This spring the Justice Center hosted a major conference, “Workers’ Rights in the 21st Century: New Developments/New Challenges,” which examined fundamental changes in contemporary employment relationships and the associated challenges for workers’ rights and for labor and employment lawyers.
The Texas Journal on Civil Liberties & Civil Rights, the Transnational Workers Rights Clinic, and the State Bar of Texas Labor and Employment Law Section cohosted the conference.
According to cohost and organizer Bill Beardall, director of the Transnational Worker Rights Clinic, “The conference provided an exceptionally valuable — and rare — opportunity for current and aspiring employee rights lawyers to come together and explore some of the cutting-edge issues in contemporary employment law.” Topics included changing concepts and enforcement challenges related to the definition of an “employment” relationship; realignments in the enforcement role of courts versus private arbitration; the evolving employment rights of LGBT workers, immigrants, and guest workers; and navigating new procedural hurdles to enforcement of workplace rights.
Presenters included:
- U.S. District Judges David Ezra and Xavier Rodriguez
- Nonprofit attorneys Bill Beardall of the Equal Justice Center and the Transnational Workers Rights Clinic, Jennifer Bennett, Budd-Kazan Attorney at Public Justice (Oakland), and Naomi Tsu of the Southern Poverty Law Center Immigrant Rights Project (Atlanta)
- Private practitioners Derek Braziel of Lee & Braziel (Dallas), Rex Burch of Bruckner Burch (Houston), and Phil Durst of Deats Durst & Owen (Austin)
- Texas Law professors Cary Franklin and Julius Getman
- Eduardo Juarez of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in San Antonio
The Justice Center is grateful to Jacob Porter and the members of the Texas Journal on Civil Liberties & Civil Rights, Bill Beardall and the staff of the Equal Justice Center, and the other presenters for their work on the conference.