This thesis examines two organizational strategies employed for influencing American environmental policy with considerations to the "power elite" and "pluralist" models of policy control. Using a data set comprised of 379 organizations derived from US congressional hearings on climate change policy between 1976 and 2006, I find that industrial corporations conceal the public footprint of their involvement by financially encouraging "independent" research centers to provide favorable testimony. Meanwhile, nonprofit organizations are more likely to be co-represented by shared experts, a resource that is strategically shared for political gain. These findings provide some circumscribed support for both the power elite and pluralist models of organizational influence: the organization of power elites has a disproportionate amount of resources in a system that provides an arena for competing values and goals. Implications for understanding the organizational strategies towards congressional testimony as well as directions for future research are discussed based on these findings.

In the aftermath of World War II, the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan followed Germany’s blueprint in fashioning a universal health coverage system. Comparisons to Germany’s welfare state during this same time period reveal markedly different social and mental health policy practices, as Germany’s Christian Democratic Union and Social Democratic Party cooperated toward progressive policies while the Liberal Democratic Party largely neglected social welfare expansion. The effect of these practices is reflected in budgetary provisions, institutionalization practices, and mental health epidemiology. This research finds that a favorable economic climate allowed the Liberal Democratic Party to politically isolate the Social Democratic Party and focus on economic productivity as opposed to welfare expansion. In contrast, West Germany’s competition with East Germany forced cooperation of its two largest political parties to balance economic policy and social progress, which is today reflected in mental health outcomes and policies markedly more favorable than those of Japan.

After 1991 five countries emerged out of the fall of the Soviet Union to create a new region: Central Asia. No longer dominated by Soviet rule these countries fought to overcome barriers to independence and struggled to be seen by the international community as developed countries. However, these countries were far from developed and had to pay the high cost of human rights to get what they desired. This study researches and analyzes how Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan have traded the rights of women to achieve a placebo of development. Two of the largest violations of women’s rights that have manifested because of the government’s direct actions are domestic abuse and sex trafficking. The government’s structure and leadership, the economic opportunity for women, and the cultural acceptance have all been orchestrated by the government to create a society where women’s rights are unheard of. The actions taken by the three governments seem extensive on paper and international covenants yet are never implemented to help society. Through this research women’s rights in the Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan are examined through the prevalence and acceptance of both domestic violence and sex trafficking. The international conventions, domestic policies, and actions taken by political leaders are examined to better understand the underlying reasons that contribute to the persistence of these attitudes.

<p>This study explores the development of francophone women's movements In Quebec, 1960-1980, In the light of a theoretical framework derived from hegemony theory and feminist theory. In particular, It is concerned to discover how the ideologies of women and the politics of feminism are related to the consolidatlon of ruling and opposition blocs in three periods, which have been characterised as liberal-modernisatlon (1960- 1976), a crisis of hegemony (1970-1976) and progressive national (1976-1980). The thesis argues that women's movements are not merely constituted by the social and political conditions in which they develop, but are also constitutive of more general allilances on a political field structured by class, national and gender struggles. Liberal, social Catholic, revolutionary, radical and trade union women's movements are studied.</p> <p>The study argues that the development of feminist politics was not, as has been thought, simply backard. Instead, IiberaI feminist politicaI organizations developed In advance of similar organizations in the rest of Canada. They did so by appropriating elements of the legitimatlng Iiberal modernisation ideology and adapting them to support their programmes for improvement In women's status and for the representation of women in the state, through an advisory ConseiI du Statut de la femme. The study also argues that feminist and nationalist aspirations were not merely opposed to one another, as is commonly argued, but that in the long run, the mobilised political field which grew out of national and trade union struggles, permitted rapid and innovative reform in state policy. Finally, the study points to the ways in which a feminist gender politics, particularly as influenced by trade union feminism, was central to the consolidatlon of the progressive-nationalist bloc, led by the Partl québécols.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>While neoliberalism has increasingly been entrenched in the province of Ontario, it has also encountered resistance. A primary goal of this dissertation is to provide a vivid historical account of women’s organizing and feminist resistance that emerged during the Harris years (1995-2001). Drawing on the narratives of thirty three feminist activists and leaders working within three different organizational settings, namely organized labour, anti-racist, and anti-violence organizations, this research project aims to capture an important moment in time when women and feminists were speaking out against some of the most pressing issues of the day including gender (in)equality, poverty, violence, sexism, racism and discrimination. Thematically, this research highlights the numerous challenges, strategies and successes experienced by a variety of differently located feminists and women’s groups. By theoretically and analytically situating these women’s narrative accounts within a qualitative, intersectional feminist framework, this collection of stories not only allow us to (re)examine theoretical and practical issues related to intersectionality and pose questions for the present state of feminist organizations, but also contributes to our understanding of feminist organizational resistance in the future, the long-term impact of said resistance and how we might go about addressing the challenges that lie ahead.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The ongoing European Refugee Crisis has been one of the most popular trending topics on Twitter for the past 8 months. This paper applies topic modeling on bulks of tweets to discover the hidden patterns within these social media discussions. In particular, we perform topic analysis through solving Non-negative Matrix Factorization (NMF) as an Inexact Alternating Least Squares problem. We accelerate the computation using techniques including tweet sampling and augmented NMF, compare NMF results with different ranks and visualize the outputs through topic representation and frequency plots. We observe that supportive sentiments maintained a strong presence while negative sentiments such as safety concerns have emerged over time.

This thesis seeks to explore the ways in which gender and identity are imagined in times of war especially in the cases of women who participate in armed struggle within the Middle East. I focus particularly on how US and UK media's framing of these women's lives and experiences distort the ways in which we understand conflict within the contemporary Middle East. Through the case studies of female militants or supports of militancy in Palestine and the Islamic State I seek to highlight women's stories and lived realities in an attempt to understand what drives them to use particular model's of agency.

Foreign aid donors increasingly demand that aid is used efficiently and effectively. This study examines the effect of corruption levels, measured by the Corruption Perceptions Index, within a recipient country on the levels of economic growth. A growing literature outlines the mechanisms through which corruption impedes economic growth and is summarized within. Additionally, as longevity gains may result from foreign aid but are not captured in economic growth, this study computes a variable called the Life Quality Indicator (LQI) that combines such gains with economic growth and examines corruption’s effect on LQI growth. As any windfall, foreign aid has been argued to exacerbate problems within corrupt countries—causing economic decline. This study develops an interaction of corruption levels and the ratio of aid receipts to GDP to examine the effects of this interaction on economic growth and LQI growth. Conducting a regression analysis shows the relationships between the interaction term and economic growth and the interaction term and LQI growth are negative, leading to policy recommendations that corrupt countries not receive foreign aid. Using game theory, this study predicts the outcomes of interactions between aid recipients and donors during the Cold War, post-Cold War, and in the present. The present predicted outcomes suggest that recipients will be the winners because they are able to choose between receiving aid from emerging donors and from the Development Assistant Committee (DAC). Policy guidance to the aid community includes understanding that emerging donors may exert influence on aid recipients and programs to monitor this influence ensuring that it does not become exploitation may be necessary. Finally, a case study of Russia is presented, highlighting its corruption and foreign aid receipts in the post-Soviet timeframe. A separate analysis is conducted on the Former Soviet Union (FSU) countries to determine whether Russia’s corruption and foreign aid receipts caused lower levels of economic and LQI growth than that experienced by other FSU countries. While results do not show this, the negative relationship between the interaction term and economic and LQI growth is also found in this subset.

The commodification of culture, space, and resources is incentivized by neoliberal urbanism. In response, we have seen an attempt to develop collectively organized, oppositional spaces within urban places. The tensions that arise when considering the production of commons in the development of the neoliberal city are the central focus of this paper. As I will observe, these spaces are subjected to commodification as they become increasingly de-politicized through neoliberal ideologies. In order to theorize about these contradictory elements, I observe a makerspace in Richmond, Virginia called HackRVA. Specifically, I consider HackRVA as an urban commons. Through in-depth interviews and participant observation, I consider how HackRVA engages with the neoliberal city of Richmond and how the organization and maintenance of their space and their community reflects commoning as social reproduction. I find that HackRVA’s relationship to the city is complicated as the community within the space both contests and assimilates to the creative economy.

This paper examines the causes for socioeconomic variation between African Americans and West Indians in the United States, focusing primarily on New York City. Nearly 2 million African Americans live in New York, 30 percent of whom are black immigrants, and likely another 15 percent that are the children of these foreign-born individuals. I provide an overview of the socioeconomic positions of both groups, focusing especially on residential patterns, labor market participation, and educational attainment. I then compare leading theories used to explain West Indian success, arguing that selective United States immigration practices account for most variation both between the two groups and also within the West Indian immigrant population itself. The success of many black immigrants, including West Indians, is attributed to their motivation and ability to leave their home country and pursue opportunities abroad, rather than by virtue of being born of their individual culture. Selective immigration practices have privileged many West Indians who’ve settled in the country, especially in regard to educational attainment. Critiquing current affirmative action programs, I offer policy suggestions to ensure restitution for African Americans who remain persistently disadvantaged by the legacies of slavery.