Daniel Posthumus

Daniel Posthumus

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Pages

Constitutional Upheavals and Autocracy in Southeast Asia

The foundation for any modern nation-state is a written constitution. The emergence of constitutionalism as a legal doctrine in the Enlightenment period was one of the crucial developments necessary for the growth of democracy and decline of absolutism. A constitution is merely the means by which a state constitutes and specifies the limits of legislative power, executive power, and judicial power. This turn towards limiting these powers (which began with the Magna Carta and the English Glorious Revolution) marked a turn away from absolutism— although plenty of non-democracies have employed constitutions. It is thus now commonly accepted that constitutions form the bedrock of government, autocracy and democracy.

Truth Commissions and Transitional Justice in the United States

This project is the result of my work with Dr. Kelebogile Zvobgo and Zoha Siddiqui as part of the International Justice Labs. We are examining US Truth Commissions’ adoption and design, a novel subject for human rights, and specifically transitional justice, researchers. With Dr. Zvobgo, I published Democratizing Truth in 2021, and now Zoha, Dr. Zvobgo, and I are working on a new project seeking to understand the role of public opinion in US truth commission design and adopion.

Posts

Free Throw Bias in the NBA

7 minute read

Published:

Disgruntled twitter heads are constantly clamoring that NBA officiating is in dire straits, their team of choice the victim of an endless league-wide conspiracy. At the bottom of the fanatics’ paranoia, there does appear to be something of a consensus that there’s such a thing as ‘superstar’ calls, i.e., a pattern of superstar players getting favorable calls that players on two-way contracts aren’t getting. This naturally leads us to ask whether there’s a bias favoring big-market teams in the association? I’ll apply some basic econometric techniques, including Bayesian posterior analytical derivation, to test the hypothesis that there is a bias in favor of big-market teams.

portfolio

Starting Early: Returns on Kindergarten Attendance in Indonesia

This project is my Honors Thesis in Economics that I am completing with my advisor Ranjan Shrestha at William & Mary. I examine the effects of kindergarten on short-, medium-, and long-term effects. I employ three empirical strategies: OLS estimation, mother fixed-effects, and instrumental variable (IV) estimation. I find kindergarten has mixed effects; for OLS and IV estimation, kindergarten has strong positive effects on years of education completed, school completion, and cognitive test scores. However, using mother fixed-effects, there’s no statistically significant evidence of kindergarten’s effects. I also find mixed results regarding fadeout. I am interested in extending this project after graduation to examine heterogenous effects using Bayesian methods, kindergarten’s effects on labor market outcomes, and other health, social, and economic outcomes.

research

short_writing

Could Putin Actually Face Accountability at the ICC

Published:

On Feb. 28, Karim Khan, chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court (ICC), announced his intention to investigate alleged atrocity crimes in Ukraine. He noted his interest to proceed “as rapidly as possible” and asked the international community for financial and logistical support as well as personnel to expedite and sustain his office’s work.

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The International Criminal Court is a Court of Last Resort

Published:

As Russian forces continue their assault on Ukraine, there is growing evidence of war crimes and other atrocities in Borodyanka, Bucha, Mariupol, Kramatorsk, and elsewhere. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, U.S. president Joe Biden, and other world leaders have even described Russian violence as genocide. Accordingly, international courts have come into heightened focus.

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Search for Facilitator Further Delays Iowa Truth and Reconciliation Commission

Published:

On the evening of Thursday, November 4, 2021, after the Iowa City Truth and Reconciliation Commissioners filed out of their meeting in City Hall, Commission Chair Mohamed Traore spoke with community members about school outreach. He noticed two police officers approaching. He thought that they might ask him about the Commission’s work. Or that something had happened to his family. It was neither: The officers arrested Traore.

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talks

teaching

Teaching experience 1

Undergraduate course, University 1, Department, 2014

This is a description of a teaching experience. You can use markdown like any other post.

Teaching experience 2

Workshop, University 1, Department, 2015

This is a description of a teaching experience. You can use markdown like any other post.