Small state diplomacy: Cambodia's foreign policy towards Vietnam

Cambodia's foreign policy behavior towards Vietnam can be characterized as using a strategy of ‘hedging’, whose nature is different from the one suggested in the existing literature. Such a strategy can be discerned from Cambodia's omni-directional policy responses, ranging from economic pragmatism, limited bandwagoning, binding engagement and soft-balancing. Furthermore, the case of Cambodia's foreign policy towards Vietnam suggests that non-state actors, such as the opposition party and the population (voters) play a significant role in shaping the state's foreign policy, even though it is formed under the authoritarian ruling party. This study also suggests that the foreign policy decisions of an authoritarian state are not solely shaped by the personal attributes of their leader.     

When the Party Comes to Town: Experiential Learning During a Presidential Nominating Convention

Winthrop University used its location in the Charlotte metropolitan area to develop a course that combined academic content with an experiential component during the Democratic National Convention. This article provides recommendations for planning logistics developing such a course for faculty who may wish to replicate this effort in future presidential election cycles.     

Do Project Pedagogies Make a Difference?

Community-based action research (CBAR) encourages students to view internships and other civic-engagement opportunities as the first steps in collaborative projects that build long-term relationships with community partners and model how democracy works. We marshal longitudinal data, qualitative and quantitative, on both attitudes and behaviors to demonstrate meaningful impacts of community-based work by university students. Our approach to this difficult question involves the use of a treatment group contrasted with two distinct control groups: one situated somewhat closely to the experiences of the treatment group and one more distantly. Despite the difficulty of developing metrics of attitude and behavior change over relatively short periods of time, we achieve leverage on the question of how project pedagogies and experiential learning shape civic attitude formation and associated changed behaviors.     

The Effect of Political Science Education on Political Trust and Interest: Results from a 5-year Panel Study

Citizenship education has evolved substantially in recent decades, with a rapid proliferation of education forms and approaches. The currently available evaluation studies, however, do not allow us to determine what kind of approach can be considered as a best practice for schools and education systems. In this article, we rely on the results of a 5-year panel study to investigate the long-term effects of various forms of citizenship education. Using the Belgian Political Panel Survey (n = 3,025), a three-wave longitudinal panel survey of 16-, 18- and 21-year-old Belgian late adolescents and young adults, we determine which citizenship education effort (i.e., classroom instruction, being a member of a school council, and an open-classroom climate) has a long-term effect on political trust and political interest. The results suggest that classroom instruction, the presence of an open-classroom climate, and being a member of a school board are positively related to political trust. We also find that classroom instruction and being a member of a school board are significantly associated with higher levels of political interest. We close with some observations on what these findings imply for citizenship education policies.     

News Media Use and Political Engagement Among Adolescents: An Analysis of Virtuous Circles Using Panel Data

This study analyzes reinforcing spirals between news media use and two manifestations of political engagement: political interest and participation intention. Drawing on a three-wave panel study among adolescents, we test the Virtuous Circle Thesis (VCT) in both an online and an offline setting, by distinguishing between selection effects and media effects as key ingredients of the VCT. Overall, the findings lend mixed support to the general argument. While the relationship between specific forms of news media use and political interest appears to be driven primarily by selection effects, reciprocal relations were found mainly between television news and participation intention. The VCT assumption of reciprocal influences was supported most clearly when adolescents’ total news media use was considered. Taken together, virtuous circles appeared to operate rather similarly online and offline.     

Dead letters on a page? Civic agency and inclusive governance in neopatrimonialism

Neopatrimonialism has explanatory power regarding the limitations of post-war democratization because it considers the combination of formally-democratic institutions together with power relations based on patronage. Neopatrimonialism does not however explain why marginalized groups make political claims in such inhospitable climates, nor have their experiences of governance processes been adequately explored. This paper addresses this gap based on empirical research in Bosnia-Herzegovina, applying a framework of civic agency to elaborate the goals and capacities of civil society actors. Under what conditions can civic agency foster inclusive governance outcomes? The research found that perceptions of limited and ambiguous outcomes from engagement in governance processes encourage civil society organizations to have incrementalist goals and limit self-perceptions of capacity. Inclusive outcomes were nonetheless more likely with persistent intentions and actions. Transactional capacities based on ties to political actors rather than participatory capacities based on political mobilization were more likely to lead to inclusive governance outcomes.     

Overwhelmed and Immobilized: Raising the Consciousness of Privileged Young Adults about World Hunger and Poverty

In this study, I compared the shifts in worldview of affluent young adults participating in a course on social justice issues to a control group of similar young adults. In this course, participating students learned about the size, scope, causes, and impact of world hunger and global poverty. However, an analysis of pre- and postsurvey data revealed that the young adults participating in the social justice course experienced a decline over the course of the semester in their support for humanitarian aid in comparison to the control group. Interviews with these young adults, and analyses of their student work, revealed that the manner in which they learned about world hunger and poverty led them to become overwhelmed by the size and scope of these global problems and convinced of their intractability.     

东亚市民社会:新兴组织与中产阶层

长期以来学界对东亚市民社会形成状况的宏观研究比较多,但是从中产阶层和社会组织视角进行的微观研究比较少.市民社会在东亚的形成受政治、经济、文化等多种因素制约,找到其中起重要作用的因素一直是一个比较大的难题.文章通过对中产阶层和社会组织的功能进行分析后指出:在东亚,决定市民社会形成的关键因素是兴起于草根社会的各种各样的具有"公共性"的社会组织,而西方学者指出的"伴随中产阶层登上社会舞台,必然形成市民社会"这一命题却不具有普适性.     

A CASE FOR REFORM OF THE CHILD WELFARE SYSTEM

There are more than half a million children in our nation's foster care system. While foster care is intended to provide a temporary safe harbor for abused and neglected children, too many of these youth spend years in foster care limbo—experiencing a turbulent life in motion as they move from placement to placement, community to community, and school to school. Youth in foster care commonly fail to receive basic health and psychological care, and nearly 20,000 youth age out of foster care every year to an adult path of homelessness, unemployment, and despair. Our entire community must work together to more responsibly parent these youth. This article will address how lawyers and child advocates can advocate for new approaches and enhanced support on behalf of the voiceless and most vulnerable members of our community. It will address existing hurdles and systemic challenges that have helped to create the current disheartening status quo. The article will then discuss strategies that advocates can employ to turn the corner on behalf of these youth at risk.     

The MISSING LINK: Exploring the Relationship Between Higher Education and Political Engagement

Empirical political behavior research has consistently observed a robust and positive relationship between education and political engagement, but has failed to adequately explain why education is so important. Using data from the Baccalaureate and Beyond (B&B) Longitudinal Study, I test three competing hypotheses explaining the enduring link between higher education and political behavior. I find that a verbal SAT scores and a social science curriculum are related to future political engagement, suggesting that the content of higher education, especially a curriculum that develops language and civic skills, is influential in shaping participation in American democracy. Analysis for this article relied on restricted-use data from the National Center for Education Statistics. Application procedures for obtaining an NCES restricted data license to access theBaccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study are available at http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/b&b/. Replication code and supplemental variables (including school quality) are available onthe authors website.