Statistics

Military Deployments, Human Development, and Growth

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Beyond the Horizon 2014: Guatemala

The deployment of US military forces has received a bump in attention over the past year or two. Most recently, as Michael Allen has discussed, US military forces were deployed to Poland in response to the deteriorating situation in Ukraine. In 2011 President Obama sent 100 US military personnel to Uganda to help track Joseph … Read more

The United States is Still a Democracy

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Polity Map

In the last few weeks, several media outlets have reported on a new study on American democracy by Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page . The headlines include: “Study: The US is an oligarchy, not a democracy” “It’s Official: America is an Oligarchy and NOT a Democracy” “Princeton Concludes What Kind of Government America Really Has, … Read more

While the IR people are away, the Americanists will play.

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⚠️ This post was written in March 2014. Some linked resources may no longer be available. Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Joshua N. Zingher, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Political Science at Binghamton University. The content of this post is based on Josh’s paper, ‘An Analysis of the Changing Social … Read more

The Dark Knight Rises and the Economic Impact of Bane’s Occupation of Gotham

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I started working on this post a long time ago and, for whatever reason, never got around to finishing it. So please keep in mind that this was largely written shortly after the film first came out. I should also disclose at the outset that this post will contain spoilers, so if there is some sort of unbelievably powerful force that has kept you from seeing this fantastic movie, please be warned. For those still interested, there’s more after the jump.

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Educational Attainment and Race in Alabama

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A part of my responsibilities as a post-doc here at Alabama entails helping faculty with seeking out external funding for projects. One of these projects has involved developing a program to promote educational outreach throughout the state. In the course of this work I’ve been digging through some data on educational attainment rates in Alabama. … Read more

Teaching Introductory Graduate Methods: Some Ideas About Understanding Sampling Distributions

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Everyone has their own way of teaching methods, but in this entry I thought I’d share a brief exercise that I thought worked well. This code was developed when I was the teaching assistant for a second-semester methods class focusing on regression. Specifically, this was a section of the class from the first few weeks … Read more

Identifying Cities with the Safest Drivers

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In May 2013 Allstate released its “America’s Best Drivers Report“, which identifies cities with residents who have the longest years between accidents. Boise is #2 on the list, so it caught my attention. The data are based on Allstate insurance claims from January 2010 to December 2011. Although the report is interesting, I think the … Read more

Political Science and Scientists in the News

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Just a quick link to this Atlantic article. It features several works by political scientists on why and when the public is likely to support military action. Complete with graphs and everything.    *Picture taken from the aforementioned and linked Atlantic article.  Michael FlynnMichael Flynn is a professor in the Department of Political Science at … Read more

Follow-up

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Just a quick follow-up to yesterday's post. Chad sent me a link to this paper that was recently posted on AJPS' early view. I've not read the entire article yet, but it seems apropos given the subject matter of yesterday's piece.  Michael FlynnMichael Flynn is a professor in the Department of Political Science at Kansas … Read more

Of QP Publications and International Relations

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Two new pieces from QP authors.  First, Michael Flynn has a solo-authored piece in an upcoming Foreign Policy Analysis that has an early view avaible. Abstract:  How does political competition among domestic actors influence foreign policy choice? Studies examining these questions often focus on the role of economic or partisan interests, and how they influence … Read more