Published Articles by Colleen C.
Colleen Chung, 2020
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Graduate Term Papers by Colleen C.
As the coronavirus pandemic continues to wreak havoc on livelihoods, landlords are ramping up eff... more As the coronavirus pandemic continues to wreak havoc on livelihoods, landlords are ramping up efforts to rent gouge and evict tenants despite there being a moratorium on evictions. This moratorium, however, is expected to expire over the next few months, which will leave thousands in a state of precarity if they fail to pay missed rent. This raises the deeper questions: if housing is so essential, why is it not secured as a universal right? Moreover, what is the justification for continuing to comply with a system in which every month, the fruit of one’s labor is surrendered to someone addressed as “lord”, under the risk of becoming destitute, for the system known as private property? This paper seeks to make the argument that the system of private property is no longer fundamental to human development and must be challenged by a different set of property relations, one that is more aligned with human nature and development. In order to do so, the law needs to alter its understanding of how property operates as well as come to a better understanding of human social relations. First, the most salient issues that can make property rights and privatization inefficacious is revealed by looking at their philosophical foundations, which serve as justifications for it today. Secondly, the myth of private property as fundamental to human development is critically examined in terms of the nature of capitalist property and the state’s role in its imposition. Thirdly, the necessity of a new system rooted in the concept of possession/personal property and use, is posited as the solution to overcoming parasitic landlord/tenant relationships and achieving more equitable property relations, ending with the ways in which the law can be used to bring about much needed changes. Utilizing a human rights framework, this paper makes the case for future treatments of property issues in the U.S. that would lead to a more rational and humane society.
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The fact that black mothers are dying at such a disproportionate rate is no accident. It is a rem... more The fact that black mothers are dying at such a disproportionate rate is no accident. It is a remnant of what most of us believe to have been over with the end of slavery— racism. Originally, one of my main premises was that racism today hides itself perniciously in institutional arrangements such as the medical profession rather than being overt displays of racist behavior, but now I am fully convinced that racism exists today in all its forms to severely disadvantage Black women in receiving the quality prenatal care they deserve. What Davis termed the “afterlife of slavery” is rooted in the precedent set forth by slavery and settler colonialism to treat Black women’s reproduction as an afterthought, if at all. It is a horrible, racist system centuries in the making that continues to influence ideas about reproduction and race, as we will see. The specific questions I expect to address are thus: (1) to what extent are today’s ideas about reproduction and race influenced by the legacy of ideas that circulated about black women during slavery?, (2) how can the “afterlife of slavery” as it is manifest in the medical profession, be overcome?, (3) what kind of practices (laws, legislation, practices, etc.) would that entail?, and (4) why is elevating and centering Black motherhood instrumental to this project? I make the argument that the effects of the “afterlife of slavery” can be accounted for by actually addressing racism, specifically medical racism, while at the same time elevating Black motherhood. In doing so, I hope to contribute to the discussion of the issues raised by Davis and other Black feminists by emphasizing the important role of motherhood in society.
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The goal of this paper is to examine the hyperinivisibilization of Southeast Asians in America an... more The goal of this paper is to examine the hyperinivisibilization of Southeast Asians in America and how it interacts with various mechanisms of the American racial project— Asianization, racially-ascribed deviance, relative invalidation, colorism, and anti-Black ideology within the Asian community— to produce a particularly unique and complex racialization process for Southeast Asians. Additionally, it will also highlight resulting policies past and present towards Southeast Asian peoples having to do with what Juliet Stumpf termed the “crimmigration system” that are rooted in a form of double displacement and position Southeast Asians as both inferior and alien. And lastly, it celebrates the values that our community holds dear: giving back to parents and the community, resistance and resilience, and activism in challenging dominant ideologies and furthering social justice, and charts new potential waters for resisting the crimmigration system through institutional policy and practice. My hope is that Southeast Asian activists, scholars, and the community at large will use these tenets as well as knowledge of their history of organizing to mobilize for social change in the diaspora.
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Revue libre de Droit, 2020
Nowadays, non-state entities such as trade organizations, internet groups, corporate bylaws, and ... more Nowadays, non-state entities such as trade organizations, internet groups, corporate bylaws, and private regulatory bodies exercise enormous influence over social lives. They have their own norms that fill gaps in state regulation, and at times, trump state law. For instance, Amazon functions as a private actor in conjunction with the State in the way it has cities doing their bidding on where to place their headquarters and influences factors such as wages and housing prices. Such incentive deals between corporations and local governments blur the lines between state and nonstate actors in the lawmaking process, bending state laws towards shared economic means. Other influential actors are banks and credit agencies in the U.S. which were responsible for setting off financial deregulation resulting in the Great Recession and are on their way to do so again. In this case, both state and nonstate actors colluded to overturn state laws like the Glass-Stegall Act and clear the way for future mergers which in turn, result in major local and global ramifications. Maintaining integral pluralism “is desirable as a source of alternative ideas and as a site for discussion about community definition and creative innovation” and “is part of a dialectic of power and counterpower”. In this way, law is an ongoing process defined by conflicting norms. Law is not an infallible indicator of universal values but an arena of conflict where different visions of alternative futures can be put up for debate. However, challenges arise when the State becomes highly reliant on the “expert” input of private actors in carrying out legislative and administrative functions, thus raising issues of legitimacy and privatization/marketization of the lawmaking process. This is none the more evident than in market enclosures in the form of privatization and marketization of shared resources by corporations, investors, and speculators in collusion with the government. Legislatures and courts are complacent in this by saying that it is for future economic growth and freedom but the reality is far from it. Society must do more than embrace conflict to maintain a kind of legal pluralism. It must start thinking about new forms of law altogether. What would it look like if the people invent their own types of laws to protect their community and shared resources? What if there were a more rigorous Law for the Commons?
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Op-Eds by Colleen C.
Imagine, for a second, that your home country has all of a sudden erupted into civil war. You fin... more Imagine, for a second, that your home country has all of a sudden erupted into civil war. You find yourself on the “wrong side” of the political divide, living in constant fear that you will one day face government retaliation in the form of violence or even death. Besides having to witness your friends and family members being imprisoned and their homes destroyed by bombs, you have been living a life of near-impoverishment. There is never enough food, water, and resources to go around the community during the war. You haven’t gone to school in years and any hope that you will ever attend is destroyed. All the while, conditions are worsening to the point that you and your family are now considering drastic action: fleeing to the United States. The journey is grueling and will traumatize you for years, as you have to cross the South China Sea in an overcrowded vessel battling disease, starvation, and even pirates. Nonetheless, you find yourself at the mercy of an entirely new country. You are starting life all over again with absolutely no resources, support, or language skills, excluded to the confines of a low-income community with few opportunities for social mobility. As the months go by, you are still barely able to pull yourself out of poverty. Joining a gang seems the only viable option to increase your stock in life, and so, you commit a “crime” to feed your family, protect yourself, pay the bills, whatever your needs are at the moment. You are then arrested by the police, given a harsh sentence disproportionate to the gravity of the crime, and your Green card is revoked. As a stateless refugee, you have no choice but to comply and serve your time. After your release years later and having established your own business in the community, you are told that due to changes in US-Vietnam relations, your past crime that you have just served time for makes you eligible for deportation and being sent back to the country you fled from years ago.
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Teaching Documents by Colleen C.
A brief explainer on gentrification that I wrote during my tenure as a research assistant at the ... more A brief explainer on gentrification that I wrote during my tenure as a research assistant at the Queens Historical Society.
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As an undergraduate teaching assistant (TA), I was responsible for creating and leading interacti... more As an undergraduate teaching assistant (TA), I was responsible for creating and leading interactive exercises pertaining to class material. The ones shown below have been proven to increase students' understanding of such topics as gender and racial disparities, media literacy, the underlying causes of poverty, and housing policy, among others.
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Published Articles by Colleen C.
Graduate Term Papers by Colleen C.
Op-Eds by Colleen C.
Teaching Documents by Colleen C.