The People’s Parity Project, the law student organization that turned Biglaw recruiting season into a pressure campaign, is folding itself into the Roosevelt Institute. According to a press release, PPP’s staff, network, programming, and assets will be integrated into the progressive think tank this fall and winter, where its mission will carry on inside the Roosevelt Society.
PPP started in 2018 as the Pipeline Parity Project, a group of Harvard Law students who figured out that the most valuable thing they had was the thing every Biglaw firm wanted: themselves. They turned that into leverage, launching the #DumpKirkland campaign over the firm’s employment arbitration agreements, leafleting outside Venable’s DC office as prospective associates walked in for a recruiting reception, protesting in front of three DLA Piper offices, and organizing affinity groups to cut ties with Gibson Dunn until the firm dropped forced arbitration for non-attorney staff.
And it worked. Kirkland and Sidley were among the firms that dropped forced arbitration provisions after student pressure. Others, like Paul Hastings, moved to an opt-out system, which, well, is a start.
The group rebranded as the People’s Parity Project in 2019, grew to as many as 25 law school chapters at its peak, and expanded its fights to judicial nominations and court reform, including pushing the Biden administration to put economic justice champions on the bench. Now it’s betting the next phase runs through Roosevelt, which says it wants to build a pipeline “from law school through the most senior roles in the profession,” including, specifically, the next generation of general counsel and senior government lawyers. Given the state of the Justice Department these days, whoever ends up in those jobs is going to have a lot of rebuilding to do.
Roosevelt’s theory of the case is that lawyers, like economists before them, have become the gatekeepers of what’s possible in public policy. PPP cofounder and executive director Molly Coleman, who we’ve pegged as having the progressive answer to FedSoc, put the group’s founding premise more bluntly:
“We founded PPP on a simple belief: Practicing law is never neutral. Every lawyer and judge is making choices about whose interests the system serves, and they should answer for those choices to the public, not just to each other.”
Which is not a sentiment you hear at many Biglaw summer associate events.
Coleman added that litigation alone was never going to get them there, and that the goal is organizing the people entering the profession “so that choosing to stand with working people becomes an expectation rather than an exception.”
This is a group that built its reputation on making Biglaw squirm, so we’d love to see what happens when they take that energy to this federal government.
Earlier: This Harvard Law School Grad Has The Progressive Answer To FedSoc
Law School Students Are Boycotting Gibson Dunn
Law School Students Protest Outside Of DLA Piper Over Alleged Sexual Assault
Another Biglaw Firm Targeted By Harvard Law School Students Over Mandatory Arbitration Agreements
Biglaw Firm Changes Course On Mandatory Arbitration… For A Limited Time
Harvard Law School Students Organize #DumpKirkland Campaign Over Biglaw Employment Arbitration Agreements
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1
The post People’s Parity Project Is Joining The Roosevelt Institute To Build A Progressive Legal Pipeline appeared first on Above the Law.
The People’s Parity Project, the law student organization that turned Biglaw recruiting season into a pressure campaign, is folding itself into the Roosevelt Institute. According to a press release, PPP’s staff, network, programming, and assets will be integrated into the progressive think tank this fall and winter, where its mission will carry on inside the Roosevelt Society.
PPP started in 2018 as the Pipeline Parity Project, a group of Harvard Law students who figured out that the most valuable thing they had was the thing every Biglaw firm wanted: themselves. They turned that into leverage, launching the #DumpKirkland campaign over the firm’s employment arbitration agreements, leafleting outside Venable’s DC office as prospective associates walked in for a recruiting reception, protesting in front of three DLA Piper offices, and organizing affinity groups to cut ties with Gibson Dunn until the firm dropped forced arbitration for non-attorney staff.
And it worked. Kirkland and Sidley were among the firms that dropped forced arbitration provisions after student pressure. Others, like Paul Hastings, moved to an opt-out system, which, well, is a start.
The group rebranded as the People’s Parity Project in 2019, grew to as many as 25 law school chapters at its peak, and expanded its fights to judicial nominations and court reform, including pushing the Biden administration to put economic justice champions on the bench. Now it’s betting the next phase runs through Roosevelt, which says it wants to build a pipeline “from law school through the most senior roles in the profession,” including, specifically, the next generation of general counsel and senior government lawyers. Given the state of the Justice Department these days, whoever ends up in those jobs is going to have a lot of rebuilding to do.
Roosevelt’s theory of the case is that lawyers, like economists before them, have become the gatekeepers of what’s possible in public policy. PPP cofounder and executive director Molly Coleman, who we’ve pegged as having the progressive answer to FedSoc, put the group’s founding premise more bluntly:
“We founded PPP on a simple belief: Practicing law is never neutral. Every lawyer and judge is making choices about whose interests the system serves, and they should answer for those choices to the public, not just to each other.”
Which is not a sentiment you hear at many Biglaw summer associate events.
Coleman added that litigation alone was never going to get them there, and that the goal is organizing the people entering the profession “so that choosing to stand with working people becomes an expectation rather than an exception.”
This is a group that built its reputation on making Biglaw squirm, so we’d love to see what happens when they take that energy to this federal government.
Earlier: This Harvard Law School Grad Has The Progressive Answer To FedSoc
Law School Students Are Boycotting Gibson Dunn
Law School Students Protest Outside Of DLA Piper Over Alleged Sexual Assault
Another Biglaw Firm Targeted By Harvard Law School Students Over Mandatory Arbitration Agreements
Biglaw Firm Changes Course On Mandatory Arbitration… For A Limited Time
Harvard Law School Students Organize #DumpKirkland Campaign Over Biglaw Employment Arbitration Agreements
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Bluesky @Kathryn1
