Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Role of Goods Distribution for Authoritarian Stability in Ethnically-Divided Developing Countries

这个项目调查了当个人获得合法权利时会发生什么。这项工作试图确定这些人是否表现出对国家更高的信任，从而增加了他们的政治参与，或者，或者，发现这些人脱离了国家。这项研究试图了解正式承认一项权利--特别是正式的土地财产权--是否会影响个人参与政治的动机。研究人员对三种农村土地产权制度进行了跨国分析。这些所有权政策提供了一个独特的机会，可以研究国家正式授予他们合法财产权时，往往被边缘化的小农户群体的反应。这项研究将对政治学和法律文献做出有意义的贡献，这些文献早就认识到合法权利的潜力，可以使国家合法化或引发政治动员，但没有探索权利的正式承认与对政治态度和行为的相应影响之间的关系。该项目还将有助于评估拟议的土地正规化努力的有效性，区分有意义的权利扩展和无效的权利扩展。此外，这项研究还可以提供证据，说明承认受害者的权利是否可以促进重建，并在武装冲突后建立对国家机构的信任。技术摘要在这个项目中，研究调查正式的、合法的权利的延伸是否导致个人信任国家和/或与国家更多地接触。这项研究试图了解对一项权利的正式承认，特别是对土地的正式财产权，是否会改变个人从事政治的动机。尽管法律权利在规范和社会运动理论中处于中心地位，但仍有两个重大问题尚未解决。首先，一项法律权利本身，作为一项权利的象征性正当理由，除了该权利保护的基本天赋或权利之外，是否对政治行为产生了影响？其次，权利是否创造了一种参与政治脱离的激励？学者们对基于权利的主张在促进政治动员和产生政治变革方面的力量展开了辩论。事实上，如果获得一项正式的权利会增加权利持有者对某种利益的安全感，那么可能就没有什么动力去从事代价高昂的政治活动了。然而，其他人认为权利是强大的象征，并质疑为什么它们在某些情况下激励动员，但在另一些情况下抑制参与。该项目采用了多方法、跨国家的研究设计，结合了定性和统计数据以及来自三个农村土地确权项目的分析。这些方案提供了研究法律地位具体变化的机会，但并没有显著改变土地的基本分配，从而隔离了法律权利变化的影响。这笔资金将通过重点小组和农村小农资助实地研究数据收集。这些新数据将有助于解释土地正规化统计分析的结果。值得注意的是，它们将提供重要的洞察，以了解与权利承认状况变化相关的任何影响所依据的因果机制。反过来，这将有助于该研究对我们对权利对个人行为的影响的理论和实证理解的影响。

General AbstractThis project investigates what happens when individuals gain legal rights. The work seeks to determine whether these individuals exhibit increased trust of the state and therefore increase their political participation, or, alternatively, find that these individuals disengage from the state. This study seeks to understand whether the formal recognition of a right -- in particular, a formal property right to land -- affects an individual's incentives to engage in politics. The researcher conducts a cross-national analysis of three rural land-titling programs. These titling policies offer a unique opportunity to study how an often marginalized group, small-holding farmers, react when the state formally grants them a legal property right. This study is poised to make a meaningful contribution to political science and legal literature, which have long recognized the potential of legal rights to legitimize the state or spark political mobilization, but which have not explored the relationship between the formal recognition of rights and the corresponding influence on political attitudes and behavior. This project will also help to evaluate the effectiveness of proposed land formalization efforts, distinguish meaningful extensions of rights from ineffective ones. Additionally, the study can also provide evidence on whether the recognition of victims' rights can promote reconstruction and build trust toward state institutions in the aftermath of armed conflict.Technical AbstractIn this project, the research investigates whether the extension of a formal, legal right causes an individual to trust in and/or engage more with the state. This study seeks to understand whether the formal recognition of a right, in particular, a formal property right to land, changes an individual's incentives to engage in politics. Despite the centrality of legal rights in normative and social movement theories, two significant questions remain unresolved. First, does a legal right itself, as a symbolic justification of a claim, have an effect on political behavior beyond the underlying endowment or entitlement the right protects? Secondly, do rights create an incentive to participate disengage politically? Scholars debate the power of rights-based claims to promote political mobilization and to engender political change. Indeed, if receiving a formal right increases the right-bearer's feeling of security over an interest, there may be little incentive to engage in 'costly' political activities. However, others argue that rights are powerful symbols, and question why they incentivize mobilization in some instances, but dampen participation in others. This project uses a multi-method, cross-national research design that combines qualitative and statistical data and analyses from three rural land-titling programs. These programs provide an opportunity to study a specific change in legal status, yet does not significantly alter the underlying distribution of land, thereby isolating the impact of the change in legal rights. This funding will sponsor the field research data collection through focus groups and small-holding farmers in rural villages. These new data will help to interpret the results from statistical analyses on land formalization. Notably they will provide important insight into the causal mechanisms that underlie any effect associated with changes in the status of rights recognition. In turn, this will contribute to the study's impact on our theoretical and empirical understanding of the influence of rights on individual behavior.