Sewanee Senior Theses 2014
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Item Aiding and Abetting: An Empoirical Study of the Effects of Foreign Aid on the Rule of Law in sub-Saharan Africa(University of the South, 2014-04) Pusateri, NicholasBringing the empirical analysis of econometrics to the debate of the effects of foreign aid on countries located in sub-Saharan Africa, this paper analyzes the effect of foreign aid on the rule of law by using instrumental variable analysis. Using a random effects model, and instrumenting for foreign aid with an innovative instrument, the percentage of the population living with HIV, this paper found that foreign aid has a significant, negative impact on the rule of law: roughly 1/6 a standard deviation Ceteris Paribus. This paper not only provides support for a reduction of foreign aid, it introduces and justifies a new instrument that can be used in further study of the region.Item A Spiritual Defense of the Garden(University of the South, 2014-04) Shimek, TarverItem Reproductive Health Policies in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Look at Five Factors and their impact on contraception access using the case studies of Nigeria and Senegal(University of the South, 2014-04-24) Alikhani, AnnaOver the last two decades, many countries in sub-Saharan Africa have implemented programs to improve the overall wellbeing of their citizens. While individual countries have observed significant strides in improving education and eradicating hunger and disease, access to reproductive health education and services have not been accorded equal priority. My research examines the impact of religious majorities, percent of women in government, donor aid programs, democracy, and female literacy rates on contraceptive prevalence in Africa. This research involved a large-N study of all countries in Sub-Saharan Africa to determine the correlation between the contraceptive prevalence percentage and the five factors. The major finding of a bi-variable and multi-variable analysis indicated that democracy and female literacy rates are large determinants of contraception availability, while religion, donors, and women in government do not have statistically significant effects. Findings were then applied to the case studies of Nigeria and Senegal to helped elucidate the ways that the five factors shape contraception prevalence. This research suggests that to improve reproductive health access, African countries must focus on improving democracy and female literacy rates.Item Signaling or Pressuring for Protection?(University of the South, 2013-12-10) Petersen, MargaretWhat INGO efforts successfully influence the adequate protection of a terrorist’s right to due process in extra-territorial detention camps? The discovery of United States CIA black sites and extra-territorial detention camps raised new concerns for international human rights organizations and the international community entirely. Believed to inflict psychological torture by denying due process, many contend the United States, for example, reputably the international champion of human rights, violates basic human rights in their detention camps. This research aims to find if, and if so under what conditions, INGO intervention can successfully protect a suspected terrorist’s human right to due process.Item "Already Having Forgotten:" Violence, Its Memory, and Political Identity in El Salvador(University of the South, 2014-04-25) Dunlap, MargaretEl Salvador suffered from a brutal civil war from approximately 1980 until the signing of the Peace Accords in 1992. Civil war identities were formed by the incremental experience of violence, solidified by the post-conflict amnesty, and subsequently incorporated into a political landscape that persists today. While there is a pervasive sense that “the past is the past,” civil war identities continue to be salient determinants in political decision making for both voters and politicians. Through an examination of a series of interviews conducted by the author in 2013, supplemented by other primary and secondary sources, the argument is made that the polarization of current Salvadoran political identity is a result of past experiences of violence and the way past violence is collectively remembered.