Daria Roithmayr
USC Gould School of Law

Daria Roithmayr teaches and writes about persistent structural racism in labor, housing, political participation, wealth and education. Her recent book, Reproducing Racism: How Everyday Choices Lock In White Advantage (NYU 2014), explores the self-reinforcing dynamics of persistent racial inequality. Her work is heavily interdisciplinary, drawing from economics, sociology, political theory, history and complex systems theory. She is currently at work on a new book, Racism Pays, which explores the way that recent innovations in the digital economy have relied on racial exploitation to get off the ground.

Before joining USC Gould, Roithmayr taught for nine years at the University of Illinois College of Law. She has also been a visiting researcher at Harvard University and a visiting law professor at the University of Michigan, Georgetown, and Yale.

Roithmayr received her BS from UCLA, and her JD, magna cum laude, from the Georgetown University Law Center, where she was a member of Order of the Coif and served as an editor of the Georgetown Law Journal. She clerked for The Honorable Marvin J. Garbis, judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. 

Books

• Reproducing Racism:  How Everyday Choices Lock in White Advantage, (NY: New York University Press, 2014). - (www)   Reviews of Reproducing Racism: How Everyday Choices Lock In White Advantage:  
  • Van C. Tran, “Book Review of Reproducing Racism: How Everyday Choices Lock In White Advantage,” 130 Political Science Quarterly 167 (Spring 2015). - (PDF) - (Link)
  • Richard R.W. Brooks, "The Banality of Racial Inequality," 124 Yale Law Journal 2626 (2015) - (PDF)

Articles and Book Chapters

• “Evolutionary Dynamic Theory and Empirical Method" In Methodologies of Law and Economics (Thomas Ulen, ed.) (Elgar, forthcoming 2017). - (PDF)
• "The Dynamics of Excessive Force," 2016 University of Chicago Legal Forum 407 (2016). - (www)
• “Should Law Keep Pace with Society? Relative Update Rates Determine the Co-Evolution of Institutional Punishment and Citizen Contributions to Public Goods,”  (with Alexander Isakov and David Rand) 6 Games 124 (June 2015). - (PDF) - (SSRN)
• "Critical Race Theory Meets Social Science," (with Devon Carbado), 10 Annual Review of Law and Social Science 149 (2014). - (www)
• "Faking It," Review of "Racial Capitalism," by Nancy Leon (126 Harvard Law Review 2151 (2013) and "Selling Diversity Short," by Stacy Hawkins (40 Rutgers Law Records 68 (2012). JOTWELL: The Journal of Things We Like (Lots) September 18, 2013. - (www)
• "Poverty, Prisons, and Power," Review of "Post Racial Racism: Racial Stratification and Mass Incareration in the Age of Obama," by Ian F. Haney Lopez (98 California Law Review 1023 (2010)). JOTWELL: The Journal of Things We Like (Lots) October 22, 2012. - (www)
• "Lessons From Mazibuko: Shifting From Rights to the Commons," 3 Constitutional Court Review 317 (2010). - (www)
• "Racial Cartels" 16 Michigan Journal of Race and Law 45 (2010) - (Hein)
• “Them that Has, Gets,” 27 Mississippi College Law Review 373 (2008). - (Hein)
• “A Dangerous Supplement,” 55 Journal Legal Education 80 (2005) (review-essay reviewing Duncan Kennedy, Legal Education and the Reproduction of Racial Hierarchy) - (Hein)
• “Locked In Segregation,” 12 Virginia Journal of Social Policy and the Law 197 (2004) - (Hein)
• “Tacking Left: A Radical Critique of Grutter,” 21 Constitutional Commentary 191 (2004) - (Hein)
• “Locked In Inequality: The Persistence of Discrimination,” 9 Michigan Journal of Race and Law 31 (2003) - (Hein)
• “Access, Adequacy, and Equality: The Constitutionality of School Fee Financing in Public Education,” 19 South African Journal on Human Rights 382 (2003) - (Hein)
• ““Easy for You to Say”: An Essay on Outsiders, the Usefulness of Reason, and Radical Pragmatism,” 57 University of  Miami Law Review 939 (2003) - (Hein)
• “A Bad Subject,” 9 Cardozo Women’s Law Journal 501 (2003) - (Hein)
• “Direct Measures: An Alternative Affirmative Action Program for Law Schools,” 7 Michigan Journal of Race and Law 1 (2001) (lead article) - (Hein)
• “Left(Over) Rights,” 22 Cardozo Law Review 1113 (2001) - (Hein)
• “Left Over Rights: Are Rights Still Useful After the Critique of Indeterminacy?” in Journal of Law, Text and Culture (Austin Sarat and Penny Pether, eds. 2001) - (Hein)
• “Barriers to Entry: A Market Lock-in Model of Discrimination,” 86 Virginia Law Review 727 (2000). - (Hein)
• “Introduction,” Race Is, Race Isn't: Critical Race Theory and Qualitative Studies in Education (Laurence Parker and Donna Deyhle eds. 1998). - (PDF)
• “Guerrillas in Our Midst: The Assault on Radicals in American Law,” 96 Michigan Law Review 1658 (1998). - (Hein)
• “Deconstructing the Distinction Between Bias and Merit,” 85 California Law Review 1449 (1998) - (Hein)

FACULTY IN THE NEWS

Politi Fact
May 23, 2023
Re: David B. Cruz

Professor David Cruz was recently interviewed about a controversial bill that was passed in Connecticut. "Paying even modest attention to the bill’s definitions should make it clear beyond doubt that it will not be the source of protections based upon the age of people to whom one is attracted or with whom one has sex," Cruz said.

RECENT SCHOLARSHIP

Jonathan Barnett
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Comment Letter from Law Professors, Economists, and Business School Professors to the Federal Trade Commission on Proposed Non-Compete Clause Rule, Jonathan Barnett (co-lead author, with Adam Mossoff and Ted Sichelman), April 19, 2023.

Robin Craig
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"Survival Equity and Climate Change Triage: How to Decide Who Lives and Who Dies," presentation as part of Adapting to a Warming World: Perspectives from the Environmental Law Collaborative, Hubbell Environmental Law Initiative, University of Iowa School of Law, Iowa City, IA, April 14, 2023.

Robin Craig
April, 2023

Robin Craig's recent research on tribal water rights and COVID-19, comparing the Navajo Nation and the Klamath Tribes, was featured on NPR's "Academic Minute" on Monday, April 17, 2023.