College of Behavioral & Social Sciences
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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations..
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Item Reinhold Niebuhr and an Ethic of Humility in Deliberative Politics(2014) Spino, Matthew Peter; Glass, James; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the degree to which the political psychology of Reinhold Niebuhr contributes to a more capacious theory of deliberative politics and to what degree such a theory may permit individuals to express themselves with more workable forms of democratic practice. Considerations of Reinhold Niebuhr's understanding of impermanence, anxiety, self-reflection, and empathy borne of humility guide the framework of the argument in that they inform and augment individual political preferences. The author uses these ideas to develop a theory of deliberative politics built upon the empathetic tendencies found in the self-scrutinizing humility of Reinhold Niebuhr's politics. The author considers this theory in contradistinction to ascendant strains in political theory and theologies of public life, which at times may disavowal Niebuhr's understanding of natural theology, his correspondent political realism, or otherwise miscategorize Niebuhr's political claims. The degree to which Niebuhr's ethical framework can or should be separated from Christian considerations of ethics more broadly, especially from Christian eschatology, is a major topic of discussion. Contrasting Niebuhr with other Christian ethicists permits us to see in what manner Niebuhr's political psychology might retain political value beyond a particular religious community. This work also considers limits of Niebuhr's understanding of liberal politics, and whether an ethic of humility can be overly disempowering at times. Tension between individual and aggregate political perspectives frames that discussion.Item Gender Beliefs and the American Electorate(2012) Bell, Melissa Ann; Kaufmann, Karen; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The overarching purpose of this dissertation is to provide the literature with a revised conceptualization of gender beliefs that will better explain variance in public opinion. When trying to operationalize feminist attitudes in the past, the public opinion literature has relied on measures of abortion or one-dimensional index scores- basically collapsing attitudes into a false dichotomy of feminist/anti-feminist. This is problematic for many reasons. I argue that the feminist belief system should be treated as a multidimensional concept comprising at least three distinct dimensions: belief about women's opportunity; belief about assertive women; and belief about the changing family structure and role of the mother. The second half of the dissertation applies this new approach within the areas of abortion attitudes, candidate evaluations (both experimental and real world), and party affiliation. Overall, the findings support the thesis that there are at least three distinct gender beliefs with varying degrees of explanatory power.Item Biomedical Innovation and the Politics of Scientific Knowledge: A case study of Gardasil(2008) Clark, Aleia Yvonne; Mamo, Laura; Sociology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Vaccine development represents a special case where historically, public health priorities are central. Trends of privatization have increased the role played by pharmaceutical and biotech companies in developing new biomedical technologies. As the innovative science behind new medical technologies moves into pharmaceutical laboratories and biotech companies, the "logics of action" that pattern knowledge production shift. This project explores how different logics of action based on commercial investment and public good shaped the development of Gardasil, a new vaccine to prevent cervical cancer. The study found that both the logics of public good and commercial profit significantly shaped the final product. The study also found that variations in the definition of public good allowed for the settlement of tensions between good and profit. The findings have implications for the future of vaccine development, as well as for the analysis of biomedical innovation in our contemporary political economy.Item Essays in Trade and Development(2004-08-09) Roy, Devesh; Panagariya, Arvind; Economics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation involves two set of papers. The first chapter contains a brief introduction of the issues covered in this thesis. In the first set of papers (chapters 2 and 3) I investigate the use of product standards in international trade. Product standards relate to restrictions on the attributes of a product that must be satisfied before the product becomes eligible to be sold in a particular market. The World Trade Organization ruling on product standards requires member countries to apply equal standards on the home produced good and the imported good. This is called the national treatment rule. In the first part of the dissertation (Chapters 2 and 3) I analyze the role of national treatment rule in the case of product standards. Chapter 4 evaluates the growth experience of Mauritius in the light of the explanations put forward in the empirical growth literature. As an African country Mauritius stands out as an exception, not only having a much higher growth rate than an average African country but also maintaining growth as a sustained phenomenon. I demonstrate that this exceptional growth performance of Mauritius has occurred because of some unique institutional features of Mauritius, making it different from the rest of Africa.