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LPE Originals

Property, Sabotage, and the Origins of Anti-Left Repression

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Between 1917 and 1921, twenty-one states passed criminal syndicalism laws. These laws, which were intended to help eliminate the Industrial Workers of the World, have largely faded from public memory. Looking back, however, we can see a formula for anti-left repression that has proven durable and widely appealing: the limitation of political speech and organizing in the name of property protection.
LPE Originals

The Rent Guidelines Board as Tenant Organizing Infrastructure

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As New York’s Rent Guidelines Board weighs a possible rent freeze, the real significance of its annual hearings lies beyond the final vote. These public proceedings serve as a crucial engine for tenant organizing, building the collective power needed to overcome the real estate industry’s next wave of opposition.
LPE Originals

Landlord Distress Isn’t Our Fault, But It Is Our Problem

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Unable to realize enough profit from their portfolios to repay their investors, landlords are turning the screws on tenants in the form of rising rents and declining conditions. Understanding this financial distress points us beyond questions of supply to a more nuanced analysis of the political economy of rental housing, revealing the market interventions needed to unlock tenant power.
LPE Originals

The Political Economy of Settler Backlash

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When courts recognize Indigenous sovereignty or jurisdiction over contested lands, governments and corporations often respond with warnings of potential economic chaos. These claims of uncertainty are not neutral forecasts but a recurring strategy of settler retrenchment aimed at preserving existing property regimes.
LPE Originals

The Authoritarian Commons: An Interview with Shitong Qiao

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In the United States, homeowners’ associations are often a symbol of petty authoritarianism or suburban conformity. Yet in China these same organizations have become laboratories of democracy for millions of people. Jed Britton-Purdy interviews Shitong Qiao about how these associations form, why the Chinese government tolerates them, and whether they vindicate modernization theory.
LPE Originals

From the Vault: LPE & Housing

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A collection of our favorite posts about the legal underpinnings of today’s housing crisis, and about what might be done to restore a conception of housing as shelter, not commodity. Featuring Angela Harris, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, David Stein, Kathryn Sabbeth, Duncan Kennedy, Karl Klare, Tara Raghuveer, and more!
LPE Originals

How Antipoverty Advocates Can Go On The Offensive

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In the embers of the Supreme Court’s disastrous Grants Pass decision, a new form of necessity doctrine offers a ray of light. If private property owners’ exclusionary rights are meaningfully threatened, might the political will for ending homelessness and food insecurity finally emerge?
LPE Originals

A Dignity-Based Approach to Debt

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One in three Americans has a debt that has been handed over to a collection agency. Lawmakers continue to throw credit at the problem and punish borrowers when they struggle to repay. To escape this cycle, we need an approach to debt relief based on the principle of human dignity, a foundational concept in human rights law.