Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Little fanfare has greeted the emergence of civil justice as a Europeanized field, beyond the largely technocratic discourse among private international law scholars. My paper rubs against this grain of academic neglect, and argues that the ‘civil justice’ element of the EU’s Area of Freedom, Security and Justice matters profoundly in historical and sociolegal terms. I explore the roots of this neglect, and argue that the emerging field is more than the sum of its parts.

No single lens suffices to capture the multifaceted developments that fall under the somewhat misleading label ‘judicial cooperation in civil matters’ (Art. 65, EC Treaty). A macro-historical perspective reveals a double movement, simultaneously towards and away from transnationalism, that appears paradoxical but is in fact endemic to the project of European integration. In this context, federalism provides a useful, albeit limited, epistemological framework. A sociolegal lens enables more fine-grained assessment of the individual and aggregate meanings of the various measures bundled under this label, which measures not only cover the spectrum from private international to procedural to substantive law, but also address institutional dimensions of the administration of justice.

Finally, my paper aims more generally to enrich sociolegal knowledge of the field traditionally known as private international law.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Quality Matters (QM) is a program designed to offer quality assurance in online education. If offers a set of review criteria, including a list of desired features for online course design based on research and national standards. Many of the features stem from the researcher/teacher perspective. Using an online survey, we ask a random sample of students (N = 177) who have online course experience to rate each feature in terms of value (i.e., how much they want these features in an online course). We also examine the relationship between students who claim general satisfaction with online learning and course features. Results reveal that students do value the QM features, though not necessarily in the same ranking as QM. Furthermore, correlations reveal that students already comfortable in online learning significantly value those features more than students with lower satisfaction in online courses in general. A discussion surrounding whether or not the QM rubric is on target, and implication of results for QM online course design, faculty development programs, and student retention is offered.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: • Has the white working class abandoned the Democratic Party? No. White voters in the bottom third of the income distribution have actually become more reliably Democratic in presidential elections over the past half-century, while middle- and upper-income white voters have trended Republican. Low-income whites have become less Democratic in their partisan identifications, but at a slower rate than more affluent whites – and that trend is entirely confined to the South, where Democratic identification was artificially inflated by the one-party system of the Jim Crow era.
• Has the white working class become more conservative? No. The average views of low-income whites have remained virtually unchanged over the past 30 years. (A pro-choice shift on abortion in the 1970s and ‘80s has been partially reversed since the early 1990s.) Their positions relative to more affluent white voters – generally less liberal on social issues and less conservative on economic issues – have also remained virtually unchanged.
• Do working class “moral values” trump economics? No. Social issues (including abortion) are less strongly related to party identification and presidential votes than economic issues are, and that is even more true for whites in the bottom third of the income distribution than for more affluent whites. Moreover, while social issue preferences have become more strongly related to presidential votes among middle- and high-income whites, there is no evidence of a corresponding trend among low-income whites.
• Are religious voters distracted from economic issues? No. The partisan attachments and presidential votes of frequent church-goers and people who say religion provides “a great deal” of guidance in their lives are much more strongly related to their views about economic issues than to their views about social issues. For church-goers as for non-church-goers, partisanship and voting behavior are primarily shaped by economic issues, not cultural issues.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Researchers have spilt much ink over the search for the proper definition of terrorism—thankfully, more ink than blood—resulting in a host of different definitions. Are these different definitions distinctions without differences? Or, are they describing different phenomenon? If the former, we can logically forgo the search for the perfect definition of terrorism and logically unify the extant research. If the latter, we must be careful in our reviews of the literature in our research and only rely on findings from those who study the same phenomena.

The heart of the question concerns commensurability of definitions in the terrorism literature. To determine the comparability of definitions of terrorism in the literature, this study uses the 3535 deaths due to the Troubles in Northern Ireland between 1969 and 2002, one statistical model, and four definitions of terrorism. If the definitions are commensurate, the model should produce similar results when using the different definitions. However, since the results are not similar, the definitions are not commensurate. This implies that research based around one definition cannot logically utilize the findings of research based on other, non-commensurate definitions of terrorism.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript