Honors Thesis Archive

Author	Kailey Coulter
Title	President Obama and Syria: The Politics of Persuasion
Department	Political Science
Advisors	Ed Hasecke, Staci Rhine, and Molly Wood
Year	2014
Honors	University Honors
Full Text	View Thesis (533 KB)
Abstract	The Syrian conflict has brought about many questions of U.S. involvement, and has been highly debated by Congress, the media, and the public. This ongoing conflict, which has ravaged Syria since 2011, has resulted in the deaths of over 146,000 people, displaced more than four million Syrians, and doomed thousands more to starvation in overcrowded refugee camps. In addition to the heavy humanitarian toll, the conflict escalated even further in June of 2013 when the United States confirmed that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had used chemical weapons on multiple occasions. Only 27% of Americans reported in December 2012 that the U.S. had a responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria. For a variety of reasons, evaluating the motivations and reasoning behind public support for U.S. intervention in the Syrian Civil War is particularly complicated. The conflicting opinions among American political elites demonstrate the challenges and complexities of understanding this war. I intend to explore these puzzling and often contradictory links between public support, Congress, the media, and the President in the context of the Syrian Civil War, which warrants an overview of the history of this conflict.