1:55 PM – 3:10 PM | Merten Hall, Rooms 1202 and 1203
Diplomacy and Policy: Foreign and Domestic
1:55 PM – 3.10 PM | Merten Hall, Room 1202
Discussant: Dr. Shannon N. Davis
Madness or Method? Evaluating the strategic effectiveness of the Kim dynasty’s nuclear brinkmanship
Barbara Montgomery (Schar School of Policy and Government)
Is North Korea an unpredictable rogue state led by an irrationally impulsive dictator, or is there a method to its seeming madness? From its ballistic missile and nuclear weapons testing to its extensive domestic indoctrination, its provocative conventional weapon attacks, and its coercive diplomacy through crisis manipulation, North Korea takes extensive risks. But are these risky tactics actually strategic, calculated, and effective in promoting North Korea’s grand strategy of regime survival? In my research, I evaluate the strategic effectiveness of nuclear brinkmanship under the Kim dynasty. I build on nuclear brinkmanship literature and use the following evaluation criteria based on theories from Thomas Schelling, Robert Jervis, and John Lewis Gaddis: 1) Credible commitment (Schelling), 2) Threat perception accuracy (Jervis), and 3) Ends/means alignment (Gaddis). Through process-tracing, I examine the following three examples: 1) Kim Il-Sung’s threat to leave the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, 2) Kim Jong-Il’s second nuclear test in 2009, and 3) Kim Jong-un’s series of ICBM tests in 2017. This research is ongoing. The full findings of process-tracing analysis will be presented at the conference. Preliminary research suggests that the Kim dynasty 1) makes a credible commitment to use nuclear brinkmanship, 2) perceives a real threat from the U.S. but misperceives the threat as offensive rather than defensive, and 3) aligns aspirations with capabilities when it has an external power to support the regime. Understanding these behavioral patterns enables other states to better predict North Korean actions and assess when risk-taking is strategic versus random or destabilizing.
Cultural Renaissance: Saudi Arabia’s Quest for Status Through Soft Power
Manar Al Mahmood (Schar School of Policy and Government)
As Saudi Arabia marks a decade since launching its national Vision 2030, it offers a compelling case study for not only rapid social and economic transformation but also a diplomatic one. For many years, the Kingdom has been under significant international scrutiny. Yet today, it has won bids to host the World Expo 2030 and the 2034 FIFA World Cup. This paper examines the pivot in Saudi Arabia’s public diplomacy strategy from relying on religious legitimacy to expanding into broader cultural appeal sectors. Much debate has focused on economic implications, attracting tourism and investments, which are central to the country’s economic diversification beyond oil strategy. However, this dimension does not fully explain the profound rebranding of the Kingdom. Therefore, I argue that Saudi Arabia’s new cultural appeal aims to bolster the Kingdom’s standing, elevate its status, and reassert its primacy in the region. This paper is grounded in two international relations theoretical frameworks: Joseph Nye’s soft power and Deborah Welch Larson’s status theory. Despite Saudi Arabia’s increasing visibility, it remains understudied in soft power and status literature. Using a qualitative approach, this paper conducts discourse analysis of official Vision 2030 documents, press releases, and published interviews of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to assess the extent of status signaling. Preliminary findings suggest that cultural appeal is positioned as both an economic driver and a diplomatic asset enhancing global stature. This research aims to contribute to broader scholarly debates on status-seeking and soft power strategies among rising powers.
When District Attorneys Decide: Election Cycles and Prosecuting Behaviors
JINPENG Shi (College of Humanities and Social Sciences)
We study how electoral incentives shape the prosecuting behaviors of district attorneys. To do so, we leverage more than 4 million web-scraped criminal case records from the Commonwealth of Virginia spanning over 25 years. Our analysis yields four main findings: (1) Consistent with shifting public attitudes toward crime, effective sentencing has exhibited a long-run decline, but this trend reverses in the most recent election cycle(s). (2) We identify no electoral pressures on district attorneys until the most recent election cycle(s), with point estimates that run into the opposite direction to the existing literature. (3) In the most recent election cycle(s), as elections approach, district attorneys are more lenient on lesser offenses while harsher on server cases, thereby resulting in higher effective sentencing. (4) Finally, case processing times have risen steadily over the past 25 years, and proximity to elections is associated with additional delays. Taken together, our findings provide a comprehensive view of the effect of electoral incentives on district attorneys.
Language, Literature, and Communication
1:55 PM – 3.10 PM | Merten Hall, Room 1203
Discussant: Dr. Stephanie J. Bluth
A Damaged Tradition: The Effects of the Cameroon Anglophone Crisis on Anglophone Cameroon’s Literature
James Watkins (College of Humanities and Social Sciences)
As a Graduate student at George Mason, the purpose of the research I have conducted is to piece together the post-colonial history of Anglophone Cameroon by means of their literary tradition. While this research both uncovers the history of post-colonial Anglophone Cameroon and brings its rich literary tradition to light, it also brings awareness to the ongoing Cameroon Anglophone Crisis. This research has explored the hypothesis that the Cameroon Anglophone Crisis, which began in 2016, has had a negative and limiting effect on the production and publication of Cameroonian Anglophone Literature. The methodological means of pursuing this hypothesis has included research into the history of Anglophone Cameroon and its literature through access of several databases and libraries, collecting both current and historical creative and scholarly literature from the North West and South West regions of Cameroon. To better understand where the crisis itself stands in this history and how it has affected the literary tradition, current creative and scholarly literature from the time of the conflict has been collected. Furthermore, interviewing has been done with educators, scholars, and students from Anglophone Cameroon in order to access perspectives from Anglophone Cameroonians. The research findings have proved the hypothesis and has also revealed that much of the scholarly research and literature written about the crisis in the last ten years comes from outside of Anglophone Cameroon. As Anglophone literature in Cameroon is historically political, these findings show that a certain political voice has been lost in Anglophone Cameroon during this crisis.
Task-Aware in Continual Learning via task similarity
Jianyu Wang (College of Science)
Continual learning in both vision and language models poses challenges due to task interference, limited labels, and the need for efficient knowledge transfer. This work presents a unified research direction across three systems—TAME, TSEE, and MoA—centered on the use of task similarity as a guiding mechanism for scalable and adaptive learning. We hypothesize that modeling task similarity can support more informed supervision, selective memory replay, and modular adaptation in semi-supervised, continual learning settings. Our methodology spans three domains: TAME uses task similarity to retrieve relevant memory in LLMs, TSEE builds a routed teacher-student framework using expert ensembles for image tasks, and MoAdapter enables parameter-efficient adaptation via similarity-based routing. All models operate under continual, low-label conditions with tasks introduced sequentially. Empirical results show that task similarity improves pseudo-label quality, reduces forgetting, and enhances adaptability across multiple benchmarks. We conclude that task similarity offers a generalizable solution for continual learning, enabling more robust and flexible transfer across diverse tasks.
Speaking Terms: Death’s Voice in La Danse Macabre
Rachel Allison (College of Humanities and Social Sciences)
La Danse Macabre is a Medieval poem that touches a belief from the Middle Ages in there being a dance of death that occurs when dying. This paper examines the ways in which the poem showcases the character, Death, communicating with its dance partners. Upon examination questions begin to arise regarding whether Death’s means of communication with the human counterparts of the poem all demonstrate trauma and grief theory in literature. By using secondary readings regarding how these two categories of literature function in conversation with a secondary reading illuminating how voices are given to nature these theories are applied to close readings of the poem. Ultimately, it is clear through these cases of deep analysis that Death is an extension of nature and therefore gains a voice to begin trauma and grief processing illuminating the connection between non-human voices and trauma and grief literature.
Beyond Demographics: Why ACE Awareness Matters in Higher Education
Jill Manuel (College of Education and Human Development)
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are strongly associated with lifelong physical and mental health outcomes, including anxiety, depression, and diminished educational attainment. Within higher education, ACEs are increasingly reflected in the growing demand for campus mental health services, academic advising, and student support programs. While organizations such as the American College Health Association have called for increased ACE awareness and trauma‑informed training for faculty and staff, institutional responses often remain limited and inconsistent. This session examines why traditional demographic‑based approaches to student support in higher education are insufficient for identifying and addressing the needs of students with histories of childhood trauma. ACEs—defined by the CDC as potentially traumatic events occurring before age 18, such as abuse, neglect, household violence, parental incarceration, or substance use—are widespread, yet largely invisible within college populations. Students with ACE histories may present with maladaptive coping strategies that affect identity formation, relationships, help‑seeking behaviors, and academic persistence. Drawing on neurobiological research, this presentation explains how early trauma disrupts brain development, particularly within the limbic system, impacting emotional regulation, memory, learning, and stress responses. These trauma‑related challenges directly affect classroom engagement, self‑advocacy, and educational outcomes. Participants will explore practical strategies for implementing trauma‑informed practices across higher education contexts, including faculty and staff training, early identification, and referral pathways. By reframing student need beyond demographic categories, institutions can better support student survivors, foster inclusive learning environments, and strengthen higher education’s role as a critical gateway to long‑term health, mobility, and success.