Scientists say that climate change is very likely to cause more frequent and more severe weather events. In order to understand how communities respond to changing weather patterns, an exploration of the connection between extreme weather events and climate change awareness, collective action, and policy is warranted. This case study...
Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness in Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) is a federal program that aims to significantly increase the number of low-income students who are prepared to enter and succeed in postsecondary education. Oregon has been receiving GEAR UP funding since 2002. In 2008-2014, Oregon received its second round...
Group Engagement Theory describes the relationship between citizen perceptions of policy, individual identity and status judgements, and individual group engagement decisions. Utilizing a least likely crucial case methodology, this paper uses the case of Josephine County, Oregon to determine the validity of the Group Engagement Theory prediction that citizen identity...
Despite widespread public support for renewable energy development, the siting of wind energy facilities can prove problematic due to opposition from surrounding communities. I propose a unifying framework to explain community response to wind energy development – showing how concepts from environmental sociology related to local biophysical and socioeconomic conditions...
The state of Oregon is divided in important ways along rural and urban lines, including the way people make a living, individual and group relationships with the natural world, political ideologies, and personal values. This rural-urban divide has assisted policymakers in making decisions that balance the needs of Oregonians on...
Whether media plays a contributory or a conduit role in the policy process has been a salient focus among policy scholars. If media plays a contributory role in the policy process, it not only shares similar policy core beliefs with advocacy coalitions, but also drafts and disseminates stories including policy...
Liberalization of electricity markets has become a dominant energy sector reform for most of the European Union (EU) countries since 1990s. Despite initial expectations that liberalization will reduce electricity prices and strengthen overall energy security, outcomes of the deregulation reforms proved to be unclear and even contradictory. This study seeks...
Researchers and policy-makers interested in assessing public communication to better inform the decision-making process are increasingly utilizing data harvested from social media. Twitter is one of the largest online sources of near-instantaneous information about a myriad of topics socially relevant in the public sphere. Renewable energy (RE) is a socially...
Nepal’s community forestry has been internationally recognized as an example of successful case of collective action. However, many scholars argue that although it has been successful in protecting forests from degradation, it has not been able to create an inclusive platform for political decision-making process. Using historical analysis, comparative case...
After Colonization and since the beginning of the globalization era, governments in developing countries have been restricted in implementing certain policies and reforms, often being forced to accept or borrow policies from former colonizers or other developed countries and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Previous studies found that borrowing policy often leads...