Master of Regional and Community Planning / Department of Landscape Architecture and Regional & Community Planning / Huston Gibson / As a legislative technique, the application of initiative or referendum is considered unconventional, yet frequently utilized to address local conservation issues throughout most of the United States. The subject of its appropriateness continues to remain under debate, especially in the field of planning. This longitudinal study employs a descriptive trend analysis on conservation measures conducted by local governments between 1996 and 2012, in order to identify any changes or consistencies in application. Subsequently, personal interviews were conducted with experienced local government officials to facilitate an understanding of current perceptions, specific experiences, and the outcomes relationship to comprehensive and capital improvement plans. Some key findings from this study include numerous relationships between ballot box conservation and election cycles, and a misperception by local governments of the passage capabilities of ballot box conservation. The inferences from this study will aid local governments and planners to consider or reconsider their stance on the use of ballot box conservation. Additionally, if local communities and governments do choose to practice or continue to practice the use of ballot box conservation, this study’s key findings will assist them in making their measures more successful.

Comparatively few studies have explored how variations in state governing institutions influence voting behavior. Utilizing lower chamber state legislative election returns from the years 2000 through 2010, and the 2002 through 2010 GSS data series, this dissertation focuses on how US state legislatures influence voting behavior and political attitudes of the American electorate. Specifically, this research takes on a comparative approach and illustrates how institutional differences in the size, capacity, and composition of the US state legislatures affect the electorates’ propensity to vote and how politically efficacious people feel.

O objetivo desta dissertação é investigar o processo político e institucional que levou, em 1954, à aprovação da reforma eleitoral que introduziu a cédula única de votação nas eleições presidenciais que elegeu Juscelino Kubitschek. A dissertação argumenta que ao contextualizar a decisão que levou à aprovação do novo método de votação, emergem novos elementos que ajudam a esclarecer o controverso episódio conhecido como contragolpe do Marechal Lott que garantiu a posse do candidato eleito. O material analisado consiste na legislação eleitoral, propostas de reformas eleitorais e a narrativa dos líderes do governo e da oposição a respeito do episódio. Conclui-se que escolha por um novo método de votação, a cédula oficial, deve ser tomada como caso de reforma eleitoral que expressa a emergência de uma dinâmica competitiva na Terceira República Brasileira. / The objective of this dissertation is to investigate the political and institutional process that resulted, in 1954, to the approval of the electoral reform that introduced the unique voting ballot in the presidential elections that elected Juscelino Kubitschek. The dissertation argues that the contextualization of the decision, by the new voting method, offers elements to understand the controversial episode known as \"Marshal Lott\'s coup\" that secured the winner\'s ternure. The material analyzed consists of electoral legislation, proposals for electoral reforms and the narrative of government\'s and opposition\'s leaders. It is concluded that by choosing a new method of voting, the official ballot should be taken as a case of electoral reform that expresses the emergence of a competitive dynamic in the Third Brazilian Republic.

In the 2004 Presidential Election social and wedge issues were among the most publicized mobilization tools utilized by the Bush Campaign. Specifically, same-sex marriage has been suggested as a key wedge issue that may have mobilized voters, although research differs on its impact. My contention is that these previous studies miss the point with regard to wedge issues, which is that they are useful on persuadable voters, and persuadable voters live in swing states. I estimate a logit model using 2004 American National Election Studies survey data. I utilize voters’ decisions to turn out as the dependent variable and control for respondents’ positions on terrorism, the economy, same-sex marriage, political interest, party identification, and socio-economic status. These findings demonstrate, consistent with my hypothesis, voters in swing same-sex marriage ballot measure states were more likely to turn out. These voters may not have been persuadable, but rather the Republican base.

In the 2004 Presidential Election social and wedge issues were among the most publicized mobilization tools utilized by the Bush Campaign. Specifically, same-sex marriage has been suggested as a key wedge issue that may have mobilized voters, although research differs on its impact. My contention is that these previous studies miss the point with regard to wedge issues, which is that they are useful on persuadable voters, and persuadable voters live in swing states. I estimate a logit model using 2004 American National Election Studies survey data. I utilize voters’ decisions to turn out as the dependent variable and control for respondents’ positions on terrorism, the economy, same-sex marriage, political interest, party identification, and socio-economic status. These findings demonstrate, consistent with my hypothesis, voters in swing same-sex marriage ballot measure states were more likely to turn out. These voters may not have been persuadable, but rather the Republican base.

The main topic of this thesis is the perspective of young people within political party structures. The author bases her research on the assumption that, in the Czech Republic, the younger generation of party members is not sufficiently represented within political parties, and that political parties do not create ballot papers that fairly represent the young candidates. However, the author also assumes that Czech political parties are aware of the under-representation of young politicians within their structures, and consistently try to work with this. The objective of this dissertation is, therefore, to more explicitly explain whether and if so then how Czech political parties officially define the position of young people within the inner structures of the parties, how large the representation of young people is on ballot papers for representative bodies, and to demonstrate how Czech political parties generally approach this issue.The author defines the young political generation as people over 18 but under 35 years old. The research section of this thesis is based on an analysis of official regulations of chosen political parties. An analysis of the ballot papers of the same political parties for the 2013 Chamber of Deputies election and for the 2012 regional representative bodies election was also carried out.The approach of political parties to their youngest members is based on a survey carried out by the author.

The main goal of the diploma thesis is to design, create, and implement the web application for online voting in the company IS4U. The thesis is divided into three parts. The first part describes the theoretical foundations required for the practical implementation. The second part analyzes the current state of the company, its information system, customers, and criteria for creating a web application. The last part deals with the implementation of the new web application and evaluates the achieved results. The web application simplifies and secures voting by its users.

An urn contains two types of balls: p "+t" balls and m "-s" balls, where t and s are positive real numbers. The balls are drawn from the urn uniformly at random without replacement until the urn is empty. Before each ball is drawn, the player decides whether to accept the ball or not. If the player opts to accept the ball, then the payoff is the weight of the ball drawn, gaining t dollars if a "+t" ball is drawn, or losing s dollars if a "-s" ball is drawn. We wish to maximize the expected gain for the player. We find that the optimal acceptance policies are similar to that of the original acceptance urn of Chen et al. with s=t=1. We show that the expected gain function also shares similar properties to those shown in that work, and note the important properties that have geometric interpretations. We then calculate the expected gain for the urns with t/s rational, using various methods, including rotation and reflection. For the case when t/s is irrational, we use rational approximation to calculate the expected gain. We then give the asymptotic value of the expected gain under various conditions. The problem of minimal gain is then considered, which is a version of the ballot problem. We then consider a Bayesian approach for the general urn, for which the number of balls n is known while the number of "+t" balls, p, is unknown. We find formulas for the expected gain for the random acceptance urn when the urns with n balls are distributed uniformly, and find the asymptotic value of the expected gain for any s and t. Finally, we discuss the probability of ruin when an optimal strategy is used for the (m,p;s,t) urn, solving the problem with s=t=1. We also show that in general, when the initial capital is large, ruin is unlikely. We then examine the same problem with the random version of the urn, solving the problem with s=t=1 and an initial prior distribution of the urns containing n balls that is uniform.

This thesis deals with a methodological phenomenon called order effect. This effect creates a situation where the preceding questions influence answers of the subsequent questions. During cognitive responding process, the preceding questions may evoke specific mental associations and ideas that are more easily accessible afterwards during responding of the following questions. This induced information may be used during answer selection process which may cause bias in answers. The same questions placed in different order can generate different answers. Different question order can have different cognitive burden. The aim of this thesis is cognitive burden assessment of different question orders. Data collection was conducted by cognitive interviews which helped to detect how respondents work with particular questions during questionnaire responding process, and to identify specific types of order effect. There are four types of order effect: carryover effect, backfire effect, assimilation and contrast effect. A specific question preceding a general question evokes information which is more accessible for interpretation of a general question therefore this question order is less burdensome. Also the order from negative to positive question is less burdensome than the opposite order because it evokes...

"Authenticity, Citizenship and Accommodation: LGBT Rights in a Red State" examines the discourse around volunteerism, exceptionalism, and queer citizenship that emerged within the context of a statewide (anti-gay) ballot initiative campaign in the American Southwest. I argue that the ways in which local volunteers and activists define themselves and their attempts to defeat the ballot initiative is tied to the struggle over the authority to represent local LGBT organizational culture and an emergent New West identity. In such a way, local debates over authentic western lifestyles that divide regional communities intertwine with intergenerational debates over gay liberation and rights frameworks, and the polarized discourse on blue and red states which have dominated the U.S. political climate of the past decade. While statewide campaign leaders with a base in Phoenix (the state capital) focused on polling data and messaging in order to stop the passage of the amendment, many Tucson activists and organizational leaders tied to the LGBT community center sought to strategize a long-term grassroots approach to change hearts and minds. Within this debate over campaign strategy and internal decision-making, both groups drew attention to the differences between the metropolitan areas. This regional example speaks to the ways in which established theoretical frameworks anthropologists utilize to understand social movements may prove insufficient for understanding the diversity that exists within the everyday processes of collective action. The internal messaging war that spilled outside of the confines of the campaign steering committee meetings into the pages of the statewide gossip and newspaper editorial sections also speaks to the ways in which official declarations of ideological stance should not be taken as the actual intent of those seeking change. One may shape one's personal story to be on message, choose to defy those constraints, or use the rhetorical strategy of the message without actually committing to the underlying premise. The broader national concerns are localized symbolically in the notion of blue and red counties, but also take on a regional flavor in the satirical call to statehood for the Southern Arizona. Here issues of authenticity emerge not only within the context of the campaign disputes around messaging, and by extension, who has the right to speak for and about the LGBT organizational community, but also in the realm of derisive banter that travels back and forth between the two major metropolitan areas over what it means to live an authentic western lifestyle. Within the southern metropolis, this discourse is framed by the notion that the western desert is a different sort of place, with a different sort of people and way of life that is threatened by snowbirds, retirees, Midwestern lifestyles and corporate interests. Often Phoenix to the north is seen as a representation of all these negative influences. In addition, Center-based activists and volunteers, describe their southern city in idealistic terms as an oasis for LGBT community, artists, activists, migrants, refugees, and all manner of progressive politics. Memory enacted through the telling of one's story at a Coming Out Day testimonial, political rallies and in dialogue with an anthropologist are shaped by these notions of difference. These notions of difference also emerge as a pattern in the narrative construction of space, violence and memory within activist life histories. These life histories in turn reveal a fragment of local LGBT organizational culture, in which the process of professionalization transforms the meaning of community, and the act of representation transforms the role of activist into that of the citizen volunteer. The community center in this sense is a memorialization of community and movement culture, and by idealizing what came before it masks material conditions at the same time that it offers up the potential of a more radical present/future. While the community center, Tucson and Pima County are coded as oases of safety, this image is continually disrupted by counter narratives, including the state-wide campaign to stop the marriage amendment; local support for the Protect Marriage and anti-immigrant amendments; and evidence of on-going violence directed against racial, ethnic and religious minorities and those who transgress hetero and gender normative expectations. These disruptions however appear to be cyclical in that they allow both professionals and concerned community members (citizen volunteers) to rally together in a show of strength and solidarity and in so doing represent the authentic, legitimate community. However, these disruptions may also allow for counter narratives to enter into public discourse, thereby offering up a more radical envisioning of community beyond the limits of LGBT organizational culture. / Anthropology