Introductory Political Science Research Articles

Three General Laws of Politics and Government in America (with Apologies to Sir Isaac Newton)

AbstractSince our earliest days as a profession, regularities of politics have been described in terms of laws of political behavior (Bryce 1909), but not without controversy. Reviewing a century of efforts to identify laws of politics yields numerous offerings, including Duverger's (1954) and Michels' (1915) well-known contributions. Following the structure embodied in Newton's Laws of Motion, I propose three general laws of politics and government in America: (1) political objects in motion tend to stay in motion, (2) the relationship between a candidate and his or her political force is the product of campaign funding and personal likability or appeal to the press, and (3) for every political action, there is an equal and opposite reaction (i.e., “Craig Leonard Brians Law of Unintended Political Consequences”). Each law is illustrated and discussed using examples drawn from US politics. Finally, I note several potential research limitations of these proposed laws, as well as their possible utility in teaching introductory political science courses.

Exploring Politics and Government With Popular Culture: Justifications, Methods, Potentials, and Challenges in Introductory Political Science Courses

For an introductory-level course (Politics and Government) mostly composed of nonpolitical science majors, I use a combination of nontraditional texts, including novels and films, along with primary documents. This article briefly justifies the value of nontraditional texts for exploring politics and government. It then sketches out the nontraditional texts used in the course and how they relate to politics and government. I also describe some methods I use in combining nontraditional texts with primary documents to highlight and explore important concepts and present-day political problems relevant for an introductory-level politics and government class. I close with a brief discussion of two problems I have encountered in employing such an approach. [Supplementary materials are available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of the Journal of Political Science Education for the following free supplemental resource(s): Tables 1 and 2, containing examples of relevant nontraditional texts and the political issues associated with them.]

Clickers in Large Classes: Evaluating How Technology Can Foster a Seminar Experience

We study the potential for clickers to create a seminar environment in large introductory Political Science and First Year Experience courses. Using behavioral surveys, we test a range of hypotheses related to attendance, student attention in class, and student participation. When used to maximize each of these learning correlates, we find that clickers facilitate student attendance and participation, even in large lectures.

Learning Political Science with Prediction Markets: An Experimental Study

AbstractPrediction markets are designed to aggregate the information of many individuals to forecast future events. These markets provide participants with an incentive to seek information and a forum for interaction, making markets a promising tool to motivate student learning. We carried out a quasi-experiment in an introductory political science class to study the effect of prediction markets on student engagement with the course topics. Although we found no significant improvement in students' enthusiasm or extent of topical reading, we did find that those students who were already reading broadly at the course start were more likely to trade actively in the markets. These findings indicate that prediction markets may be most successful as an education tool in settings, like graduate education, where individuals are already knowledgeable about the topics of the market, instead of an introductory learning context.

The Teaching Assistant to Faculty Transition Employing the Learner-Centered Teaching Model

This paper discusses the classroom experiences of the author during the transition from a Graduate Teaching Assistant to a faculty member. It describes changes in teaching method that were enabled, changes in student attitudes and also in student performance. The classroom experience is compared and contrasted between teaching introductory political science research methods as a teaching assistant and introductory comparative government as a faculty member. Key differences in the method and experience include teaching from a lead faculty member’s perspective, using materials prepared and provided by another to teaching from a learner-centered method in which materials were predetermined by the author but content and direction of the course are negotiated with the students in a learner-centered model. The paper focuses on the actual application of the Learner-Centered model for teaching in the classroom. Observations will include student perceptions, performance, and attitudes as well as the perception, experience and performance of the author/teacher.

Making Politics “Click”: The Costs and Benefits of Using Clickers in an Introductory Political Science Course

In this article, the author addresses both the costs and benefits of implementing clickers into an introductory political science course. Comparing student responses to a mid-semester survey in both a clicker and non-clicker course, the results show that students have higher satisfaction of the course and instructor, higher exam scores, and feel more comfortable participating in class when using clickers. The author finds that the benefits of using clickers in a large introductory course greatly outweigh the costs and encourages others to try the technology.

Using Calibrated Peer Review to Facilitate Writing Assignments in Large Political Science Classes

As class sizes grow, faculty must often sacrifice writing assignments in order to keep up with grading demands. Writing assignments, however, help students develop important communication skills and encourage higher order learning. Calibrated Peer Review (CPR) is a software system developed through a grant from the National Science Foundation to address these challenges. By teaching students to be competent reviewers, the program allows a system of peer- and self-assessment which simultaneously takes the grading burden away from faculty while still giving students the opportunity to develop complex arguments and the critical thinking skills to assess such arguments. In this paper, we will present our experiences with using Calibrated Peer Review in three large sections of introductory political science (with a total of over 650 students). Our ongoing project proposes to focus on whether the CPR writing process facilitated student learning of the substantive content of the essays and whether the CPR process actually helped students develop their writing skills. Although the limited empirical literature suggests that CPR has positive benefits on student performance (see Russell 2005), what component part of CPR is most responsible for student learning of specific content? In this paper we outline some of the basic features of the CPR program and present some preliminary empirical results regarding the impact of the use of the CPR program in two introductory US government classes at the University of North Texas. We address two questions 1) did the CPR process increase students’ learning of substantive content of essay topic? In particular, we examine the effects of the component parts of the CPR exercise—doing the essay, doing the calibration exercises, and completing the self reviews; and. 2) did completing CPR process for Essay 1 improve quality of Essay 2?

When in Rome, Do as Jon Stewart Does: Using America: The Book as a Textbook for Introductory-Level Classes in American Politics

This article draws from different experiences in teaching Introduction to American Politics classes over a six-year period. It examines the value of using nontraditional texts in introductory political science classes that may also fulfill general education requirements, in order to engage as many students as possible in the subject matter. It also looks at the ways in which academic rigor and scholarly integrity can be maintained while incorporating less than traditional sources (in this case, Jon Stewart's America: The Book) into class materials. In the end, the article suggests that it may be possible to update introductory American political science class texts to be able to identify with new and unique audiences without sacrificing the standards necessary to ask important questions and foster critical thinking.

President Eisenhower and the Development of Active Labor Market Policy in the United States: A Revisionist View

The early assessment of Dwight D. Eisenhower and his presidency by the popular media and academic scholars was predominately negative. They saw his political philosophy as conservative and dated, his political leadership and skills as weak, and his grasp of issues and policies as minimal. His foreign policy was timid and isolationist. His domestic policy was virtually nonexistent. In addition, he was accused of delegating decision making to his staff and cabinet. Moreover, he was lazy and a bumbler with the English language (Barber 1972, 162; Brinkley 1990, 113; De Santis 1976, 191; Greenstein 1994, 6-7; Reichard 1978, 266-71). President Harry Truman, who began taking notes for a book on American presidents soon after he left office, categorized Eisenhower as one of our worst presidents. In Truman's estimation, He didn't do a thing as President ... [and] never made any effort to put forward the leadership to which he was entitled, and he didn't have any program (1988, 7). Academics reinforced these early assessments in their ranking of the presidents from greats to failures. The famous Arthur Schlesinger, Sr., poll of 75 prominent historians, political scientists, and journalists in 1962 ranked Eisenhower twenty-second out of 31 presidents. Subsequent assessments by historians and political scientists ranked Eisenhower nineteenth to twentieth among presidents (Reichard 1978, 273; Rosenman and Rosenman 1976, 553-54). James David Barber, in his classification of presidents, rated Eisenhower a passive-negative president--that is, someone who does little in politics and enjoys it less and a political leader who lack[s] the experience and flexibility to perform effectively (1972, 13, 156). However, time has been good to Eisenhower's reputation. Changing values brought on by the alleged military and domestic excesses of the 1960s and 1970s, and the opening of various Eisenhower archives, have resulted in an outburst of revisionist literature. Commentators now hail Eisenhower's leadership skills, his hidden-hand executive maneuvers, his foreign policy successes, and his domestic achievements. The most highly touted of these newly discovered successes were his foreign policy efforts in dealing with the Middle East, China, Vietnam, and the Soviet Union (Alexander 1975; Cook 1981; De Santis 1976; Divine 1981; Hahn 2006; Reichard 1978; Rushkoff 1981). Eisenhower's much-derided political and executive skills have also been subject to positive revision (Conley and Yon 2007, 293; De Santis 1976, 206-7; Greenstein 1994; Maranto 1993; Reichard 1978, 275; Sloan 1991, 153, 160). Some revisionists now credit Eisenhower with desegregating public facilities in previously rigidly segregated Washington, D.C., thus burnishing his civil rights record (Brownell 1991; Mayer 1991). Eisenhower's early rankings as a mediocre president at best have also been reversed. For example, a 1982 poll of historians placed Eisenhower ninth in the presidential rankings. Successive polls and analyses have ranked Eisenhower between ninth and eleventh as president (Endersby and Towle 2003, 392; Murray and Blessing 1994, 16; Ridings and McIver 1997, xi). Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. (1997, 189), whose father initiated the ranking system, found in a replication of his father's poll that respondents rated Eisenhower tenth, just below James K. Polk and just above John Adams. Sanchez (1996, 61, 99, 102), in an analysis of positive and negative comments on American presidents in 36 introductory political science texts, found that of the modern presidents, Eisenhower ranked second to Franklin D. Roosevelt and just ahead of John E Kennedy in the total percentage of all positive comments. Purpose of the Article This article is concerned with Eisenhower's domestic policies, namely his initiatives in furthering active labor market policy (i.e., full employment)--an important staple in the welfare state--in the United States. …

Scholarship of Multicultural Teaching and Learning (review)

Reviewed by: Scholarship of Multicultural Teaching and Learning Amanda Kraus Matthew Kaplan and A. T. Miller (Eds.). Scholarship of Multicultural Teaching and Learning. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, No. 111. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2007. 106 pp. Paper: $29.00. ISSN: 0271-0633. In the Scholarship of Multicultural Teaching and Learning, editors Matthew Kaplan and A. T. Miller present a broad range of topics and issues related to multiculturalism in higher education in the specific context of teaching and learning. Comprised of 12 short and accessible chapters, this book discusses how multicultural learning is designed, implemented, and applied effectively across a variety of academic disciplines. They present topics in a logical sequence that enables readers to make connections across chapters. This book provides a framework by which multiculturalism can be infused into curricula. Chapters 1 and 2 provide a strong foundation for topics discussed in subsequent chapters. Chapter 1 provides a comprehensive overview of state initiatives that threaten to eliminate affirmative action programs on campus. Its author, Susan W. Kaufmann, discusses the value of diversity on college campuses and the negative implications of various California propositions on diversity at state institutions over the past 10 years, despite many efforts by campuses to combat these effects. Beyond outlining specific propositions, this chapter serves as a warning to other institutions that may fall prey to current multistate initiatives that threaten affirmative action and funding for diversity-related services. Chapter 2 qualitatively explores the experiences of diverse faculty navigating the academy. These faculty members believe that their race, gender, and age negatively affect their relationships with students and colleagues, and their perceived creditability, intelligence, and experience. This chapter underscores the significance of bias, both conscious and unconscious, and also charges faculty and administrators who are members of privileged social groups to be advocates and allies for their diverse counterparts. The varied examples across chapters present a multidimensional conception of learning. Moving beyond a linear approach to learning, the faculty authors of these chapters have developed ways for students to connect with one another in the classroom, connect with their surrounding communities, and connect course content to the world in which they live. These practices help reframe traditional concepts of learning and promote a broader definition of education that is more appropriate for a multicultural context. Chapters 4 and 5 discuss specific classroom experiences that seek to engage diverse students through transformational learning experiences and discursive engagement. Chapters 6 and 7 discuss two experiential learning opportunities as ways to educate about oppression, privilege, power, and social change. The assessment in Chapter 7 was very helpful in demonstrating attitudinal shifts among students and their long-term commitment to social change. In a similar vein, Chapter 3 discusses the use of interactive theater as a technique for training faculty on how to handle difficult, diversity-related situations. Although the audience shifts from students to educators, the experiential methods are in line with the methods previously addressed. Chapters 8, 10, 11, and 12 outline innovative classroom experiences that have increased the participation and success (attendance, grades, self-confidence) of diverse students. These findings are supported by quantitative assessment and data. Faculty in multiple disciplines modified their course content and teaching styles to engage students in a “real world” context. Chapter 8 focuses on initiatives to improve retention for underrepresented students in engineering, one of which was to help students connect engineering principles to real world issues. In Chapter 10, a professor discusses the implications of globalization on instructional technology as a way to prepare students for careers that demand multicultural competency. Chapter 11 discusses an introductory political science course that relies heavily on group work to develop citizenship skills. Chapter 12 reports on the success of asking mathematics students to solve real economic, political, and social problems using formulas they had learned in class. These experiences not only better engaged diverse students but helped students apply academic concepts outside the classroom room. Chapter 9 has implications not only for underrepresented students but also for the way in which faculty build curricula. It questions the omission of African American art songs and spirituals from vocal performance curricula. Because African American music was born out of the slave...

Choosing the One for 101: A Review of Primary Textbooks for Introductory Political Science Survey Courses

Choosing the One for 101: A Review of Primary Textbooks for Introductory Political Science Survey Courses

“You Hafta Push”: Using Sapphire's Novel to Teach Introduction to American Government

Using fiction in the classroom can dramatize public policy issues and political science concepts, therefore, making them more real and relevant to students. Sapphire's 1996 novel Push puts a face on welfare, rape, incest, child abuse, educational inequalities, homophobia, and AIDS. I also use this novel to discuss the public policy process, federalism, diversity, and bureaucracy. Push's main character, Precious Jones is the original child left behind. Drawing on surveys and reaction papers from 176 of my students collected in 2002 and 2004, I conclude that introductory political science students learn more about American government from reading Push than from the traditional lecture format. Women particularly report that Push has helped them learn difficult concepts and that they “learned a lot from the book.” Students who read the book come to empathize with Precious even though they recognize she is very different than they are. Recognition and empathy for those different than us is a key element in citizenship.

Weighing the Research Paper Option: The Difference that Information Literacy Skills Can Make

Requiring a short research paper in introductory political science courses can prove challenging for instructors, in part because of the diversity of student grade levels and majors in such courses. This is particularly the case with Introduction to Comparative Politics, as, at most universities, this course is not only required for the political science major, but often also fulfills multicultural requirements and can be used to complete lower division social science requirements. In deciding whether to include a research paper assignment in this course, one must weigh the benefit of catching majors early in order to begin building strong research skills, as well as the benefit of immersing students in key issues affecting the larger world, against the challenge of underdeveloped writing and research skills among the typical student in such a course. Another factor to consider is the grading load of reading large numbers of papers, given that most introductory courses have high enrollments. When choosing to require a research paper under these circumstances, then, one must also commit to working with students to hone their research and writing skills. In a collaborative, mutually beneficial partnership, college and library faculty can work together to identify ways to integrate information literacy concepts into course content and to design effective learning assignments addressing these important skills. This approach was undertaken by the authors, who revised a significant portion of the Introduction to Comparative Politics course at the University of West Florida to integrate information literacy activities in support of a semester-long, content-based research and writing assignment. This article explores using information literacy exercises as a tool to produce higher quality research papers in lower division political science courses.

Creating an Interactive Classroom: Enhancing Student Engagement and Learning in Political Science Courses

ABSTRACT Students of the pedagogy of teaching have found that cooperative/problem-based learning activities engage the learner, promote ownership of the material, advance the development of higher-level cognitive skills and increase retention better than more passive learning activities. Despite broad recognition within the political science discipline that classroom activities can and should facilitate better student learning outcomes, political science classes (both large and small) frequently have characteristics that make cooperative/problem-based learning activities more difficult to employ and less likely to succeed. Anonymity in large sections, a steep learning curve of complex concepts, and students who see passivity as the least costly approach to success combine to produce these subpar learning outcomes. Recent developments in classroom technology, however, facilitate the use of cooperative learning techniques in a wide variety of political science classroom settings. In this article, we first explore the challenges associated with promoting student engagement in political science classes. Second, we review solutions to these challenges in the instructional psychology and technology literature. Finally, we describe specific tools and techniques professors can use to promote greater student engagement in their courses. In doing so, we draw on our own recent experiences with interactive voting technology in introductory political science courses at Brigham Young University. We also make suggestions about other class venues where similar technology could be employed.

Does the Wording of Syllabi Affect Student Course Assessment in Introductory Political Science Classes?

In this article, we examine the impact of syllabi wording on how students assess a hypothetical instructor for an introductory political science course at a medium-sized state institution. Student participants were recruited from political science classes at this institution and randomly assigned to two groups. The groups were asked to review a sample syllabus from an introductory political science class and answer a number of questions regarding the instructor, as well as a few demographic questions. The syllabi were identical except for the wording of the requirements. For one group, the requirements were expressed in “rewarding” terms; for the other, the requirements were expressed in “punishing” terms.

Making Connections in Introductory Political Science

Historically, political science has been plagued by disagreements over the purposes it serves, the basic questions it should be addressing, and the methods of analysis by which we gain knowledge of politics.1 These quarrels have affected the political sci ence curriculum, especially Introduc tion to Political Science. One result is that the course is not even offered at some American colleges and universi ties. Based on nationwide surveys, John Wahlke (1992,1) reports that only 60 percent of four-year institutions of fer it. In contrast, Introduction to American Government is a required course at 80 percent of these schools. Furthermore, one finds very little uniformity among the introductory po litical science courses that are taught. In this course, students should learn about the basic nature of political sci ence and the connections between the sub-divisions of the field. Instead, we find a wide array of different ap proaches, including the great issues of politics, classics of political sci ence, comparative political systems (generally confined to Europe), and in troduction to empirical analysis. Al though courses of this nature are valu

Unheard Voices: The First Historians of Southern Women (review)

Reviews115 wandered the world in quest of a place where he could restore the traditions of his southem Troy. Having ceased his explorations, he finally came home to the South to live in old age. He died in 1979 and was buried in his beloved Sewanee. His last poetic lines from "The Buried Lake" indicate how his faith had given him some degree of peace. Light choir upon my shoulder, speaking Dove, The dream is over and the dark expired. I knew that I had known enduring love. Only Caroline Gordon now remained of this remarkable foursome. In her final years Caroline taught at the University of Dallas where, ever faithful, she anchored her teaching in Maritain's philosophy. She carried on a lively correspondence with Jacques until his death in 1973. In her old age Caroline remembered, "I always told Jacques that I followed—if remotely—in his wake." This last fugitive and exile died in Mexico in 1981, aged eighty-six. The epigraph she chose for her 1956 novel, The Malefactors, came from Jacques. It appears on her tombstone: "It is for Adam to interpret the voices that Eve hears." John Dunaway's skillful editing of the Tate-Maritain correspondence is a graceful tribute to the remarkable friendship of four gifted individuals who were at the heart of the cultural revival of their native lands —lands from which all were, in their separate ways, exiles and fugitives. Unheard Voices: The First Historians of Southern Women. Edited by Anne Firor Scott. University Press of Virginia, 1993. 199 pp. Cloth, $29.95; paper, $12.95. Reviewed byJacqueline Jones, professor ofhistory atBrandeis University. She is author ofThe Dispossessed : America's Underclasses from the Civil War to the Present. Her newproject is a hhtory ofthe social division oflabor in America from 1600 to thepresent. Unheard Voices introduces five pioneering scholars of the history of southern women to a modem audience, with essays (originally published between 1928 and 1941) by Virginia Gearhart Gray (1903-71), Marjorie Stratford Mendenhall (1900-1961), Julia Cherry Spruill (1899-1986), Guion Griffis Johnson (1900-1989), and Eleanor M. Boatwright (1895-1950). Anne Firor Scott's introduction places their work and personal lives in a larger context, one framed by the struggle of an early-twentieth-century generation of women historians to make a significant contribution to scholarship. All five writers produced impressive monographs in the then undefined field of women's history, but none received commensurate formal recognition from her colleagues or the profession in general during their most productive years. Only Julia Cherry Spruill lived to see later historians acknowledge and appreciate the significance of her work, beginning in the early 1970s. And so the irony noted in the book's title: against great odds, each woman managed to find her own voice, only to realize that, for the most part, her contemporaries were not listening. Included in the book are Gray's "Activities of Southern Women: 1840-1860," Mendenhall's "Southern Women of a 'Lost Generation'" (the decades immediately following the Civil War), Spruill's "Conjugal Felicity and Domestic Discord," Johnson's "Family Life," and Boatwright's "The Political and Civil Status of Women in Georgia, 1783-1860." 116Southern Cultures In her introductory essay, entitled "A Different View of Southern History," Scott notes the difficulties all of these women had to overcome in order to research, publish, and teach in the field of southern history. The five followed different career paths. Gearhart received a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin in 1928. Scott considers her dissertation "the first scholarly effort ever made to survey the life and work of antebellum southern women." Gearhart married, had three children, and later in her life became a library curator at Duke University, where her husband (a zoologist) was a professor. Mendenhall completed her dissertation, "A History of Agriculture in South Carolina, 1790-1860," at the University of North Carolina in 1939. She married a widower in 1942 (he died three years later) and continued to do historical research while teaching introductory political science at UNC. Spruill wrote her pathbreaking Women's Life and Work in the Southern Colonies as a research assistant at UNCs Institute for Research in...

Simulating the Nuclear Threat in the Classroom

It should not be surprising that freshmen students in an introductory political science course know little about the threat of nuclear war. Like a great percentage of the general public, they are unfamiliar with strategic options, weapons systems, technology, or even some of the ethical issues raised by the presence and possible use of such weapons. Some of these students tell me that they deliberately try to not think about such things because the realities are too horrible to contemplate. Others simply prefer to leave such matters to our leaders and “the experts” or, for whatever reason, are overwhelmed by the ennui which is a threat to any lecture session on any topic.One way around the pitfall of routine boredom which can affect any college course is to vary the menu of activities; and one of the best learning devices to supplement lecture and written materials, I have found, is simulation. Simulation brings some aspects of reality—decision-making, interactions, the perspective of sitting in a seat of power, and others—into the classroom without claiming that this supposed “slice of life” can replicate the real world in every detail. Some of the processes and institutions of government—Congress, juries, city councils, mediation of labor disputes, and others—lend themselves well to the simulation and gaming format.

A Model for Teaching Writing in Large Introductory Political Science Classes

For the past two years as part of the Writing Center's writing-across-the-curriculum project at Montana State University, we have been experimenting with writing assignments in an introductory American government class with an enrollment of 130-150 students per quarter. We think we have developed a way to assign and teach persuasive writing in large introductory political science classes that helps students argue effectively but does not create a grading nightmare for the professor.In the Spring 1988 issue of The Political Science Teacher, Richard A. Brumback notes that students are entering graduate school without the ability to write effectively. Brumback calls for instruction in writing, particularly persuasive writing, in public administration curricula. “The science of public administration can only take us as far as systematizing our search for information. Effective evaluation and interpretation of that information rests in the ability to use it persuasively.” Professor Brumback's argument should be extended to undergraduate education in political science. English departments alone cannot do the job of teaching students to write well in all disciplines, especially when they have students for just one or two writing courses. Students need to write often in a variety of disciplines if they are going to write well when they graduate.There are other reasons, besides helping students develop writing skills, for assigning writing in undergraduate courses. Writing about course content makes students think. It gives them a chance to apply the concepts and methods of the discipline and to interpret and evaluate information. It also helps them see themselves more as active learners, less as passive receptors whose job it is to absorb information, memorize it, and repeat it on tests.

Decision Making and Participation: An Exercise

This article describes an exercise in political decisionmaking for use in introductory political science courses. Based upon participatory democratic theory, the exercise is a covert simulation project aimed at providing students with an experiential understanding of the political decisionmaking process. This activity is useful for exposing the latent political structure which underscores most social settings and for allowing a clear analysis of the exercise of power in a small, educational arena; the simulation provides a unique opportunity for combining subject matter and pedagogical technique.The procedure will be described in some detail, the initial results generated are discussed, the topics related to the experience later in the course are examined, and suggestions for instructor preparation are made. This procedure has been successfully used in undergraduate classes of Introduction to American Government and in Introduction to Political Science over a five year period.