The Aoki Social Justice Clinic is a project of the Aoki Center for Critical Race & Nation Studies. The project seeks to foster student excellence in critical race theory with initiatives that connect learned theory to practice, improving the lives of subordinated groups.
The Clinic offers students the opportunity to critically examine the racial impacts of the criminal justice system at the same time they represent clients in the system. Under the supervision of professors, students litigate cases in the areas of criminal defense, workers’ rights, environmental justice, and other areas related to critical race theory. In a recent project, the Clinic collaborated with the Federal Defender office in the Eastern District of California to represent clients on appeal in several cases; the Clinic won each of the cases that students worked on during the semester.