Social Welfare Law (Ossei-Owusu)
Faculty
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| Shaun Ossei-Owusu Presidential Assistant Professor of Law oss@law.upenn.edu |
Additional Information
Skills Training
Oral Presentations
Grading
30% Participation,
70% Paper
With Permission of Instructor
Class meets in person.
Course Continuity
Students are encouraged to stay home if you are ill or experience flu-like symptoms. If you miss a class for any reason, it is still your responsibility to make up the work missed.
I offer the following to students who miss class due to illness:
- I will make PowerPoint slides or other class materials routinely available on the course site to everyone in the class.
- If you are absent due to illness or some other unavoidable circumstance, email me and I can make PowerPoint slides or other class materials available to you.
- When you are better, please make an appointment to meet with me and I will review/answer questions about what you missed.
- Please make an appointment to meet with me and I will review/answer questions about what you missed.
Meeting Times/Location
R 1:30PM - 4:10PM
Tanenbaum Hall 320
Category
Upper-Level
Credits
3.0
This course focuses on the legal infrastructure of American social welfare programs. One set of concerns coheres around antipoverty efforts that impact millions of poor and low-income Americans. In this context, the course will draw from a range of sources, primarily federal constitutional law (e.g., the Sixth Amendment's right to counsel, the 8th Amendment's prohibition on excessive bail and fines, the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause); federal statutory provisions (e.g., the Fair Labor Standards Act, Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, the Affordable Care Act); and a host of corresponding federal regulations and state analogs. In this sense, the course would benefit people who plan to work in public interest fields (e.g., indigent defense, civil legal aid, civil rights advocacy).
Contrary to popular belief, social welfare programs are not limited to people facing economic precarity. A second focus of the course will be on what social scientists have referred to as the “submerged state” or the “hidden welfare state”—government benefits that serve social welfare purposes but are delivered indirectly via private entities or the tax code. Some of these include employer-provided health insurance and private pension plans that receive special tax treatment) and social insurance programs with solid political support, such as Medicare and Social Security. Because these programs do not involve the same kinds of direct spending as needs-based schemes, they are less stigmatized and seldom recognized as government assistance. In this context, the course intersects with various issues handled by law firms (e.g., Medicare compliance, ERISA, government contracts).
Some key subject matter areas we will cover include health, work, housing, criminal justice, credit, and education. Throughout the course, students will examine legal challenges to public benefits programs, how issues of federalism interface with welfare administration, the administrative design of social welfare, and statutory innovations that attempt to address poverty. We will also discuss how social welfare programs interface with debates about race, gender, disability, age, and citizenship. The course uses a traditional casebook but will also draw on interdisciplinary perspectives from economics, sociology, and history. Before enrollment, prospective students are encouraged to consider their readiness to actively engage in approximately 100-120 pages of weekly reading and how equipped they will be to talk, debate, or write about the materials, as the course involves significant in-class engagement.
Constitutional Law Learning outcomes: Demonstrate a core understanding of constitutional law; Perform legal analysis in the context of constitutional law; Communicate effectively on topics related to constitutional law; Demonstrate an understanding of constitutional law affects other areas of law.
Courts and the Judicial System Learning outcomes: Demonstrate a core understanding of both substantive and procedural issues in the operation of our legal system; Perform legal analysis in the context of procedural issues and the judicial process; Communicate effectively on topics related to procedure and the judicial process; Demonstrate an understanding of how procedural issues and the judicial process affect all other area of our legal system.
Administrative and Regulatory Law Learning outcomes: Demonstrate a core understanding of administrative and regulatory law and the administrative process, including the role of statutory authorization and work of administrative agencies; Perform legal analysis in the context of administrative and regulatory law; Communicate effectively on topics related to administrative and regulatory law; Demonstrate an understanding of the role administrative and regulatory law play in our legal system and in society as a whole.
Public Interest Learning outcomes: Demonstrate a core understanding of the varied legal aspects of public interest law; Perform legal analysis in the context of public interest law; Communicate effectively on topics related to public interest law; Demonstrate an understanding of how public interest law is connected to and affected by a wide variety of legal and regulatory structures and doctrines.
Textbooks
"Poverty Law, Policy, and Practice " by Juliet M. Brodie, Clare Pastore, Ezra Rosser, and Jeffrey Selbin |