Defining Nonviolence as a Matter of Law and Politics

2020 ◽  
pp. 201-236
Author(s):  
Tabatha Abu El-Haj
Keyword(s):  
First Amendment ◽  
Political Protest ◽  
Scholarly Community ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
Law And Politics ◽  
Legislative Procedures ◽  
American Tradition ◽  
Constitutional Protections ◽  
Democratic Norms ◽  
Emerging Pattern

Recent years have seen the reinvigoration of disruptive political protest — from the Occupy Movement, to Black Lives Matter, to the Women’s Marches. These sorts of disruptive outdoor assemblies, including many of their tactics, have been central to American politics since the Founding, and have long been protected by the First Amendment. Nevertheless, legislatures around the country have been introducing and passing bills that render a wide swath of protest tactics unlawful precisely because they have been effective in drawing attention to claims and issues that typically fall off the legislative radar. More important, these legislative efforts are part of a broader erosion of fundamental democratic norms—from partisan redistricting to rewriting legislative procedures and traditions for judicial nominations—as well as the emerging pattern of attacking the free press and the loyalty of dissenters. Now more than ever, therefore, whatever our personal normative views on either the tactics of contemporary protesters or the parameters of current constitutional doctrine, it is our duty as a scholarly community to reaffirm that recent acts of protest and dissent operate well within the bounds of our American tradition of outdoor assembly and its constitutional protections.

Camping Grounds

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phoebe S.K. Young
Keyword(s):  
Core Beliefs ◽  
Political Protest ◽  
John Muir ◽  
National Belonging ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
American Tradition ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Depression Era ◽  
Do So

Camping appears to be a simple proposition, a time-honored way of getting away from it all. Yet as this book demonstrates, the simplicity of camping is deceptive, its history and meanings far from obvious. Why do some Americans find pleasure in sleeping outside, particularly when so many others, past and present, have had to do so for reasons other than recreation? A closer look at the history of camping since the Civil War reveals unexpected connections between its various forms and its deeper significance as an American tradition linked to core beliefs about nature and national belonging. Never only a vacation choice, camping has been something people do out of dire necessity and as a tactic of political protest. Still, the dominance of recreational camping as a modern ideal and natural idyll has obscured other forms from our collective memory. Camping Grounds rediscovers these unexpected and interwoven histories of sleeping outside. It uses extensive research to trace surprising links between such varied campers as veterans, tramps, John Muir, newly freed African Americans, and early leisure campers in the nineteenth century; federal campground designers, Depression-era transients, family car campers, backpacking enthusiasts, countercultural youth, and political activists in the twentieth century; the crisis of the unsheltered and the tent-based Occupy movement in the twenty-first. These entwined stories show how Americans camp to claim a place in the republic and why public spaces of nature are critical to how we relate to nature, the nation, and each other.

scholarly journals Putting Accessible Expression to Bed

2019 ◽  
pp. 1507
Author(s):  
Jamila Odeh
Keyword(s):  
First Amendment ◽  
Public Parks ◽  
Political Expression ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
Injunctive Relief ◽  
Expressive Activity

In 2011, the Occupy movement began. Occupiers seized space in dozens of public parks and in the American imagination, providing a compelling illustration of an inclusive format of political expression. In the courtroom, protesters sought injunctive relief on First Amendment grounds to protect the tent encampments where Occupiers slept. In 2017, the last of the Occupy litigation ended; but the ramifications the Occupy cases hold for the First Amendment and expressive conduct remain unexamined. This Comment takes an in-depth look at the adjudication of Occupiers’ First Amendment interest in sleeping in public parks. It analyzes the adjudication of the Occupy cases and contends that the pattern of judicial enforcement results from a desire to remove the appearance of disorder associated with houselessness. This Comment argues that the test used to set the scrutiny level for First Amendment expressive activity systematically disadvantages speech by and about houseless persons.

How Libel Law Applies to Automated Journalism

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Peters
Keyword(s):  
First Amendment ◽  
Scaling Up ◽  
Professional Baseball ◽  
Significant Issue ◽  
News Content ◽  
Constitutional Protection ◽  
Complex Information ◽  
Computer Services ◽  
Constitutional Protections ◽  
Libel Law

Automated journalism—the use of algorithms to translate data into narrative news content—is enabling all manner of outlets to increase efficiency while scaling up their reporting in areas as diverse as financial earnings and professional baseball. With these technological advancements, however, come serious risks. Algorithms are not good at interpreting or contextualizing complex information, and they are subject to biases and errors that ultimately could produce content that is misleading or false, even libelous. It is imperative, then, to examine how libel law might apply to automated news content that harms the reputation of a person or an organization. Conducting that examination from the perspective of U.S. law, because of its uniquely expansive constitutional protections in the area of libel, it appears that the First Amendment would cover algorithmic speech—meaning that the First Amendment’s full supply of tools and principles, and presumptions would apply to determine if particular automated news content would be protected. In the area of libel, the most significant issues come under the plaintiff’s burden to prove that the libelous content was published by the defendant (with a focus on whether automated journalism would qualify for immunity available to providers of interactive computer services) and that the content was published through the defendant’s fault (with a focus on whether an algorithm could behave with the actual malice or negligence usually required to satisfy this inquiry). There is also a significant issue under the opinion defense, which provides broad constitutional protection for statements of opinion (with a focus on whether an algorithm itself is capable of having beliefs or ideas, which generally inform an opinion).

Zoning out the ghetto

1995 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 129-132
Author(s):  
Gara Lamarche
Keyword(s):  
Critical Race Theory ◽  
First Amendment ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Critical Race ◽  
Race Theory ◽  
Law And Politics

‘…we use the words of law and politics to fight the words that wound and exclude. We seek a legal system that recognises and remedies the harm of the structures of have and have-not…’ From Words That Wound: Critical Race Theory, Assaultive Speech and the First Amendment, by Mari Matsuda, Charles Lawrence, Richard Delgado and Kimberle Williams Crenshaw

scholarly journals OCCUPY BIENNALE? SOCIALLY-ENGAGED ART PRACTICE AND ART INSTITUTION

ARTis ON ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 171-177
Author(s):  
Urszula Staszkop
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
The Political ◽  
Occupy Wall Street ◽  
Political Protest ◽  
Art Practice ◽  
Wall Street ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
Socially Engaged Art ◽  
Activist Art ◽  
Participatory Practices

The political phenomenon of Occupy Wall Street obtained the global attention in the fall of 2011 with its encampment in the Zuccotti Park (New York). As the movement grew, there also seemed to be an aesthetic component to it revealed in socially-engaged, participatory practices. Those presuppositions provoked the debate focused on the emerging issue of activist art and on the art’s capability to transmit the aims of political protest. Consequently, curators and art institutions attempted to endorse the Occupy movement, while incorporating it into various art events. This text seeks to explore those issues through the analyses of emerging discourse on socially-engaged practices and its existence within art institution on the example of Berlin Biennale 7.

'Liking' on Facebook and the First Amendment

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Bregant ◽  
Jennifer K. Robbennolt
Keyword(s):  
First Amendment
Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document