For over seven decades, preventing the spread of nuclear weapons has been a core feature of American foreign policy. This policy has relied on a set of conditions—international, domestic, and normative—unique to the post-1945 world. An international balance of power favorable to the U.S. allowed policymakers to shift states’ incentives for nuclear acquisition. Domestic political consensus gave the policies credibility and allowed them to endure despite domestic transfers of power. American normative appeal led to voluntary compliance with the nonproliferation regime and reduced the policies’ cost. But these foundations of U.S. nonproliferation policy are eroding. A worsening international balance of power, domestic dysfunction and polarization, and reduced U.S. legitimacy within the global nuclear order all mean that effective nonproliferation policy is coming to an end. Drawing on a growing body of literature in nuclear nonproliferation, we develop a typology of the ways in which U.S. nonproliferation policy is becoming obsolete. We then examine the track record of a range of nonproliferation tools in an age of American decline and polarization, including alliance coercion, economic sanctions, international institutions, bargaining, and an aggressive, counterforce-oriented U.S. nuclear posture. We extrapolate from existing trends to determine how nonproliferation policy will fare if the international, domestic, and normative underpinnings of U.S.-led nuclear order continue to erode. In doing so, we articulate the theoretical underpinnings of U.S. nonproliferation policy that the literature has up to this point left implicit.

This research examines the relationship between the President of Belarus, Aleksandr Lukashenko, and Russia, and how Lukashenko uses the Belarusian government institutions to censor media, instill fear in reporters, and create a “culture of silence”. Belarus and Russia have had a close relationship since the formation of the USSR. The similarity in the countries handling of the press show that. This investigation relies upon an historical analysis of the relationship between the countries; data collected in interviews with journalists and bloggers; as well as data regarding press freedom collected via secondary sources including NGOs, IGOs, and journalists.l. Because of the low freedom of the press index, there is still much information that has been censored or not reported on to date. Therefore this study seeks to uncover the ways in which freedom of the press are curbed in Belarus, and whether or not the relationship between the country’s president and Russia is relevant to that repression.

This research explores how the present political atmosphere affects Latino voter participation in East Los Angeles, where 96% of the population identifies themselves as Latino. Despite a highly concentrated Latino population, voter turnout is meager. Political scientists have previously claimed that Latino voters are more likely to vote during elections when candidates of similar ethnicity and backgrounds are on the ballot. Even though the community is primarily represented by Latino representation at all levels of government, only 55 % of the roughly 45,000 registered voters cast their ballots in 2020. It seems that previous studies do not apply to East Los Angeles as there is no direct correlation between the high concentration of Latino voters and their low voter turnout despite similar ethnic candidates. This mixed-methods study utilizes an online survey as a source for data collection as well as virtual interviews with volunteer participants. I hypothesize that low voter turnout in East Los Angeles will be due to little to no knowledge of information on upcoming elections, including presidential elections. This study further explores what challenges voters face and how they affect their voting behaviors. As it stands, Latinos are growing in population size across the nation, with experts predicting that they will become the largest minority-majority in less than a decade. As a result, I and those in my field must better understand Latino voter behaviors and patterns to more accurately predict turnout and increase civic engagement.

The study's objective is to examine the Latino population's involvement in politics and possible techniques to increase that involvement in future years. There is a substantial list of reasons why Latinos are a group that is not as politically involved as other demographics. Yet, these same reasons can also demonstrate how their involvement has increased over the years and can continue to grow. The materials used in this study are various scholarly articles discussing the Latino vote during the election of Obama and Trump as well as research on the topic of immigration. This includes data about different voting patterns between races/ethnicities regarding immigration and turnout. The findings throughout the study show that exclusion, stereotyping, anti-immigrant stances, lack of knowledge, and grievances play a role in stopping eligible Latinos from political involvement and voting but at the same time, they raise a high level of emotion, motivating them to take action and vote. These findings aim to help change the mentality of many eligible Latinos and promote them to reconsider their decision to withhold their vote. It is hard to say that Latinos can come together to form the same ideology because that is not the case, but Latinos are one of the largest minority groups in the country. They have the potential to influence many aspects of government if their political presence grows from what it is now.