Matching Items (6)
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- All Subjects: nationalism
- All Subjects: Refugees
- Creators: Sivak, Henry
- Status: Published
Description
In the United States, the past thirty years have brought with them a substantial rise in income and wealth inequality rates. Inequality in the U.S. has risen to levels not seen for nearly a century and shows no signs of decreasing in the near future. Conversely, Canada has experienced lower levels of inequality during this same period despite many similarities and ties to the U.S. Therefore, the purpose of this paper will be to examine the extent to which these two countries differ in this area and identify some of the more salient factors that have contributed to this divergence, including tax policies, unionization rates, and financial industry regulation, as well as the deeper, more fundamental elements of each nation's identity.
ContributorsPetrusek, Nicholas Anthony (Author) / Puleo, Thomas (Thesis director) / Sivak, Henry (Committee member) / Thomas, George (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
"Phoenix as Refuge: A Photographic Exploration of Refugees Within the City" was a creative thesis project that aimed to bridge the gap between divided communities by creating awareness of refugees within the city of Phoenix. Through an IRB approved research study, multiple refugee families were interviewed and photographed. The project documented refugees and their stories and then made those interviews accessible to the greater Phoenix community. The purpose was to make the Phoenix community more aware of refugees in the hopes that this awareness would increase community activism and advocacy for this resilient yet vulnerable minority group. This paper explains the refugee resettlement process and addresses the social and economic implications of refugee resettlement and advocacy within an urban area. Many inhabitants of Phoenix are unaware the refugees that live in their city because of the geographic divide between social classes and ethnic groups. In highly urbanized communities, the geographic layout of the city leads to a more individualistic and segregated society. This notion leads to a discussion of Robert Putnam's theory of social capital, which argued that by improving and fostering social connections, one could increase social well-being and even make the economy more efficient. This paper then applies Putnam's ideas to the interaction between refugees and non-refugees, using space as a determining factor in measuring the social capital of the Phoenix community. As evident in the study of Phoenix's geographic divide between social and economic classes, Phoenix, like many urban cities, is not designed in a way that fosters social capital. Therefore, advocacy must go beyond people and into advocacy for a different kind of city and place that sets up refugees, and non-refugees alike, to succeed. In this way, rethinking the city through urban planning becomes integral to making new social networks possible, building social capital, and increasing social welfare in urban spaces.
ContributorsRutledge, Chloe Grace (Author) / Sivak, Henry (Thesis director) / Larson, Elizabeth (Committee member) / School of Art (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-12
Description
The purpose of this thesis was to answer the research question of how do states and international agencies, respectively, differ in application of efforts towards implementation of refugee rights, status, and protection and/or resettlement and why these differences occur. The respective refugee crises that arose following the Bosnian war in the 1990s and the Syrian civil war happening in the present day were used as case studies to further examine and answer this question. These case studies were chosen due to their relatively large refugee populations and differing causes for said refugee populations. To properly measure efficacy of refugee policies on a state and international level, the dispute of state sovereignty versus the right to international intervention was focused on and assessed exhaustively throughout this paper. It was determined that sovereignty could only be deemed legitimate and free of international intervention if certain basic functions (keeping the peace, upholding human rights, etc.) were being upheld within a territory's borders. In the cases of both Bosnia and Syria, the lack of protection and rights provided for refugees warranted international intervention, yet that intervention was not always carried out in the most efficient manner. This paper sought to elaborate on why international intervention occurred when it did and whether it was more powerful than state sovereignty. In the end, international agencies would be most effective in implementing refugee policies if individual states complied with those set policies. Until then, the battle between international policies and the proper implementation of those policies by individual states will remain an intricate one.
ContributorsAouad, Dina Ghassan (Author) / Sivak, Henry (Thesis director) / Larson, Elizabeth (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
Czechoslovakia failed to implement democracy and nationalism in an equal and fair manner to the Czechs and Slovaks. As Masaryk mirrored Czechoslovakia off of the United States and his close friend President Wilson, the founding Czechoslovakian documents created an unequal version of the basic democratic principles. The domestic geopolitical culture of nationalism and nationalism abroad influenced ethnic identification between the new borders for the Czechs and Slovaks. Without the shared social language of Czechoslovakian nationalism the Czechs and Slovaks did not unite politically, ethnically, or at all. This allowed for the Czechs to take over and create their idealist democracy, otherwise known as an ethnocracy.
ContributorsPeak, Madison Kimsey (Author) / Sivak, Henry (Thesis director) / Pout, Daniel (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
There has been great debate regarding the place of public religious worship in France in recent years. With each new instance of terrorist violence, discussion over France's changing religious landscape rears. Elemental to this conversation is the concept of Laïcité, France's unique version of secularism. Laïcité is often used to support discriminatory bans on hijabs, niqabs, and burqas in public spaces. I argue that French colonial history in the Maghreb region demonstrates that Laïcité is a form of national state-building and opportunism in practice. It is a concept that developed alongside the establishment of colonial empire. An examination of this colonial history explains much of the current tensions in France over Islam, secularism, and public space.
ContributorsGurr, Alexandra (Author) / Sivak, Henry (Thesis director) / Ripley, Charles (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor)
Created2022-12
Description
This thesis approaches the concept of nationalism within the context of post-Soviet Estonian and Georgian state-building from a sociological perspective, building upon the work of Émile Durkheim, Bernard Yack, Anthony Smith, and Rogers Brubaker. Taking such a stance identifies nationalism as a social concept whose relationship with geopolitics and political integration comments on the merits of post-Soviet Estonian and Georgian geopolitical conditions and their respective state-building processes, specifically regarding ethnic minority and international integration. I argue that the cases of Estonia and Georgia demonstrate that social solidarity institutionalized in states and expressed through nationalism has significant effects on geopolitics and the integration of ethnic minorities into a broader multi-ethnic state as well as on the integration of a broader multi-ethnic state into the international community. This thesis demonstrates that the different paths that Estonia and Georgia took towards this integration indicate the significance not only of domestic nationalistic circumstances, but also of the larger geopolitical realities and underlying historic foundations in which and from which state-building must occur.
ContributorsLepley, Karissa Renee (Author) / Sivak, Henry (Thesis director) / Pout, Daniel (Committee member) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-12