2022

As historians of the Republic of Texas have noted, the country faced two major problems in the 1830s and 1840s: negotiating relations with foreign powers and with Native tribes within its own borders. But historians have neglected the obvious question: How did the two relationships impact each other? This thesis argues that Texan fears of Native collusion with Mexico drove both reactive diplomacy with Native tribes and proactive diplomacy with the United States. In doing so, it writes Native actors into a diplomatic history that does not treat them as significant historical actors.
 

This thesis explores why Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK) fail to fully cooperate with one another. Given the circumstances of a more powerful China and an aggressive North Korea, it doesn’t quite make sense why these two Western allies are, themselves, not allies. Drawing on the quasi-alliance theory—a modification of realist theory—as well as theories of national identity, this thesis examines the relevancy of these theories in understanding what drives the cooperation of Japan and ROK. Focusing on the early 2010s, which saw increased attention to the region due to greater US defense commitments with the “Asia Pivot” and a successful North Korean nuclear test, this thesis examines three potential independent variables in analyzing this question of cooperation: (1) US security commitments to northeast Asia, (2) levels of threat perception, and (3) the difference in attitude toward the other country as a result of the two countries’ emotionally charged history. By examining state-level public documents and statements released by the military and diplomatic offices, this thesis analyzes Japan and ROK’s behavior toward one another by tracking their cooperation in the security, economic, and diplomatic realms in an effort to better understand cooperation between the two countries.
 

This thesis seeks to understand models' labor and its intersection with legal discourse and labor organizing. The first chapter argues that glamor is the illusion that a model can just “sit still and look pretty” in return for economic and social capital. Yet, a model’s look, the lie of effortlessness, and perceived wealth all require extensive amounts of labor to create and maintain. An analysis of the European fashion market demonstrates how even when the fashion industry is at its most extractive, it is the glamorous image that prevails as the defining image of modeling. The second chapter unpacks how in the production of glamor, models become part of a live supply chain between agents and clients; rather than facilitating the movement of an object through a supply chain, they at once embody the object and the chain. This has led organizers to rethink points of power intervention and methods for building solidarity. The third chapter analyzes legal discourse surrounding victimhood, criminality, and evidence. It establishes that in attempting to concretize ideals like equality, legal discourse places certain victims outside the law. Because models are engaged in glamorous labor, this discourse most adversely affects them and renders their labor and injuries invisible.
 

Early exposure to violence has deleterious effects on the brain and human behavior. Significant prior work has demonstrated that violence-related trauma can have a negative impact on children’s and adults’ psychosocial wellbeing. Emerging research, however, suggests that experiences of violence can also promote positive behaviors, such as prosocial behavior. Prosocial behavior, a term used to describe voluntary actions individuals undertake to benefit others, is a crucial precursor to both social cohesion and collective action (e.g., voting or activism) within a democratic society. Limited work has investigated the drivers of prosocial behavior in youth following experiences of violence. The present study seeks to investigate the relationship between trauma, prosocial behavior, and the mediating role of neural processes in children. I utilize survey and structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) data from the national Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study—which includes approximately 12,000 children aged 9–10 years old in the United States—to evaluate whether structural alterations in brain regions (such as the hippocampus, amygdala, and subregions of the prefrontal cortex) following exposure to violence shapes youth prosocial behavior. I find preliminary evidence suggesting the existence of a neurobiological mechanism partially responsible for the relationship between violence-exposure and prosocial behavior in youth. 

This project explores the long-term partnerships between anti-human trafficking organizations in Thailand and Protestant churches in the US, looking at how these relationships have the power to transform the beliefs and practices of the latter. Many scholars have explored how American Christianity has shaped both moral attitudes toward and political/organizational support for anti-human trafficking efforts in Southeast Asia over the past three decades; however, few have tried to understand how encounters with increasingly localized anti-trafficking efforts might be shaping the American churches who continue to support them. Through over thirty ethnographic interviews and field work with the congregants, ministry leaders, and elders of churches as well as the founders and staff of their partnering organizations in Thailand, I find that these relationships are a site of transformation for American Protestant Christianity. I argue that congregants' personal faith, church-level theological practices, and the church's outlook on sexuality as well as political affiliation are challenged and expanded by working in the Thai human trafficking space.
 

Which factors and phenomena explain adjustments to diplomatic relations between the United States and Taiwan? While formally unofficial, this diplomatic relationship has exhibited over forty years of near-constant change and fluidity, specifically in its day-to-day realities, procedural regulations, and de facto engagement. Through analysis of interviews with current and former diplomats involved in US-Taiwan relations, I find that the most influential factors dictating change for the US side are national interests and the status of Taiwan's domestic politics; whereas on the Taiwan side, considerations of bureaucratic logistics and timing dominate, with more mixed results on the importance of political factors such as Taiwanese and Chinese political activity.
 

In the years since Canada's 1982 constitutional enshrinement of Indigenous rights and title, Indigenous peoples have seen their rights continuously defined and adjudicated by the courts. In many respects these new rights have been posited to support Indigenous peoples’ ability to assert self-determination under Canadian law. Yet, as Glen Coulthard argues, the last forty years have also seen a shift toward “politics of recognition.” In this sense, Coulthard suggests that “where ‘recognition’ is conceived as something that is ultimately ‘granted’ or ‘accorded’ by the dominating power, this domination is perpetuated.” Informed by Coulthard's conceptualization of recognition, my thesis investigates ongoing settler colonial dynamics laid within the Canadian state's assumption of underlying Crown sovereignty. Using a case study of Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline against the backdrop of amounting case law and a political push for energy sector expansion, I specifically explore how resource projects and their regulatory review replicate settler colonial structures of dispossession and the perfection of state sovereignty as seen prior to 1982. Doing so, my thesis argues that regulatory processes and case law implement legal protections for Indigenous rights that inherently limit Indigenous peoples’ territorial jurisdiction—all while subjugating Indigenous nations through the state's assumed right to define and allocate these rights. 

In November 2017, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen declared that the US should “cut all aid” funding to Cambodia amid bilateral tensions due to Hun Sen’s growing authoritarianism. Why would an authoritarian leader call for an end to foreign aid when his government’s patronage system relies on funding from abroad? My analysis considers three possible explanations: an anti-US shift in public opinion; influence from China, Cambodia’s top foreign investor; and a novel theory I call ham sandwich diplomacy. Using interview sources, journalistic sources, foreign funding databases, and NGO reports, I conclude that there was neither a notable spike in anti-US sentiment nor convincing evidence that China exhibits enough influence over Cambodian politics to affect the US–Cambodia aid relationship so significantly. Public opinion and Chinese investment remain important in understanding Hun Sen’s actions, however. I conclude that due to Cambodia’s relative weakness and Hun Sen’s growing unpopularity, the prime minister employed a type of bandwagoning dubbed ham sandwich diplomacy to capitalize on U.S. fears of a China-aligned Cambodia. By denouncing US funding, Hun Sen scared the US into giving him more funding with decreased emphasis on democratization. This single-case study builds theory on how small powers may operate under competing larger powers. 
 

While the South Korean government requires North Korean refugees to go through an extensive three-month-long residential resettlement program (called “Hanawon”), many of these refugees still exhibit struggles assimilating into South Korean society, especially long-term. Political and social science literature often focuses on the challenges that come with the ethnic differences and the legal integration of refugees. However, neither of these issues apply to the Korean case, since refugees are ethnically similar, speak the same language, and immediately obtain legal status upon arrival. A similar pattern can be found when looking at former East German refugees in West Germany. Thus, this thesis explores two questions: Why does short-term integration in this context seem rather effective but long-term integration remains a challenge for these refugees? And what can the differences in outcomes for the German and Korean case teach us about successful strategies for the integration of ethnically similar populations? Through a qualitative analysis of interviews with these refugees, this thesis finds that while a frontload of resources may be beneficial for some refugees—especially for refugees with similar characteristics—a continuous supply of integration resources targeting their mental health, financial circumstances, and social status appears more advantageous.

This thesis explores how mobilized Crimean Tatar civil society actors responded, and continue to respond, to Russia’s occupation of the Crimean Peninsula after 2014. I situate my topic in civil society and social movement literature in democratic and authoritarian contexts, using two community advocacy organizations—Crimea SOS and Crimean Solidarity—as comparative case studies. I use primary source interviews, ethnographic data, and secondary source analyses to investigate how Crimean Tatars, in different contexts, have mobilized effective community responses to internal displacement, political and religious repression, and other effects of the occupation. I also examine historical Crimean Tatar political mobilization in the Soviet Union, particularly the nation’s mass self-repatriation to Crimea from exile in Central Asia, and demonstrate how their historical experience of self-organization in authoritarian contexts influences contemporary action.
 

Why is the distribution of Syrian refugees in northern and western Europe so uneven? In a study of France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, I analyze formal and informal barriers within the asylum process that account for this disparity. Using a five-indicator system, I evaluate both the external and internal features of asylum law. However, given these data, variance in accepted Syrian refugees is explained only between the UK compared to Germany and Sweden. This finding pushes against the convention that an analysis of formal legal structures is sufficient to predict variation in refugee acceptance. To build upon formal legal studies of asylum procedures, I expand the framework to include bureaucratic drift. Namely, I argue that bureaucrats consider public opinion when executing laws. Using sentiment analysis methods such as text mining, collocative analysis, and linguistic inquiry and word count, I compare refugee-related sentiment trends across the five case studies. Because negative sentiment correlates with low proportional acceptance, I argue that bureaucrats who observed negative sentiment informally raised barriers to entry for asylum seekers. This additional condition explains the variation between France and Spain compared to Germany and Sweden. Correspondingly, I posit that media-influenced bureaucratic drift replicated the effect of formal barriers for Syrian refugees.

This thesis examines vaccine hesitancy in the Dominican Republic and the role of trust in shaping attitudes toward vaccination. It combines a national survey, qualitative interviews, and a social media analysis in a mixed-methods research design. Using survey data, I find that trust in government and health officials are significant predictors of vaccine acceptance, while trust in religion and social media are significant predictors of vaccine hesitancy. Using qualitative data from interviews and social media, I explore the mechanism relating trust and vaccine hesitancy and find that trust affects how people receive information about the COVID-19 vaccine, which in turn shapes any specific concerns they have about vaccination.

Child trafficking in India is a product of complex socioeconomic issues such as inadequate labor protections, poverty, caste oppression, predatory lending practices, and more. However, Indian laws and policies instead treat trafficking as a simple question of unchecked criminal activity. They concentrate on incarcerating street-level recruiters, many of whom are the neighbors and kin of trafficked children, who are simply the last link in the long chains of exploitation that culminate in trafficking. I argue that such an approach criminalizes the poor and leaves underlying systemic issues untouched. I am not simply arguing that India’s approach is flawed in its implementation because of corruption, as is so often argued, but that even bureaucrats and police committed to child protection are constrained by laws and an institutional machinery that incentivize them to focus on the weakest links in the chain of exploitation instead of on wealthy employers where the demand for child labor originates. I draw on ethnographic research (key informant interviews and participant observation) I conducted in the state of West Bengal to ground my analysis of the legal and political landscape of India's anti-trafficking response.