Student Honors Papers

Tibetans have been internationally displaced for over 60 years; following the failed Lhasa Uprising that began in the spring of 1959. Yet, despite being internationally displaced, Tibetans appear to construct and sustain their peoplehood movement around the annual commemoration of the events that took place in the Lhasa Uprising on March 10th. The paper shows how the March 10th protests have been institutionalized and used by Tibetan leaders and their followers to durably change their demands. This research demonstrates how Tibetan leaders frame their peoplehood movement through different mechanisms. In order to do this, the paper will build upon the writings on social movements to further understand the goals of the Tibetan community from the structural movements and processes of these social movements.

After decades of struggling for autonomy, Catalonia, Spain has initiated a renewed independence movement. This paper seeks to answer the question: what economic motives are driving the possibility of Catalan secession from Spain, and how have these motives affected Catalonia’s economy and ways of life? I will focus on the politically and economically significant timeline of 2008-2019, analyzing indicators of economic health such as Gross Domestic Product, Foreign Direct Investment Rates, Unemployment, and the actions of Ibex-35 Businesses within Catalonia. Further, I will use public opinion polls on independence and national identity to gauge support for independence within the region, examining whether support for independence and Catalan identity vary during this time. I argue that when economic motives to support Catalan independence began to dwindle, political cries for independence became muted as a response to fears of secession creating an economic crisis.

This paper attempts to settle scholarly debates around significant legislation’s passage rates within the context of presidential mentions and influence amongst legislation. The first section of this paper will lay out significant literature surrounding topics such as: quantifying congressional-presidential relations, scholarly investigations centered around divided and unified government, works concerning institutional effects on legislative productivity, as well as investigations into legislative success by policy type. Secondly, the paper will discuss the methodological processes and standards used to determine if presidential mentioning is influential on legislative success. The next section will identify key findings to determine if the hypotheses of the study can be confirmed, as well as discuss limitations to the study. Finally, the paper will look at future implications that this study has within legislative productivity research.

In the early ‘90s, several conservative Christian legal organizations (CCLOs) sprung up in the United States in response to pluralism. These CCLOs sought to match the strategies and power of long-standing liberal public interest groups, like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Much literature has been produced on the activities of CCLOs, but few have considered the CCLOs’ lasting impact on the nation. Using Willamette University College of Law Professor Steven K. Green's framework of religious disestablishments across U.S. history, this paper proposes that the country has entered a prolonged period of moral reestablishment partly thanks to CCLOs. With a focus on the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), this twenty-year longitudinal case study demonstrates how the powerhouse firm has used the courts, media, and educational institutions to extend culture wars in America in the aftermath of the third religious disestablishment.

Ideological polarization is not a unique product of western politics. A national survey (2007-2014) revealed that the overarching division in Chinese society is split between nationalism and cultural liberalism. Why does polarization happen in society where state ideology dominates the political apparatuses? This paper approaches this puzzle by examining the relationship between individuals' media diet facilitated by media censorship policies and their ideology in China. The findings suggest that polarization as an outcome is due to nationalists adhering to heavily state-controlled media, while liberals seek less censored resources. The findings also suggest that polarization as a process is due to the fact that agnostics who use the media mainly for learning purposes tend to stay or become nationalists, while agnostics who use media mainly for entertainment purposes tend to become liberals.

Over the last decade, many political analyst’s multiple has observed what they perceive to be a crisis of democracy in advanced developed democracies. These analysts associate the crisis of democracy with declines in party membership, widespread distrust in representative government, and a lack of participation in electoral practices. However, although there is a large literature that maintains that political parties are the ‘gatekeepers’ of democracy, the critical role of political parties in intensifying the democratic crisis has not been adequately examined. This paper offers a theoretical account of party function for the electorate, the party organization, and the government to understand how the diminishment may undermine democratic norms. This paper focuses its empirical analysis on polarization in the United States and examines changes in co-sponsorship of congressional bills and circuit court judge confirmations.

Why the Right? Evaluating Vote Choice in Rural America focuses on explaining the seemingly “counterintuitive” vote choices of many poor, white, rural Americans. Theoretically, one would anticipate that those with low incomes would have a vested interest in redistributive policies. In reality, however, many of these Americans do not vote for these policies or the political party that champions them, The Democrats. This idea that these residents vote against their interests is growing increasingly popular and it is often referenced in explanation of the results of the 2016 US Presidential Election. Using data from the American National Election Study and a series of 30 interviews with residents of the rural village of Arthur, Illinois, this study seeks to determine what does motivate vote choice in rural America. This study finds that attitudinal factors, such as feelings of alienation and resentment are contributors to vote choice, and that the vote choices of rural citizens do align with their expressed interests. If this is the case then, despite popular rhetoric, the vote choices of rural Americans are not in fact, counter intuitive.

Much of the early literature on right-wing populism in advanced democracies suggested that PR electoral rules offer an advantageous opportunity structure for the emergence and success of populist radical right (PRR) parties. By extension, scholars have assumed that, even where demand is ripe for a populist surge, majoritarian institutions will act as a bulwark against the influence of the PRR. The recent success of the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and the election of Donald Trump as US President challenge that orthodoxy. If those events are in fact majoritarian expressions of right-wing populist success, then support for Brexit and Donald Trump should be accounted for through models already articulated in the general literature. Recent studies suggest that those most displaced by the combination of economic and cultural changes associated with post-modernism feel that they have been “left behind.” These voters have a sense that they are not recognized, valued, or integrated into their societies. They tend to view society, the economy, and politics as being in a state of decline and are particularly vulnerable to populist promises to “take the country back” or “make the country great again.” Marshalling data from two different surveys, this study finds that those who do not feel socially recognized and maintain anti-immigration sentiments are the most likely to support Brexit, while those in the US that view society in a state of economic decline, live in rural areas, and identify as born again Christians are the most likely to support Trump. These findings are consistent with the literature and indicate that those who feel left behind are the most likely to offer their support for right-wing populist leaders and movements, even in majoritarian structures.

In the United States, women and racial minorities continue to face serious obstacles to entering elected office, particularly above the local level. This has serious consequences for democratic participation and legitimacy and may affect the substantive representation of issues that concern women of color. Studies show that many eligible women list the following as deterrents from running for office: low political confidence, perceived risks associated with running, a lack of support, and a lack of interest in running for higher office. But do Latina candidates, as members of an underrepresented gender and a marginalized racial minority, face unique challenges when compared to non-minority women or Latino males? This study builds on the research on women and Latinos in politics and attempts to garner an in-depth understanding of the Latina candidate's experience through interviews with Latina elected officials at various levels of government in Illinois. This study finds that familial support is of critical importance for Latina candidates but that identification and encouragement from party gatekeepers plays the key role in determining whether a Latina will step forward to seek office.

While the determining factors leading to the dismally low levels of voter turnout in national and statewide elections have been well studied, nowhere is turnout lower than in local elections, a particular area that is significantly understudied. Of the limited literature on local and mayoral elections, few examine cities below 250,000 in population. Rather, many examine mega-city elections, which are comparable to congressional or statewide elections. Utilizing an original dataset of 356 midsized (50,000-250,000 in population) American cities from the Midwest, South, and Northeast, this study examines the drivers of mayoral election turnout: election day circumstances, stakes in the game socioeconomic factors, and race. The primary findings are that election day circumstances, especially the timing of the elections, perform best across all models tested, with the stakes in the game variables also being significant. Additionally, these first two measures drive turnout far more than any social, economic, or racial composition of a city’s population.