Matching Items (10)
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- All Subjects: Social Research
- Creators: Colbern, Allan
- Creators: Romero, Mary
- Status: Published
Description
This study explores how grantmakers conceptualize their work with respect to issues of social justice. It seeks to answer two primary questions: What role, if any, does the philanthropic community ascribe to itself in not just ameliorating but helping solve our greatest social challenges? And if philanthropy does see itself as an agent of change, what are the barriers that limit its potential? After painting a portrait of contemporary American philanthropy, this paper applies Iris Marion Young's critique of distributive justice to philanthropy's dilemma between downstream charitable aid and upstream structural change. The thesis then turns to analysis of semi-structured interviews with eighteen of Arizona's foundation leaders to assess whether and how state-level philanthropic leaders see their work vis-á -vis social justice, and understand how external factors limit philanthropy's ability to effect maximum social change. Participants express a desire to engage in genuinely meaningful philanthropy which does more than just maintain the status quo, but identify multiple constraints, including legal barriers to fully utilizing advocacy as a tool, governmental infringement on philanthropic autonomy, the channeling of philanthropic resources toward basic needs as a result of the recession, and a grantmaking orientation that prioritizes short term programs that yield swift, measurable results as opposed to longer term efforts.
ContributorsLester, Eva Lorraine (Author) / Zatz, Marjorie S (Thesis advisor) / Haglund, LaDawn (Committee member) / Romero, Mary (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of neoliberalism on the occurrence and intervention of genocide, particularly the ability to create othered groups through a process of dehumanization that desensitizes those in power to the human condition. I propose Social Externalization Theory as paradigm that explains how neoliberalism can be used as a means social control to create subjects vulnerable to political and collective violence that is justified as the externalized cost of economic growth, development, and national security. Finally, the conflict in Darfur (2003 - 2010) serves as a case study to analyze the influence of neoliberal policies on the resistance of the International community to recognize the violence as genocide. Analysis of the case study found that some tenets of neoliberalism produce results that fit within the ideologies of genocide and that some aspects of neoliberalism assume a genocidal mentality. In this case, those in positions power engage in daily activities that justify some suffering as acceptable, thus desensitizing them to the harm that their decisions generate.
ContributorsCalleja, Robert J (Author) / Romero, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Swadener, Beth Blue (Committee member) / Schugurensky, Daniel, 1958- (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
The dissertation explores how participants view the relationships between democratic principles such as freedom, liberty, justice, and equality in work and home environments and their impact on the health and productivity of people living within these environments. This information can be used to determine the gap between legal democratic instruments established the published laws and rights and the participants understanding and awareness of these rights. The first step in effectively capturing information from the participants involved developing a virtual ethnographic research system architecture prototype that allowed participants to voice their opinions related to democracy and how the application of democratic principles in various lived environments such as the workplace and home can affect their health and productivity. The dissertation starts by first delving into what democracy is within the context of general social research and social contracts as related to everyday interactions between individuals within organizational environments. Second, it determines how democracy affects individual human rights and their well-being within lived environments such as their workplace and home. Third, it identifies how technological advances can be used to educate and improve democratic processes within various lived environments such that individuals are given an equal voice in decisions that affect their health and well-being, ensuring that they able to secure justice and fairness within their lives. The virtual ethnographic research system architecture prototype tested the ability of a web application and database technology to provide a more dynamic and longitudinal methodology allowing participants to voice their opinions related to the relationship of democracy in work and home environments to the health and productivity of the people who live within these environments. The technology enables continuous feedback as participants are educated about democracy and their lived environments, unlike other research methods that take a one-time view of situations and apply them to continuously changing environments. The analysis of the participant's answers to the various qualitative and quantitative questions indicated that the majority of participants agree that a positive relationship exists between democracy in work and home environments and the health and productivity of the individuals who live within these environments.
ContributorsBooze, Randall Ray (Author) / Romero, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Goul, Michael (Committee member) / Schugurensky, Daniel, 1958- (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
American families have been coming to South Korea accompanying active duty service members or Embassy employees since before the Korean War. While their numbers were originally smaller, they continue to increase as South Korean assignments undergo "tour normalization", a transition from a location intended for service members to come alone for one year to a location where service members come accompanied by their family and stay for longer periods of times. The U.S. maintains a large presence in South Korea as a deterrence against possible threats from North Korea. Despite establishment of an armistice at the conclusion of the Korean War, a constant state of potential threat was created. This paper will examine what affect the recent rise in tension between North Korea and South Korea has on the American children living in South Korea with their active duty service member parent(s).
ContributorsWoodley, Elizabeth Saucedo (Author) / Margolis, Eric (Thesis advisor) / Romero, Mary (Committee member) / Appleton, Nicholas (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
The increasing job opportunities abroad as spa therapists attract significant numbers of young Indonesian women. Although the placement process is conducted by licensed recruitment agents and supervised by government officials, migrant workers might be at high risk of experiencing work exploitation and physical or sexual abuse. To investigate the phenomenon of documented, yet still vulnerable, female migrant workers, this research conducts interviews with several former spa therapists who were working in Malaysia and some civil servants. This study highlights that individual or personal resistances could be a collective political struggles. Specifically, this research connects individual experiences with the bigger picture of social, economic, and political condition, which, together, constitutes a gender-based labor migration system. To do this, the research employs qualitative-interpretive research methods through discourse analysis and in-depth and open-ended interviews. It also employs an intersectional feminist approach to data analysis to reveal how Indonesian female migrant workers are marginalized and oppressed and the power dynamics at play.
ContributorsNabila, Asma Zahratun (Author) / Colbern, Allan (Thesis advisor) / Behl, Natasha (Thesis advisor) / Goksel, Nisa (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
Description
The thesis for this study is that structural racism within the U.S. criminal system causes Black mothers to assume the emotional work of caring for incarcerated sons. This project was designed using an interpretive approach that employed a combination of qualitative and auto-ethnographic methods, drawing on grounded theory principle. Six interviews were conducted with mothers in order to gain in-depth insight into their lived experiences. An auto-ethnographic method was used to analyze the author’s own personal experiences as a family member of the incarcerated in dialogue with the experiences of the broader research population. Studies on the key finding of the psycho-social impacts on mothers with incarcerated sons have explored the relationship between the mental depression of mothers and their son’s incarceration. They have found that financial challenges, dwindling social connections, lousy parenting evaluations, as well as the burden of care of the grandchildren of the incarcerated sons are some of the mediating factors of this relationship. A second key finding also showed that incarceration have had social-economic effects on the prisoner’s families. These families experience extreme financial hardship as a result of incarcerated loved ones. Another finding showed the unique coping strategies for mothers included assuming care taking responsibility, maintaining family relationships, and budget control. Finally, this study found that there are challenges to re-entry experienced by mothers with incarcerated sons when their released. Research findings and original contribution to scholarly knowledge uncovered that Black mothers of the incarcerated in addition to working the Second Shift, are experiencing the phenomena of what is coined to be the “Third Shift.”
ContributorsWhite, LaTonya C (Author) / Keahey, Jennifer (Thesis advisor) / Colbern, Allan (Committee member) / Murphy-Erfani, Julie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
ABSTRACT
Elite experience and careers in judged female sports complicate the binary categories of retirement while they are especially exposed to cultures of abuse, pressure and subjectivity. This thesis is comprised of multiple voices and experiences from the elite female athletic perspective, including my autoethnographic narrative. Highlighted and discussed are the topics of sexual assault and abuse, family pressure on children to do and excel at sport, the National Team experience representing the United States and subjected bodies and judging. It is an aim of this thesis to culminate all of those factors in the final chapter and hold that the experience and the cultures of athletic identity within synchronized swimming, gymnastics and figure skating not only cannot be explained by current research on athletic identity through retirement but have the capability to retire undeveloped young women by overdeveloped athletic identities. Through a sampling of voices and experiences across different female judged sports, over three decades, the reader will observe similarities that cause these sports to have a culture of solidarity through the aspects they hold in common with each other. The narrative highlights pivotal moments in the lives of the elite female athlete within these sports, which add to the calculation of their athletic identities and the lack of their personal identities. Through reflection and analyses of not only my story, but the interviewees from my original research and that of Joan Ryan’s as well, I aim to voice a mutual experience of elite athletes. Consisting of multiple factors throughout many years we will see through my autoethnography, paralleling with other voices and experiences, how it all intersects and contributes to this: Who am I now and where do I go from here?
Elite experience and careers in judged female sports complicate the binary categories of retirement while they are especially exposed to cultures of abuse, pressure and subjectivity. This thesis is comprised of multiple voices and experiences from the elite female athletic perspective, including my autoethnographic narrative. Highlighted and discussed are the topics of sexual assault and abuse, family pressure on children to do and excel at sport, the National Team experience representing the United States and subjected bodies and judging. It is an aim of this thesis to culminate all of those factors in the final chapter and hold that the experience and the cultures of athletic identity within synchronized swimming, gymnastics and figure skating not only cannot be explained by current research on athletic identity through retirement but have the capability to retire undeveloped young women by overdeveloped athletic identities. Through a sampling of voices and experiences across different female judged sports, over three decades, the reader will observe similarities that cause these sports to have a culture of solidarity through the aspects they hold in common with each other. The narrative highlights pivotal moments in the lives of the elite female athlete within these sports, which add to the calculation of their athletic identities and the lack of their personal identities. Through reflection and analyses of not only my story, but the interviewees from my original research and that of Joan Ryan’s as well, I aim to voice a mutual experience of elite athletes. Consisting of multiple factors throughout many years we will see through my autoethnography, paralleling with other voices and experiences, how it all intersects and contributes to this: Who am I now and where do I go from here?
ContributorsHaylor, Alyson (Author) / Colbern, Allan (Thesis advisor) / Mean, Lindsey (Committee member) / Kassing, Jeffrey (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
This project seeks to explore how organizations work toward refugee and immigrant integration through forming different types of coalitions and strategic networks. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to identify when coalitions emerge between refugee organizations and immigrant rights groups in order to examine their development, from how the coalitions broadly conceive of refugee and immigrant rights, to how they organize resources and information sharing, service provision, policy advocacy, and policy implementation. The project is guided by the question: What explains the formation of coalitions that advocate for both immigrant rights and refugee rights? Through examining the formation and development of these coalitions, this thesis engages at the intersections of immigration federalism, refugee studies and human rights scholarship to reveal deeper complexities in the politics of immigrant integration. The project sharpens these three scholarly intersections by three multi-level jurisdictions – California and Arizona in the United States and Athens in Greece – and by employing comparative analysis to unpack how national governments and federalism dynamics shape coalition building around immigrant integration.
ContributorsAmoroso-Pohl, Melanie Hope (Author) / Colbern, Allan (Thesis advisor) / Keahey, Jennifer (Committee member) / Walker, Shawn (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
This case study explores American Indian student activist efforts to protect and promote American Indian education rights that took place during 2007-2008 at a predominantly white institution (PWI) which utilizes an American Indian tribal name as its institutional athletic nickname. Focusing on the experiences of five American Indian student activists, with supplementary testimony from three former university administrators, I explore the contextual factors that led to activism and what they wanted from the institution, how their activism influenced their academic achievement and long-term goals, how the institution and surrounding media (re)framed and (re)interpreted their resistance efforts, and, ultimately, what the university's response to student protest conveys about its commitment to American Indian students and their communities. Data was gathered over a seven-year period (2007-2014) and includes in-depth interviews, participant observation, and archival research. Using Tribal Critical Race Theory and Agenda Setting Theory, this study offers a theoretically informed empirical analysis of educational persistence for American Indian students in an under-analyzed geographic region of the U.S. and extends discussions of race, racism, and the mis/representation and mis/treatment of American Indians in contemporary society.
Findings suggest the university's response significantly impacted the retention and enrollment of its American Indian students. Although a majority of the student activists reported feeling isolated or pushed out by the institution, they did not let this deter them from engaging in other social justice oriented efforts and remained dedicated to the pursuit of social justice and/or the protection of American Indian education rights long after they left the in institution. Students exercised agency and demonstrated personal resilience when, upon realizing the university environment was not malleable, responsive, or conducive to their concerns, they left to advocate for justice struggles elsewhere. Unfortunately for some, the university's strong resistance to their efforts caused some to exit the institution before they had completed their degree.
Findings suggest the university's response significantly impacted the retention and enrollment of its American Indian students. Although a majority of the student activists reported feeling isolated or pushed out by the institution, they did not let this deter them from engaging in other social justice oriented efforts and remained dedicated to the pursuit of social justice and/or the protection of American Indian education rights long after they left the in institution. Students exercised agency and demonstrated personal resilience when, upon realizing the university environment was not malleable, responsive, or conducive to their concerns, they left to advocate for justice struggles elsewhere. Unfortunately for some, the university's strong resistance to their efforts caused some to exit the institution before they had completed their degree.
ContributorsSolyom, Jessica A (Author) / Brayboy, Bryan (Thesis advisor) / Romero, Mary (Committee member) / Lee, Charles (Committee member) / Flores, Lisa (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
This paper assesses the obstacles faced by immigrant aid groups on the U.S./ Mexico border and the resiliency used to challenge these obstacles. The borderlands of the United States and Mexico is a unique landscape for activists and humanitarians to work given the prevalence and amount of entities that police the area and the suspension of certain constitutional protections. The criminalization of activists on the border provides a unique lens in understanding how social movements and nation-building are linked to immigration in the United States. This research aims to provide a rich description of what criminalization is and how it plays out between the government and activist groups along the border. My findings critique the United States and its claim that it is a liberal democracy because it breaks norms and international laws in its assault against activists and humanitarians, many of whom are U.S. citizens. This attack further demonstrates that the violence migrants endure on the border is not just an unfortunate side effect of border policies but very much intentional and by design. In addition to criminalizing activists, this thesis examines the activists’ mental health and exhaustion as they relate to their humanitarian work and how this is also intentional violence the U.S. Government inflicts in order to maintain itself as a nation-state.
ContributorsRoether, Nichole (Author) / Colbern, Allan (Thesis advisor) / Firoz, Malay (Committee member) / Redeker-Hepner, Tricia (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021