Department of Political Science
Permanent URI for this community
Browse
Browsing Department of Political Science by Issue Date
Now showing 1 - 20 of 64
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item The direct primary election system in Alabama(University of Alabama Libraries, 1931) Burgin, Maggie; University of Alabama TuscaloosaChapter one of this thesis deals with the early primary regulations in Alabama, and is therefore mostly historical. Early methods of making nominations are discussed, and the desire on the part of the voters for a primary election is shown. The first steps toward majority rule are presented by citing acts and laws passed by the legislature and by the State Committee. The autocratic power of the State Democratic Executive Committee is shown, and the chapter closes with a discussion of the set of 1911 and further regulations by the committee and Subcommittee.Item Politics in Covington County, Alabama from 1890 to 1900(1941) Love, Gladys; University of Alabama TuscaloosaItem An annual cost of living index for the American states, 1960-1995(University of Texas Press, 2000) Berry, WD; Fording, RC; Hanson, RL; State University System of Florida; Florida State University; University of Kentucky; Indiana University System; Indiana University Bloomington; University of Alabama TuscaloosaAn enormous amount of research on state politics and policy relies on monetary variables. Such variables are affected by differences in the purchasing power of a dollar over time and across states, but a lack of information about geographic variation in the costs of goods and services has kept social scientists from taking these differences into account. We remove this obstacle by constructing an annual cost of living index for each continental American state from 1960 to 1995. The index constitutes a deflator suitable for cross-sectional, time-series, and pooled research. After establishing the reliability and validity of our index using a battery of diagnostic tests, we illustrate the importance of deflating monetary variables by examining two variables that are often used in state politics research.Item Reassessing the "Race to the bottom" in state welfare policy(Blackwell, 2003) Berry, WD; Fording, RC; Hanson, RL; State University System of Florida; Florida State University; University of Kentucky; Indiana University System; Indiana University Bloomington; University of Alabama TuscaloosaOn the assumption that poor people migrate to obtain better welfare benefits, the magnet hypothesi. predicts that a state's poverty rate increases when its welfare benefit rises faster than benefits in surrounding states. The benefit competition hypothesis proposes that states lower welfare benefits to avoid attracting the poor from neighboring states. Previous investigations, which yield support for these propositions. suffer from weaknesses in model specification and methodology. We correct these deficiencies in a simultaneous equation model including a state's poverty rate and its benefit level for AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) as endogenous variables. We estimate the model using pooled annual data for the American states from 1960 to 1990 and find that a state's poverty rate does not jump significantly when its welfare payments outpace benefits in neighboring states. Further-more, there is no evidence of vigorous benefit competition among states states respond to decreases in neighboring states' welfare benefits with only small adjustments in their own.Item Politics and state punitiveness in black and white(University of Chicago Press, 2005) Yates, J; Fording, R; University System of Georgia; University of Georgia; University of Kentucky; University of Alabama TuscaloosaRecent findings from the literature on imprisonment policy suggest that in addition to traditional social and economic variables, imprisonment rates are also strongly related to changes in the state political environment. In this study, we extend this literature by testing a theory of state punitiveness which posits that (1) the political environment of states influences the degree to which they incarcerate their citizens, and (2) the political determinants of state punitiveness may be conditional upon the racial subpopulation being incarcerated. Our results suggest that increases in state political conservatism in recent decades have contributed to increases in both the growth in black imprisonment rates and black imprisonment disparity (relative to whites), but that these effects are, to a degree, tempered by countervailing political conditions.Item Devolution, discretion, and the effect of local political values on TANF sanctioning(University of Chicago Press, 2007) Fording, Richard C.; Soss, Joe; Schram, Sanford F.; University of Kentucky; University of Wisconsin System; University of Wisconsin Madison; Bryn Mawr College; University of Alabama TuscaloosaOne of welfare reform's most significant consequences is the devolution of policy-making authority from the federal government and states to local governments and frontline workers. What is perhaps less often appreciated is that devolution of authority to state governments has been accompanied by a significant decentralization of policy-making authority within states. As a result, prior research has not given sufficient attention to local political context as a factor shaping program implementation. This article examines the effect of local political values on the use of sanctions to penalize welfare recipients. Analyzing administrative data from the Florida Department of Children and Families for over 60,000 welfare clients, we find that there is a statistically significant amount of local variation in sanctioning rates across the state of Florida, even after controlling welfare clients' characteristics. Local sanctioning patterns are systematically related to selected characteristics of local communities, including their ideological orientations.Item A comparative test of theories of polarity and conflict(University of Alabama Libraries, 2009) Zhang, Wanfa; Gibler, Douglas M.; Oneal, John R.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaWorks on the relationship between polarity and war in the past produce inconsistent, sometimes, self-conflicting conclusions. This is caused by the lack of a comparable way of conceptualizing and defining polarity and the lack of a common gauge for estimating that relationship. This research addresses these methodological shortcomings and explores the linkage between the international system of the major powers and dyadic conflict by conducting a comparative study of polarity and war. It tests the targeted relationship using: 1) a number of quantifiable polarity concepts proposed by several representative scholars, including John Mearsheimer, Jack Levy, Charles Kegley and Gregory Raymond, and George Modelski; 2) a common research design that has incorporated the Kantian variables and has drawn the essence from the latest progress in this discipline, and 3) an objective method of calculating a continuous measure of the polarity among the great powers. Such a research design can compare the impact of various types of polarity on the onset of wars while controlling for both realist and Kantian influences. It provides a broad prospective on the connection between polarity and war. This study confirms the existence of a connection between polarity and war of unipolarity > bipolarity > multipolarity in order of peacefulness.Item When recipients become donors: Polish democracy assistance in Belarus and Ukraine(University of Alabama Libraries, 2010) Pospieszna, Paulina Maria; Chotiner, Barbara Ann; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe dissertation is a first attempt to explore democracy assistance efforts provided by a young democracy that was a recipient of similar aid in the past. The study investigates approaches to democracy assistance, reasons for a young democracy's engagement, methods and effectiveness of efforts to promote democratic ideas and practices in recipient countries. Specifically, the research examines how government and social actors in a young democracy conceptualize democracy assistance and how their view on democracy aid is different from approaches used by Western donors. Then, why and how a former recipient country goes about assisting other states in their struggles for democracy are investigated. Finally, the research is motivated by the question of how democracy assistance efforts by a young donor can be evaluated in terms of their potential to diffuse democracy to other recipient countries. This project demonstrates several main findings based on comparative case studies of Polish democracy assistance to Ukraine and Belarus. These conclusions contribute to the theory and practice of democracy assistance. First, the Polish approach to democracy assistance takes into account the political situation of recipient country and is carefully crafted when directed to authoritarian and democratic regimes in terms of types of assistance, choice of domestic partners, and strategies used in the programs. This assistance also seems to avoid pitfalls described in the literature on democracy assistance. Second, this dissertation reinforces the importance of civil society as a sender and recipient of democracy assistance. This study unveils the key role of Polish NGOs in shaping the state's democracy assistance and their unique ability to reach civil society groups in recipient Belarus and Ukraine. Third, this research reveals a great deal about the features of cross-border work as a method of democracy assistance to exert an impact on civil society groups. Polish NGOs engage in close collaborative work with foreign civil society groups. By demonstrating the democratizing potential of cross-border projects, the dissertation shows that this form of assistance may contribute to the overall diffusion of democracy in the region, thus strengthening the role of regional actors in promoting democratic values and practices.Item The search for place and context: locating strategies of resistance in gay and lesbian subjectivity(University of Alabama Libraries, 2010) Austin, Gregory Phillip; Miller, Ted H.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThis dissertation is about the nature of community and the substance of individual and collective subjectivity. Specifically, I interrogate the character of gay and lesbian subjectivity by investigating the ways in which the gay or lesbian subject is constituted through the discourse on same-sex marriage and military service. I argue that recasting gay subjectivity uncovers more meaningful ontological possibilities for the emergence of a new description of an individual who has relational and social attachments to a broader community while maintaining fidelity and integrity to descriptions of the self. I argue that gay subjectivity begins as a search for models, a search for examples, and of a representation of the self. Gay subjectivity is about a search for place and context in an environment that views homosexuality as merely a marginal sexual identity. It is in this environment that gay and lesbian subjectivity is produced through a heteronormative discourse that distorts what it means to be gay. I argue that marital equality and unqualified military service successfully fulfill the Foucaultian promise of meaningful resistance which allows for a fuller, more meaningful subjectivity to be embraced by gays and lesbians.Item Competing issue frames and attitude consistency: conditions for understanding public opinion(University of Alabama Libraries, 2010) Park, Young Hwan; Cassel, Carol A.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaCompeting elite cues help citizens crystallize their policy opinions. Political leaders prime and frame issues in opposing terms, allowing them to be emphasized and discussed in electoral competition. With equal message flows, citizens contrast policy issues and attach personal relevance to the side of the issues as campaigns connect policy alternatives to citizens' underlying political principles. Through these means, citizens in a low information environment become better informed. Since data are structured in levels of groups and coefficients can vary depending on groups, multilevel models are used. The findings show that when they are exposed to competing issue frames, citizens tend to increase constraint between their general political principles and perception of meaningful differences between candidates. This effect is remarkable for the less grounded people.Item Deep in the heart: Mark Twain and Walker Percy as authors of agency(University of Alabama Libraries, 2010) Bourland, Laura Lea; McKnight, Utz Lars; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe following project examines the transformative power of literature against certain problems of the modern and postmodern experience as articulated by political theory. The primary concern is what theologian David Kyuman Kim calls "melancholic freedom," a condition wherein the intelligibility of the self has been compromised by the decreases in personal agency brought on by a modern disconnect from moral and ethical sources. As such, this work is situated within the contemporary debate on the interrelatedness of identity and agency, and thus the work of Charles Taylor will figure prominently. Much of the work of twentieth and twenty-first theorists has centered around attempts to resolve the complications that have developed in the wake of our modern era, to explain the tradeoffs and contradictions. Kim suggests the need for "projects of regenerating agency," which satisfy the following criteria: 1) provide suggestion of a religious imagination at work; 2) support a cultivation of the self; 3) demonstrate a search for moral identity and present opportunities for spiritual exercise; and 4) exhibit an aspiration toward a vocation of the self. It is my argument that engagement with the literary arts, either as a reader or writer, fulfills these conditions and presents an alternative site for regenerating agency. This expansion of Kim's work opens theory to wider application and joins political philosophy and literature in a common project of expanding the discourse on identity and agency. I will demonstrate how the writing and lives of Mark Twain and Walker Percy meet Kim's criteria for such a project. Twain and Percy as authors of projects of regenerating agency advance the case that art has the capacity to be instructive and illuminating as part of our moral discourses in ways that theory cannot replicate. Also, a reading of literature motivated by the concerns of political theory--in this case the discussion on identity, agency, and their points of intersection--allows us to reinvigorate the critical appreciation of these two authors.Item Race and the Local Politics of Punishment in the New World of Welfare(University of Chicago Press, 2011) Fording, Richard C.; Soss, Joe; Schram, Sanford F.; University of Kentucky; University of Minnesota System; University of Minnesota Twin Cities; Bryn Mawr College; University of Alabama TuscaloosaTo illuminate how race affects the usage of punitive tools in policy implementation settings, we analyze sanctions imposed for noncompliant client behavior under welfare reform. Drawing on a model of racial classification and policy choice, we test four hypotheses regarding client race, local context, and sanctioning. Based on longitudinal and cross-sectional multilevel analyses of individual-level administrative data, we find that race plays a significant role in shaping sanction implementation. Its effects, however, are highly contingent on client characteristics, local political contexts, and the degree to which state governments devolve policy control to local officials.Item Does the media send mixed messages?: a case for competitive framing(University of Alabama Libraries, 2011) Mitchell, Sean Patrick McLean; Cotter, Patrick R.; Cassel, Carol A.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaBased upon the work of John Zaller, the way people receive information can at least temporarily affect their opinions. Considering that most people get at least some of their information from broadcast/print news outlets, the way in which those organizations present, or frame, the information is incredibly important. The news media can activate predispositions by how they provide and/or do not provide information. This in turn can affect how the public feels about a news topic. This dissertation builds upon the work of Zaller, Druckman, Kahn and Kenney, and other leading researchers to show that different media sources use different framing techniques in their coverage of news events. Whereas previous studies into competitive framing have concentrated primarily upon political campaigns, this dissertation analyzes how the media uses various framing techniques in covering an issue. The analysis concentrates on the broadcast/print news media coverage of President Bush's "60 Stops in 60 Days" tour to promote his Social Security initiative during the spring of 2005. The analysis of competitive framing within the "Length", "Placement", "Frame Strength", and "Tone" variables is included. In a more traditional study, Length and Placement might be thought of as "agenda setting" rather than as framing variables; however, the fact that this study is on a major Presidential initiative means that the news media is expected to cover the issue. How much they cover it and where they place the coverage is a result of their own gate-keepers' perceptions of the importance level, or weight, relative to other stories. The interest here is with the actual content of media coverage. Specifically, this study examines whether or not there is variation in the way a political topic is framed within various news outlets. That is, in framing political issues, do various news outlets engage in "competitive framing."Item Pledge fulfillment in Germany: an examination of the Schröder II and Merkel I governments(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Ferguson, Mark Joseph; Royed, Terry J.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaPast scholarly research has indicated that campaign pledges are important. This research has led scholars to examine the various institutional differences between states. For instance, single-party majoritarian system, the British Westminster (UK), the American federal system for pledge fulfillment, coalition and minority systems, e.g., Ireland, Spain, Italy, France, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Sweden have been examined and compared. Combined, these scholars have presented academia compelling evidence that the rates of pledge fulfillment are a function of the individual institutional designs of the states examined. This dissertation expands on existing research by including the German system to the expanding understanding of pledge fulfillment and institutional design. This work examines the Schröder II (2002-2005) and Merkel (2005-2009) governments. I argue that there are several substantial questions that need to be addressed in relationship to Germany and pledge fulfillment. First, to what extent does the mandate model apply to Germany? Second, to what extent do parties in a grand coalition fulfill pledges, compared to normal coalition governments? Lastly, to what extent does the German case compare to previous research? I argue that pledge fulfillment under German coalition governments should be consistent with existing research; pledge fulfillment under grand coalition governments should be lower than previous research. By adding Germany to the already extensive work on pledge fulfillment, we are better able to make stronger inferences on the impact of institutional design on pledge fulfillment.Item Territorial threats and individual attitudes of leadership, corruption and quality of life(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Miller, Steven V.; Gibler, Douglas M.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaMany of our theories in political science about the nature of international conflict and the threats to democratic development make assumptions about the importance of individual-level attitudes under conditions of external threat. Citizens that feel that sense of salient threat from outside the state's borders react in ways that lead to centralized states, autocracies, and even conflict between states. This conforms well with what we know from international relations research, as well as political behavior research. However, much of our analyses do not fully test these arguments. In international relations, individual-level attitudes are usually assumptions of broader arguments of development and conflict, for which the assumptions are affirmed in the outcomes that individual-level attitudes are purported to explain. Political behavior research is more interested in the role of asymmetrical, or ``normative'', threats that lead to a divergence of attitudes in society, and not the convergence of opinion that affect state development processes inside states and conflict processes between states. International relations scholarship and political behavior research overlap in important ways, but still have much to learn from each other. This dissertation fully incorporates international relations theories and political behavior scholarship through an assessment of how salient, external threats to the state affect individual-level political attitudes. Identifying territorial threats as a class of salient external threats, ex ante, I argue and demonstrate the effect these threats have on three distinct, though related, individual-level attitudes. First, I show how territorial threat leads individuals to prefer strong state leaders, with few bounds on discretionary power. These threats routinely coincide with the emergence of state leaders, though the argument I advance is these threats lead individuals to $prefer$ this type of leader. Second, I show the multifaceted effect of territorial disputes on individual-level subjective well-being, the so-called ``ultimate dependent variable in social science.'' I find that citizens living under constant threat are unsurprisingly unhappy in general, which, I argue, is part of the conflict process linking crises over territory and war. However, citizens living in states that initiate a lot of territorial threats are happier in general, which follows because the disputed territory is a type of coveted good that the leader tries to provide to important regime supporters. Finally, I demonstrate the unique effect that territorial threat has on individual-level tolerance of corruption. Citizens living under territorial threat will tolerate government corruption, provided the government is working toward the security of the territory. However, citizens are unlikely to afford this same liberty to their fellow citizens. Under conditions of territorial threat, societal corruption is seen as undermining group norms. Taken together, these analyses bridge the gulf between international relations research and political behavior research, also demonstrating the unique importance of territorial issues for our understanding of politics in the international system.Item The impact of public service motivation on the turnover intentions of federal employees(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Morrison, Jennifer Caroline; Baldwin, J. Norman; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThis dissertation addresses the impact of public service motivation on the turnover intentions of federal employees. A survey measuring four types of public service motivation--attraction to policy-making, compassion, public interest, and self sacrifice--along with several traditional predictors of employee turnover was distributed to a random sample of 1,600 federal employees. The findings demonstrate significant relationships between turnover intentions and the traditional predictors of turnover but fail to demonstrate significant direct relationships between the measures of public service motivation and turnover intentions. However, the measures of public service motivation appear to indirectly affect turnover intentions through their relationship with organization commitment. The dissertation suggests that a larger and more diverse sample of federal employees might yield different findings, as would a study that investigates the turnover intentions of state and local government workers who have more direct contact with the general public and the clientele of their public agencies. The dissertation further suggests that future research might investigate the impact on turnover intentions of the interaction between public service motivation and the degree to which employees' jobs allow them to fulfill their public service motivation. Retention of employees will save government agencies money, resources, and knowledge talent. However, given its methodological limitations, this dissertation reveals that four popular forms of public service motivation do not predict federal employees' intentions to turnover. Instead, organization commitment, job satisfaction, and person-organization fit--three traditional predictors of employee turnover--are better predictors of federal employee turnover intentions.Item Corruption, political institutions and foreign direct investments: a disagregated study(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Munga, Jane; Gibler, Douglas M.; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThere is great debate if corruption deters or helps foreign direct investment (FDI). In my dissertation I forward this debate and offer two suggestions. The link between corruption and FDI is best observed at the FDI industrial level. I disaggregate FDI into three dependent variables: market-seeking, labor-seeking and raw materials-seeking FDI. Second I argue the relationship between FDI and corruption is affected by the prevailing political institutions in a host country. I include veto players as a measure of political institutions. I conduct quantitative analyses and results indicate that FDI is indeed a firm level decision. I find that for the most part corruption and weak political institutions are a deterrent to FDI, however, in raw materials-seeking corruption compensates the consequences of a defective bureaucracy and bad policies. These findings show that foreign investors invest in different host environments in pursuit of different institutional advantages. The positive relationship between weak political institutions and corruption on raw materials-seeking FDI should however, not be interpreted as an ultimate institutional advantage. Results indicate that corruption is an effective tool in the short-term only, in the long run, the positive effects of corruption on raw material-seeking FDI diminish indicating that a government's commitment to foreign investments is best signaled by legitimate government institutions.Item Immigration policy in the American states: an event history analysis of state adoption and diffusion of the cooperative immigration enforcement 287g program(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Bozovic, Laura Beth; Borrelli, Stephen; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe focus of this dissertation is to determine why states have chosen to cooperate with the federal government to enforce immigration laws. In order to identify why certain states are aligning with the federal government, an event history model is utilized to test state level factors leading to adoption of the 287g cooperative immigration enforcement program. The study concludes that the costs associated with sudden population growth increases the likelihood of state level immigration enforcement efforts, while, local level adoptions of the 287g program reduces the likelihood of statewide adoption.Item Love's praxis: the political in Kierkegaard's Works of love(University of Alabama Libraries, 2012) Surman, Darren Edward; McKnight, Utz Lars; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe goal of this dissertation is to incorporate Kierkegaard's Works of Love into current theorization of love as a political concept by showing how it models political sensibilities that can be responsive to contemporary problems of political and social injustice. It will be shown that the themes of `love' and `the neighbor', as contained in Works of Love, represent a politics that are critical not only in combating individual commitments to what bell hooks calls, "...the will to dominate and subjugate..." (hooks 1995, 262-272), but the structures of discrimination and oppression that result from such individual commitments as well. This dissertation, then, is concerned with the political subjectivity of the individual as it is, potentially, oriented around the praxis of love of the neighbor, concepts that populate what Lukács termed Kierkegaard's "qualitative dialectic" (Lukács [1952] 1980, 256).Item Elite political networks, network change, and violent conflict in Ukraine and Georgia(University of Alabama Libraries, 2013) Akin, Andrew MacDonald; Chotiner, Barbara Ann; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe degree of variance in political outcomes after the Soviet collapse remains a subject of political inquiry because of the complicated nature of republic experiences during transition. This dissertation explores the variance in post-Soviet transitional violence, or its absence, in Ukraine and Georgia, by using social network analysis. The argument made is that the degree to which political elites in Georgia and in Ukraine were connected or fragmented is an untested, but highly relevant, factor in conflict onset. While the impact of elites on regime transition and armed conflict is a well-reviewed subject in the comparative literature, no study formally models elite networks as an explanation for why conflict begins, or abates. At the center of the argument is the structure of political elite networks created by personal or professional connections. Using social network analysis methods and eleven original datasets--from material in English, Russian, and Ukrainian--this study demonstrates that Ukrainian elites maintained well-connected and more densely tied networks both before and after the Soviet collapse than did elites in Georgia. Conclusions drawn from this study suggest that well-integrated elites create mechanisms by bargaining, or the creation of high social capital, to avoid conflict. This study contributes both theoretically and substantively to the existing literature. Conflict theorists should incorporate the idea of elite network structures as a contributory factor to conflict or peace during transitions. The datasets used for this work offer an initial foray into formally modeling elites and assessing their network dynamics.