symposium booklet 24-45

Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy

ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE: RECLAIMING POPULISM AS A TOOL FOR LIBERATION

BJBLP Annual Symposium

EXCLUSIVE! April 18, 2025 Berkeley Law

“A black-led movement broad enough for all working people to follow.”

–Robin D.G. Kelly, In the Lion’s Mouth: Black Populism in the New South 1886-1900 by Omar H. Ali (Foreword)

Honoring Professor Edley

Christopher Edley Jr. served as the dean of Berkeley Law from 2004 to 2013, becoming the first Black dean of a T-14 law school. A distinguished scholar of administrative law, education policy, and civil rights, Professor Edley’s legacy is marked by his unwavering commitment to justice, democracy, and education. During his tenure at Berkeley Law, he increased financial support for public interest students, implemented structural reforms within the law school, and made lasting contributions to educational institutions across the country.

This year, the Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy (BJBLP) honors Professor Edley by centering conversations on education. He instilled in many of us the belief that a just society requires equitable access to high-quality education. Guided by that principle, we have committed ourselves to elevating scholarship and ideas that move us closer to that vision. In our Spring symposium, this commitment is reflected in Panel 4, and in Volume 25 of our publication, through our educationfocused article, Abolishing Fourth Amendment Dead Zones: Strengthening Protections in School Cell Phone Search Policies.

BJBLP members had the privilege of experiencing Professor Edley’s mentorship, thoughtfulness, and deep dedication to education—both in and beyond the classroom. We are proud to dedicate this Symposium and the forthcoming Volume of our publication to his memory and legacy.

Program Charles A. Miller Lobby

9:30 - 9:50 a.m.

Registration & Check-In

10:00 - 10:10 a.m.

Welcome & Symposium Introduction

Room 100

10:10 - 10:25 a.m.

Panel 1 Populism: Power or Peril?

Cihan Tuğal

10:30 - 11:05 a.m.

Panel 2 The “Black Vote,” Democratic Party, and Political Complacency

Dylan Penningroth Russell Robinson

11:10 - 11:45 a.m.

Keynote 1 The Pigford Cases and Rebellious Lawyering

Stephen Carpenter

12:00 - 12:45 p.m.

Lunch & BJBLP Announcements

1:00 - 1:30 p.m.

Keynote 2 Racial Capitalism and a Path Forward

Malaika Jabali

1:35 - 2:10 p.m.

Panel 3 “Serve the People”: Cooperative Economics and Lessons from the Black Panthers

Xavier Buck Malaika Parker Veryl Pow

2:15 - 2:50 p.m.

Panel 4 Black University: Reimagining Higher Education in a Populist Era

Jonathan Glater Cameron Clark Maria Echaveste Shani Shay

3:00 - 4:00 p.m.

Closing Remarks & Reception

Room 140

Steinhart Courtyard

Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy About Us The Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy (BJBLP) is committed to publishing works dedicated to addressing social, political, and economic issues affecting the Black diaspora while promoting the works of scholars of marginalized identities, activists, and attorneys. Topics include institutional racism, social, political, and economic inequality, and anti-Black racism.

Our Purpose The Journal seeks to publish social policy and legal scholarship addressing economic, political, philosophic, and sociological issues affecting Black people.

As we see it, the challenge facing the Journal is threefold: First, the Journal aims to disrupt the centering of whiteness in legal academia. We hope our journal will ultimately serve Black communities by infusing intellectual discourse with provocative and innovative scholarship, thus deepening thinking about policy options and choices.

Second, the Journal will give rise to the voices of emerging scholars, organizers, and advocates. The Journal will bring these folks into conversation with community members, professors, judges, policy-makers, and practitioners.

Finally, we see the Journal as a training ground where students can sharpen their editing and writing skills, and gain experience in critical thinking by wrestling with ideas revolving around Black liberation, equality, and justice.

A Word from our Editors-in-Chief Thank you so much for attending our Spring symposium! We take pride in producing an event that was planned and executed purely by busy, full time Berkeley Law students. Focusing on the legal, social, and political issues facing the Black community is of utmost importance because the Black community has represented the most marginalized and scapegoated community in this country since its inception. Most of the legal wins achieved for every other marginalized community in the United States have been the result of the advocacy of Black Americans. Remedies that liberate the Black community will inherently liberate all. We urge you to support BJBLP however you can! As of 2024, Black attorneys represent about 5% of the legal profession in the US despite Black people making up a little under 14% of the U.S. population.

Sustaining the few existing Black law journals is a large responsibility on the shoulders of a disproportionately small number of Black law students. We are incredibly grateful for your engagement and participation and we hope you continue to engage with our programming in the future. Thank you for your contributions that Alexis Tatum & Kaela Allen help make this programming possible!

Symposium Panels Panel 1 Populism: Power or Peril?

Since the 2016 election of Donald Trump, political discourse in the U.S. has increasingly focused on populism—its appeal, its dangers, and its potential for transformative change.

Alongside Trump’s right-wing populism, Bernie Sanders’ progressive populism demonstrated the potential of populist rhetoric to mobilize people around issues like wealth inequality, healthcare, and economic justice. The 2024 presidential election further underscored the widespread dissatisfaction with entrenched inequality, economic precarity, and political disenfranchisement that fuels both left- and right-wing populist movements.

This session will define populism and explore its relationship with democracy, drawing on examples from both American and global populist movements. From the Colored Farmers’ Alliance to the People’s Party to Occupy Wall Street, we will examine how marginalized groups have used populism to challenge power structures, while also addressing potential pitfalls of populist rhetoric.

Panel 2 The “Black Vote,” Democratic Party, and Political Complacency This session will explore the role of Black identity in constructive political action.

Joe Biden’s administration will be remembered for (at least) two historic appointments of Black women: Kamala Harris as Vice President and Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court.

However, these milestones have not been accompanied by significant departures from the political status quo or the delivery of meaningful change. Since the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Black voters have been the Democratic Party’s most reliable constituency. Yet, the Democratic Party’s increasingly transparent reliance on tokenism and representation appears to be evolving into a barrier to multiracial solidarity, emphasizing symbolic gestures over systemic change. Nonetheless, identity politics, as originally envisioned by the Combahee River Collective in 1977, emerged from Black Marxist feminist thought as a critique of the failures of white- and maledominated political culture to address the unique struggles of Black women.

Keynote 1 The Pigford Cases and Rebellious Lawyering with Stephen Carpenter This keynote will discuss the Pigford discrimination class action settlements, providing an example of how Black Americans have been systematically denied economic opportunity and relief even in federally funded programs designed to provide support to the working class, specifically for rural farm workers. The Pigford cases were among the largest civil rights class action suits in US history, due to the "united effort on the part of farmers and their supporters, as well as legal teams and social justice organizations.” Discussion of these cases will explore the racial and economic circumstances of rural America that have informed the gross disparity between Black and white farm workers, and how this history is interconnected with the histories of various populist political movements.

Symposium Panels Keynote 2 Racial Capitalism and a Path Forward In this keynote address, Malaika Jabali will examine the structural roots of workingclass struggles and systemic injustice, arguing that capitalism lies at the heart of both. As a system grounded in profit maximization and labor exploitation, capitalism prioritizes profit over people, relying on low wages, weakened labor protections, and the privatization of essential public goods such as healthcare and education.

These dynamics contribute to widespread economic precarity and erode trust in government and social institutions.

Capitalism’s emphasis on individualism and competition renders it fundamentally incompatible with a more cooperative, equitable, and sustainable future. Jabali will invite audience members to critically interrogate the limitations of our current socioeconomic system and consider alternative frameworks as a path toward collective liberation.

Panel 3 “Serve the People”: Cooperative Economies and Lessons from the Black Panther This panel aims to look out how communities can take care of themselves through cooperative efforts when failed by social and economic institutions of power. Panelists will delve into the Black Panther Party’s extensive community survival programs and vision of cooperative selfdetermination.

Additionally, they will examine cooperative economic models rooted in both law and organizing, assessing their relevance to address the social and economic perils communities face today, as well as their potential to bring about more equitable futures by reshaping society as a whole.

Panel 4 Black University: Reimagining Higher Education in a Populist Era

The powerful college campus Palestine protests of 2024 have underscored a profound disconnect between the values of universities and the communities they are meant to serve.

As universities increasingly adjust to rightwing political norms, administrative control over curriculum and campus expression has tightened. It is clear that the role and structure of higher education in our society demand urgent re-evaluation.

This panel will examine how education can transcend its current role as a gatekeeping institution, entrenched in meritocratic and competitive frameworks, and become a tool for cooperation and communal transformation. Drawing on W.E.B. Du Bois’s conception of the “Black University” and the radical independent schools movement that flourished during the Black Power era, this session will challenge traditional notions of education as a mechanism for ‘opportunity’ i.e. individual advancement. Instead, it will explore how higher education can serve as a hub for community and shared worldmaking.

Symposium Speakers

Cihan Tuğal Professor of Sociology UC Berkeley (he/him)

Cihan Tuğal studies social movements, populism, capitalism, democracy, and religion.

In his recent publications, he discusses the far right, neoliberalization, state capitalism, and populist performativity in Turkey, the United States, Hungary, Poland, India, and the Philippines. Tuğal is currently working on a book that will incorporate these case studies, along with an analysis of populism in Brazil.

Based on fieldwork in Egypt and Turkey as well as historical analysis, Tuğal’s previous book Caring for the Poor examines the emergence, globalization, and decline of liberal welfare ethics. His ongoing work explores ethical, religious, and spiritual alternatives to the rationalization and individualization of care and well-being.

Dylan. C Penningroth Professor of Law Berkeley Law (he/him)

Dylan C. Penningroth is professor of law and Morrison Professor of history at Berkeley, and an Affiliated Research Professor of the American Bar Foundation.

Currently serving as Associate Dean of the Program in Jurisprudence and Social Policy (JSP), he specializes in African American history and legal history.

In Before the Movement: The Hidden History of Black Civil Rights, he revises the conventional story of civil rights to tell a forgotten pre-history of the marches of the 1960s and recovers a rich, broader vision of Black life ― allied with, yet distinct from, the freedom struggle.

Penningroth reveals that African Americans have thought about, discussed, and used the law going as far back as slavery.

Russell Robinson Professor of Law Berkeley Law (he/him)

Prior to joining UC Berkeley, Russell Robinson was Professor of Law at UCLA. Robinson graduated with honors from Harvard Law School (1998), after receiving his B.A. summa cum laude from Hampton University (1995). Robinson’s scholarly and teaching interests include anti-discrimination law, race and sexuality, law and psychology, constitutional law, and media and entertainment law.

Symposium Speakers

Stephen Carpenter Senior Staff Attorney Farmers’ Legal Action Group (FLAG) (he/him)

Stephen Carpenter is a graduate of Drury College in Springfield, Missouri, and of Stanford Law School. At the Farmers’ Legal Action Group (FLAG), much of Stephen’s work has centered on discrimination in agricultural lending, debtor-creditor issues for farmers, and federal farm and farm loan programs. He served as Senior Counsel in the Office of the Monitor in the Pigford case and as the courtappointed Ombudsman for the In re Black Farmers Discrimination case. His law review writing discusses rebellious lawyering on behalf of farmers, discrimination litigation against the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the future of agricultural law, lawyering for family farmers in poverty, and sustainable agriculture.

Other academic writing discusses federal farm policy, populist farm protest, and equality in agriculture.

Malaika Jabali Journalist, Author, & Public Policy Attorney (she/her) Malaika Jabali is a public policy attorney, journalist, and author. Her debut book, It’s Not You, It’s Capitalism: Why It’s Time to Break Up and How to Move On, was named by the Boston Globe as one of the Best Books of 2023, and her debut political feature, “The Color of Economic Anxiety,” published in Current Affairs Magazine, was awarded the 2019 New York Association of Black Journalists Media Award for Newspaper/ Magazine feature. A Columbia Law School graduate, Malaika was an Articles Editor for the Columbia Journal of Race & Law and is the former Senior News and Politics Editor of ESSENCE magazine. Prior to law school, she received her M.S. from the Columbia University School of Social Work, studying social welfare policy, criminal justice, and social enterprise.

Xavier Buck Executive Director Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation (he/him)

Xavier Buck, Ph.D., is the founder of the Black Panther Party Museum in Oakland, California, established through his visionary leadership as Executive Director of the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation.

Passionate about preserving and sharing the legacy of the Black Panther Party, Dr. Buck directs all aspects of the museum’s operations, including fundraising, exhibitions, education initiatives, and public programming.

Through groundbreaking projects and global social justice campaigns, Dr. Buck inspires audiences across generations to learn from history and work toward a more equitable future. He is a graduate of St. John’s University and the University of California, Berkeley.

Symposium Speakers

Malaika Parker Executive Director Black Organizing Project (she/her)

Veryl Pow Staff Attorney Sustainable Economies Law Center (he/they)

Malaika Parker has demonstrated her commitment to BIPOC communities in the SF Bay Area for 25 years, working to address issues of police accountability, racial justice in education, environmental justice and race-based inequities in the child welfare system.

Malaika is the founder of Hummingbirds Urban Farming Collective, a project that works at the intersection of race and ecological justice, promoting food sovereignty and an ancestral connection between Black children and the communities that raise them.

Malaika currently serves as the Executive Director of Black Organizing Project, an Oakland based organization that is fighting for racial, social and economic justice through grassroots community based organizing.

Veryl Pow is a movement lawyer at the Sustainable Economies Law Center and, in the words of Joy James, a “guerrilla” scholar and law professor. Veryl’s conception of movement lawyering was inspired by his tenure in Baltimore, where community members have creatively and resiliently built urban farms, cooperatives, and community land trusts in response to neoliberal conditions of disinvestment, immiseration, and death. He encourages movement lawyers to support such grassroots prefigurative efforts that reshape social relations between land and people from extraction and competition to stewardship and mutual aid. Veryl's current legal work involves supporting the rematriation of land back to Indigenous groups, building a local solidarity economy ecosystem, and decommodifying housing.

Johnathan Glater Professor of Law Berkeley Law (he/him) Jonathan Glater’s research focuses on the ways that law promotes and limits access to education, especially higher education, and the impact that education debt has on educational opportunities.

Glater is a faculty co-director of the Center on Consumer Law and Economic Justice at Berkeley Law. He is also cofounder and co-director of the Student Loan Law Initiative, an interdisciplinary partnership with the Student Borrower Protection Center devoted to the study of the effects of student debt.

Symposium Speakers

Cameron D. Clark Clinical Supervisor, Policy Advocacy Clinic Berkeley Law (they/them) Cameron D. Clark is a Clinical Supervisor in the Policy Advocacy Clinic, pursuing legislative reforms to abolish administrative fines and fees imposed on youth who are involved in the criminal legal system. Cameron received their law degree from Harvard Law School, where they were managing editor of the Harvard Blackletter Law Journal. Cameron’s research interests are at the intersections of critical race theory, queer theory, and legal ethnography. They hope to develop innovative approaches to legal theory and practice that are informed by the legacies of resistance led by Black, Indigenous, queer, disabled, and other marginalized communities. In their free time, Cameron supports mutual aid organizing and consults with marginalized communities to expand access to the legal academy and professional careers.

Maria Echaveste Policy and Program Development Director Berkeley Law (she/her)

Maria Echaveste is the Policy and Program Development Director at the Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Law and Social Policy. Maria Echaveste joined University of California’s Berkeley School of Law as a Lecturer after cofounding a strategic and policy consulting group, serving as a senior White House and U.S. Department of Labor official.

She has worked as a community leader and corporate attorney. She is also a Senior Fellow with the Law School’s Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity and Diversity. Ms. Echaveste is also a nonresident fellow of the Center for American Progress working on issues such as immigration, civil rights, education and Latin America.

She continues to provide strategic and policy advice to a variety of corporate, non-profit and union clients through her consulting firm, NVG, LLC.

Shani Shay Berkeley Undergrad Scholars Incarceration to College Program Shani Shay is the director and founder of Incarceration to College and Pathways to College. She is a 2022 graduate of UC Berkeley with a Bachelor’s in AfricanAmerican Studies and a minor in education, and a 2024 Harvard University graduate with a Master's in Education.

Shani forwards educational access through systemic change. She serves as the President of Black Underground Scholars to recruit, retain, and advocate for black previously incarcerated students in the UC system. As a 2021 Firebaugh Scholar, her research focused on effective teaching methods for incarcerated and marginalized youth. She uses Black Feminist Pedagogies to increase the educational aspirations of incustody and marginalized youth and hopes to create spaces where educational practices meet the liberatory needs of society.

Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy 2024-25 Board of Editors Editors-in-Chief Alexis Tatum Kaela Allen Managing Editor Kennedy Edwards

Publishing Editors Bailey Malveaux

History & Communications Editor Alyssa Young

Articles Editors

Senior Articles Editor Grace Oyenubi Senior Symposium Editor Metyia Phillips

Aaniyah Hicks Dominick Williams (Fall Semester)

Nailah Edmead Haleh Jeddi Ben Regas Khiari Neal Trenitee Wesley Michael John Uchechi Duruji Jordan Perry

Associate Editors

Nyanga Nyandemoh Adrianna Ferguson Charyl Bowens Amber Farrell* Charyl Bowens Jeffrey Greer IV Joshua McDaniel Liana Harris*

*1L Editors

Sidney Wright Mar Helire Grace Wilson Cameryn Bryant Sarina Addy Zusi Emafo Agbor Tabe

Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy Thank you for attending our annual symposium! BJBLP is grateful to our wonderful panelists and sponsors for helping us host this event. Additionally, thank you to our student members for helping make this event and forthcoming publication come to life. Finally, thank you to our guests! We hope this symposium has inspired you to learn more about the work of our panelists.

We look forward to sharing our Spring Volume 23 publication with you soon.

If you would like to support the journal in curating future events, please consider the following: Donations to our journal can be donated in one of two ways: 1. Credit card: Law firm employees/contacts can make a donation by calling in to the Gift Processing folks at 510643-9789. For wire or EFT instructions, please contact gifts4law@law.berkeley.edu; or sending the payment to the address below.

2. By check payable to "UC Regents" and should include the Journal name in the memo field of the check. The checks should be sent to: Berkeley Law Journal Black Law & Policy c/o UC Berkeley Gift Services 1995 University Ave; Ste. 400 Berkeley, CA 94704-1070

Thank You to Our Co-Sponsors!

The Henderson Center connects students, professors, lawyers, activists, and thinkers across and beyond campus to make relevant, vibrant conversations about law, power, equity, subordination, and privilege part of intellectual and social life at Berkeley Law. We focus on building our students’ capacity to be effective social justice advocates for the long-haul, and we are proud to be the home of this school’s active, diverse, and ever-growing social justice community.

Each week, we enrich the law school by hosting a guest practitioner, alumni, or circle of experts to converse with students and faculty about social justice issues, policies, and skills. We create symposia, workshops, teach-ins, and mentorship opportunities for social justice students, and collaborate with an array of student organizations, from First Generation Professionals to Coalition for Diversity to the California Law Review. We also support students’ summer employment financially through the Thelton E. Henderson Racial Justice Fellowship, and administer two certificates that recognize students’ who complete focused curriculums through the Race and Law Certificate and the Public Interest and Social Justice Certificate.

We are named after the Honorable Thelton E. Henderson (Class of ’62) and were established in response to California’s Proposition 209. For nearly 20 years, we’ve helped train thousands of lawyers to serve the least visible and least powerful with passion and expertise. We welcome anyone to our table who believes that advancing social justice is an integral part of the legal profession.

If social justice interests you, then join us. Share your voice. You are welcome here.

Thank You to Our Co-Sponsors!

BJBLP would also like to specially acknowledge members of our community that contributed vital donations to our February crowdfund to help make this event possible. Thank you to: Monique Liburd Jasmine Anderson Shannon King June Jeffries Mark Sims Marsha Nettles Taylor Dewberry Sorace Johnsenia Brooks Sherri Evans Harris Tiffany Thomas

The Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy is published annually each Spring by students of the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law. Contact Information If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact us.

(Email is the most efficient means of communication).

University of California, Berkeley Berkeley Law Berkeley Journal of Black Law & Policy 6 Law Building #7200 Berkeley, CA 94720 - 7220 Email: bjblp@berkeley.edu

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