Month: September 2019

This spring Dr. Jonathan Morris presented a paper titled “More Guns, Fewer Shootings? Public Opinion on Mass Shooting Prevention in America,” at the Annual Meeting of the Western Political Science Association, in San Diego. The paper was co-authored with his brother, David Morris, whose PhD is in sociology.

Abstract: “There is a relative dearth of academic work on the public’s perception of arming school teachers, as most existing studies look at opinion on gun control. The purpose of this study is to investigate public opinion on arming school teachers as a solution to curb mass shootings in America. Our main research question asks: What factors contribute to the belief that arming school teachers will cause a decrease in mass shootings? We also ask: What factors contribute to the overall belief that increasing access to guns among law-abiding citizens will decrease mass shootings in America? Using data survey data collected in June 2018, which was shortly following the mass shootings in Las Vegas and Parkland, we investigate these questions in effort to provide a clearer understanding of the belief that more firearms will ultimately reduce the threats of mass shootings.”

Dr. Peter Francia presented his latest research paper, “The Paranoid Style and the Rise of Fake News in American Politics,” at the 2019 American Political Science Association’s annual conference in Washington, DC.

Abstract: In 1964, historian Richard Hofstadter authored the seminal text, The Paranoid Style in American Politics. Fifty-five years later in an era now littered with “fake news” websites and conspiracy theories that can spread rapidly over the Internet, Hofstadter’s investigation into “the politics of the irrational” warrants revisiting.

In this paper, I draw on the concept of the “paranoid style” originally developed by Hofstadter, but with a quantitative twist. Psychologists Allan Fenigstein and Peter Vanable (1992) developed a now widely used survey instrument to assess paranoid thought. Using data from an original nationwide and demographically representative survey of more than 800 adults that combines the Fenigstein and Vanable paranoia instrument with questions about popular present-day political conspiracies and well-publicized fake news stories, my research asks the question: Is there a relationship between paranoia and one’s willingness to accept or deny established political facts?

Drawing on Hofstadter’s earlier work about the “paranoid style,” I hypothesize that in today’s sometimes confusing information environment, which includes both credible and fake news, paranoia plays a significant role in understanding why some Americans are more susceptible than others to believing misinformation popularized through fake news websites. The results of this research confirm my expectations and raise potentially serious implications for democratic theory, which holds that an informed citizenry is necessary for elections and government to function properly. By examining the theory of the “paranoid style” in today’s modern context, this research offers potentially useful insights into better understanding why some people are better able to differentiate facts from fiction in the political arena. These results have clear and obvious implications for the future of American democracy.

Francia also served as a discussant on the panel, “Budgets and Attitudes Toward Economic Policy,” and as a panelist for the “Author Meets Critics” roundtable, “Who Donates in Campaigns.”

Recently published research from our own Hanna Kassab: “Military Intervention and the Destabilization of Target States” Journal of Studies and Applied Research on Third Sector, vol, 2 no, 2, (2019): 19-35 (with Kaitlyn Rose).

ABSTRACT: This article examines the use of foreign military intervention (FMI) through the international relations theory of liberalism. As intra-state conflict is becoming increasingly transnational in nature, FMI has become a powerful foreign policy tool in the post-Cold War era. Often, the use of military intervention is aimed to promote liberal democracy and humanitarian values. This often requires a dynamic change to the target state’s centralized power structure. In turn, this transfer of power has repeatedly allowed for long-standing power vacuums to emerge. This article uses a qualitative approach when examining the cases of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria to provide a more encompassing detail of the intended and unintended consequences of FMI, as well as prospects for the future of these nations, all of which have been plagued by civil strife, violence, and human rights violations in recent years.

Congratulations Hanna!