2021

2021
Zhang, Alice. 2021. “Invisible Strings: Identity, Disillusionment, and Transnational Cultural Spheres As Experienced by First-Generation Chinese Immigrants.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
This thesis explores the complex perspectives on freedom of expression, governmental control, and political/cultural identity held by first-generation Chinese immigrants to the United States and the larger role these thoughts play in discussions on power and global cultural spheres. The researcher conducted approximately thirty in-depth interviews with Chinese immigrants living in major US metropolitan centres, holding conversations on legal consciousness, freedom vs. stability in society, resistance to power, and China’s enduringly strong hold on its overseas children. The findings analyse the complicated interplay between two clashing cultural and political backgrounds and explore how these influences play out in the identities of those who are embroiled within this tension. The thesis argues that feelings of exclusion and alienation from both Chinese and American culture influence how first-generation immigrants view expression and control in both the US and China; these same feelings of otherness have facilitated the development of a public sphere detached from traditional political institutions. Looking to Habermas on the postnational constellation, the thesis concludes with positions on transnationalism and global democratisation of speech, pointing out both the flaws and potential in Habermasian thought as it relates to the future of multiculturalism.
Rolando, Francesco. 2021. “Temporaneous Existences: Migrants’ Access to and Exclusion from Healthcare Services in Turin, Italy.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
In the last decade, migration has become one of the most intensely contested topics in the European public sphere. The categorization of this phenomenon as a “crisis” has allowed to focus on emergency measures and border security instead of building a system capable of integrating and caring for vulnerable people arriving in the continent. The media spectacle focused on dramatic scenes that unfolded at the borders of the European Union (EU) and within refugee camps hastily built to accommodate (or keep away) those arriving by land and by sea often overshadows forms of reception and exclusion that occur in the metropole’s mainland. My research in Italy investigates the interface between immigrants and the state beyond narratives of arrival, and it builds on and contributes to the substantial and still-growing academic field that examines migration and borders in Europe. The question I address in my thesis is whether welfare services, and in particular healthcare services, act as boundaries separating citizens and noncitizens. In other words, what is the role of healthcare in defining the “migrant” in contemporary Italy? To answer this question, between May and August 2020 I conducted participant observation while volunteering with Camminare Insieme (“Walking Together”), a secular charitable organization providing care to immigrants and other people unable to access national healthcare services in Turin, Italy. I also accompanied undocumented immigrants as they accessed public hospitals, interviewed people working at other religious and public organizations meant to relieve the disease burden of marginalized groups, and participated in meetings bringing all these public and private actors together. Through my thesis, I argue that healthcare services participate in creating the unstable temporalities that define noncitizens—mainly those who are “undocumented”—giving rise to what I call temporaneous existences. My ethnographic study of healthcare provision brings to light forms of temporal discontinuity that characterize the lived experience of migrants in northern Italy, a conditional hospitality extended within the confines of the nation-state and its power structures, and one that helps uphold them.
Soffe, Raphaelle. 2021. “Forecasting Brexit: Austerity-induced Local Public Service Cuts and the Rise of the Far-Right.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
In this senior thesis project, I investigate whether austerity-induced local public service cuts—such as transport, maintenance, libraries, and other public provisions—motivated UK Independence Party (UKIP) Westminster vote shares and subsequently the Leave vote in the 2016 EU Referendum. I compare my measure of austerity, share of public employees as a proxy for local public service cuts, to Fetzer's (2020) measure for austerity: welfare reform. First, I find that local service cuts between 2010 and 2015 had a statistically significant and notable effect on UKIP electoral vote share in Westminster elections. Secondly, I document how the two key varieties of austerity policy—local public service cuts and welfare reform—measure two different channels of electoral response and therefore cannot be aggregated into the broad term “austerity.” Local public service cuts hit a broader segment of the local community than needs-based welfare reforms, thus generating a wider political response across class, industry and political affiliations. Whereas welfare reform has a higher predictive power in manufacturing constituencies, local public service cuts are not affected by industry-specific disparities. Further, I identify nonwhite population shares as potential mechanisms for how local public service cuts actualised into UKIP votes. 
Rogers, Heide. 2021. “What Drives Diasporas to Engage with Their Home Country? The Lebanese Diaspora in the US.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
The Lebanese diaspora is one of the largest globally and has been characterized as strongly influencing Lebanon’s economic, political, and social landscape. I assess this diaspora community’s relationship with Lebanon based on an original subpopulation theory. I propose that immigrant engagement with their home country varies based on within-diaspora characteristics—such as time of emigration, religion, and relative economic status. I test my theory both qualitatively and quantitatively, conducting interviews with over twenty members of the Lebanese diaspora in the United States in conjunction with survey data. The results show that certain diaspora characteristics do indeed influence home country engagement. I find that religion as well as time of arrival into the US strongly influence a diaspora individual’s engagement with Lebanon. My findings also present implications for the behavior of the worldwide Lebanese diaspora as well as mark a contribution to the broader field of diaspora studies that seeks to better understand the activities of immigrant communities as they interact with their countries of origin.
Mammel, Andrew. 2021. “ʔakniǂkaʔnuk: Indigenous Resistance and Water Sovereignty in Northwest Montana, 1930 – 1991.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
This thesis examines the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes’ relationship to hydroelectric development in northwest Montana throughout the twentieth century. It argues that the geography and hydro-morphology of the region today is a direct result of the Tribes organized efforts for greater self-determination. In 2015, the Tribes successfully repossessed the Kerr Dam, a project constructed by the Montana Power Company on the reservation in 1935 despite overwhelming tribal objection, making them the first Native American nation to fully own and operate their own major hydroelectric facility. Given the immensely fraught relationship between Native nations and dam construction in the American and Canadian West in the twentieth century, this feat is remarkable. This thesis, therefore, studies the means by which the Tribes built and developed a resistance movement that responded to political currents of the twentieth century and ultimately shaped the maps of Montana, Idaho, and British Columbia that we see today. This thesis studies the Tribes early engagements in negotiation during the planning and construction of the Kerr Dam in the 1930s. It then examines the Tribes efforts to construct their own dams along the Flathead River in the 1960s. It concludes by analyzing the variety of political, judicial, and social methods the Tribes used to ultimately renegotiate the license to Kerr Dam in the 1980s, paving the way for full ownership in 2015. Studying this past not only explains the present state of hydro-development in the region, but also demonstrates the importance of Indigenous resistance in American and Canadian histories at large.
Lindsay, Phoebe. 2021. “Coming of Age in a New Democracy: How Young Indo-Fijians Navigate Identity and Community.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
In this thesis, I investigate how the current generation of Indo-Fijians aged 20–35, who have come of age in a more open and expansive democracy, engages with their community and expresses their ethnic identity. The first chapter lays out the legacy of British colonialism on the political structures in Fiji today, and how this history of colonialism still shapes the social, economic, and cultural currents of Fijian life, thus touching the lives of young Indo-Fijians in multiple spheres. The second chapter explores how these young adults enact their membership in the Indo-Fijian community by engaging in traditional religious rituals, while simultaneously living more secular lives than earlier generations. The third chapter investigates how the forces of Western social media and global culture have been incorporated by young Indo-Fijian adults and, in light of these influences, how they navigate their identities and commitments to the Indo-Fijian community.
Ishikawa, Chihiro. 2021. “Mobilizing Social Movements in East Asia: SNS Usage and Anonymity in Japanese and Korean Feminist NGOs.” WCFIA Undergraduate Thesis Conference. Online: Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Abstract
In my thesis, I analyze the function of “safe spaces” as sites of healing and resistance in feminist activism in East Asia by comparing differences in the tactical repertoires in SNS usage and online anonymity utilized by Japanese and Korean feminist NGOs for mobilization under the #MeToo Movement. Much literature has discussed the danger of online anonymity while few have identified contemporary resources for online activism. I hypothesize that anonymity can be a resource for “safe spaces” for targeted feminist activists in conservative East Asian societies as it enables levels of privacy unseen in traditional activism, such as street protests which are “high-visibility” and “high-risk.” I collect data through in-depth qualitative interviews with Japanese and Korean feminist activists and content analysis of organizational Twitter posts before, during, and after the #MeToo Movement. The aim of this project is to 1) to revise traditional understandings of social mobilization particularly in the context of East Asia and 2) to advance resource mobilization theory by proposing anonymity as a new resource for contemporary movements.