementation of policy goals put forth by NAC and NWCI in the sectors of child care and unemployment insurance, or when they did respond, policy outcomes had differential impacts on women. With this in mind, the overall research question of this study was: What happened to the policy goals ofNAC and NWCI once they were articulated to government?</p> <p>In order to answer this question, this study merged the theoretics of historical institutionalism with feminist political economy into a theoretical framework I have termed feminist-institutionalism. This framework was applied to argue that policy institutions (as mediators and containers ofgendered social relations) redefine feminist policy goals articulated by women's groups to government into gendered policy outcomes that often undermine the original intent of those goals. I have called this process of redefinition policy transformation. By employing a framework of analysis three spheres of policy transformation -this study comparatively maps out the processes, institutions and factors within the macro-political policy context which contributed to an overall lack of success on the part of NAC and NWCI in the realization of their child care and unemployment insurance policy goals. One of the conclusions of this study is that NAC and NWCI were equally unsuccessful even given stark differences between macro-political institutional structures and interest representation systems in Canada and Ireland.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This American Political Development research explains cross-state variation in aid for children at private religious schools in the United States up to the end of 2012. Using a mixed-methods approach I examine how the institutional orderings of Federalism, Constitution, Church and Party affect policymaker decisions to instigate and sustain programmes of aid. By ‘aid’ I mean education vouchers and tax credits, transportation, textbook loans, equipment, nursing and food services, and tax exemptions for private religious school property. I conduct Fuzzy-Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis across all fifty states, supported by interview and archival research in six case-study states – California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, New York and Utah – and by statistical treatment of the constitutional amendments known as ‘No-Aid Provisions’. All of the aid policies examined here are ‘submerged’ in Mettler’s terms, in that they help private organizations to take on state functions, re-frame such functions in terms of the marketplace, and are poorly understood by the public. In this thesis I extend Mettler’s conception of submergedness to explain when institutions matter, which institutions matter, and why they matter for religious school student aid. State decentralization is necessary for high levels of aid and a high proportion of Catholics is sufficient for high levels of aid. Republican control of the state offices is a necessary condition for the passage of tax credit or voucher scholarships but not for other types of aid. No-Aid Provisions are unrelated to aid. Of the four institutional explanatory conditions, Federalism and Church have the most important effects on aid for children at private religious schools. Party explains some types of aid but not all, and Constitution is surprisingly lacking in explanatory power.

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Recent election campaigns generated extensive attention for their creative use of Internet, from President Obama’s 2008 Facebook tactic of allowing Facebook friends to share their support with each other to tools that allow supporters to mobilize and influence offline. This thesis asks whether Internet access alone can influence an individual to vote, within the context of American Presidential elections. First, I replicate similar literature by conducting a series of Linear Probability Models that indicate that Internet does have a significant impact on an individual’s decision to vote. However, one major issue that previous studies fail to address is the likelihood of endogeneity between self-reported Internet access and voting behavior. To address this, I introduce a measure of Internet Service Providers available in a given Congressional District as an instrumental variable. Once instrumented, it appears that Internet is largely insignificant. However, there is a key exception in 2008, where Internet access is significant. I argue that this is due to the developments in social media technology that revolutionized the ways in which candidates engaged with voters and voters engaged with one another.

In order to understand the motivations and driving factors that encourage individuals to join the political sphere, as volunteers, the individual’s stories and background will be examined through an exploratory study without any initial hypothesis. Utilizing qualitative research methods, this study will directly look at the lived experiences of political volunteers that drive campaigns and candidates in Colorado’s 5th Congressional District. A greater understanding for both the factors that compel an individual to enter the political sphere in the first place as a volunteer as well as variables that persuade the volunteer to continually stay active will be analyzed. Results: Based off of 10 different interviews with registered voters in Colorado’s 5th Congressional District, this thesis found significant differences in motivations varying from party affiliations, religious values, as well as relationships with the campaign staff.

In his 2015 State of the Union Address, President Obama announced “America’s College Promise,” a plan to make community college free for all American families making less than $200,000. In this thesis, I provide an analysis of the plan and provide an evaluation of its potential impact on the education attainment gap in the United States. I also evaluate the plan’s various components and assess its potential impact on community college student enrollment, completion, and transfer to four-year universities. Lastly, I offer recommendations for improvement.

This investigation into the rapid expansion of prison construction and mass incarceration in Eastern Kentucky under the leadership of Congressman and House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers aims to determine why this policy has continued to be a viable political strategy for Rogers despite its apparent failure to advance social and economic development in the region. This analysis suggests that the Rogers Case can be used as a case study to greater understand the proliferation of political power available to elected officials in ANY district where the democratic incentive structure encourages politicians to represent the interests of private corporations and industries instead of constituents as long as they can count on their campaign contributions and the protection of their incumbencies.

This paper examines the tension between states' rights and rights of the individual in the jurisprudence of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Through analysis of O'Connor's personal biography and a series of opinions written over her tenure on the Supreme Court, I find that O'Connor reached an incremental balance between the sometimes conflicting goals of protecting the rights of the states and individuals, resulting in a unique rights-based approach to federalism. / Constitutionalism, federalism, and expressive democracy -- Justic O'Connor and federalism -- The state and the individual -- Analysis. / Department of Political Science

Are campus movements concerning free speech—from Berkeley in the 1960s to the campaign against political correctness today—really about speech? Are movements really concerned with civil liberties on campus or are their calls for free speech excited by partisan motives? While free speech movements are never purely driven by civil libertarian concerns, they should not be considered simply partisan either. Campus speech movements have frequently united activists across the ideological spectrum, which suggests that these movements aren’t only sectarian in nature. It also confirms that these movements are in fact about speech, because those advocating for it have a wide range of motives, but free speech is the point of agreement. However, this is not to say that there aren’t ulterior partisan underpinnings in these pushes for free speech.

The 2016 election cycle has shown a dramatic radicalization of the right, featuring elements such as out-group demonization, law and order rhetoric, and populist strategies that have not been so prevalent in the US since the rise of Nixon’s Silent Majority in the 1970s. The UK has experienced a similar ideological shift, though its emergence has perhaps not been so notoriously outspoken. All the same, the fervent anti-statist and anti-elitist narrative employed by the Leave Campaign is starkly similar to language historically associated with the populist rhetoric of the Far Right. Drawing on analyses of economic, socio-cultural, and geopolitical trends that have changed the status quo of each of these countries in the post-crisis era, I attempt to elucidate potential factors that have made Far Right narratives of fear, paranoia, and insecurity particularly salient.