Browsing by Subject "Political participation"

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A multi-modal approach to understanding Asian American political participation
(2023-04-20) Lawrence, Cornelia Elizabeth; Shaw, Daron R., 1966-; Philpot, Tasha; Jessee, Stephen; Wong, Janelle
This project aims to enhance our understanding of political participation within the United States by more carefully and systematically examining political participation within the Asian American community. Previously, prominent theories of political participation have been created with Anglo-Americans in mind, resulting in incomplete or unsatisfactory applications to racial and ethnic minority groups. By updating our understanding of what participation looks like and by formulating a racially aware theory, I seek to improve upon these previous explanations of the participatory habits of voters. I first expand upon the Resource model offered by Verba, Schlozman, and Brady (1995), both by updating the conceptualization of the dependent variable, political participation, to reflect recent technological advances, and including key variables I believe that are missing from the original. My first empirical chapter compares the original Resource model to the updated model, I name the Unified Resource Model, via an Asian American survey sample. There I find strong support for my suggested changes, before speaking with members of the Asian American community via focus groups in my second empirical chapter. Finally, in my third empirical chapter, I retest the Unified Resource Model in a hybrid quantitative-qualitative online community. Throughout this study, generational status and nativity status are significant predictors of the numbers of acts one is likely to participate in politically, and while organizational involvement behaved similarly in 2016, qualitative research suggests that this may no longer be true. All three empirical chapters support the expanded conceptualization of political participation to include social media usage.
The affective citizen communication model : how emotions engage citizens with politics through media and discussion
(2011-05) Valenzuela, Sebastián; Gil de Zúñiga, Homero; McCombs, Maxwell E.; Stroud, Natalie J.; Jarvis Hardesty, Sharon; Coleman, Renita
This dissertation seeks to improve our understanding of the process by which emotions enable citizens to learn about public affairs and engage in political activities during electoral campaigns. It advances a theoretical model that incorporates the dynamics of emotions, various forms of media use, interpersonal communication and political involvement. This affective citizen communication model integrates into a single framework the insights of affective intelligence theory (Marcus, Neuman, & MacKuen, 2000) and the work on communication mediation (McLeod et al., 1999, 2001) and its two iterations, cognitive mediation (Eveland, 2001) and citizen communication mediation (Cho et al., 2009; Shah et al., 2005, 2007). More specifically, it suggests that the effects of emotions triggered by political candidates (e.g., enthusiasm, anxiety, anger) on knowledge of the candidates’ stands on issues and on political participation are largely mediated by communication variables, including news media use, political discussion and debate viewing. By positing emotions as an antecedent of both mediated and interpersonal communication, the study extends current research based on affective intelligence theory. At the same time, the study adds emotions to communication mediation processes, which to date have been studied from a mostly cognitive perspective. To test the relationships between the variables identified in the affective citizen communication model, I rely on panel survey data collected for the 2008 and 2004 U.S. presidential elections by the American National Election Studies (ANES) and the National Annenberg Election Surveys (NAES), respectively. Two types of structural equation models are tested, cross sectional (to relate individual differences) and auto-regressive (to relate aggregate change across waves). Results suggest that positive emotions spark media use, whereas negative emotions spark political discussions, and both types of communication behavior influence issue knowledge and participation in campaign activities. Furthermore, the theorized structure is found to perform better than an alternative structure where communication variables cause positive and negative emotions. Thus, results provide strong support for the proposed affective citizen communication model. Refinements to the proposed model, connections with existing theories of political communication, such as agenda setting and partisan selective exposure, and directions for future research are also discussed.
Anatomy of emotions in politics : the role of discrete emotions in political information search and participation
(2018-06-15) Choi, Sohyun; Stroud, Natalie Jomini; Vangelisti, Anita; Hardesty, Sharon Jarvis; Johnson, Thomas
Discrete emotions in response to politics have increasingly been examined. However, there has been a negativity bias where scholars have been primarily focusing on discrete negative emotions. Despite documented evidence of their distinctiveness in cognitive psychology, discrete positive emotions, such as enthusiasm, hope, and pride, have received little to no attention from communication scholars and political scientists. Drawing from appraisal theories, this dissertation advances our knowledge about the different constructs of discrete emotions, especially positive emotions, and their effects on information search and political participation. I answered two main questions in this research: First, how different are enthusiasm, hope, and pride from one another in terms of their constructs of appraisal components? Second, to what extent do discrete positive and negative emotions result in differential effects on people’s information seeking and political participation? I employed a multi-methodological approach to analyze the cognitive constructs and effects of discrete emotions. First, I executed an online survey to find out which appraisal components predict each positive emotion. The confirmatory factor analysis captured three different sets of cognitive appraisal dimensions for enthusiasm, hope, and pride. Second, I conducted an online experiment to test the varying effects of six discrete emotions on participants’ information seeking behavior and their intentions to participate in eight political activities. I investigated the differential effects for three positive emotions and three negative emotions. This research uncovers that enthusiasm, hope, and pride, prevalent positive emotions in the political realm, are different from one another in regard to their cognitive appraisal constructs. Moreover, the dynamics among emotions, information seeking, and participation intentions are found to vary across discrete emotions with the same valance in several instances. The dissertation sheds light on different profiles of discrete emotions as well as their varying effects on people’s political life. The closer look at the role of discrete emotions in politics increases our chance to better democracy as citizens become more aware of their own emotions enacted by the media, politicians, parties, and can thus make conscious decisions about exercising their rights as a citizenry.
Asociaciones de mujeres de sectores medios-altos y altos de Lima
(1998-01) Kogan, Liuba
Capturing the nature of issue publics : selectivity, deliberation, and activeness in the new media environment
(2013-08) Chen, Hsuan-Ting, active 2013; Coleman, Renita; Stroud, Natalie Jomini
This dissertation seeks to understand how issue publics contribute to citizen competence and the functioning of democracy. In the first part of the dissertation, a new measurement was constructed by theoretically and empirically analyzing the attributes of issue public members. Through the hypotheses testing, the new measure was more reliable in identifying issue public members compared to previous measurement strategies. Employing the new measure, results show that issue public members with concern about a specific issue, exercised their issue-specificity in seeking information (i.e., issue-based selectivity) with exposure to both attitude-consistent and counter-attitudinal perspectives. Issue public membership also had significant effects on issue-specific knowledge, and generating rationales for their own and other's oppositional viewpoints. These direct effects were mediated by issue-based selectivity. The relationships highlight the importance of issue publics in contributing to the deliberative democracy. In addition, issue publics play a significant role in contributing to the participatory democracy in that issue public members have greater intentions to participate in issue-related activities than nonmembers. However, while issue publics come close to solve the deliberative-participatory paradox, it was found that their information selectivity and argument generation were unbalanced in a way of favoring pro-attitudinal perspectives over counter-attitudinal perspectives. The second part of the dissertation examined conditional factors--accuracy and directional goals in affecting information selectivity and processing. The findings show that directional goals influenced participants to apply either the strategies of selective approach or selective avoidance to seek information depending on the issue. Accuracy goals exerted a main effect on the issue that is relatively less controversial and less obtrusive. They also interacted with issue public membership in influencing the less controversial and less obtrusive issue. Argument generation was not affected by accuracy or directional goals. Overall, through conceptualizing citizens as members of different issue publics, individuals are more competent then we thought. Their intrinsic interest in an issue serves as a strong factor affecting their information selectivity, information processing, and political actions. Despite finding an optimistic role for issue publics in the democratic process, their limitations also should be recognized. The implications for the deliberative and participatory democracy are discussed.
Citizenship politics : Latino civic participation across generations
(2017-08) Corral, Álvaro José; Leal, David L.; Shaw, Daron; Rivera, Michael; Rodriguez, Nestor; DeSipio, Louis
The field of Latino politics has traditionally explained relatively low rates of Latino political participation as rooted in several factors—low socio-economic status, a large immigrant share of the population, and nascent levels of acculturation. However, instances of vibrant civic activity among immigrants (many undocumented) abound, from the mass mobilization of the 2006 immigrant rights marches to examples of direct action by immigrant youth. This challenges many of the field’s assumptions about civic engagement. As a consequence, this dissertation reexamines the civic integration process from a multi-generational and institutional perspective. The objective of this dissertation project is to address how social institutions foment civic activity among Latinos and how that process differs across generations. I propose an original theory of ‘Generational Political Incorporation’ as an analytic tool that highlights the way immigrant generation interacts with institutional accessibility to structure pathways to incorporation. I detail how Latino participation in society’s major social institutions—churches, schools, the military, labor unions, and political parties—varies according to generational status. I show how limited access to some institutions during the immigrant generation hinders the incorporation process while those with expanded access help spur political engagement. Through a mixture of quantitative and qualitative analysis I find that Latino non-citizens, who have the greatest need for pathways to American civic life, quickly learn that few American institutions are willing or able to introduce them to supportive networks. As first generation immigrants, their relationship to American civic life is largely structured by the opportunities found in the most accessible institutions, namely churches and the public education system. By contrast, the acculturative experiences of the children of these immigrants are very different; as they enter adulthood and look to engage in civic activities, they are welcomed by the same institutions that were closed to their parents. By the third and subsequent generation, I find that levels of involvement are more dependent on socioeconomic status than their institutional affiliations. The dissertation illustrates how the acculturation process unfolds beyond traditional measures related to the immigrant experience and incorporates the all-important role of civic institutions in the integration process.
Contrajuventud: ensayos sobre juventud y participación política
(2001) Venturo Schultz, Sandro
Cucharas en alto, del asistencialismo al desarrollo local: fortaleciendo la participación de las mujeres
(2004-05) Blondet, Cecilia; Trivelli, Carolina
La cuidadanía en debate en América Latina. Discusiones historiográficas y una propuesta teórica sobre el valor público de la infracción electoral.
(2004-12) Irurozqui Victoriano, Marta
Desarrollo local y participación política en Ilo: nuevas formas de articulación y representación social y política
(1998-09) Vargas León, Carlos
Disobedient markets : street vendors, enforcement, and state intervention in collective action
(2017-05) Hummel, Calla Marie Buzy; Madrid, Raúl L.; Auyero, Javier; Findley, Mike; Weyland, Kurt; Wolford, Scott
Under what conditions do informal workers organize? Contrary to conventional wisdom, informal workers organize in nearly every major city on every continent and officials often encourage them to do so. I demonstrate that under certain conditions, governments offer private benefits to informal workers who organize self-regulating associations, which solves the workers' collective action problem. This leads to another puzzle: why do governments pay people to organize, especially people who routinely violate the law? I argue that where the state cannot stop violators, it may prefer to pay violators to organize a self-regulating group rather than enforce the law itself. The state can then bargain over legalization, regulation, and enforcement with a representative group. The project challenges assumptions about collective action in marginalized communities and offers a new theory of collective action where informal workers interact strategically with the state. I argue that where enforcement is costly, states may take an active role in encouraging potential violators to organize and, once organized, regulate themselves. Recent work on the politics of enforcement demonstrates that governments reap political benefits by not enforcing laws against poor citizens in informal work and housing. However, foregoing enforcement can create additional political, public health, and material costs. I extend this work by using enforcement costs to explain why informal workers organize. I suggest that where governments successfully encourage potential violators to organize, governments keep the political benefits of forgoing enforcement while civil society organizations assume partial responsibility for enforcement. My fieldwork included 14 months in Bolivia and Brazil working as a street vendor, gathering 92 interviews, and administering two surveys. Chapter 1 of the project develops the puzzle---why do informal workers organize, given barriers to collective action---in the context of current research. Chapter 2 presents the theory and then formalizes it in a game theoretic model of collective action. Chapter 3 justifies the model's assumptions and demonstrates how its dynamics work in an ethnography of street vendor organizations and their interactions with the city government in La Paz, Bolivia. Chapter 4 illustrates how the model explains variation across people and places by comparing street vendors in La Paz to their counterparts in the neighboring city of El Alto. I then compare the highly organized street vendors in La Paz to the sparsely organized vendors in São Paulo, Brazil. Chapter 5 tests the theory on out-of-sample data: 26,304 self-employed respondents in 17 countries from the Latin American Public Opinion Project. I analyze the data with logistic regressions and then move to a nonparametric machine learning framework to address concerns about identifying assumptions. I find similar patterns in different types of data across different analytic frameworks, lending support to the theory.
La emergencia de las mujeres en el poder: ¿hay cambios?
(1998-05) Blondet, Cecilia
The ethics of political participation : are citizens obligated to participate, and what exactly are they obligated to do?
(2015-05) Tsoi, Siwing; Martinich, Aloysius; Dancy, Jonathan; Gregg, Benjamin; Higgins, Kathleen; Sosa, David
The aim of the dissertation is to show that, with few exceptions, citizens have a defeasible moral obligation to participate in politics. Moreover, the arguments presented in support of the thesis have an implication on how exactly one should participate: participation can take many different forms, but they all need to constitute democratic deliberation of one’s polity--the policy-making process guided by the exchange of reasons among citizens. In Chapter One, I clarify the thesis and frame the issue in terms of a challenge raised by a classical liberal consideration against the obligation to participate in politics. In Chapter Two, I argue that one should not defend the obligation to participate in democratic deliberation by thinking of democracy as a sort of shared value in democratic society. In Chapters Three and Four, I present two independent arguments for the thesis that citizens have a defeasible moral obligation to participate in democratic deliberation.
Explicating the central role of news media use in the process of political participation : toward establishing an integrative structural model of news media effects on political participation
(2010-08) Jung, Nak-won; Coleman, Renita
In order to fully explicate the role of news media in individuals’ political participation, this dissertation aims at establishing an integrative structural model that specifies relationships among news media use, its antecedents and mediators of its influence on political participation. The proposed model is comprised of key factors of political participation that previous research has identified. The relational structure is based on models and theories relevant to prediction of political behaviors. Specifically, the model integrates (a) communication mediation model, which posits that communication behaviors (i.e., news media use and interpersonal discussion) mediate the effects of socio-demographic variables (i.e., income, education, age, gender, and race) and political dispositions (i.e., political interest, partisanship and ideology) on political outcomes; (b) agenda-setting theory, which posits that frequent exposure to news media increases the salience of news objects in audiences’ minds; (c) cognitive mediation model, which posits that elaborative and collective thinking is a prerequisite to produce political outcomes of news exposure; (d) theory of planned behavior, which posits that human behavior can be best predicted by three proximal variables (i.e., attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control); (e) O-S-R-O-R (orientations-stimulus-reasoning-orientations-response) model of communication effects, which provides a parsimonious framework of effect process. Using the structural equation modeling (SEM) method, this dissertation analyzes the 2008 American National Election Studies data set to test the validity of the proposed structural model. Results indicate that frequent exposure to news media stimulates attentive news use as well as intra- and interpersonal reasoning, which produce a wide range of political outcomes. Two reasoning behaviors (i.e., self-reflection and interpersonal political discussion) are critical mechanisms that linked news media use to various political outcomes including political participation. Personal-psychological mediators, such as strength in affects, personal traits, opinions about political issues, campaign interest, political knowledge, attitude strength, perceived ability of political parties and political efficacy all significantly mediate the influence of news media use on political participation. News media use mediates significant portion of effects that a set of preexisting variables have on political participation as well as various types of political orientations.
Género, autoridad y competencia lingüística: participación política de la mujer en pueblos andinos
(1989-11) Harvey, Penelope
Get @ the vote : using Facebook and email to increase voter turnout
(2016-05-05) Haenschen, Katherine Elizabeth; Strover, Sharon; Stroud, Natalie Jomini; Albertson, Bethany; Brundidge, Jennifer; Straubhaar, Joseph; Wilkins, Karin
This dissertation investigates the effects of the two most commonly used forms of digital media – email and Facebook – as mechanisms of voter mobilization. The widespread adoption of digital media in America makes it an idea conduit for voter mobilization, but to date there is minimal research that attempts to use Facebook to increase turnout, and few studies that use email to successfully boost participation. These studies leverage unique affordances of both mediums to increase voter turnout: Facebook increases the visibility of users' behaviors on the platform, and email messages and Facebook advertisements are inexpensive and easy to send to mass audiences. The results engage with existing literature on the power of social norms and how they can be used to drive behavior changes. To explore this topic, I conducted four field experiments designed to leverage Facebook and email messages to increase voter participation during the 2014 general election in Texas. These experiments adapt social pressure messaging, which emphasizes the public nature of voting records and attempts to increase the visibility of voting behaviors, for digital communication platforms. In implementing two of the studies, I developed a new method of conducting field experiments on Facebook randomized at the level of the individual that are implemented with the help of confederates. Results were analyzed using logistic regression. The most effective method – directly shaming people for failing to vote in the ongoing election – produced a statistically significant increase in turnout of 22%, which is much higher than what has been obtained through traditional analog methods. Directly praising friends for past participation was also able to raise turnout by 9%. Additionally, seeing others be praised for voting was able to increase turnout amongst new and infrequent voters. The second two studies build on past research by combining the email messages with Facebook advertisements and sending multiple waves of reminders. They show that multiple rounds of email and social pressure messaging can generate small increases in turnout. The findings demonstrate that Facebook and email can be used to increase voter turnout, and that the effects of mobilization within peer-to-peer networks are much larger than those obtained from unsolicited mass-email messages. This work contributes to existing theory by demonstrating that voting behavior circulates and can be induced through networks. Furthermore, the heightened visibility of user behaviors within online social networks was able to amplify the effects of the treatments beyond what has been produced in an offline context. Overall, the results show that digital media can be used to increase voter turnout, and offer reasons to be optimistic about the future of democracy in our increasingly digital society.
The impact of selective exposure on political polarization and participation : an exploration of mediating and moderating mechanisms
(2013-05) Kim, Yonghwan; Gil de Zúñiga, Homero; McCombs, Maxwell E.; Stroud, Natalie Jomini
This dissertation seeks to improve our understanding of the process by which citizens' selective exposure contributes to attitudinal polarization and engagement in political activities. In this dissertation, I test two models that explicate the relationship between selective exposure and political polarization and participation. The knowledge model suggests that the effects of selective exposure on individuals' attitudinal polarization and political engagement are mediated by knowledge of candidate issue stances. The stereotype model proposes that selective exposure indirectly influences polarized attitudes and political participation via stereotypical perceptions of candidates (i.e., McCain's age and the prospect of a Black presidency). By posing issue knowledge and stereotypical perceptions as potential mediators, this study extends current literature to analyze why and how selective exposure leads to polarization and political participation. The results provide evidence that selective exposure influences individuals' stereotypical perceptions of the candidates' age and race, and these stereotypic perceptions influence attitudinal polarization and participation in campaign activities. There was no support for the knowledge model; selective exposure did not have a significant relationship with citizens' issue knowledge nor did it play a mediating role in the relationship between selective exposure and political polarization and participation. This dissertation thus challenges the argument that selective exposure is normatively desirable due to its contribution to citizens' greater levels of political participation. The findings of this study call into question such a contention because the results show that individuals who engage in selective exposure are motivated to participate in political activities by forming stereotypic perceptions of candidates rather than by gaining factual issue knowledge, which is in contrast to democratic theories' assumptions of informed citizenship. Turning to the role of exposure to dissonant media outlets, two contrasting roles were found. On one hand, results offer some evidence that dissonant media use contributes to gaining issue knowledge and inspiring citizen participation. On the other hand, some findings suggest that it reinforces, rather than attenuates, citizens' attitudinal polarization and stereotypical perceptions of candidates. Thus the findings from this study offer mixed support for encouraging citizen exposure to dissimilar viewpoints.
Influencing alcohol and drug policy: political participation and its predictors among addiction professionals
(2009-05) Peacock, Tammy; DiNitto, Diana M.
This study aimed to identify the type, extent, and predictors of civic and political participation among addiction professionals. A sample of 633 addiction professionals participated in an online survey using the Citizen Participation Study’s survey instrument. Twenty-two political activities were measured as well as three predictors of political participation: resources, psychological engagement, and recruitment networks. Political participation and predictors of participation were analyzed for the full sample and compared among subgroups--social workers vs. those who were not social workers; those who reported they were recovering from alcohol and other drug (AOD) addiction vs. those who were not recovering; and those who held a professional addiction certification vs. those who were not certified and those who were certified plus held other professional credentials. The mean political participation index for participants who were not certified was significantly lower than for participants with a certification and those with a certification plus other professional credentials. No significant difference was noted in the mean political participation index for recovering participants and those not recovering from AOD addiction; and social workers and participants who were not social workers. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to assess the influence of resources, psychological engagement, and recruitment networks on political participation while controlling for recovery status, professional credentials, age, race, and gender. Resources, psychological engagement, and recruitment networks were all significant predictors of political participation. Recruitment networks was the strongest predictor for the full sample and for subgroups who were not social workers, certified, not certified, certified with other professional credentials, and not recovering from AOD addiction. Psychological engagement was the strongest predictor of political participation among individuals recovering from AOD addiction and social workers. However, the validation analysis did not replicate the findings for social workers, those not recovering from AOD addiction, and those who were certified. The significant role of recruitment networks in political participation has important implications for social workers and others interested in mobilizing addiction professionals for political participation. Recommendations for further research include the need to develop valid and reliable measures of political participation that capture civic activities and the use of technology.
Information and computer technology and the digital divide in the post-revolution Tunisia
(2016-05) Toumi, Ikram; Straubhaar, Joseph D.; Charrad, Mounira; Chen, Wenhong; Tyner, Kathleen; Wilkins, Karen
The goal of this study is to better understand the dimensions of the digital divide in Tunisia in the context of the post-revolutionary phase. The significant role of information and communication technologies (ICT) during the revolution and in the post-revolution democracy process raises questions about the inclusiveness of the digital sphere to all Tunisian social groups and about the overall interactions with the ICT and their domestication into the Tunisian households. This study was designed to answer three main research questions: what are the implications of gender, age, and class for (1) ICT access and usage? (2) Attitudes towards ICT? And (3) ICT usage for political participation? An ethnographic semi-structured interview study was conducted in three neighborhoods of the city of Sousse in Tunisia over a two-week period of intensive field work, and was complemented by observations of the locals’ interactions with ICT during multiple visits to Tunisia. Respondents were recruited through snowball and convenience sampling. The study focused on those considered to be vulnerable social communities: women, the elderly, and socioeconomically disadvantaged Tunisians. The interview analysis revealed that demographic factors did not have a significant influence on the gaps between the users and non-users, except for age in certain instances. The concept of social capital made the difference and had a significant effect on balancing issues related to economic and cultural capitals. For most of the informants, social capital, mainly family and community members, played an integral role in domesticating the technologies and brokering techno-competencies to those without economic and educational means. On the other hand, perceived relevance and cultural values emerged as the most significant divide factors. This project makes a theoretical contribution to the literature about the digital divide by emphasizing the role of the cultural values and the social landscape in reducing or widening the gap between the connected and non-connected. This dissertation stresses on the importance of conducting more ethnographic research in small Arab world community contexts in order to reveal more culturally embedded factors that directly affect the interaction between the culture and information technologies.
Iron fellows : commitment and activism in a poor people's movement
(2016-05) Perez, Marcos Emilio; Auyero, Javier; Young, Michael; Roberts, Bryan; Charrad, Mounira; Dietz, Henry
Drawing upon ethnographic fieldwork, life history interviews, and an extensive review of secondary sources and databases, this dissertation studies the experiences of activists in the unemployed worker’s movement in Argentina, also known as the piqueteros. My goal is to explain three puzzles: (1) why some participants develop a strong commitment to their groups while others withdraw; (2) how the experience of mobilization relates to other aspects of activist’s lives; and (3) the ways in which these dynamics affected the overall trajectory of the movement. Addressing these empirical questions allows us to complement the current literature on social movement participation. Although there is a substantial body of research on the factors that contribute to a person’s engagement in contention, many more studies focus on the recruitment phase than on the long-term trajectories of activists. Consequently, we know a great deal about the conditions that make participation more likely, but we are less knowledgeable about the process by which people develop commitment (or not) to the organizations they have joined. I argue that answering this question requires us to engage in a broader debate concerning the sources of social action. In other words, in order to understand sustained activism we must first explore the ways in which partaking in an activity becomes an end in itself. Since the mechanisms that attach people to contentious politics are also present in other instances of collective life, we can draw clues from areas of sociology, beyond the limits of the field of social movement studies. In addition, this dissertation sheds light on relevant processes currently taking place in Latin America. The consolidation of democracy rule in the region during the last three decades coincided with a retrenchment of the welfare. This has led to large-scale protests and the development of new forms of collective action, of which the piqueteros are just one example. Exploring the experiences of rank-and-file members in these movements is essential to understand their potential as sources of social change, and thus their capacity to contribute to a stable and inclusive political regime.