Political science

Topic: Most Americans point to circumstances, not work ethic, for why people are rich or poor.  What kinds of policies should Congress enact to address the growing gap of inequality in this land of wealth and opportunity?  Explain your analysis, why you believe your recommended policies would best serve the majority of those negatively impacted by such inequality.  Your analysis should include an examination of current domestic policies and what they may or may not provide to balance the distribution of wealth in the U. S Students will write a minimum 5-page public policy memo based on the statements found in the prompt above. Your paper must be your original thought and not taken from the thoughts/words of others. Failure to meet the minimum required page count will automatically result in a loss of 50 percent of the point value.  Your paper must be a minimum of five (5) FULL pages of critical thinking content. Format:  Academic English, 12-point font, Times-New Roman, double-spaced, APA style (in-text citations are required), one-inch margins, top, bottom, and sides, page numbers, Reference page, and Cover page.  Neither the Reference page nor the Cover Page is counted in the minimum 5-page count.  The Cover Page is not page 1.  Format Page 1 as the first page after the Cover Page. Cover page: Your Last name, First Name, Policy Paper, Date

Recently there has been debate in the United States about whether or not we should “defund the police.”  What exactly does it mean to “defund the police”?  Have any cities in the United States done this?  Who is in favor of  defunding the police?  Who is against it?  Do you believe that cities should defund the police?  Would doing so help protect people’s rights?  Why or why not?   Please use at least four outside sources.

you are to find an article from a REPUTABLE news source that discusses an issue related to federalism. You will then answer the following questions: -What issue is your article discussing and why is it an example of federalism? -What problems have arisen, or could potentially arise, as a result of the state-national policy interaction discussed in your article? -In your opinion, is United States federalism an efficient method of governance, or does it create more problems than it solves? Why? ***Be sure to use as many examples from the readings as possible. Show me that you understand what you are writing about -Include a work cited page. -Your chosen article should be from a credible source, if you are not sure please ask the professor in advance if your source is credible. -Your article should have been written within the LAST 24 MONTHS. -Your essay should include citations from your chosen article in MLA format.  -Use a standard font and margin spacing (Times New Roman, Calibri). -Include a title. -Be sure to cite when you quote or paraphrase. -You may use internal citations, footnotes, or endnotes. Please MLA style of citation

It’s not every semester we get an election like this in the middle of our government class! This week, there’s no chapter to read. There’s no quiz to take. All I want you to do is pay attention to the election results on Tuesday. write four numbered well-written paragraphs – one on each of these four topics, with your thoughts: 1. What happened in the national Presidential election and why do you think that happened? Be sure to give the national popular vote (numbers and percentages) and electoral vote for each candidate. 2. What was the popular vote in the Presidential election in Texas? (numbers and percentages) Who received Texas’ 38 electoral votes, and to what do you attribute this? 3. What was the (unofficial) voter turnout (number and percentage) in Harris County for this election, and how does that compare to the primary election turnout you studied for your political participation assignment? What do you think explains the huge difference? (The precinct-by-precinct canvass report won’t be available yet, so don’t worry about that part) 4. What was the result of the Harris County Commissioner, Precinct 4, race? Do you think your virtual client pursued a strategy similar to the one you outlined for him? Did it work? Submit in Word. Cite your sources. (Note: A lot of the numbers you’re using will be preliminary numbers as mail-in ballots drift in and various election irregularities are settled. Don’t worry about that. Use what you can get and do the best you can.) Additional Resources https://www.270towin.com/ (Links to an external site.) is a great place to compare what’s happening election night to what the polls predicted. https://harrisvotes.com/ (Links to an external site.) will have all the election night returns for Harris County, including the results of the Precinct 3 Commissioner race. The Texas Secretary of State will have statewide election results as they come in from Texas’ 254 counties:

Respond to each of the four questions (or prompts) below (each worth 25 points). Your answer to each question should not exceed 600 words (or roughly 2-3 paragraphs). This does not mean that you should write exactly 600 words and stop, expecting an “A” for the answer. It means that you will need to be pithy. Pithiness often requires revisions and rewrites. Shorter answers are welcomed. Your answer will be evaluated on a proper use and understanding of political economy concepts, use of citations, paragraph/sentences structure, and grammar. Please use a standard 12-point font (e.g., Times New Roman, Garamond, Arial). Do not “lock” your file and use that as an excuse for being tardy. Locked files that the teaching associates cannot access will be considered late and assessed the penalties above. In order to test who has done the reading and viewed the lectures, and to incentivize future reading and viewing, each answer must have at least two citations to either the reading material, the pre-recorded lectures, other videos, and/or podcasts (unless otherwise noted). Question 1= QUESTION 1: EVERYONE KNOWS ITS WINDY (25 POINTS) A giant windstorm has just ripped through the Pacific Northwest, cutting power to nearly 500,000 Puget Sound residences and commercial businesses. Given the extent of the damage, repairs will take up to a week to complete (and more in some places).2 Fortunately, many households have backup generators that run on gasoline. However, roughly half of the gas stations cannot run their pumps because of the power outage, and it is difficult to get shipments of gasoline in due to damage to roads in the area. Clearing the roads will be the first priority of recovery workers and most vehicle access will be restored within two days. With reference to at least two readings, podcasts, or lectures, discuss two ways in which gasoline can be rationed to those who need it. Your answer should include a discussion of how the price mechanism operates in a market and what the effect price controls will have on behavior (including the possibility of secondary [black/gray] markets). If price controls are put into place, how might gasoline be rationed?  Question 2= QUESTION 2: THE GREAT ROCK N ROLL WHODUNNIT (25 POINTS) Evaluate the following scenario using at least one political economy concept introduced in the first five weeks of class. Your answer must include at least two references (citations) to the readings, assigned videos, and/or lectures. It is Sunday evening at 10 p.m. and you are feverishly working to complete your POL S 270 midterm essay exam. At 10:05 p.m. the neighbors in the neighboring apartment begin playing their stereo very loud, rocking out to the latest release of AC/DC while you are trying hard to concentrate. You can clearly hear the music through the walls connecting the two units and it is difficult to work. You ask the landlord to tell the neighbors to turn down their stereo, but he refuses to do so. You then call the police to report a disturbance. Although there are no known laws in the area regarding noise, the police talk to the neighbors and get them to turn the stereo down. In evaluating this scenario, your response should address the following: What important political economy concept is at work here? Who is causing this “problem”? What other solutions could have been used to mitigate the problem? Briefly provide one additional example of the central concept at play in this scenario that is not discussed in any of the course readings or lectures. [WARNING: The answer to this question is not as easy as it seems. An “A” answer will shed sunshine (and not throw shadows) on to the deep lesson at work in this scenario.]  question 3= QUESTION 3: MORBID OPTIMALITY (25 POINTS) A political economist friend of Prof. Gill’s recently said, “The optimal number of deaths from the flu is not zero.” (This statement recognizes that illnesses occur exogenously in nature and are not released into the environment by intentional human action.) Evaluate this statement with reference to at least two different readings, lectures, or podcasts in class. Note that you are not required to agree with the above statement. Rather, you are to use the concepts introduced in class to understand why a political economist would say this. Question 4= QUESTION 4: WRITER’S CHOICE (25 POINTS) Choose one of the following concepts below and write a brief essay explaining it to a person who has not taken POL S 270. Use at least two (2) examples to illustrate the concept, one of which may come from the readings, lectures, videos, or podcasts. The other example should not be drawn from the readings, lectures, videos, or podcasts, but rather one that you think to which the concept applies. For this question, you need only cite one (1) reading, lecture, or podcast source from the class. • Moral hazard. • Pooling and separating equilibrium. • Principal-agent problem. • Unintended consequences. • Asymmetric information. • Thick and thin rationality  SOURCES (all books, should be able to find pdf forms)=  1. Winter, H. 2005. “Trade offs: An introduction to Economic Reasoning and Social Issues”. 2nd Edition Chicago: University Press. Chicago Press.  2. Leeson, P. 2009. “The invisible Hook: The hidden Economics of Pirates 3. Anderson,T.L and P.J Hill. 2004. The Not so Wild. Wild west: Property Rights on the Frontier 4. Hirschman, A.O. 1970. Exit. Voice and Loyalty: Responses to Declines in Firms. Organizations and States

REQUIREMENTS: More than 5,000 words. More than 10 references to international relations journals articles (see journal list on Canvas) or books by university presses over and above class reading. A coherent answer to the question that you select from the choices below. A consistent style for references, headings, subheadings etc. Clear writing with appropriate grammar.  How do the approaches to International Relations (Realism, liberalism, constructivism, etc) inform scholarship on terrorism, guerrillas, international law, ethno-nationalism? How do they lay the groundwork and marshal the field of international relations and allow for this more practical, perhaps substantive, content?

B. Creating Topic, Thesis and Methodology Statements • 10 marks • Choose ONE of the questions below • For the question,wWrite a Topic sentence (2.5 marks), Thesis Sentence (5 marks), and Methodology sentence (2.5 marks) 1. How is John of Salisbury’s conception of political power consistent with the Great Chain of Being? 2. How can George Frederickson’s investigation of the history of racism in the early modern period be related to the Great Chain of Being? Does racism belong to the GCB or does it show that it has been dismantled? C. Introductory Paragraphs: • 20 marks • Choose ONE of the topics below; 2 • For the topic you choose, you must write an introduction to a hypothetical essay 1 – 1.5 pages (single-sided, 12 pt font, double-spaced, 1” margins). • Your introduction must include: a description of your topic, a thesis statement, and a methodology. Your description of your topic should provide sufficient background for why the topic is even an issue in general and help to make sense of your particular thesis. Your thesis can be one to three sentences long. Your methodology should be fairly specific; don’t just say “I will discuss Blake and Kant,” say what ideas or passages in particular you will discuss; • You may use first-person singular (i.e., “I”) 3. In what ways does Shakespeare’s presentation of social class, revenge, and forgiveness in The Tempest overthrow the Great Chain of Being and adopt a modern sensibility? 4. How are (1) Galileo’s claims that physical events should be studied by means of the senses and reasoning and (2) Da Vinci’s representation of the human body related to each other? How are both of these different from the form of thinking in the Great Chain of Being?

In 1971, Joseph Nye wrote a book called Peace in Parts.  His theory was that if we developed more effective regional organizations, we might be able to prevent conflicts and address critical problems.  Do you think having more comprehensive regional organizations might be better than trying to reform the United Nations and make it more effective?

Critical Response on Weber For this critical response, you’ll be asked to answer the following questions: What are the two main components of the state? What are the three types of legitimate rule, and which of them do you see in our own state system? (This part of the answer could be accompanied by an example / outside source from the news) You will also briefly think your way through the following two questions: Can politics and ethics co-exist? Think particularly about the “ethic of ultimate ends” and the “ethic of responsibility”. Provide an example / argument that shows politics and ethics either co-existing, or clashing. Why don’t we care about politics? Should we care? What should we care about? The second part of the prompt is obviously sort of broad, and I’m just interested in whatever strong critique / argument you want to make (though of course your argument will need some kind of evidence or support). As always, remember: Write in your own voice! Don’t try to imitate Weber’s complicated style of writing – that won’t be fun for any of us. Focus on clarity. What that means is that even someone who isn’t in this course should be able to easily to understand what you’re writing about. If you need help with technical things (grammar, formatting, etc.), talk to me or visit the writing center. You should quote Weber directly at least once. Since we’re all using the same texts, your citation for that can be embedded in the text and should look something like this: (Weber, Politics as a Vocation, 70). You should quote and/or cite an outside news article from a reputable source. The citation should look like this: (Author’s name, “Name of Article”, News Source Title, date. URL. Date Accessed). You can embed the citations in the text parenthetically, or you can cite them in footnotes. You can have a “Works Cited” segment at the end of your paper, as well, but since there are very few sources, this is not necessary. Footnotes or parenthetical citations make more sense. Don’t cite any outside sources (like Wikipedia or other online encyclopedias). Just trust your own definitions. Try to format this as a regular essay: intro / argument / conclusion. It’s just good practice. Please, don’t plagiarize. It’s very easy to see if someone pulls a line from Britannica or Wikipedia or any other online site, and any little amount of plagiarism will mean that you’ll either a) get a zero on this, or b) schedule a meeting with me to discuss Weber’s theories for a possible 50% on this. Just avoid it so that we don’t have to go through that! It should be a 12 pt font, Times New Roman, 1-in margins, double-spaced

Political Science 21A: Question Set #2. Civil Liberties, Civil Rights  and American Political Parties.   Please respond to each of the five short response questions posted below.  Your answers should be short, focused, and complete, ranging from one to three paragraphs.  Please make sure to answer each specific part of every question.  Successful answers will provide details and context that support your arguments and explain your position to the readers. You may also want to provide real world examples taken from the readings, lectures, group discussions, or your own independent thinking. These illustrations can be from the course materials or your own ideas.  Providing this context and being able to apply the material to YOUR OWN understanding of politics really shows us that you have mastered the material.   Each answer will be worth 20 points, for 100 points total.  The Question Set is due on Canvas at 11:59 pm on Monday April 27th.  You should write plan on uploading your response as a docx file or PDF to this Question Set #1 assignment tab.   Baron v Baltimore established a concept of dual citizenship. How did this view of dual citizenship shape civil liberties/civil rights protections for early citizens of state governments?  Why and how did so many of the civil liberties protections come to be nationalized or incorporated? What are the benefits and drawbacks of incorporating civil liberties protections to extend to citizens of United States regardless of their state of residence?   What were Jim Crow laws, and what were their two primary goals? How were these largely remedied in the 1960s, and what are the Constitutional justifications for these remedies? Make sure and note the difference between de facto and de jure segregation in considering the effectiveness of these remedies.   How/why did federalism delay the extension of civil rights to various groups throughout American history? Despite these delays, how/why were these rights eventually extended? Make sure and note the role the federal government, social movements, and individual state governments have played in doing so.   Why do we have parties? What roles do they play in a representative democracy? How can these roles be beneficial? How can they be harmful?   Why does the US have only two major political parties? Make sure and describe Duverger’s law and strategic behavior on the part of voters, politicians, and parties. Explain why it would be hard for a third party to be electorally successful.