VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Politics at the intersections [electronic resource] : race, ethnicity, and gender in political identity and behavior

How do multiple identities jointly shape political attitudes and behavior? In this dissertation project, I investigate three separate questions about the simultaneous effects of race/ethnicity and gender on American political behavior. Together, these three papers demonstrate the contingent effects of multiple identities. Treating identities as singular and independent obscures the way that multiple identity categories affect political experiences. In Chapter 2, I use two novel survey experiments to test how negative stereotypes about race and gender subgroups can transform into positive perceptions of candidate competence under racialized conditions. In the first experiment, I test the theory of stereotype transformation by priming White respondents with information about rising local crime rates prior to offering a choice between two candidates in an intra-party mayoral race. Consistent with theoretical expectations, highly qualified Black male challengers are advantaged relative to other candidates when respondents are informed that crime is on the rise. The second survey experiment supports the theoretical basis for this counterintuitive result: associations of African-American men with violence lead to stereotypic assumptions that Black male candidates are best equipped to handle crime policy. The findings suggest an exciting new understanding of the relationship between group stereotypes and political behavior. In Chapter 3, I leverage random assignment in a national survey of Latino Americans to test the effects of race/ethnicity, out-group ties, and racial threat on the boundaries of Black-Latino electoral cooperation. I develop and test a theory that the threat of anti-Latino discrimination broadens Latinos' conception of the in-group beyond ethnicity to include other racial minorities. In turn, this increases Latino support for Black candidates who challenge White incumbents. I find that this effect is contingent on Black candidates signaling their ties to Latino interest groups, and that racial resentment and panethnicity moderate treatment effects. In Chapter 4, I use observational mass attitude data and novel survey experimentation to investigate the gender gap in African-Americans' racial linked fate. I argue that gender discrimination limits African-American women's belief that their own fate is tied to the fate of their racial group. Using both the oversample data from the 2012 ANES and new experimental evidence from a national survey of African-Americans, I find that perceptions of gender marginalization reduce racial linked fate among African-American women. However, when racial and gender disadvantage are primed simultaneously, linked fate among African-American women does not diminish. The findings indicate the need to analyze diversity within the Black population, and suggest a need to reexamine the theoretical foundations of linked fate theory.

Keywords: Political Science.
Advisor: Segura Gary M.
Iyengar Shanto advisor. Thesis advisor
Sniderman Paul M. advisor. Thesis advisor
Politics of Cultural Representation Afro-Ecuadorian Narratives in a Plurinational Framework

The thesis presents a historical as well as theoretical analysis of what Afro-Ecuadorian identity is—that is not a set of innate characteristics but rather actively constructed representations, in this case created by artists and musicians in relationship to their personal lives as well as the active discourse of their positions and shared experiences in relationship to broader Ecuadorian society. Furthermore, I suggest that Afro-Esmeraldeñan artists, particularly musicians and dancers, are an important part of the creation of cultural representations that travel and are shared with people across different spaces. As one artist elaborates, they are the ‘material authors’ of their identity and without their work, their expressions and the knowledge communicated through them would not exist—whether that be an explicit politics of resistance or a choreography that has been danced a million times that tells an ‘ancestral story’ (Interview, July 18, 2014). Marimba as a form of musical expression and dance to the rhythm of marimba cannot be dismissed as merely superficial understandings of ‘a people’ or merely a stereotype, but as a space in which a broad range of people interact, interpret and create meaning about their own identities and what it means for them in relationship to ‘Afro-Ecuadorian’ identity.

Keywords:  Department of Anthropology
Ecuador - Social life and customs
race
performance
Esmeraldeñan culture
cultural representation
ethnicity
marimba
Afro-Ecuadorian identity
Stanford University Department of Anthropology
Thesis
Advisor: Thiranagama Sharika
The politics of military operations [electronic resource]

Do domestic political institutions affect the way that states fight wars, and if so, why? I argue that military operations on the battlefield are systematically influenced by civilian politicians to favor lower-risk strategies in the months preceding a domestic election. Because domestic constituencies are casualty-sensitive, democratically elected civilians face strong incentives to temporarily trade long-term strategic success for a short-term decrease in casualties, resulting in the direct and indirect politicization of military operations. Direct politicization occurs when civilians intervene in operations through direct requests, increasing monitoring, or changing tactical guidelines, while operations are indirectly politicized when the military polices its own behavior in response to organizational, bureaucratic, or personal incentives. This culminates in a preference for defensive operations in the months leading up to a domestic election, while high-risk offensive strategies are delayed until after electoral pressures have been resolved. The first empirical chapter uses the insights developed in my theory to systematically test the effect of electoral cycles on troop movement and violence levels during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I then use both most different and most similar case designs to qualitatively evaluate the timing of military operations during the wars in Vietnam and Iraq. The third and fourth empirical chapters evaluate systematic deviations and patterns in bombing operations over North and South Vietnam using a recently released dataset that enables analysis of bombing runs from 1965 to 1975. Finally, I conclude with a comparative case study of the strategic bombing campaigns as executed by the United States and United Kingdom during World War II. In each case, I show that domestic politics profoundly influence civilian decision-making during conflict, and that this influence is most pronounced in the months immediately preceding an election. These findings challenge our current understanding of battlefield effectiveness, normal civil-military relations, and how democracies fight wars more generally.

Keywords: Political Science.
Advisor: Sagan Scott Douglas primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Fearon James D. advisor. Thesis advisor
Laitin David D. advisor. Thesis advisor
Schultz Kenneth A. advisor. Thesis advisor
The politics of Native American theatrical adaptations [electronic resource]

Educated at top colleges and universities, Native American theater artists now hold mastery and authority over classic western theater texts. These individuals do not necessarily embrace western theater practice as the gold standard but, instead, combine remnants of their indigenous cultures with their sophisticated learned knowledge of European performance traditions. For generations, American Indians were targeted for genocide and cultural eradication, isolated by geographical and ideological boundaries specifically constructed to make European colonists feel comfortable with, distinct from, and superior to "The New World's" indigenous peoples. This dissertation is not intended to re-litigate the traumatic histories of Native America nor is it to chronicle the rise of the numerous stereotypical depictions that now dominate our current pop-culture imaginings. This project considers these to be self-evident phenomena. Instead, this dissertation offers a close investigation of the virtuosic mastery many American Indian theater artists hold over Euro-America theater making: an expertise that gives them the ability to transform narrow yet rigid ideas of Native American existence. Theatrical adaptations by New York City's Spiderwoman Theater, Los Angeles' James Lujan, and Honolulu's Taurie Kinoshita do not align with predictable non-Native cultural imaginings of American Indian existence. In fact, each of these artists has adapted a classic western theater work not as a simple homage and recapitulation of the famous source material but as a new theater work suited to a unique worldview and set of artistic inquiries. These new theater works challenge many long held beliefs of American Indian culture, experience, and identity.

Keywords: Theater and Performance Studies.
Advisor: Brody Jennifer DeVere primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Biestman Karen advisor. Thesis advisor
Elam Harry Justin advisor. Thesis advisor
Jakovljević Branislav advisor. Thesis advisor
Portable GMR biosensor platform with smartphone interface [electronic resource]

Magnetic nanotechnologies have shown tremendous potential in the areas of medical imaging, therapeutics, and early diagnostics. In particular, giant magnetoresistive (GMR) spin-valve sensors, commonly used as hard disk read heads, have demonstrated significant promise as biosensors. However, access to such technologies has been limited to laboratories in developed countries. In this work, we present two custom designed portable magnetic immunoassay platforms using integrated GMR biosensors and controlled entirely via smartphone. Then, we explored if GMR sensors can detect glucose molecules. First of all we introduce Eigen Diagnosis Platform (EDP) Generation 1 (G1) that can quantitatively detect analytes of interest within 15 minutes. The platform performs biological reactions on an 8x8 array of GMR biosensors. The signals from the GMR biosensors are transferred to a smartphone connected to the platform by micro USB. A smartphone app processes the raw data and translates them into concentrations of the analytes in the sample. We have developed and implemented a unique one-step assay to complement this platform and simplify point-of-care diagnostics. As demonstrations, we detected human IgG and IgM antibodies and the hepatitis B antibody. The IgG and IgM antibodies could be detected down to 0.07 and 0.33 nanomolar (nM) concentrations, respectively, using the platform's multiplexing capability. Secondly, we further reduced the size of the station, EDP G2, to fit in half the palm of a hand, enhancing its portability. Bluetooth was added in the station to allow wireless communication between the station and a smartphone. To minimize the size and power consumption of the station, we custom designed a toroid magnetic core inductor for operating the GMR biosensors. As proof of concept, we detected THC, the principal constituent of marijuana, to enable roadside screening of impaired drivers. Because the size of THC molecule is small, a competitive assay was designed to detect THC in saliva. Using EDP G2, we quantitatively detected THC down to 15.9 nM concentrations. Thirdly, we explored if we can detect glucose using GMR biosensor. Currently, there is no antibody that can specifically bind to glucose. So, we studied transduction mechanisms for sensing glucose molecules.

Keywords: Electrical Engineering.
Advisor: Wang Shan
Dutton Robert W. advisor. Thesis advisor
Feldman Brian (Brian Jay)
Positive, normative and methodological questions in the economics of education [electronic resource]

The Economics of Education is a field that deals with an education system that is funded and administered at different levels. For example, states provide funds for public universities, schools get funding from local taxes, and experimental designs deal with different administrative levels (e.g. school, district, state). The existence of different levels in the educational systems raises interesting questions. Therefore, this thesis studies positive, normative and methodological questions that arise from the level design of education systems. First, an interesting question is how different education systems interact with each other. Regarding this positive question, the first thesis chapter looks at the interaction of public universities at the state level. In particular, it estimates the effect on in-state tuition rates of interstate Tuition Reciprocity Agreements (TRAs) that allow students from out-of-state to get in-state tuition rates. The results suggest that TRAs increase tuition rates and education quality. Therefore, market integration and quality competition would explain a part of the "always increasing tuition" phenomenon in higher education. The second chapter of the thesis studies the normative question of optimal taxation on opportunity inputs. In particular, the chapter uses tools from the Optimal Taxation literature and introduces a Social Welfare Function with equal opportunity concerns. The theoretical results suggest that equal opportunity concerns imply taxation on opportunity inputs. The optimal linear scheme includes an important transfer of resources to school districts. However, the transfer of resources is taxed away when private/local funding of education increases. Therefore, the results support the normative principle of redistribution of local school district revenue, when society has equal opportunity concerns. Finally, the third chapter addresses some issues of experimental research. In the education literature, experiments usually take place at the school or district level, which counteracts the preference of researchers for covariates balance. That preference has resulted in researchers using different re-randomization schemes (constraints on the treatment allocations allowed). The re-randomization schemes improve the efficiency, but researchers have struggled to understand the implications of re-randomization. As such, the paper clarifies the implications of re-randomization and suggests a re-randomization scheme that preserves asymptotic normality -a key property for statistical testing.

Keywords: Education.
Advisor: Bettinger Eric primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Carnoy Martin primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Scheuer Florian
The postal west [electronic resource] : spatial integration and the American west, 1865-1902

The Postal West is a spatial history of one of the defining transformations of the late nineteenth-century United States. When the American Civil War drew to a close in 1865, much of the West remained a sparsely settled and violently contested periphery with only tenuous connections to the rest of the country. Over the next three decades, the West incorporated six new states and millions of new inhabitants into an increasingly interconnected regional system. How did this integrative project unfold so quickly across such a massive area? The answer comes from an unlikely source. More so than the any other institution, the U.S. Post was the midwife of western integration. Its sprawling network of post offices and mail routes connected local communities to larger systems of capital and commerce, law and governance, politics and culture. This dissertation maps where, when, and how that process unfolded in the western states and territories. The spatial infrastructure of the U.S. Post explains the speed and course of the region's integration into the larger nation.

Keywords: History.
Advisor: White Richard
Frank Zephyr L.
Winterer Caroline
Postwar in no man's land [electronic resource] : Germans, Poles, and Soviets in the rural communities of Poland's new territories, 1945-1948

This dissertation examines what happened to the vast landed estates of Prussia's nobility in the former German territories assigned to Poland after Nazi Germany's defeat in 1945. I follow these estates and their villages from their occupation by the Red Army, to the expulsion of their German inhabitants, through the subsequent resettlement of the land by Poles. The transformation of these estates into Polish farms involved the forced resettlement of millions of Poles and Germans and an attempt by Polish authorities to convert large capitalist agricultural enterprises into smaller holdings or state farms expected to operate in the new country's socialist economy. While previous works have studied the transformation of western Poland's urban spaces, this study shows how rural communities and the land they depended on changed as a result of war, forced migration, and regime change. The forced migrations accompanying the end of World War II in Central Europe resulted from the Allies' decisions establishing the new postwar European order. During three separate conferences, the leaders of the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union decided to shift Poland's borders westwards by several hundred kilometers. This would allow the Soviet Union to keep former Polish lands in the east, which Stalin had first invaded in 1939, and would compensate Poland for that loss with German territory in the west. While the western Allies acceded to Soviet and Polish demands that the German population from these territories had to be transferred, they left the final decision on the exact run of the new Polish-German border to a future peace conference which never took place. While Polish authorities began to expel Germans from the lands provisionally placed under their administration, Polish settlers arriving in this territory from the center and former east of the country remained uncertain that their settlement would be permanent. The movement of millions of people in the aftermath of a destructive war did not happen overnight. Long after the fighting had ended hundreds of thousands of Germans continued to live and work on the large estates of Poland's sparsely populated northwestern countryside. As a result German citizens, Polish settlers, and Red Army soldiers lived alongside one another for at least four years following the war. Their everyday life in this contested space is the subject of this dissertation.

Keywords: History.
Advisor: Naimark Norman M. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Sheehan James J. primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Jolluck Katherine R.
Weiner Amir
Power to the People: How to Engage Disadvantaged Communities and Drive Urban Policy Change

This project investigates how urban social justice campaigns can engage disadvantaged communities to enact progressive public policy. Working-class neighborhoods and communities of color are typically underrepresented in the political process: compared to more affluent citizens, they are less likely to vote, donate to causes, volunteer for campaigns, or attend public meetings or rallies. As a result, they have little power to influence policy decisions, which overwhelming favor wealthy and advantaged constituencies. Moreover, mainstream political strategies – focused on persuading citizens who are already engaged – often ignore disadvantaged communities, exacerbating such inequalities.
In this paper, I study ways to increase the political participation of poor and minority citizens. As a synthesis, it draws together research on social movements, community organizing, voter mobilization, civic engagement, and political persuasion. By combining this existing literature with interviews from four California case studies – a mayoral race in San Diego, a ballot proposition to raise the minimum wage in San Jose, an organizing effort to enact a living wage ordinance in Los Angeles, and an innovative voter engagement program also in San Diego – I explore how these campaigns can most effectively mobilize communities and drive policy change responsive to their needs. I then identify common themes shared by these case studies and suggest ways different social change approaches could be integrated into a combined model.

Keywords:  Urban Studies
Community Organizing
Voter Mobilization
Civic Engagement
Social Movements
Political Empowerment
Urban Politics
Mixed Methods
Program on Urban Studies
Stanford University
Thesis
Advisor: McAdam Doug
Practical reasons, practical reasoning [electronic resource]

A normative reason for an agential response (such as an action or the formation of a belief) is a consideration that counts in favor of someone's having that response, or that to some extent justifies someone in having that response. What is the nature of this relation of "counting in favor"? The project of this dissertation is to defend an answer to that question for the case of intentional actions, which I call the Reasoning View about normative reasons for action. The central claim of the Reasoning View is that we should understand facts about such reasons in terms of facts about the norms of practical reasoning. Modulo some important qualifications, this means that p is a normative reason for A to X just in case p is the content of a premise-state in a possible piece of sound and undefeated practical reasoning that concludes in the intention to X. I argue for the Reasoning View on abductive grounds: I claim that it better balances the ethical, action-theoretic, and epistemological demands on a theory of normative reasons for action than does any of its competitors.

Keywords: Philosophy.
Advisor: Bratman Michael primary advisor. Thesis advisor
Malmgren Anna-Sara advisor. Thesis advisor
Schapiro Tamar
Preadaptation to the anthropocene [electronic resource]

Human impacts, principally land-use change and habitat conversion, are radically changing the environment. While our collective footprint harms some species, it simultaneously benefits others. These beneficiaries are enigmatic, succeeding in what superficially appear to be evolutionarily novel habitats. However, many of the mechanisms by which species benefit from land-use change likely derive from preadaptations—anthropogenic habitats fortuitously match environmental conditions that the species evolved to exploit in natural habitats. But which characteristics preadapt species to land-use change, and what environmental gradients are relevant in filtering human-tolerant communities, are not well established. Using studies of organismal physiology, species distribution modeling, and standardized field surveys, I show that species' climatological niches predict their affinity towards human-made agricultural habitats across tropical amphibians, reptiles, and birds. Further, because species' responses are conserved phylogenetically, agricultural intensification erodes phylogenetic diversity faster than it undermines species diversity. By understanding the environmental gradients that determine community composition, rapid anthropogenic change becomes more predictable, and thus, its undesirable impacts may be minimized.

Keywords: Biology.
Advisor: Daily Gretchen C.
Hadly Elizabeth Anne
Fukami Tadashi