Political Science Theses and Dissertations

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A Key Mechanism of Control: Communication Strategies and Preference Formation in the U.S. House of Representatives
(University of Oregon, 2024-08-07) Asberry, Craig; Tichenor, Daniel
This dissertation explores the origins and content of strategic communication in the House of Representatives. Social science literature has established that congressional communication is mediated by various factors: personal characteristics, constituency pressures, and institutional-contextual incentives. All of these variables change the prevalence and content of MC communication. The focus of this dissertation is to explore the determinants and flavors of congressional speech from a quantitative, text-as-data perspective. In short, why do members of Congress focus on the substantive policies that they do? And how does that change the content of their speech? The answers are nuanced. Personal characteristics seem to exert the broadest influence on how often members speak about certain policies, while constituency pressures and institutional-contextual incentives can exert strong, narrowly focused effects on the prevalence of speech by members. Differences in content seem to follow procedural or identity-based rhetorical strategies, representational or obfuscatory strategies, or brand management rhetorical strategies vis-à-vis a member’s posture within the institution of congress. Elucidating these dynamics provides a greater ability for scholars and citizens alike to hold public servants accountable to the American people and take effective action to correct decades of partisan polarization.
Open Access
Why do states adopt carbon taxes when they do?
(University of Oregon, 2024-08-07) Ahmed, Saima; Mitchell, Ronald
With ever-increasing global temperatures and climate change problems, states are faced with the challenge of formulating carbon reduction policies. The objective of this dissertation is to unfold the factors that lead states to adopt carbon taxes to reduce carbon emissions. Despite being considered an effective carbon reduction policy, carbon taxes have been adopted by only 28 states, and the remaining 166 did not adopt carbon taxes. The dissertation aims to understand the determinant factors behind the decision of the adoption of carbon taxes by 28 states and also to understand the timing of their implementation to explore specific circumstances. I have applied mixed methods in this research by conducting a cross-sectional quantitative analysis and two case studies, one on Australia’s adoption and repeal of carbon taxes and another on Mexico’s adoption of carbon taxes.The quantitative study of this dissertation found a strong influence of high levels of democracy in adopting carbon taxes, indicating the implication of the institutional features of liberal democracy, such as inclusivity, diverse representation, and accountability, and discussed how they allow room for policymakers to address climate change problems by having strong carbon emission reduction policies such as carbon taxes. It further demonstrated that proportional representative systems within highly liberal democracies also have strong correlations with the adoption of carbon taxes, indicating that the institutional features of proportional systems in democracies ensure more multiparty representation in the legislature that increases the likelihood of carbon taxes. The dissertation's case studies confirmed the quantitative study's findings about the positive impact of democratic institutions and proportional systems on the adoption of carbon taxes. Australia has been a highly liberal democracy for many decades, while Mexico democratized in 2000. Australia and Mexico have some proportional representation in their mixed systems, which ensures the representation of many political parties in the legislature. The political-institutional features helped both countries to have more discussions on the policy option of carbon taxes. In addition, both case studies helped to come to the conclusion that if Green or Left parties can form governments to attain decision-making power, the adoption of carbon taxes becomes highly likely.
Open Access
Staging an Insurrection: The Application of Theatre and Memory on January 6th
(University of Oregon, 2024-08-07) Reanne, Jessica; Gash, Alison
In this dissertation, I apply the concepts of theatricality and cultural memory to the January 6 th insurrection. I suggest that read together, theatricality and cultural memory tell a compelling story about the motivations and impacts of the January 6 th insurrection, more than traditional partisanship analyses. I analyze three instances of memory building during and after the insurrection: the memorialization of Ashli Babbitt and the state’s commemoration of Lt. Byrd’s actions defending the Capitol; the history and use of American flags in American culture and their deployment during the insurrection; and finally, the use of ceremony by the state during Biden’s inauguration. These three cases highlight the convergences of cultural memory creation by the insurrectionists and by the state, both of which believe themselves to be the legitimate inheritor of America’s cultural memory and legacies. This dissertation includes previously published materials.
Open Access
Selective Objection: A Comparison Between Two Social Movements in Israel
(University of Oregon, 2004-12) Dar, Dana
Since the eruption of the Al-Aqtsa intifada, increasing numbers of soldiers have refused to serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip as a form of political protest. Two groups organize these refusers, Yesh Gvul ("There is a Limit") and "Ha'omez Lesarev" ("the Courage to Refuse"). Using content analysis of public statements by both groups, this study examines their similar political goals and different strategies for mobilization and legitimation. It shows how their different use of cultural resources such as specific symbols, values, discourse and institutions leads to a difference in support and legitimation for each group. Yesh Gvul focuses on a universalistic discourse of justice and morality while Courage to Refuse uses a more realist militaristic discourse. The findings suggest that Courage to Refuse and the use of a realist-militaristic discourse has a stronger public appeal than Yesh Gvul's universalistic message.
Open Access
Myths of Missile Defense: International Ambition Driven by Domestic Politics
(University of Oregon, 2024-03-25) Baker, Joshua; Cramer, Jane
This dissertation investigates the paradoxical revival of strategic missile defense, a resurgence notable for high economic, diplomatic, and strategic costs and a lack of imminent threats. Despite historically incurring substantial costs, including massive downstream costs, with more projected in the near future, it is fundamentally flawed, both technologically and strategically. It creates significant diplomatic hurdles in arms control, spurs arms races, incentivizes first-strike postures and countermeasures like MIRVing ICBMs, and creates a world where we are less safe with it than we were without it. This study challenges the idea that this resurgence is driven by legitimate national security needs, instead arguing that it is best understood as a form of overexpansion—a self-defeating policy of aggression. Although Jack Snyder's theory of Coalition logrolling provides insights into overexpansion, it falls short in explaining the specific dynamics of missile defense resurgence, particularly concerning the timing, involvement of actors without direct benefits, and the lack of effective democratic oversight. Using historical process tracing and organization theory, this dissertation uncovers that the resurgence is driven by an informal network of actors bound by resource dependencies, including financial connections, information exchanges, and personnel dynamics. These actors strategically leverage resources to ensure survival, mitigate uncertainty, resist autonomy infringements, and access necessary resources. This approach allows a more nuanced understanding of the resurgence's timing, accounting for shifts in resource distribution (financial and political) following exogenous events. The dissertation tracks how network actors strategically shaped their environment to benefit the network, employing tactics that transcended immediate personal gains. It highlights their efforts to manage uncertainties, manipulate organizational environments, and create demand for network-provided resources. The study examines strategies to buffer against environmental fluctuations, including strategic secrecy, information management, and practices for perpetual resource acquisition. Network actions that undermined international agreements for the network's advantage, while resisted by actors with minimal network ties, are also analyzed. The resurgence of strategic missile defense is best understood through an organization theory lens, focusing on resource dependencies and network behaviors. This perspective comprehensively explains the policy's revival, emphasizing an influential network's strategic actions and motivations within the US defense policy sphere.
Open Access
Prospect Theory-Based Explanation of Majority Nationalist Mobilization: Cases of Russia and Kazakhstan
(University of Oregon, 2024-03-25) Tyan, Maxim; Parsons, Craig
The current dissertation has a dual purpose of developing a theory of majority nationalistmobilization and explaining substantive variation in levels of nationalist mobilization in post- Soviet region during the first two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, particularly in the country cases of Russia and Kazakhstan. The study begins by pointing out at the failure of major theoretical approaches to nationalism such as modernism and perennialism to account for a phenomenon of bottom-up majority nationalist mobilization, a variation in levels of which can be observed in these two countries through the period of 1990s-2000s. It then develops a theory of bottom-up majority nationalist mobilization based on the combination of insights from the cognitive perspective to ethnicity and prospect theory. Further, using qualitative cross-case and within-case analysis, the dissertation tests suggested theory against empirical evidence in cases of Russia and Kazakhstan and demonstrates that this framework provides better explanation to divergent mobilization outcomes in these countries then existing rational-instrumentalist and non-rationalist theoretical alternatives.
Open Access
The Shadows of American Law: Enmity, Intersectionality and Police
(University of Oregon, 2024-01-09) freeman, kahina marie; Gash, Allison
This dissertation explores the concept of public enmity and its deployment at the founding, in the nation’s most pivotal state-building arenas: the courts, the military, and the emerging institutions of internal security. The Black Seminole people represented a perennial enemy bent on destroying the fabric of the fledgling nation through violence and atrocity. American tabloids valorized every act of violence committed for the sake of liberation as an act of heinous murder against innocent people. Jackson furthered these tropes in his few public speeches, utilizing the specter of Afro-Native violence to win the southern vote in 1828. Abraham, though never directly named, emerged as a scourge on American society bent on upending civilization. Jackson used his experiences as a military commander to justify the burgeoning of the militia system, which would give way to both slave patrols and the genocidal atrocities of the US Marshals during the frontier wars. This project seeks to accomplish three goals: establish a concrete definition of public enmity; identify how it operates as an invitation for a specific kind of state-building; highlight the work that it performs in specific institutional or policy spaces. I am motivated by what I argue is a missed opportunity to connect the development of police authority in the United States to the historical roots of public enmity. I argue that the conceptual work on police in American law would benefit from identifying the central role that enmity played in development of police authority in the Jacksonian era. I bridge policing to the public enmity narrative by presenting cases from the Jacksonian era and highlighting the crucial links between the development of a white nationalist ideology on the one hand, and the role of police authority in combatting national threats in the form of “internal enemies (Taylor, 2013).” I trace the debates on public authority during the Jacksonian era highlighting what prompted these debates, what populations were identified as enemies or threats to national sovereignty, and what institutions were mobilized to defend the nation. In the two cases that follow I highlight the relationship between enmity, sovereignty, and police authority.
Open Access
States of Detention: A Comparative Historical Analysis of Migration Crises to the United States
(University of Oregon, 2024-01-09) ellis, dustin; Tichenor, Daniel
What is a migration crisis? To answer this seemingly simple question, this study juxtaposes two migration crises that have profoundly shaped the character of American political institutions and the imaginations of liberal democratic politics. Migration, crisis or not, will be the primary issue driving major policy and state-market innovations for the next century, and may pose the ultimate test for liberal democracies facing new challenges in a rapidly changing world. Proffering a diagnosis of our contemporary immigration and border politics for the purposes of thinking more holistically about the past, present, and future, this study maps out the origins of crises from colonialism to the 21st century through a comparative historical analysis that uses eclectic data collected from archives both physical and digital. The results are clear, we cannot ignore the deeply interconnected histories and geographies of the United States, Cuba, Haiti, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras if we are to understand the origins of migration crises and their implications in reproducing a future wrought with familiar paradoxical tensions between America as an idea, and America as a place.
Open Access
United States Foreign Policy and International Organization: Its Regional Aspects
(University of Oregon, 1960-06) Martin, Larry Clifford
The planning and negotiations resulting in the formation of the League of Nations and the United Nations involved problems of regionalism. The relationship of regional arrangements and understandings to global organization arose in both cases. In the preliminary planning for the United Nations considerable attention was given to the idea of structuring the organization along regional lines. The primary purpose of this thesis is to examine the political and security aspects of the United States policy concerning the participation in regional arrangements and organizations, and their relation to those of a more global or universal nature. A secondary aspect involves a consideration of the idea and possibility of erecting a post-World War II international organization upon a regionally structured foundation. These considerations involve the following general questions: What was the nature of United States regional interest? What were the effects of these interests on United States policy toward global organization? What, of regional significance, resulted from the policy? Although this study does not extend beyond the San Francisco Conference on International Organization, it should facilitate future study in the field of regionalism and United States policy.
Open Access
The Utility of the Former German Colonies and the Feasibility of the Return of Them
(University of Oregon, 1940-06) Rowe, Harold L.
An understanding of the colonial policies of the nations today, and especially in relation to Germany’s position, could not be complete with out some attention being devoted to the historical aspects of German colonial efforts and achievements. In the story of the German colonies, from the first individual commercial enterprises in Africa through the fateful clauses of Versailles, can be found many factors explaining German actions today. Certainly an Empire that was founded, developed and lost in the space of an individual lifetime is something more than passing interest. On this discussion, however, the historical aspect must be studied only for the purpose of orientation, and will be subordinated wholly to the larger issues in question. For the same reasons the material in this section is gathered from the investigations of those who have worked in the field, not upon the writer’s own research.
Open Access
The Caucusing Groups of the United Nations – An Examination of Their Attitudes Toward the Organization
(University of Oregon, 1964-03) Vincent, Jack Ernest
This dissertation has two basic purposes: ( 1 ) to describe certain attitude patterns toward the United nations by the delegate members of Caucasian groups within the organization and (to closed parentheses to test a hypothesis concerning these patterns. The descriptive component is intended to supplement political science literature concerning the Caucasian groups of the United Nations. Although Thomas Hovet, Jr. Has made a study of the voting records of caucusing groups in his book Bloc Politics in the United Nations, no one, so far, as attempted to ascertain attitudinal differences between the groups. It is apparent that attitudes are not the only important set of variables in the (present or future) behavior patterns at the United Nations. Every discussion, therefore, of the ramification of these patterns must be considered prefaced by the phrase: “to the extent delegate attitudes are pertinent.” It is assumed that these attitudes are pertinent. This assumption is made because delegates ( 1 ) frequently make decisions without directions from their home governments, ( 2 ) supply information to their home governments and hence their personal opinions are probably reflected in this intelligence, and ( 3 ) are frequently asked for their advice when home governments compile instructions. Therefore, a presentation of delegate attitudes may facilitate an understanding of the United Nations.
Open Access
Ultimatum to Congress: A Case Study of a Deficiency Appropriation
(1961-06) Miner, Ralph E.
Spring of 1956, Congress passed the Treasury-Post Office department's appropriation bill which included $2,984,340,000 for the operation of the Post Office Department for the 1957 fiscal year, beginning July 1, 1956. The appropriated amount was $15,660,000 less than requested by the President in his 1957 Budget. The House of Representatives had approved a report of its Committee of Appropriations which recommended a cut of $26,100,000, and the Senate had approved a reduction of $5,220,000. The conference committee recommended an even split of the difference between the two amounts, and this compromise passed both the House and Senate on March 28, with a minimum of debate. The President signed the bill into law on April 2, 1956.
Open Access
The City Manager in the Community: An Exploratory Study
(University of Oregon, 1959-06) Field, Gary R.
This thesis cannot approach the magnitude of the research project suggested in the preceeding several paragraphs. A more manageable problem, and seemingly a necessary step leading to a more critical examination of city manager government, will be set forth here, however. The starting point of this study is the writer's surmise that the doctrines and concepts of the International City Manager's Association do not serve as an adequate or realistic tool, or model, by which the behavior or activities of city managers can be analyzed or understood. Before presenting what might be termed the occupation's self-conception, or its public image, in Chapter IV, two narratives of a community's experience with city manager government will be related. The first narrative describes several conflict situations Involving the adoption of the manager plan and the hiring and dismissal of several managers. The second narrative directs attention to the process of policy formation in the community. In this narrative annexation serves as the specific policy question in which two city managers in the same community were involved. In Chapter V the writer will present material which can be used as the basis for a more realistic analysis of manager government. Material from public administration and sociology will be used in this critique of the public image of city manager government. The two narratives« stressing conflict and the process of policy formation, will be used as the "anchor" for the more theoretical material. Finally, in the last chapter of the study, the writer will summarize the material which has been set forth, and make more explicit some critical thoughts about the possible results of manager government.
Open Access
The Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1958: Another Attempt to Unify the Armed Forces
(University of Oregon, 1959-06) Wolfe, Leon K., Jr
This thesis is a detailed study of the Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1958 and includes: 1. A short historical review of the events that led to the unification of the armed forces in 1947. 2. A study of each of the three major steps previously taken in the continuous attempt to provide the nation with a more effective defense organization. 3. A summary of the startling events that occurred in 1957 which indicated further changes were necessary in the Department of Defense and the processes and factors involved in the formulation of a reorganization plan. 4. A study of the legislative process and its relation to the defense reorganization plan as it passed through Congress. 5. A detailed analysis of the major provisions of the 1958 Reorganization Act. 6. A review of the changes the act made in the Department of Defense.
Open Access
State Administrative Reorganization by Constitutional Revision
(University of Oregon, 1953-06) Foss, Phillip Oliver
The last two sessions of Oregon's legislature bills have been introduced to provide for a constitutional convention. For some time there has existed a rather vague feeling of discontent with the Oregon constitution. Critics have pointed out useless and archaic provisions and the combination of the basic law, statutory law, and administrative regulation which appear in the constitution. These deficiencies may or may not be sufficient reason for calling a constitutional convention. It is not likely such a convention would confine itself to the deletion of anachronisms and to improve the whole constitution and the administrative structure of state government.
Open Access
Political Determinants of Covid-19 Mortality; Factional Politics in Vietnam; Rising Media Enclave Extremism
(University of Oregon, 2022-10-04) Nguyen, Thuy; Vu, Tuong
My dissertation consists of three independent projects. The first one investigates possible relationships between certain macro-systemic political variables and Covid mortality rates. Using multilevel modeling, I analyze countries’ trajectories of Covid mortality rates between March 2020 and January 2022. I found that countries with a federal system, on average, tend to have higher death rates than those in a unitary system. Democracy is found to be negatively associated with Covid mortality overall, but democracy’s effects on the trajectory of Covid rates depend on what subgroup of countries are considered. Government effectiveness persists as a significant factor that is negatively associated with Covid deaths. In countries where people have higher trust in government, the curves of death tolls tend to be flatter. The second project addresses the debate on authoritarian resilience with evidence from Vietnam. The dominant view in the debate focuses on political institutions and argues that institutions help dictators resolve “the problem of authoritarian power-sharing”. I test two main claims of this dominant view: institutions facilitate power access and rule-based power succession. I found that these processes are rather superficial in the case of Vietnam and show how the persistence of factional politics, coupled with the historical context of the country, are embedded in current politics. In contrast to the expectation of institutionalist scholars, top leaders were not bound by retirement age limits. Furthermore, evidence indicates that hometown ties constitute rigid political factions. The third project examines the rise of media enclave extremism, showing how it successfully mobilized a historically inactive ethnic population into the far-right circle. My research provides insight into the production side of media enclave extremism in an ethnic minority news outlet on the far-right, The Epoch Times. I conduct a discourse-historical analysis of its political news articles and identify two main discursive strategies. First, the outlet links their traditional enemy, the Chinese Communist Party, with US political entities such as the Democratic Party, Liberals, the mainstream media, and “bad” immigrants. Second, The Epoch Times groups itself with US right-wing media, “good” immigrants, naturalized citizens, and conservatives.
Open Access
Good Order and Discipline: The Politics of Exclusion in the American Military
(University of Oregon, 2022-10-04) Rivera, John; Cramer, Jane
How do systemic and ideational factors shape the composition and effectiveness of the American military? From the American Revolution to the present, the American military has regularly established informal and formal discriminatory military personnel policies that have limited the availability of its military manpower, diminished its ability to fill critical and undermanned military occupations, harmed unit cohesion, reduced retention of vital talent, and made it difficult for individual service members to be the best they could be at their jobs. I contribute to the debate within security studies literature concerning the formation of military doctrine by including a focus on military personnel policies with an extensive focus on the American military’s historical treatment of African American men, gay men and lesbians, women, and transgender individuals. Existing literature suggests that national security is an area of state behavior where we should least expect ideational variables to trump systemic ones, and where states are least likely to make national security decisions that act against a state’s material self-interest. This dissertation demonstrates the United States has frequently done so and placed the enforcement of prejudicial ideas and beliefs about certain groups of individuals above national security. In a mixed-methods research study, I exhaustively review existing literature on the relationship between race, sexual orientation, gender, and transgender identity with military service, conducted archival research from the Congressional Record and various Department of Defense records, and conducted forty-five semi-structured personal interviews with civilian and military elites as well as individual military service members. My findings demonstrate that discriminatory military personal policies are entirely ideational in origin and are neither a function of systemic pressures nor military necessity and are both harmful to military effectiveness and antithetical to national security. The lengthy historical content across discriminatory military personnel policies shaped by prejudicial ideas and beliefs about race, sexual orientation, gender, and transgender identity also strongly demonstrates that elites’ justifications for these policies are strikingly similar across time and the harmful effects of individual policies are not isolated events.
Open Access
Autonomous Problem-Solving and the Creation of Community-Controlled Housing Alternatives in the United States
(University of Oregon, 2022-10-04) Farrington, Alex; Gash, Alison
In this dissertation project, I introduce the concept of autonomous problem-solving and apply it to housing struggles in the United States. Autonomous problem-solving is a mode of collective action in which everyday people experiment with self-organized and self-implemented solutions to pressing problems in their community. I show how this concept highlights a set of empirical cases that contemporary scholarship on public problem-solving has failed to address. I then analyze two cases in which organizers used autonomous problem-solving to grapple with housing precarity in their communities. I examine the creation of the first community land trust by civil rights activists in Georgia in 1969 and the creation of Dignity Village (one of the first autonomous houseless villages) in Portland in 2001. In both cases, participants generated novel forms of community-controlled housing by reconfiguring conventional property relations in creative ways.
Open Access
The Clothing Curse: Institutional Causes And Political Consequences Of Clothing Export Dependence In Developing Countries
(University of Oregon, 2022-05-10) Rahman, Mohammad Shafiqur; Vu, Tuong
Readymade garments (RMG) or clothing industry is the most important manufacturing export for poor and developing countries. Low capital requirement, high labor intensity and simple technology make the industry a natural starting base for internationally competitive manufacturing. In the last seventy years of growth in RMG exports, many formerly underdeveloped countries embarked on manufacturing export-led economic development with a start in RMG exports. These countries rapidly expanded and diversified their manufacturing sectors and climbed up the ladder of economic development. However, in recent decades, some of the leading clothing exporting countries seem to be stuck in long-term concentration in clothing exports without expected diversification and upgrading in industries. These clothing export-dependent countries also witnessed increasing authoritarianism in their ruling political regimes. This dissertation seeks to explain these phenomena in political economy of developing countries with theoretical arguments, cross-country empirical analysis and case studies. The main argument of the paper has three basic parts. First, distinctive sectoral characteristics of the RMG export industry make the sector a less suitable launching pad for industrial upgrading and diversification. Second, if a developing country where RMG export industry has become established, lacks state capacity to implement industrial policy, then the country is likely to fall into extended dependence on RMG export. Third, extended apparel export dependency changes the distribution of power among political and economic elites to the extent that democracy reversal by incumbent takeover becomes more likely. Although the dissertation focuses on RMG industry, the building blocks of the arguments are generalizable to characteristics of all mainstream manufacturing and service export sectors, and institutional quality in developing countries. Thus, the arguments and explanations have extensive ramifications in political economy of development for poor countries.
Open Access
The Good Student, the Bad Student, and the Celtic Tiger: The Role of National Identity and Responses to the Troika in Europe
(University of Oregon, 2021-09-13) O'Hare, Kevin; Parsons, Craig
In response to crises of unsustainable debt, which left Greece, Ireland, and Portugal locked out of bond markets, each country received assistance from the “Troika” (European Commission, European Central Bank, and IMF). They received loans in return for implementing austerity policies and liberal structural reforms. All three countries suffered painful cuts and massive recessions, but their citizens and leaders reacted differently. Greece experienced significant political and social resistance and ultimately needed a second program. The Irish rejected the government that requested the bailout and elected a new government that implemented the Troika program with little deviation from the original plan and exited its Troika program on time. Ireland also saw very little labor unrest, and limited protest. The Portuguese elected strong advocates of the Troika’s policies and saw an initial 16-month period with moderate levels of protest and strikes, before a more intense period ensued. Despite increased social pressure, the Portuguese government weathered a near collapse while maintaining its commitment to the Troika program and exited its Troika program on schedule. Many have argued that the prevalence of “neoliberal” ideas, institutional factors, or differences in the difficulty of the individual programs can account for these responses, but all of these explanations fall short in various ways. This dissertation argues that these responses were influenced by particular aspects of each country’s national identity, especially as each relates to the European Union. In this dissertation, I show that each country can be seen to have very different types of national identities, with the most prominent features of each identity being themselves a result of the historical context of each country. Additionally, the most prominent aspects of each country’s identity were the least contested in each society. Viewed through the lens of national identity, the responses from Greece, Ireland, and Portugal not only reproduced central elements of the content of each country’s national identity, but the identities interacted in real time, with Ireland and Portugal highlighting their differences from Greece, and Portugal actively striving to be more like Ireland. The interaction between identities further reinforced each country’s responses to their respective Troika programs.