Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2004. / "June 2004." / Includes bibliographical references (v. 2, leaves 301-314). / This dissertation argues that public deliberation is a transformative force in democratic politics. I build a framework for analyzing public debates in advanced industrial societies, and then use it to illuminate the political stakes of "coming to terms with the past" in societies with recent histories of mass violations of human rights. My dissertation recasts dealing with the past as a punctuated series of elite debates over the "lessons of history." These lessons become important elements of political culture and important variables in partisan competition. My cases are Germany and Austria, and the dissertation addresses an important empirical puzzle: despite similar electoral institutions, partisan political landscapes, and pressures from immigration, right-wing populist parties have experienced very different fates over the last two decades in the two states. Austria has produced one of Europe's most successful right-wing populist parties (the Austrian Freedom Party, FPO), but no such party has come close to establishing itself in Germany. What explains the divergent strength of the far right in the two surviving successor states of the Third Reich? I argue against existing structural explanations, and instead contend that the divergence between Germany and Austria stems from differences in elite ideas about the Nazi past. In Germany, public debates about Nazism produced an elite consensus that identified right-wing populism as a threat to Germany democracy. When the right-wing populist 'Republikaner' party first appeared, other political parties, the media, and groups within civil society actively combated it and prevented it from establishing itself as a permanent force in German politics. In Austria, however, public debates about the / (cont.) Nazi past produced a nationalist backlash among political parties, the media, and civil society. This reaction created the ideal environment for Jorg Haider to engineer the FPO's electoral breakthrough and consolidation. My findings suggests that to explain the success and failure of right-wing populist parties in general, we need to focus on the strategies that other political parties, the media, and groups in civil society use to deal with them. / by David C. Art. / Ph.D.

This dissertation focuses on how Abraham Lincolns idea of liberty to all affected his political thought about the intersection of government and the economy. It is a search for Lincolns political economy. While contemporary economists focus on a single aspect of the person such as self-interest, Lincoln following thinkers such as Francis Wayland viewed economics as a moral science. I do this by examining the speeches and deeds of Abraham Lincoln. I explore topics such as what he meant by liberty to all, his valuing of a commercial society over an agrarian one, and his understanding of the importance of free labor in terms of Lincolns thinking on theology and natural rights. Additionally, I examine Lincoln on what the US Constitution allows the national government to do to promote economic prosperity and the role political parties play on these policies. Lastly, I consider several thinkers from the Progressive Era and how they understood Lincoln and considered themselves to be impacted by his administration. My goal is to understand not just what Lincoln was against, i.e. slavery but what Lincoln was for; free labor and what he thought the national government should do to support its cause.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Political Science. Thesis. 1966. Ph.D. / Bibliography: leaves 199-215. / Ph.D.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2018. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 167-176). / In dominant-party states, why do individuals vote in elections with foregone conclusions when they are neither bought nor coerced? It is especially curious in these cases why the rural poor decide to cast their ballots. I posit that communities that collectively rely on the government for public services foster social norms of voting to influence turnout. Motivated by the perception that regimes reward high turnout areas with public goods, communities use esteem "carrots" and social "sticks" to overcome free-rider incentives and increase the likelihood of receiving services. The norm is strongest in less politically-competitive areas, precisely where the puzzle of participation is most obvious. At the individual level, those who rely on their local community for non-material goods, such as information and kinship, are more likely to comply with the norm in order to secure their access to these social benefits. Findings from a lab-in-the-field voting experiment in rural Tanzania indicate a strong influence of the social norm of voting. In the experiment, when turnout is public to their neighbors, respondents are 11 percentage points more likely to vote, compared to when they are in private. The theory, which applies broadly to many patronage-based regimes, explains how communities sustain social norms of voting even when elections lack legitimacy, elucidating the paradox of high turnout in dominant-party systems. / by Leah R. Rosenzweig. / Ph. D.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, February 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (v. 2, leaves [483]-502). / This thesis examines technological innovation capabilities in the Chinese machine tool, automobile, telecommunications equipment, and information technology sectors in the era of reform ( 1979-2002). Contrary to other studies, the thesis reveals that the foundations for Chinese industrial learning and innovation are weak. I evaluate several models for explaining why this is true, including market-, developmental state-, and regional-based explanations. Finding these unsatisfactory, I propose an alternative model: particularist political structure and industrial strategic culture undermine the ability of Chinese firms to associate, learn, and innovate. Particularism and strategic culture interact to undermine reciprocity and trust, weakening the ability of Chinese industrial firms to form effective horizontal association. As observed in economies from the developed (e.g. United States) to the developing (e.g. Taiwan), horizontal association between manufacturers as well as customers, suppliers, financers, research institutes, and universities is critical to industrial learning and technology development. The weakness of associational means for reducing risk and promoting information and resource flows inhibits the ability of Chinese firms to effectively indigenize, diffuse, innovate, and leverage industrial technology. Political particularism - manipulation of state policy and resources by agents of the state in pursuit of parochial goals - intensified during the reform period. Market reforms rendered existing industrial governance regimes ineffective, but the state suppressed formation of new mutual monitoring and consensus-building regimes appropriate to liberalized markets and society. / (cont.) Particularist structures inform a Chinese industrial strategic culture - a set of assumptions about order in the economy, and about the best ways of handling challenges and opportunities. Chinese industrial strategic culture is exceptionalist. Firms pursue short-term strategies, develop vertical ties with officials, and eschew horizontal ties to other innovation system constituents in seeking to manipulate state action to their individual benefit. Technology development capabilities in all sectors examined suffered as a result of the interaction of political particularism and industrial strategic exceptionalism. However, some sectors performed better than others. These sectors were characterized by a combination of relatively faster-paced technological change, weaker particularist action, and greater horizontal association among firms and other constituents; they offer a model for possible change in Chinese political economic institutions and technological capabilities. / by George J. Gilboy. / Ph.D.

Thesis (S.M. and S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 145-155). / China's personnel contributions to United Nations peace operations has significantly increased in the first decade of the twenty-first century, however little academic or policy attention has been given to examining patterns of Chinese participation. Most current literature examines China's voting behavior on peace operations in the UN Security Council. This thesis employs a research design that combines quantitative and qualitative approaches to assess the drivers behind China's personnel contributions to peace operations. Specifically, the thesis examines the factors that lead China to deploy large contingents of peace keepers to some missions and smaller numbers or none to others. The thesis posits that China's personnel contributions will be higher in peace operations taking place in states that have a high strategic value to China. That is, the peace operation host state is important to China because of the presence of natural resources, Chinese investment, diplomatic interests, or a variety of other factors. The thesis finds that China's participation in peace operations after 2000 is guided by a realist motivation that seeks to maximize access to commercial and diplomatic interests, with higher levels of participation in states with high strategic values. Prior to 2000, fewer Chinese personnel were deployed to peace operations, and the states where they were deployed often had little strategic value to China. / (cont.) These findings suggest that the calculus behind China's peace operations participation, and perhaps China's foreign policy, shifted from improving China's international image to supporting China's economic and diplomatic development. Understanding China's participation in peace operations is important as it may shed light on broader concepts in Chinese foreign and military policy. An enhanced understanding of the motivations guiding China's participation may provide academics and policymakers with deeper insight into Chinese foreign policy that may help shape future interaction with the People's Republic of China. / by Erik Lin-Greenberg. / S.M.and S.B.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 255-263). / Year after year, Americans are told that their country's reputation is on the line. If we do not carry out our commitments, our foreign policy leaders warn, no one will believe our threats and promises in the future. This claim rests on the hypothesis, which I call the "reputation hypothesis," that tomorrow's enemies will assess America's credibility on the basis of U.S. actions today. Is the reputation hypothesis true? Will our adversaries predict our future actions by looking at today's decisions? More generally, do decision makers predict their adversaries' actions in a crisis by looking at the adversaries' previous actions? I test the reputation hypothesis against a hypothesis which I call the "power/interests" hypothesis. This hypothesis posits that decision makers assess the credibility of an adversary's threats by assessing the current balance of power and interests; commitments are credible when they support important interests and are backed up by the power to carry them out. I test these theories by studying American and British decision making during three crises. From 1958-1962, the Soviet Union and the NATO allies faced each other in a series of crises over Berlin and Cuba. I use evidence from American and British archives to discover how decision makers assessed Soviet credibility during these crises. I look for evidence that they based their assessments of Soviet credibility on past Soviet actions, and for evidence that they assessed Soviet credibility by evaluating the current balance of power and interests. The results are striking: during this period the Soviets repeatedly made threats and then backed down. But years of unfulfilled threats did not damage Soviet credibility. In fact, Soviet credibility grew from 1958-62, as the power/interests hypothesis predicts. American and British decision makers worried constantly about their own reputation, but they did not use Soviet past behavior to assess Soviet credibility. This research suggests that countries should not fight to build a reputation for credibility - threats will be credible if and only if they promote substantial interests and are backed up by sufficient power. / by Daryl Grayson Press. / Ph.D.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2015. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages 236-258). / Do a dominant state's policies have a greater effect on a rising state's threat perceptions or its assessment of the dominant state's resolve? Existing theory, rooted in Jervis's spiral and deterrence models, contends that the answer depends on whether the state has status quo or revisionist intentions. Rising states are typically seen as revisionist, a type of state that is said to be easily emboldened by conciliation but not easily threatened by competition. This project, on the other hand, argues that rising states - even those with revisionist aims - are more easily threatened than emboldened. Anarchy and uncertainty surrounding the dominant state's intentions give all rising states incentive to be cautious in their assessments. Underestimating threats could leave a rising state more vulnerable to coercion or unprepared for war with a materially stronger dominant state. Rising states, therefore, increase their threat assessments in response to almost any kind of competition by the dominant state. The risks of underestimating the dominant state's resolve are also significant: a resolute dominant state might respond to a challenge with overwhelming force. Therefore, rising states only downgrade their assessments of the dominant state's resolve in the face of very strong signals, such as large, militarily useful concessions. This dissertation tests these competing arguments during periods when Britain was a dominant state facing a rising, revisionist power - the United States (1837-1846) and Wilhelmine Germany (1894-1898). Detailed, historical analysis identified each British policy change and assessed the impact on U.S. and German perceptions. The results suggest that existing theory overstates the risks of conciliating rising states and understates the impact that competition has on a rising state's threat perceptions. Rising states may be ambitious, but they do not lose sight of their material weakness, the threats they face, or the limits to what they might gain. / by Miranda Priebe. / Ph. D.

Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2017. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (pages A61-A75). / How do people hold local governments accountable? My dissertation shows how cognitive and perceptual biases, as well as electoral institutions and strategic communication, can hinder voters' ability to hold government accountable. I gather data on local politics -- a level of government that people interact with on a daily basis, and one that encompasses the vast majority of elected officials and elections in the United States. My evidence comes from large-scale elections and communications data, surveys, and partnerships with governments and service providers. My findings indicate that widespread confusion around government responsibilities and a cognitive bias favoring recent information shape how voters evaluate government for performance, that election timing can prevent voters from effectively holding their incumbent politicians accountable, and that strategic communication by municipal governments can further bias the balance of information that citizens rely on to judge government. Together, these papers demonstrate how three facets of politics can frustrate accountability in cities. This work contributes to theoretical knowledge on political behavior and political institutions, as well as the urban politics literature, and does so using three independent sources of data that provide fertile ground for future extensions of this work. / by Justin de Benedictis-Kessner. / Ph. D.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Political Science, 2011. / Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 329-339). / When is non-state violence politically effective? Existing scholarship suggests that insurgency and terrorism are generally effective or ineffective based on the analysis of unitary non-state coercers operating solely at the strategic level. Although this approach provides useful insight, a failure to account for the internal dynamics of social movements within which armed groups are embedded obscures many of the most important causes and effects of non-state violence. The structuralist theory of non-state violence holds that the structure of power within social movements explains the greatest variation in both the use of violence by armed groups and its political effectiveness. Armed groups pursue common strategic goals that are characterized by collective action challenges against external enemies, such as the founding of a new state, while they simultaneously engage in zero-sum competition for organizational dominance with internal rivals. The central hypothesis of the structuralist theory is that violence is more likely to be strategically effective when employed by a unipolar social movement with one dominant armed group than by a multipolar social movement with two or more significant armed groups. The secondary hypothesis is that the strongest armed group in a social movement is the most likely to pursue strategic goals, whereas weaker groups in the hierarchy are more likely to pursue organizational goals exclusively, to the detriment of the movement. This theory is tested with a longitudinal analysis of 29 groups in 33 campaigns marked by a mix of violent and nonviolent action within the Palestinian, Irish, Zionist, and Algerian national movements. Analysis of primary sources and extensive interviews with key participants and observers help to demonstrate that the hierarchical position of groups within each of the four movements drove their relative focus towards strategic or organizational objectives as well as their associated use or non-use of violence. Furthermore, violence was more politically effective during periods of unipolarity than during periods of multipolarity within each movement. The structuralist theory of non-state violence thus reveals and explains greater variation in the political effectiveness of non-state violence than previous scholarship. / by Peter John Paul Krause. / Ph.D.