2007 Conference Program - Midwest Political Science Association

Saturday, April 14 – 8:00 am – 9:35 am
1-110 ROUNDTABLE: A MATTER OF FAITH? THE
PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE OF RELIGION IN
U.S. POLITICS (Co-sponsored with Politics and
Religion, see 53-101)
Room Red Lacquer, 4 th Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Chair David Campbell, University of Notre Dame
Panelist Larry Bartels, Princeton University
Byron Shafer, University of Wisconsin
Corwin Smidt,Calvin College
Eric Uslaner, University of Maryland
Overview: This roundtable features scholars of differing
perspectives on the role religion does, and does not, play in
contemporary American politics.
2-13 THE POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP
AND IDENTITY
Room Salon 1, 3 rd Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Chair Markus Crepaz, University of Georgia
Paper Voters and the Extreme Right in Western Europe: Economics
or Identity?
Deniz Aksoy, University of Rochester
Overview: This paper examines the impact of increasing
immigration and worsening economic conditions on the
development of anti-immigrant attitudes in Western Europe and
the electoral success of extreme right parties.
Paper What Motivates Immigrant Assimilation? How Select
Individuals Respond
Louise A. Hendrickson, University of California, Riverside
Overview: What causes people to assimilate and become
naturalized in a host country. Two groups will be compared;
immigrants from India and Russia. The analysis of involvement
and assimilation will be in four countries, the U.S., Canada,
Ireland, and England.
Paper Citizenship and the Anti-immigrant Vote in Western Europe:
Institutional and Cultural Dimensions
Barbara S. Kinsey, University of Central Florida
Juan Gabriel Gomez-Albarello, Illinois Wesleyan University
Overview: We examine the effects of two dimensions of
citizenship, institutional and cultural, on the anti-immigrant vote
across Western European countries over time.
Paper The Emerging Politics of Identity in France and Belgium
Lawrence C. Mayer, Texas Tech University
Alan T. Arwine, Texas Tech University
Overview: We conceptualize and analyze the causes of an
emerging politics of identity as distinct from the classic right and
supplanting the politics of interests using data from France and
Belgium.
Paper Moving From Preferences to Politics of Immigration Reform
Mariana Medina, Washington University, St. Louis
Overview: In this paper I analyze what determines congressional
votes on immigration in the U.S. using roll call votes, census data
on the composition of the regions, and measures of regional
dependence on trade.
Disc. Markus Crepaz, University of Georgia
3-9 ETHNIC PARTIES
Room Salon 2, 3 rd Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Chair Donna Lee Van Cott, Tulane University
Paper Indigenous Identity as a Political Product in Latin America
Daniel E. Moreno, Vanderbilt University
Overview: As a social construct, ethnic identity can derive from
political processes and is not necessarily a political prior. This
paper focuses on the political factors that are related to indigenous
self-identification in Latin American countries.
Paper State, Religion and Gender in India
Chandra Y. Mudaliar, Michigan State University
Overview: The interaction between the state as political authority,
and religion and society has been longstanding, if varied. The
paper examines the nature and role of the secular state, and how it
has shaped the secular policy and gender in India.
Paper Politics, Institutions and Ethnic Voting in Plural Democracies
Kunle P. Owolabi, University of Notre Dame
Overview: This paper examines a variety of structural,
institutional and contingency hypotheses in order to explain
variations in the prelevance of ethnic voting in three plural
democracies: Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Mauritius.
Paper When Does Ethnicity Structure Party Systems? Explaining
Ethnic Politics across India’s States
Adam Ziegfeld, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Overview: This paper argues that ethnic groups’ size and relative
position in the social hierarchy determine the extent to which
ethnicity structures party competition. Empirically, it focuses on
state-level party systems in India.
Disc. Donna Lee Van Cott, Tulane University
4-10 NEW COMPARATIVE THEORETICAL
APPROACHES TO DEMOCRATIZATION
Room PDR 4, 3 rd Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Chair Monica Dorhoi, The World Bank
Paper Demography and Democracy: Falling Fertility and Increasing
Democracy
John A. Doces, University of Southern California
Overview: This paper studies the role of fertility as a determinant
of democracy. Following the literature in demography, strong
support is found for falling ferility rates as a determinant of
increased future levels of democracy.
Paper A Modernization Theory: Development, Inequality and
Democratic Transitions
Daniel C. O'Neill, Washington University, St. Louis
Overview: Expanding on Boix's theory, I argue that there is no
clear relationship between income equality and economic growth,
and that the effect of income equality on the likelihood of
democratic transition varies with income levels.
Paper The Political Economy of Language Regime Change: Lessons
from South Africa
Eric S. McLaughlin, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Overview: This paper examines how language regimes change –
or fail to change – in new democracies. I use field data from
South Africa to test a model of language regime change with
important implications for democratic transitions in diverse
societies.
Paper Endogenizing the Exogenous as a Means to Explain
Democratic Breakdown
Peter A. Ferguson, University of Western Ontario
Overview: An endogenous theory of democratic breakdown is
introduced that re-connects structure through actor preferences
arguing that breakdowns occur when cases fall into a risk zone,
not just as exogenous conditions but rather as endogenous to actor
choice.
Disc. Gabriel Negretto, CIDE
5-101 AUTHOR MEETS CRITICS: LUIS MEDINA'S
"UNIFIED THEORY OF COLLECTIVE ACTION
AND SOCIAL CHANGE"
Room Parlor F, 6 th Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Panelist Luis F. Medina, University of Virginia
Rick K. Wilson, Rice University
Rod Kiewiet, California Institute of Technology
Katri K. Sieberg, Binghamton University
Overview: Author meets critics roundtable.
6-5 PERSONALITY, PATRIOTISM, AND NEO-
CONSERVATISM
Room Sandburg 7, 7 th Floor, Sat at 8:00 am
Chair Kathleen Dowley, SUNY, New Paltz
Paper The Administrations of Fear: A Comparative Analysis
Between the Administrations of Saddam Hussein and George
W. Bush
Alexander R. Dawoody, University of Texas, Brownsville
Overview: This paper is a comparative analysis of similarities and
differences between the administration of former Iraqi President
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