Law Commons^™

Resurrecting The Rent Strike Law, Greg Baltz

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

We Have The Right To Play, Duane Rudolph

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

This article evaluates landmark cases spanning almost seven decades from the Supreme Court of the United States dealing with sexual orientation and gender identity. The cases are as follows: (1) One, Inc. v. Olesen (1958); (2) Boutilier v. Immigration and Naturalization Service (1967); (3) Baker v. Nelson (1972); (4) Rowland v. Mad River Local School District (1985); (5) Bowers v. Hardwick (1986); (6) Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Group of Boston (1995); (7) Romer v. Evans (1996); (8) Boy Scouts of America v. Dale (1996); (9) Lawrence v. Texas (2003); (10) United States v. Windsor (2013); (11) Hollingsworth …

Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind: Removing Unhoused People By Proxy Of Mental Illness, Carl Wu

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

Across the United States, various legal mechanisms have subjected unhoused people to cruel practices that seek to remove them from public view. These practices have included laws that criminalize sleeping in public. Following a decades-long series of Supreme Court decisions, the Ninth Circuit recently struck down these “anti-homeless” laws under the Eighth Amendment’s ban on Cruel and Unusual Punishment and held that one’s status and unavoidable conduct resulting from that status could not be criminalized. Since 2022, a second wave of removal has emerged. California and New York City have both enacted initiatives, shrouded under the guise of a “compassionate” …

Masthead

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

Anti-Bds Laws And The Politics Of Political Boycotts, Osama Alkhawaja

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

The Best Protection Is Abstinence (From Funding): The Illegality And Unconstitutionality Of Abstinence-Only Sex Education In The United States, Haley Ferise

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

The United States funds abstinence-only sex education through a variety of spending programs, such as the Title V Sexual Risk Avoidance Education (SRAE) program. Receiving abstinence-only sex education is correlated with higher teen pregnancy rates, more frequent instances of sexually transmitted diseases and infections among young people, young people’s engagement in sexual activity with a greater number of partners, and even a reduced average age of engagement in vaginal intercourse. Federal funding of programs which carry these risks must cease immediately. Scholars and litigants have raised challenges to the constitutionality of programs like SRAE; legal scholar James McGrath purports that …

From Trauma To Transformation: Trauma-Informed Pedagogy In Law School, Angela P. Harris, Monika B. Kashyap

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

In this essay, we seek to expand the meaning of “trauma” by aligning trauma-informed pedagogy with principles of disability justice and progressive critiques of legal education. We argue first that the existence of trauma is not a sign of individual brokenness or deficiency, but rather should be taken as a warning about broken or deficient social institutions or practices. This approach to trauma recognizes the potential of those who experience trauma—whose bodies and minds bear the marks of both subordination and resilience—to contribute to institutional and structural transformation. We use as an example the trauma too often experienced in law …

Identity Annexation: Israel's Non-Territorial And Psychic Annexation Of West Bank Samaritans In The Occupied Palestinian Territories, Zeina Jallad

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

The Hazy Employment Protections For Medical Marijuana Users In The Pennsylvania Medical Marijuana Act, Kathryn M. Capizzi

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

Anti-Carceral Human Rights Advocacy, Chi Adanna Mgbako, Nate Johnson, Vivienne Bang Brown, Megan Cheah, Kimya Zahedi

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

The theory of carceral abolition entered the mainstream during the 2020 global protests for Black lives. Abolition calls for divestment from carceral institutions like police and prisons in favor of the expansion of social and economic programs that ensure public safety and nurture community well-being. Although there is little scholarship explicitly linking abolition to international human rights, there are scholars and advocates who implicitly echo abolitionist theories by critiquing the international human rights regime's overreliance on criminal law. These critics argue that relying on carceral institutions to address impunity for human rights abuses and promote gender justice does little to …

Let's Talk About Sex (Work): The Irony Of Partial Decriminalization Of Sex Work, Linda S. Anderson

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

California High: A Note On Enforcement Of The Harrison Act, Lawrence M. Friedman, Omar Vasquez Duque

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

No abstract provided.

Internet Human Rights, Michael J. Kelly, David Satola

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

The rate at which Internet connectivity is spreading is matched only by the increasing amount of time people spend online. Today over 5 billion humans access the Internet; the overwhelming majority of them engage in social media, and almost all of them live out key aspects of their daily lives digitally. Human rights are universal in the sense that they apply to everyone, everywhere. And while there are indicators that they apply in cyberspace, how they apply is a different story.

Now, as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) turns 75, we wonder how many of those rights accompany …

Socio-Philosophical Ontology: Supraorganic Emergence Of Social Reality, René Reich-Graefe

University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Social Change

This article develops and defends a general theory of supraorganic emergence of social reality which, as a base model, is also claimed to causally underpin all instances of sociolegal emergencenamely, the collectivist and wholistic organizational process of a given society that, over large, intergenerational timescales, produces sociolegal rules and practices in terms of legal-system social institutions on the one hand (for example, the first-tier legal recognition and organization of businesses as partnerships and corporations) and legal-system social laws on the other hand (for example, the second-tier legal recognition and organization of certain intra-business fiduciary duties among business owners and managers). …