Thesis--University of Pennsylvania. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves xx-xxiii) and index.

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The emergence of supranational organizations like the European Union (EU) raises questions fundamental to the sociological study of regions and nation-states. Hypothetically, the EU could provide regions within nation-states most of the governmental services that they currently receive from the state. For regions with strong ethnic and cultural identities that have sought to break away from the nation-state over time, decreased political and economic dependency may provide the autonomy that they have been seeking. On the other hand, if the emergence of supranational organizations like the EU represents state-building at the global level, then the EU can pose a threat to regional groups seeking autonomy from the nation-state. At issue is how the growing influence of supranational organizations like the EU is affecting the demand for autonomy within ethnically, politically, and culturally distinct regions. This dissertation attempts to answer these questions by examining variations in nationalism over time for three regions in Spain (Basque Country, Galicia, Catalonia) from 1977-2002. In order to begin to answer this question, I created a new dataset of protest events in Spain in order to assess variations in demands for autonomy over time. The protest event counts were incorporated into a comparative historical analysis that seeks to explain the effects of the influence of the evolving European Union (EU) on contentious demands for autonomy within those three regions; the variations in the protest event counts over time were analyzed against additional economic and political data collected from archival materials. I find that, while nationalism declined overall over time, it did not disappear but rather took on a different character. The classical manifestations of nationalism transformed into distinct movements centered on human rights. I argue that this transformation took place as a result of three interrelated factors: 1) Forced cooperation between the regions and the central Spanish government; 2) Elite abandonment of the nationalist movement; and 3) The state of the regional economies. In contrast to what extant theory might predict, my results indicate that nationalism continues to exist for the following reasons: 1) The EU has not rendered the nation-state irrelevant, but rather has altered their competencies; 2) The EU has not resolved the tensions between the nation-state and regions, but rather has created new ones; and 3) The EU has not leveled the economic playing-field between regions, but rather has opened them up to new forms of competition. In conclusion, this dissertation argues that supranational organizations like the EU have altered the relationship between regions and nation-states, thus transforming - but not solving - the nationalist question.

The past decade has seen an upsurge ofacademic and popular interest in the political activity undertaken by citizens. This thesis presents a predominantly qualitative analysis ofthe nature of voluntary political participation, and subsequently addresses a number of key concerns about the current state of democracy in Britain. It is argued that existing analysis of political participation tends to focus on quantitative questions such as the levels and socio-demographic composition of political activity, with little attention being given to the experiences of those citizens who engage with political organisations. The analysis utilises the theoretical work of JUrgen Habermas in order to consider the potential role of both state mechanisms of participation and structures of civil society within the development of rational and deliberative democracy. The primary research draws upon sixty interviews conducted within the British Labour Party, the British section of Amnesty International, two Tenants' Associations, one Residents' Association and an alternative lifestyle collective known as Exodus. Three main themes are addressed in the form of a comparative study. Firstly, the thesis considers the nature of the various organisations and their membership policies. Secondly, a typology ofpolitical participation and activism is presented. Finally, analysis is provided of the experiences ofthe respondents of the actual process ofparticipation. Addressing these themes enables the thesis to explore the nature of the discourse that occurs within spheres ofvoluntary political participation, and to provide some insight into the dialectical relationship that exists between structures of participation and the activity that develops within such contexts. It is concluded that a range of conflicting tensions currently inform voluntary political participation. These factors raise a number of serious questions about the role of civil society within processes of democratisation.

This study uses qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) to examine the basis of industry political power by assessing conditions of economic interdependence and political action associated with the passage of the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 (ERTA), and the significant reduction in effective tax rates for eight of eighteen U.S. industries. Past research has focused on the simple passage of "pro-business" legislation, failing to provide adequate evidence as to who benefits or how they benefit from the legislation. The Boolean analysis used in this study indicates that a distinct combination of both political action and economic factors present a clear pattern of causal conditions associated with both tax winners and losers. Using three separate analyses, the theoretically exclusive explanations offered by both class dominance and structural theories fail to provide any clear explanations. Tax policy is associated with a set of conditions that are conjunctural in nature, supporting a combined model. Strong PAC contributions, number of registered lobbyists, and outside lobby firms in association with a strong federal relationship, and either total economic strength or strong inter-industry relations produced the specific conjunctural patterns associated with "winning' industries. Lack of significant PAC contributions to the House Ways and Means and Senate Finance Committees insured an industries failure to benefit from the legislative change. The results from this study indicate that a new theoretical model is needed that incorporates the complexity of the interdependent-relationships of political and economic conditions. Evolving from the mutually exclusive theoretical explanations of the past, class segmentation, political dominance, and structural economic explanations are brought back together in a manner that exposes the complexity of the relationships resulted in tangible benefits from the passage of ERTA.

Political advocacy research has often relied on concepts from social movement literature to explain the success or failure of lobbying efforts. The following study builds on recent efforts to partner social movement concepts with neo-institutional theory in order to better understand political mobilization. Specifically, I aim to contribute to an understanding of how non-state actors, with little or no formal power, attempt to influence public policy. Seventeen in-depth interviews were conducted with participants of a nonprofit lobbying campaign that occurred in Alberta, Canada, in 2007. By examining the processes and the structural elements of the lobby’s activities, I assess the utility of combining these two theoretical literatures to enhance explanatory power. This study also emphasizes the multi-faceted nature of lobbying campaigns. Advocacy outcomes are influenced not only by challenger strategies and arguments, but by the responses and contexts of their challenges. Social movement concepts, such as frame analysis and resource mobilization, shed light on the lobbying processes undertaken by nonprofit advocacy participants. However, neo-institutional theory allows us to situate these processes within a larger political context, and understand how this context influences the decisions made by political decision makers. In addition to arguing these theoretical claims, I discuss the opportunities and limitations that facilitate and constrain collaborative processes between the Government of Alberta and the province’s nonprofit sector.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2003. / Advisor: Dr Will H. Moore, Florida State University, College of Social Sciences, Dept. of Political Sciences. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed Mar. 3, 2004). Includes bibliographical references.

Political representation remains one of the areas in American life in which gender inequality is most pronounced, and scholars claim that women’s reluctance to run for office is now the most significant barrier to gender equality in the political sphere. Yet, researchers have not adequately grappled with the complexities and contradictions in women’s “deciding to run” accounts and have often overlooked the varied narrative strategies of women leaders across race, class, and social movement identities. I conducted 46 interviews with women leaders in Texas and fieldwork in a political campaign to examine the stories women tell to explain their decisions whether or not to run for office. I find that the “deciding to run” narratives that African-American women and Latinas employ are distinct from the stories white women use to explain their decisions whether or not to run for office, as they more often draw from civil rights discourses of courage, confidence, and commitment to their causes. I argue that feminist organizations actually encourage women to downplay their political ambition in the attempt to spread their social movement messages that women need to be recruited more heavily to run for office. These messages play an important role in influencing the reluctance story told by most of the white women I interviewed. I argue that structural factors such as majority-minority and majority-white voting districts also play a large role in shaping the “deciding to run” accounts of candidates and potential candidates, as raced-gendered and social movement discourses take different forms and carry varying weight in these political contexts. My findings challenge the dominant explanation for women’s sparse levels of office-holding, which suggests that women are under-represented in politics because they lack the confidence to enter political races. In addition, I highlight the political ambition of African-American women and Latinas, whose remarkable success records in seeking and winning elective office have not been accounted for in current paradigms explaining women’s under-representation. Finally, my research exposes the cultural dynamics underlying women’s “deciding to run” explanations, as I illuminate how women draw from raced-gendered and social movement discourses to account for their political decisions. / text

This study uses qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) to examine the basis of industry political power by assessing conditions of economic interdependence and political action associated with the passage of the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 (ERTA), and the significant reduction in effective tax rates for eight of eighteen U.S. industries. Past research has focused on the simple passage of "pro-business" legislation, failing to provide adequate evidence as to who benefits or how they benefit from the legislation. The Boolean analysis used in this study indicates that a distinct combination of both political action and economic factors present a clear pattern of causal conditions associated with both tax winners and losers. Using three separate analyses, the theoretically exclusive explanations offered by both class dominance and structural theories fail to provide any clear explanations. Tax policy is associated with a set of conditions that are conjunctural in nature, supporting a combined model. Strong PAC contributions, number of registered lobbyists, and outside lobby firms in association with a strong federal relationship, and either total economic strength or strong inter-industry relations produced the specific conjunctural patterns associated with "winning' industries. Lack of significant PAC contributions to the House Ways and Means and Senate Finance Committees insured an industries failure to benefit from the legislative change. The results from this study indicate that a new theoretical model is needed that incorporates the complexity of the interdependent-relationships of political and economic conditions. Evolving from the mutually exclusive theoretical explanations of the past, class segmentation, political dominance, and structural economic explanations are brought back together in a manner that exposes the complexity of the relationships resulted in tangible benefits from the passage of ERTA.

Since the end of the Cold War, considerable attention has been paid to "ethnic" or "identitive" conflicts. Some scholars argue that these conflicts tend to draw in 'kin' states who support the belligerent(s) with whom they share identitive affinities. This thesis examines such involvement, based on identitive affinities, in ethnopolitical conflicts. In particular, it analyses the pattern of involvement of one country: Iran. Specifically, it looks at Iran's policy towards five conflicts: Afghanistan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Iraq, South Lebanon and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. / This thesis argues that kinship is only a permissive cause of involvement while the presence and scope of involvement are determined by other factors, in the following order: security threats, non-security interests (influence, economic interests), and ideology. Proximity is of great importance as security threats usually emanate from neighbours and not from far-away enemies.