ClassCrits March 10th at 5PM Eastern Time (UTC-5) "Keeping the 'Crit' in Critical Tax: Lessons from LatCrit and CRT" .  This discussion will focused on the body of scholarship and the long-running conference that go by the name "Critical Tax."  Scholars and teachers in this area do not necessarily agree with each other about the boundaries of critical tax.  This conversation evaluated in what sense, if any, this work is properly described as "critical" (and why that does, or doesn't, matter).

Panelists:

Diane Klein, Visiting Professor of Law (Remote), Southern University Law Center

Anthony Infanti, University of Pittsburgh School of Law

Frank Valdes, University of Miami School of Law

Prof. Andre Smith, American University Washington College of Law

April 21, 2022 at 12pm (noon) EDT via Zoom Derrick Bell, Racism, and Well-Being with Kim Clark, Dr. K. Parameswaran, and others.

This was a practicum on teaching and living the ethics and values of the movement begun by Professor Derrick Bell. Although race may not be at the center of our legal considerations, bias is, and racial bias is salient to the thinking mind. How can this cognitive focused teaching and practice of law advance better decision-making in our personal lives, our communities and the larger society? What healing and peace can this perspective bring to our lives? Hear from the panelists how understanding the “vexing bond of race and power” leads to liberation of one’s self and how we become energized by meeting this challenge.

ClassCrits XIII Conference Unlocking Race & Class For Just Transitions- October 21-22, 2022 at Thurgood Marshall School of Law, Houston, TX

Click here for the PreliminProgram

Co-Sponsored by ClassCrits, Inc., Thurgood Marshall School of Law

Taproot Earth  Just Transition Lawyering Institute, & Equation Campaign

Knote Speaker:  Colette Pichon Battle, Esq., Co-Executive Director of TapRoot Earth

Conference Theme, Unlocking Race & Class For Just Transitions

The Civil Rights Era of the mid-20th century brought about some reforms, but it did not achieve substantive equality for people of color, and in particular for African American, Latinx and Native American communities.  The wealth and income of these communities are far below that of whites, their poverty and unemployment rates are far above the national average, and they are far underrepresented among college graduates and in professions requiring higher education.  There is still widespread de facto racial and ethnic segregation in schools and residential living patterns.  And people of color are often harassed and brutalized by police and private citizens while engaged in normal human activities.  

For several decades, scholarship in Critical Race Theory and LatCrit Theory has examined the role of ongoing racial discrimination in perpetuating persistent injustices and inequalities against African Americans and other people of color.  A somewhat different perspective is found in the literature on “racial capitalism.”  Inspired by scholars in the Black radical tradition such as W.E.B. DuBois, Cedric Robinson, and Sylvia Wynter, historians and theorists of capitalism have begun to trace the relationship between global capitalism and white supremacy.  From the dispossession of indigenous people in the “New World” to the establishment of Atlantic slavery, through the construction of empires of cotton, sugar, bananas, and other commodities that pulled colonized and racialized peoples around the globe into new supply chains designed to serve the European metropoles, the cheap land and labor produced by white supremacy has been central to the emergence of capitalism.  

The climate crisis, which currently threatens the well-being of the entire world and of which people of color and other marginalized communities bear the brunt, is an outcome of a globalized economic system based on extraction from and exploitation of these communities and of the planet at large.  Indeed, new historical research suggests that capitalist tools and mechanisms—from accounting and management practices to mortgages, the corporate form, and private property itself—are the products of a mindset that has distributed the privileges of “humanity” unequally.  This account refuses the conventional question of “Is it race or class?” and suggests that the two are intimately intertwined.

This backdrop poses several questions.  Is it possible to overcome white supremacy with the existing tools of American law?  Can white supremacy and capitalism be disentangled?  Is it possible, given what DuBois called the “wages of whiteness,” to build a more egalitarian society with minimal wealth and income disparities, high quality education and guaranteed employment for all, and comparable opportunities to seek fulfillment in life?  Despite the enormous power of the moneyed elite, is it possible and what would it take to transform our society from one based on competition, profit, and individual satisfaction to one whose core values are working cooperatively, meeting people’s needs, and fairly sharing what society collectively produces among all its members? What might this “Just Transition” look like? And how do we equip lawyers to facilitate the transition?  

For more details about ClassCrits XIII, including sponsors, logistics, and fees, please see the full conference description by clicking here.