Transnational Development Clinic

In the Transnational Development Clinic, students work on a range of litigation and non-litigation projects designed to promote community-centered international development, with an emphasis on global poverty. Rather than focus on international development institutions, such as the World Bank or UN bodies, the year-long clinic works with community-based clients and client groups and provides them with legal advice, counseling, and representation in order to promote specific development projects. The clinic also focuses on development projects that have a meaningful nexus to the U.S., in terms of client populations, litigation or advocacy forum, or applicable legal or regulatory framework.

Projects will focus on some, but not all, of the following areas: remittances among immigrant workers in the United States; promotion of transnational worker networks; microfinance initiatives, either domestic or international; access to medicines litigation and policy; corporate accountability; and international trade policy. A seminar accompanying the fieldwork provides readings and structured discussion to explore the relationships among law, development and advocacy, with an emphasis on the role of the law and the lawyer in combating global poverty. The seminar serves as a site to interrogate prevailing and competing notions of development itself. In addition, it explores practice-based advocacy skills, including brief writing, oral advocacy, and policy advocacy, engage domestic and international law, and considers professional responsibility as applied to transnational development practice.

Read more about the Transnational Development Clinic.