Research

I write about the ways that data-centric technologies impact marginalized people.  My scholarship includes topics in poverty law, social welfare, feminist legal theory, and critical class theory.  

“The Relevance and Prejudice of Poverty Evidence,” in Critical Evidence (I. Bennett Capers, Jasmine Harris & Julia Simon-Kerr, eds. forthcoming 2026).

The Impact of Proptech and the Datafication of Real Estate on the Human Right to Housing, Georgetown Law Technology Review (forthcoming 2025).

Ten Empowering Strategies for Non-Directive Clinical Supervision, 31 Clinical L. Rev. 211 (2024).

Participation Versus Scale: Tensions in the Practical Demands on Participatory AI, 29 First Monday, April 2024 (with Meg Young, Upol Ehsan, Ranjit Singh, Emnet Tafesse, Michele Gilman, Christina Harrington & Jacob Metcalf). 

Beyond Window Dressing:  Public Participation for Marginalized Communities in the Datafied Society, 91 Fordham L. Rev. 503 (2022).

Me, Myself and My Digital Double:  Extending Sara Greene’s Stealing (Identity) from the Poor to the Challenges of Identity Verification, 106 Minn. L. Rev. Headnotes 301 (2022).  

Expanding Civil Rights to Combat Digital Discrimination on the Basis of Poverty, 75 SMU L. Rev. 571 (2022) (symposium on AI, Algorithms and Inequality).

A Critical Class Analysis of Data-Centric Technologies in Cambridge University Handbook on AI & The Law (Kristin Johnson & Carla Reyes eds., forthcoming).  

Periods for Profit and the Rise of Menstrual Surveillance, 41 Colum. J. Gender & Law 100 (2021).

Chapter, Feminism, Privacy & Law in Cyberspace, in The Oxford Handbook of Feminism and Law in the United States (Martha Chamallas, Deborah Brake & Verna Williams eds., Oxford U. Press, 2022).

Digital Barriers to Economic Justice in the Wake of COVID-19 (with Mary Madden), Data & Society (April 21, 2021).

Five Privacy Principles (from the GDPR) the United States Should Adopt to Advance Economic Justice, 52 Ariz. State L.J. 368 (2020).

Poverty Lawgorithms:  A Poverty Lawyer’s Guide to Fighting the Harms of Automated Decision-Making on Low-Income Communities, Data & Society Research Report (2020).

Commentary on Wyman v. James, in Feminist Judgments:  Reproductive Justice Rewritten (Kimberly Mutcherson, ed., Cambridge U. Press 2020).

The Future of Clinical Legal Scholarship, 26 Clinical L. Rev. 189 (2019).

Chapter, The Difference in Being Poor in Red States versus Blue States, in Holes in the Safety Net: Federalism and Poverty (Ezra Rosser, ed., Cambridge U. Press, 2019).

The Surveillance Gap: The Harms of Extreme Privacy and Data Marginalization (with Rebecca Green), 42 NYU Rev. L. & Soc. Change 253 (2018).

Privacy, Poverty and Big Data:  A Matrix of Vulnerabilities for Poor Americans (with Mary Madden, Karen Levy & Alice Marwick), 95 Wash. U. L. Rev. 53 (2017).

En-Gendering Economic Inequality, 32.1 Columbia J. of L. & Gender 1 (2016).

Chapter, Wyman v. James:  Privacy as a Luxury Not for the Poor, in The Poverty Law Canon (Ezra Rosser & Marie Failinger, eds., Univ. of Michigan Press 2016).

A Court for the One Percent:  How the Supreme Court Contributes to Economic Inequality, 2014 Utah L. Rev. 389 (2014).

Feminism, Democracy, and the "War on Women," 32 J. of Law & Inequality 1 (2014).

The Return of the Welfare Queen, 22 J. of Gender, Social Policy & the Law 247 (2014) (symposium).

The Poverty Defense, 47 U. Rich. L. Rev. 495 (2013).

The Class Differential in Privacy Law, 77 Brook. L. Rev.1389 (2012).

The President, Preemption, and the States, 26 Const. Comment. 339 (2010) (symposium).

The President as Scientist-in-Chief, 45 Willamette L. Rev. 565 (2009) (symposium).

Privacy, Feminism, and Welfare, 39 U. Balt. Law Forum 1 (2009) (symposium).

Litigating Presidential Signing Statements, 16 Wm. & Mary Bill Rights J. 131 (2007) (symposium).

Fighting Poverty with Faith:  Reflections on 10 Years of Charitable Choice, 10 J. Gender, Race & Justice 395 (2007) (symposium).

If at First You Don’t Succeed, Sign an Executive Order:  President Bush and the Expansion of Charitable Choice, 15 Wm. & Mary Bill Rts J. 1103 (2007).

Poverty and Communitarianism:  Toward a Community Based Welfare System, 66 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 721 (2005).

“Charitable Choice” and the Accountability Challenge: Reconciling the Need for Regulation with the First Amendment Religion Clauses, 55 Vand. L. Rev. 799 (2002).

Legal Accountability in an Era of Privatized Welfare, 89 Cal. L. Rev. 569 (2001).

Note, Retroactive Application of the Civil Rights Act of 1991 to Pending Cases, 90 Mich. L. Rev. 2035 (1992).

Book Notice, Weddington:  A Question of Choice, 91 Mich. L. Rev. 1618 (1993).

 “We Are Who We Say We Are.” On the Datafication of Identity and the Social Safety Net, Data & Society: Points, May 11, 2022.

Will My Period App Betray Me?  Menstrual Surveillance in a Post-Roe World, MsMagazine.com, May 9, 2022.

How a Supreme Court Decision Limiting Access to Abortion Could Harm the Economy and Women’s Well-Being, The Conversation, December 2, 2021.

A Better Prescription for Algorithms, The Hill, December 24, 2020.

Coronavirus Related Debt Will Live in Digital Platforms for Years – Hurting Americans’ Ability to Get Job, Apartments and Credit, The Conversation, June 1, 2020.

AI Algorithms Intended to Detect Welfare Fraud Often Punish the Poor, The Conversation & US News, Feb. 14, 2020.

Let’s Enact a Privacy Law that Advances Economic Justice, The Hill, Dec. 9, 2019.

Expanding Frameworks:  An Economic Justice Approach to Digital Privacy, Data & Society Points, Nov. 6, 2019.

Voices of the Poor Must Be Heard in the Data Privacy Debate, Jurist, May 14, 2019.

Data Insecurity Leads to Economic Injustice – and Hits the Pocketbooks of the Poor Most, The Conversation, April 30, 2019.

Why Women Still Earn a Lot Less Than Men, The Conversation, Jan. 29, 2019.

Supreme Court Ruling Against Class Action Lawsuits is a Blow for Workers – and #Metoo, The Conversation & Salon, May 21, 2018.

Davos Grapples with Inequality, The Conversation, Jan. 26, 2018.

Three Myths About the Poor That Republicans are Using to Support Slashing US Safety Net, The Conversation & Salon, Dec. 13, 2017. 

What Gorsuch’s Supreme Court Means for Workers, The Conversation, April 20, 2017.

Why the Supreme Court Matters for Workers, The Conversation, October 1, 2016.

How Limiting Women’s Access to Birth Control and Abortions Hurts the Economy, The Conversation, April 27, 2016.

How the Supreme Court Made Economic Inequality a Whole Lot Worse, The Conversation, March 30, 2016.

The Injustice of the Affluenza Defense, Let’s Talk About this Series, Public Justice Center, March 6, 2014.

Faith-Based Initiatives:  Do They Really Work?, Balt. Sun, Aug. 3, 2008, at 27A.

Still suffering growing pains, Daily Record, November 12, 2004, at 19A.

When will the waiting end?  Daily Record, March 19, 2004, at 10A.

The Bond Barrier, Balt. Sun, Aug. 29, 2003, at 17A.

Do Faith Based Services Work? Balt. Sun, Aug. 11, 2002, at 1F.

AI Impacts on Poverty, in “Law and New Technology, AI, Legal Metrics,” Encyclopedia Sociology of Law (Håkan Hydén, Ulrike Schultz, and Peter Scharff Smith, eds. forthcoming 2025).

Expanding the Public’s Role in Federal AI Governance, 49 ABA Administrative & Regulatory News 16 (Fall 2023). 

Democratizing AI:  Principles for Meaningful Public Participation, Data & Society (2023).

How the Supreme Court Decision Limiting Abortion Access Will Harm the Economy and Women’s Financial Well-Being, in Aftermath:  Life in Post-Roe America (Elizabeth G. Hines, ed. 2022).

Learning Critical Legal Theory Across the Curriculum: An Innovative Course in Applied Feminism, 20 The Law Teacher 5 (Spring 2014).

Book Review of Elizabeth Tobin Tyler, et al., Poverty, Health and Law:  Readings and Cases for Medical-Legal Partnership, World Medical & Health Policy Journal (2012).

Book Review of Jo Anne Schneider, Social Capital and Welfare Reform:  Organizations, Congregations, and Communities, J. Urban Affairs (2008).

Bradfield v. Roberts, in Encyclopedia of American Civil Liberties (Paul Finkelman, ed., 2006).

Privatization, in Poverty and Social Welfare in America:  An Encyclopedia (Gwendolyn Mink and Alice O'Connor, eds., 2004).

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, in Major Acts of Congress (Brian K. Landsberg, ed., 2003).