The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) could help improve public health by creating a retail-based mechanism to provide participants in its Food Stamp Program (FSP) with significant monetary incentives to purchase health-promoting foods, such as minimally processed fruits, vegetables and whole-grain products. Increasing the consumption of health-promoting foods is of immediate importance in combating skyrocketing rates of diet-related chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity, all of which disproportionately affect low-income consumers. This incentive program could be paid for out of the tens of billions of dollars currently spent on annual commodity support payments. The redirected funds could be used to reimburse retailers and wholesaler-distributors for lost revenues, and to provide growers and processors with direct payments. The USDA would do well to consider such an approach because U.S. farm and nutrition policies often lack coherence and are not designed specifically to improve the health of U.S. consumers. This approach would also benefit California specialty crop growers, who currently receive a small proportion of federal subsidies and no direct commodity payments whatsoever.

Clifford Geertz’s “Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight” is one of the most recognized modern sources on cockfighting. Geertz’s use of thick description to analyze the motives behind the actions of Balinese cock fighters is an important methodological approach in understanding cock fighting around the world. Geertz’s essay, although crucial in its pioneering use of thick description, cannot be used as a universal source on cock fights. The primary reason for this is because Geertz’s essay focused on Balinese cock fighting which was as an exclusively male sphere of activity. Although cock fighting in Bali was an exclusively male practice, cock fighting in America, and specifically in the American Midwest, was an activity participated in by both men and women. Women were certainly not the majority of the participants at cock fights but enough of them were present to be included in the discussion of one of the practices that shaped rural America in the twentieth century.

This dissertation consists of three papers analyzing the dynamics of protest and repression in the digital age. It focuses on the interplay between government strategies such as internet shutdowns and traditional forms of physical repression, assessing their effectiveness and motivations across various contexts such as protests and elections. The first paper examines the strategic use of internet shutdowns by the Indian government to suppress dissent, particularly in regions with strong opposition presence. This study indicates that such digital repression tactics are not merely responses to violence, but also proactive measures to maintain political control. The second paper investigates the diffusion of protests, assessing the relative impact of geographic and social connections in the spread of movements. By combining an observational analysis of the India Farmers' Protest with an online experiment that isolates individual responsiveness to protest information, this study finds that although social networks facilitate protest diffusion, geographic proximity remains a significant factor. The third paper broadens the scope to global patterns of electoral violence, employing a close elections regression discontinuity design to explore the link between local incumbency and the perpetration of election-related violence. Collectively, this dissertation deepens our understanding of state control and repression tactics across diverse political landscapes and geographic regions, providing crucial insights into the evolving dynamics of technology, political power, and repression in our increasingly digital world, while also highlighting enduring patterns of state behavior and resistance strategies.