The North American Free Trade Agreement was passed by the U.S. Congress in November 1993. The United States had decided that a regional trade approach would be more beneficial than bilateral trade with its neighbors. This move accepted Mexico as an equal economic partner with the United States and Canada despite their economic deficiencies. The NAFTA agreement came into effect on January 1, 1994. Canada, Mexico, and the United States agreed to eliminate tariffs on roughly ninety-nine percent of internationally traded goods by the end of 2004. The agreement was also significant because the three nations took a big step in further liberalizing Foreign Direct Investment policies. NAFTA resulted in what is today a $19 trillion regional market with over 470 million consumers. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimates that six million U.S. jobs depend on trade with Mexico and another eight million jobs depend on trade with Canada. As seen, economic interests clearly dominated the NAFTA debate on all fronts. There still were other domestic political interests that further pushed the United States to seek regional integration with Canada and Mexico. Drugs, energy, pollution, and the threat of American jobs as a result of Mexico’s low wages were all major issues considered in the United States at the time. The issues noted above can be closely linked to the United States’ national security interests. Policy-makers and treaty negotiators constantly connected the passage of this agreement to the long-term interests of the United States. For NAFTA to have a chance in the first place, all operational concerns had to have been resolved first. The governing structure for management of the activities that fall under NAFTA’s umbrella was a huge prerequisite. Additionally, separate side agreements with Canada and Mexico had to be negotiated so that the they would offset any future problems NAFTA might create for the United States. Although a challenge, it all came together perfectly and the passage was successfully implemented. Taking everything into consideration, the United States should stray way from its’ isolationist ways and pursue a regional agreement like NAFTA for the betterment of all North Americans.

In 2010, social media, being made available in Arabic, made a large impact in the Middle-East, and social movements throughout several countries exploded from those regions, using the power of social media to their advantage and creating new discussions which were not able to be spoken prior to the introduction of social media in Arabic. Besides creating new social movements, social media has resulted in the transformation and evolution of socialization and how people communicate in their daily lives.
Social media changed the system of networks and connectivity, making communication more tenacious, adaptable, and efficient than ever. Social media is often criticized as a reason for why social movements have not met desired results; however, this is not the fault of social media, rather the fault of the disorganization of people. In this essay, these ideas will be explored, and the many criticisms and misconceptions of social media will be addressed and challenged, creating a more realistic image of social movements with the added power of the new technology called social media.

The first section of this thesis covers the welfare state and a brief history of private charity in the United States over the past century, both explaining and describing their growth and decline. The second section outlines the historical evolution of the Food Stamp Program since the John F. Kennedy presidency to SNAP under the Obama administration. The third and final section specifically discusses the current food assistance program called SNAP and the potential reforms that can be made to the governmental program as well as reforms made to encourage private charity.

Civic engagement is often defined as political activism; to be a part of governmental decision making, the practices thereof, and various efforts of participation in voting. However, civic engagement is also known for its role within non-political work, such as community building and development. Because of the former definition many members of our society have a tendency to not embrace the full potential of their community roles. It is always about who is a Republican, who is a Democrat, who looks better, or who has a better name. Now it must be noted that this is not in absolute, not all members of our society work in this thought process, but many still do. If that doesn't come as a surprise to you, then the simplicity of how you can be an engaged member will. As a student attending Arizona State University at the West campus in Phoenix, Arizona, I have chosen to challenge the traditional view of civic engagement and prepare this development plan for the campus community. Having done so, I not only discovered the paths that one can take to be engaged in such matters, but also continued my role as a civil servant.

Young voters are the future of the country, yet are disengaged and disinterested in politics, leading to low turnout rates. This paper focuses on the Millennial generation, which consists of adults ages 18 to 33, and at times, narrowly focuses on the subset of college students. Since individuals should learn about the presidential candidates and the election before casting a vote, I analyze the similarities and differences between receiving election content through television news, a traditional source, compared to social media. Next, I examine the importance of political expression and political discussion, along with how millennials engaging in such activity on social media allows for a deeper level of engagement in elections than what was possible before the birth of social media. Thus, as opposed to focusing on the reasons milllennials shy away from politics, the purpose of the first three chapters is to highlight the potential benefits for using social media during presidential elections. Lastly, I analyze millennials' voting behaviors, particularly the generation's preference for liberal social values. Since we are currently in the 2016 U.S. presidential election season, the purpose of this chapter is to highlight current research regarding millennials' voting patterns, which should then be compared to the future 2016 general election studies. By analyzing consistent and divergent trends, researchers can further add to the discussion of millennials' political behavior. Although I dedicate a brief part to the 2016 presidential election in Chapters 2 through 4 to discuss how trends are similar or different from current research, the overall purpose of this paper is to inform readers about how millennials learn, engage, and participate in presidential elections.