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Access to University Education by Learners with Physical Disabilities: Combating the Barriers
Get PDFFederalism and the Limits of Subnational Political Heterogeneity
Get PDFWith an epidemic of democratic backsliding now afflicting many of the world’s democracies, including the United States, some scholars have suggested that federalism might serve as a useful defense for liberal democracy by impeding the ability of an authoritarian central government to stamp it out at the subnational level. In this Essay, I dispute that contention. An examination of both federal theory on one hand and the behavior and tactics of central control employed by ancient and early modern empires on the other leads to the conclusion that the protective value of federalism against the effects of national authoritarianism is indeterminate and depends upon a host of contingencies. These include the particular structure of the federal state in question; the specific pathways of influence available to subnational units to protect their autonomy in any given federal structure; and the goals, motivations, and determination of governments and populations at both levels.
However, a few considerations suggest that the outcome in any particular case, though contingent on many details, might nonetheless be subject to certain general tendencies, and these tendencies by and large favor an eventual strangling of subnational liberal democracy. First, autocratic tolerance for the exercise of subnational autonomy generally extends only to matters of indifference to the central state, and in today’s world there may well be few matters as to which an authoritarian central government is truly indifferent. Second, the tendency in all autocracies, as they become better established, has been continually to tighten social and political controls, making successful opposition to the regime increasingly unlikely as time passes. Third, the tactics of subnational influence and self-defense that are most likely to be successful in a centrally authoritarian federation tend to be self-defeating because they require behavior that is largely incompatible with the very liberal democracy it would aim to preserve. Thus, the survival of subnational liberal democracy in a centrally authoritarian federation, although not theoretically impossible, would require an extremely fortunate confluence of highly favorable and unlikely contingencies
Pain Is Enough: Chronic Pain as Disability
Get PDFStates have historically failed to recognize chronic pain as a disability. In medicine, chronic pain has gained increasing recognition as a disability in and of itself, even absent a current, medically determinable physical impairment. The law, however, has been slow to catch up. This Article argues that chronic pain is a disability, even without medical evidence of an underlying impairment, because of pain’s significant functional impact on the body and mind. In the 2018 case of Saunders v. Wilkie, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit recognized that “pain is enough” for a veteran to be eligible for disability compensation, even when the claimant is unable to establish a current, underlying cause of their pain. This Article argues that Saunders is an important first step in judicial recognition that chronic pain is a disability, and that disability benefit programs should recognize and compensate chronic pain for the disabling condition that it is
Helen Drew and Marissa Egloff discuss diversity, equity, and inclusion in major sports leagues
No full textEpisode 19 features Helen Drew, Professor of Law, and Marissa Egloff, a third year JD candidate, in the University at Buffalo School of Law. Professor Drew and Ms. Egloff discuss their research examining the number of women and minorities in executive or coaching positions in professional sports. They are exploring why, even with proactive policies such as The Rooney Rule in the NFL, women and people of color find it difficult to obtain these “front office” positions. They are also exploring how nondiverse work environments can become toxic
Reframing Law\u27s Domain: Narrative, Rhetoric, and the Forms of Legal Rules
Get PDFLegal scholars typically understand law as a system of determinate rules grounded in logic. And in the public sphere, textualist judges and others often claim that judges should not make law, arguing instead that a judge\u27s role is simply to find the meaning inherent in law\u27s language. This essay offers a different understanding of both the structure of legal rules and the role of judges. Building on Caroline Levine\u27s claim that texts have multiple ordering principles, the essay argues that legal rules simultaneously have three overlapping forms, none of which is dominant: not only the form of conditional, if-then logic, but also that of a rhetorical situation (as Lloyd Bitzer defines it) and a stock story, in which the story\u27s elements are reduced to classes of things, acts, and circumstances. As a result, lawyers must tell stories, and legal decisions are a complex act of categorization in which a judge must decide whether the story before the court fits within the category of stories defined by the governing legal rule. This essay further suggests that if storytelling is inherent in law and legal practice, then legal textualism is flawed because it ignores both actual authors and actual audiences. In a very real sense judges do make law, and law\u27s legitimacy in a modern democracy depends on a judge\u27s willingness to consider the divergent voices of those who write the rules and who are bound by or benefit from them
Sustaining the Alison Des Forges International Symposia
Get PDFEpisode 14 of our podcast series is about the work of the Alison L. Des Forges Memorial Committee, and its international symposia held at the University at Buffalo. Beginning in 2012, each symposium has been annually sponsored, in part, by The Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy. This episode features Roger Des Forges, the group\u27s co-founder. He is joined in discussion with the Committee co-chairs, Ellen Dussourd and Shaun Irlam. Together, they offer insight on aspects of sustaining the annual Alison Des Forges International Symposia. The ninth annual event takes place April 30, 2021
