Date of Thesis

Spring 2023

Description

In an era when attention to reconstruction and preservation of the environment is crucial, this thesis looks at the effect that electoral institutions have on attention paid to the environmental policy issue dimension. Specifically, it looks at party manifestos and policies in post-1980 Germany and Japan to determine if specific electoral structures, such as the number of parties in a system, correlates with a greater amount of either attention paid to environmental policy in party platforms or in the actual passing of policy. It finds that though both Germany and Japan employ multi-member proportional systems, the greater number of parties with proportionally larger shares of seats in Germany alongside its environmentally-dedicated Green party incentivized its ‘winning’ parties to pay attention to ecological policy. Conversely, in Japan, the Liberal Democratic Party’s power left it up to smaller parties to bring the environmental conversation to the table.

Keywords

environment, policy, germany, japan

Access Type

Honors Thesis

Degree Type

Bachelor of Arts

Major

Political Science

Second Major

English- Creative Writing

First Advisor

Christina Xydias

Second Advisor

Joseph Jozwiak

Third Advisor

Carl Lin

Download

Share

COinS