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S7E7: The Secret Lives of Lawyers - Ballet and the Right to Health with Prof. Christina Ho
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Rutgers Law Professor Christina Ho joins Dean Bond to talk about her own career and education principles, her thoughts on healthcare, and her life as a ballerina. You can pick up a copy of her book, Normalizing an American Right to Health, at Oxford Academic.
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The Power of Attorney is produced by Rutgers Law School. With two locations minutes from Philadelphia and New York City, Rutgers Law offers the prestige and reputation of a large, nationally known university combined with a personal, small campus experience. Learn more by visiting law.rutgers.edu.
Executive Producer: Shanida Carter
Series Producer & Editor: Nate Nakao
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Transcript
Introduction of Christina Ho and Her Career
00:00:09
Speaker
You're listening to the award-winning podcast from Rutgers Law School, The Power of Attorney. I'm your host and Dean of the Law School, Joanna Bond.
00:00:24
Speaker
Today's episode is part of our Secret Lives of Lawyers series, where we chat with faculty who are accomplished in both law and a different industry. Our guest today is Professor Christina Ho, whose career spans continents and disciplines, from directing health initiatives in China with the Clinton Foundation to shaping national policy at the White House Domestic Policy Council. She's the author of the book, Normalizing an American Right to Health.
Influence of Family and Harvard Education
00:00:52
Speaker
She is also a ballerina. Thank you for joining us, Professor Ho. My pleasure. So fun. We're thrilled to hear your story. So the place that we often start is to ask the question, tell us your origin story.
00:01:08
Speaker
um So I'll tell one version of the origin story. I mean, I think I feel like, you know, it's one of those like multiverse things where You know, you you would have a different origin story, but end up in the same place. Right. Absolutely. A hundred percent. Yes. Tell us one version of that.
00:01:24
Speaker
One version of it is that, you know, um my parents, my mother worked for the IRS as um a tax auditor.
00:01:37
Speaker
And so she was kind of the, um you know, the front line between sort of ordinary, you know, taxpayers and their encounter with kind of legal obligations. Right. And she was in a sense, a sort of like face of state capacity. Right. And she sort of took her responsibilities incredibly seriously. um I think that she sort of felt kind of a special um kind of um sort of,
00:02:06
Speaker
not pressure per se, but just like a sort of, you know, ah something that she had to sort of stand up for because she was an immigrant. And sort of, it was just something that she took very seriously. it was a responsibility. And I, so I, and my, her father um in Taiwan had been, had worked for the Bureau of Railroads. And so again, sort of this kind of career, this lifetime of dedication to, um,
00:02:30
Speaker
state capacity that um that that makes kind of, you know, a better life possible for for for everyone um in in society. So I feel like that, that you know, one way or another um influenced kind of, you know, my thinking about what was a um sort of worthwhile way of life, you know, people who I was proud of and how they had spent their time.
00:02:52
Speaker
Yeah. And so I think i think that's that's really, i'm going to tell that version of the origin story today. That's fantastic. I love that. And and I love that that you grew up with that that sense of of commitment and the role of the state in your in your own life. That's fantastic. Okay. So I'm i'm switching gears now. to we're goingnna We're going to jump ahead to your own ah legal education, which I know was at Harvard. So I want to ask you about the most important thing that you learned as a law student at Harvard. Yeah.
00:03:28
Speaker
So, you know, something that I've come to realize, um and I didn't know at the time that I had sort of absorbed this, was that um as members of this profession, um you're part of a tradition. And that becomes increasingly important, I think, that you just feel like you're carrying on something that other people have invested in. um And so so part of sort of my introduction into that tradition even began when I was an undergraduate at at Harvard for college.
Specialization in Health Law and Career Highlights
00:04:05
Speaker
So my my freshman year, I took this class with Morton Horwitz, who is a um sort of pathbreaking legal historian and um one of the founding members of the Critical Legal Studies School. And he was teaching an undergraduate core course. um
00:04:19
Speaker
I was you know a freshman from Ohio. And it was kind of my first encounter with a lot of these ideas. And so I had that experience where it just opened an entire world to me. Many of his TAs were um law students. um And the the nature of his work at that time was such that um people were so energized. The energy in the room was just was electric. And so you know, that actually made me want to go to law school, right? So, um now I didn't realize, of course, that sort of the critical legal studies movement had that sort of particular history. And in in fact, right, this was sort of the early 90s, right at the turn of the 90s, this was actually kind of the... um
00:05:05
Speaker
You know, maybe when ah critical legal studies was really coming under increasing attack and, um you know, we were going to it had, know, its energy was going to be dissipated after that. But I sort of always carried that with me, this idea that, um oh, wow, there's a ah type of energy that ideas can bring to people and a passion that they will then. you know, sort of carry forward to sort of their their outside world. So and a fast forward, I go to Harvard Law School. um You know, Duncan Kennedy is one of my professors there. And um
00:05:36
Speaker
and Then I came to, you know, many years later to Rutgers um and there were folks who were part of the critical legal studies studies movement here. And in fact, um one of the one of the folks who um sort of taught health law here had been one of the original critical legal studies crew, i'm Rand Rosenblatt. And so, you know, I just so felt fortunate that I was able to. um you know, have this kind of trajectory where where things that I had inherited, I could sort of bring to the next generation of students also. um And hopefully we just pay that energy forward. that's That's wonderful. And I love that you had that experience as an undergrad that was really energizing, that opened the door to law school for you, at least at least in your mind, um and that actually led you to law school. So that is fantastic. um
00:06:26
Speaker
You mentioned health law and and Rutgers' historic engagement with health law through RAND. ah Can you tell us a little bit about why you decided to specialize in health law?
00:06:38
Speaker
That's a great question. um So when I went to law school, I went to um the Kennedy School at the same time. And um I got a master's in public policy. And um sort of in in my mind, what I wanted to do was I wanted to influence policy, right?
00:06:55
Speaker
and And, you know, you can do that without a public policy degree. But I think that um one one way of kind of um thinking about law as kind of a discourse and a profession is to sort of think about it also from internally and also externally. And I think that's what sort of being at the Kennedy School allowed me to do. um One of the biggest kind of unanswered policy problems right of our time, unsolved problems policy problems of our time, was the healthcare care system. and
00:07:27
Speaker
you know, in the early 90s, in the mid 90s, right, sort of Hillary Clinton had been sort of working on this problem very prominently. um And now that I look back, I see so many of sort of the talented people from my cohort sort of drawn into this area. And I think that that's just people responding to kind of this um this felt need, right, for for this important area of people's lives. to be addressed in some way. And so, so much talent went into that area. Why I kept on doing it though, is, you know, it's um a lot of our our sort of disputes are sort of
00:08:05
Speaker
more crisply backlit by what's at stake in a healthcare dispute, right? Absolutely. And yeah, there's a sort of sharpening of of of sort of your understanding of what what is what you're really trying to do with respect to a legal problem. And I like that about it. um I like that um it's very interdisciplinary. So, you know, it's something where you have to bring kind of a lot of skills to bear. You have to bring, you know, your sort of maybe technical and maybe sort of scientific background skills to bear, you have to bring interpersonal skills to bear. It's such a sort of intimate topic, right? And I think there's some other, there's like family laws, just something where you have to sort of bring your whole self in a way. And and so I always liked that about it as well. um Well, you know, also having to sort of understand the complex economics, right, of of our healthcare care system. so um
00:09:00
Speaker
So, yeah, I don't tire of it. That makes sense to me completely, Professor Ho. And and the the idea that this is really an interdisciplinary topic would would keep things fresh and interesting um across the board.
00:09:17
Speaker
So I want to ask you a little bit about your work as the country director for the Clinton Foundation's China Program and and the White House ah Domestic Policy Council position. Can you tell us a little bit more about those roles?
00:09:31
Speaker
Yeah, well, let me start with the latter first because just want to sort of hook back into this um realization I've had about the importance of the tradition that you sort of, and the legacy that you that you sort of carry. So, um you know, one of my favorite professors in law school was Christopher Edley, who had taught me administrative law. And he had worked um at OMB in the Carter administration, I think. um And he'd worked worked in many administrations, the Carter administration, the Clinton administration, um the Obama administration.
00:10:05
Speaker
And um his his teaching of administrative law was just right at the intersection of, of law and policy, which, you know, we're sort of seeing, um, in, you know, I just really stark terms right now, um, given all the sort of conflicts that are going on in the government shutdown. So he was able to bring sort of a context to the class that sort of again, helped me understand the stakes, right. And understand where, um,
00:10:36
Speaker
sort of law and policy interconnect and overlap. So after i graduated from my um from from my concurrent degree in in law and public policy, actually knew that I had always known that I had wanted to go to DC.
00:10:52
Speaker
And so um I went to work on the House side for Massachusetts congressman. um And I also, sort of got to know people who were in the Clinton White House who were saying, look, this is a time when, you know, we we need folks on board. We need young folks. There are a lot of actually people who are leaving um to work. it was at the time was on the Gore campaign. Right. And so a moment when, um,
00:11:14
Speaker
when ah when yeah someone who was sort of young, ambitious, you know um you know willing to spend a lot of hours in the office. Right, right. Oh yeah. I think about those early early days in my career too. There were a lot of nights and weekends for sure.
00:11:29
Speaker
you know could sort of um sort of enter the fray. So I did that. And in fact, right um i had told you know Professor Edley, right um this is what I'm applying for. and And you know his his wife was deputy chief of staff at the time. And so I think that um he he helped me get that
Teaching Philosophy and Community at Rutgers
00:11:46
Speaker
job. And again, I felt like I was sort of carrying forward something that right I had sort of seen up my role models um do.
00:11:54
Speaker
Then um sort of when when ah Later on, i like i sort of entered the academy um and i I ended up sort of teaching administrative law. i I called Chris and I said to him, you know,
00:12:09
Speaker
I um am teaching ministry of law and I'm going to teach it the way that you taught it. right Right. And the way that you taught it was from this really storied book, right? The Gellhorn and Weiss book, which, you know, Clark Weiss was the model for the um the professor in the paper chase. Right. So I just sort of felt like it was like bringing this kind of type of like law teaching into the classroom that had this storied history.
00:12:31
Speaker
um And you know, what he said to me was he was like, Great. And when you teach, tell them that they are getting the same administrative law class that Barack Obama got.
00:12:44
Speaker
And I tell my students that to this day. I just want them to understand that this is an achievement of generations of people who have invested in this way of trying to make sense of and cabin government power, right? But also deploy it for, for you know, the the good of of of the community. And so...
00:13:09
Speaker
I think that helps them contextualize their own professions, right? Or their own future professions as well. And so I i just love that. That's something that I treasure about sort of having you the people that I had teach me and the the people that I get to teach now.
00:13:22
Speaker
I do too, I love that. And and the fact that that you share that historical perspective with your students is is wonderful. I'm sure that that enables them to engage with the material in a totally different way because they see that they're part of this continuum too.
00:13:38
Speaker
that's That's fantastic. Okay, so we know you're now at Rutgers. ah Thankfully, I'm so happy to have you as a colleague. up Can you tell me a little bit about what what led you to Rutgers?
00:13:52
Speaker
So one of the things that I just always think was so crucial, I had a friend um at the White House who then went on to um work for John Corzine when he was governor of New Jersey.
00:14:05
Speaker
And um she said, you know when i When I told her that I was interviewing at Rutgers and then I sort of went to visit her, she was like, you have to meet Ron Chen. And so Ron Chen had been working for the Corzine administration as um as public advocate. And in fact, every person I talked to in the callback interview said,
00:14:26
Speaker
Oh, you know, you really need to meet Ron Chen. It's a really unfortunate that he's not here right now. i No, that that is not at all surprising. For our listeners, will you explain who Ron Chen is and and his his role sort of historically at the law school? I can't even explain. It's hard to capture it.
00:14:48
Speaker
I mean, but... um Ron, again, is this sort of carrier of tradition, right? So he is he is a student um from Rutgers Law who has gone on to become, right, you know,
00:15:04
Speaker
associate dean, vice dean, and dean um of the law school. um But sort of even when he wasn't dean of the law school, he was kind of this like repository of sort of all this information about sort of the the history of Rutgers, the um the identity of Rutgers, kind of the the plumbing, the mechanics of how Rutgers Law School works. Absolutely. um And, you know, I think that...
00:15:32
Speaker
you know, some of us are in that habit, whether healthy or otherwise, of just sort of when we don't know how something works. We all say, oh, Ron. ah Yes, yes. I've been in that position myself. And and Ron has been a helpful resource time and again, because he does have this sense of institutional history that almost no one else in the building has. yeah And he, as you know, he has returned to the faculty and and he continues to play any number of helpful roles ah to the administration and to the faculty. So ah yes, he is he is quite a resource to put it lightly. and yeah and So he helped in your recruitment. Yeah, I think that that cemented it. And the other thing the other thing that I will mention is um um right now I'm on the appointments committee and um so the the role of the students is instrumental, right? So we um for everyone who interviews to teach at Rutgers,
00:16:28
Speaker
that Actually, the students interview them, right? And um they take it so seriously. um It's the the the SBA president and a special committee even who recruits students to come in and conduct these interviews.
00:16:43
Speaker
So the students who interviewed me were so fantastic. And um I even remember, I think the SBA president at the time was Rob Menendez, who has since become Congressman Rob Menendez. Wow. Another piece of history right there. Yes.
00:16:58
Speaker
um And, ah yeah, and he, he um you know, he they asked terrific questions, the group of people whom he he assembled. And um and they I had just a wonderful conversation.
Regulatory State and Legal Tradition
00:17:12
Speaker
Rutgers stood out for me from from all the other places that I had interviewed because of that. And, yeah, I'm in my friends to this day. Yeah. Well, and and our students continue to play that role, as you mentioned, with with the appointments committee. And they are such an important voice in terms of who we who we bring into and recruit to this community. Exactly.
00:17:36
Speaker
Wonderful. Okay. Well, ah can you share with us a case or a moment that that deeply impacted your perspective as a professor?
00:17:47
Speaker
So um there's so, so many moments. Okay. But um what I will say is that sort of that very first year that I taught in 2010, there were a couple of students who sort of came up to me afterwards. I was an administrative law, the class that I taught. And they really said, look, um you know,
00:18:08
Speaker
I learned a lot about the law, but what I really, what they really wanted to convey to me was that the class had sort of opened up a world for them that they didn't know, right, had previously existed. And I feel like that was something that sort of Morton Horowitz had done for me when I was here.
00:18:24
Speaker
a freshman in college. And then I sort of felt like, oh my gosh, this is a responsibility. Like this is an obligation that I have. So I'm teaching. So so I do feel like I always feel like, okay, I'm teaching the content, but I also want to teach something about the um the world and the system that it represents, right? so So how did we get these doctrinal rules? What do they mean? Like what what can we infer about sort of, you know,
00:18:52
Speaker
you know, the the entire world of people who invested in trying to make things make more sense in this area, you know? And I think that that's like a kind of a a revelation sometimes for students. And I don't want to lose that, right? So if there's ah if there's someone whose world you've opened up in that way, you want to make sure that that door is available for other people too. So...
00:19:13
Speaker
And it strikes me as as such an important and interesting time to be talking about the role of the regulatory state and the way that it's changing and ah and all of the all of the changes that are happening right now. um it's It's a dynamic field.
00:19:28
Speaker
It Is that fair to say? Yeah, very much so. And I feel like, um so, when you know, I taught it last fall and I'll teach it, or last spring and I'll teach it this spring as well.
00:19:41
Speaker
i was I was so um surprised and delighted that one of the things that the students hungered for was this sense of, um even as maybe the system is under attack, right, um they still wanted to know what the notion of the system whole looked like, right? And what I and what i what i like about that, right? um It connects to sort of this feeling that I had from that first year when the students said there was this whole world that opens up to me.
00:20:10
Speaker
You know, all of us are going to be um the carriers of this knowledge when, you know, when we rebuild and we are going rebuild. Right. Absolutely. um And so to have the vision of what to rebuild, maybe not build in the exact same way, but to build it better. Right. Is, is critical. And I feel like sort of being a conduit of that, that, you know,
00:20:35
Speaker
It was an amazing achievement of um of ah civilization, really. Right. So so um as the sort of values of of that kind of civilization are under attack, you know, all of us are sort of like, you know you think about the kind myth of King Arthur. Like we we like have to be carriers of those kinds of of values and norms and ideals and values.
00:20:58
Speaker
And it was a great privilege to be able to to be part of that and sort of pass that to to people who cared, who hungered for Right. Well, it's it's really encouraging to hear that the students themselves recognize that that and are hungry for it that sense of what the system is supposed to look like or or what what it could look like under a different leadership, perhaps. And and how do we move back to that or or create something even better, as you mentioned? Okay.
00:21:25
Speaker
Okay. Now i want to ask you something that that I'm really excited to hear you talk about. What is your favorite part of teaching? I mean, my favorite part of teaching, obviously, is kind of, you know, this this is the energy that the students bring. Okay.
00:21:44
Speaker
There's always that moment in class where the students sort of um like a self-consciousness drops and you can just see there's like an internal momentum that they have to try to understand something. There's like internal curiosity to know. And there's like a sort of urgency and pleasure and joy in in you know, in wanting to know and understand. And that there's something about that that's so pure. And I want to say it's rare, but it's not rare. It's it's there in sort of every single class. um
00:22:22
Speaker
And it's just, but again, so such an honor um to be able to sort of help feed that. Right. Those are such gratifying moments when you when you see that happen in the classroom. It really is it really is gratifying.
00:22:37
Speaker
Now I want to ask you about your book. So in 2023, you published the book Normalizing an American Right to Health, and it proposes a fresh plan for realizing the right to health in the United States.
Ho's Book and Healthcare System Insights
00:22:50
Speaker
Tell us more about the book and and why it's so timely. So all of us had just sort of lived through the pandemic, um and I was writing it during the pandemic. And um I think it was sort of a moment that um where sort of the value and the sanctity of people's lives and health were being traded off um sort of pretty cavalierly against some other material interests. and
00:23:23
Speaker
I felt like we didn't have ready at hand a language, right, to express sort of what, um why normatively that trade-off should shouldn't be so casual, but should be dear. yeah and um And I sort of felt like, okay, well, this is something that I've been thinking about for a very long time in my life, the right to health. And I think that our sort of neglect, right, of that topic, our willingness to say, okay, well, we're not gonna make any progress on that. Let's set it aside and sort of talk about areas where we are gonna make progress. That left us kind of bereft of this language to make this very important point. And so, you know, I just felt like, oh my gosh, I've got to actually just write this as fast as I can now, right? Like I want that language on the table. There's a little pressure there.
00:24:14
Speaker
and so so So that's part of – I mean, I think it's ah an evergreen topic, of course. Right. Right? um It's so fundamental to sort of um us being human, us being human together. But um but ah this – yeah, that that at let Lenten add urgency. Of course. To the point I wanted to make. Of course.
00:24:35
Speaker
Well, what what do you think is the most important thing that that Americans should be focused on right now with respect to their health care? Right.
00:24:47
Speaker
You know, something that I think is is um really present now in the discourse, I think is super important, is that... um there's a mutuality to healthcare, right? And I think there's like this very old Aristotelian wisdom about that, that sort of human flourishing is not sort of flourishing alone, but flourishing together in a community, right? That there's, you can't separate out those those those there's the conditions of flourishing and being in a community.
00:25:16
Speaker
That, um you know, I think people have have seen what that looks like with respect to infectious disease. But I also think that people are seeing what that looks like right now with respect to health care financing and delivery. Right. So if you don't have doctors who are feel comfortable practicing right OBGYN care, then you're not going to have right the ability to. um You're not going to have the capacity to deliver babies in in and large parts of the country. If there's not Medicaid right supporting hospitals for the patients who um you know qualify for Medicaid, then the hospitals also aren't going to be there and functional for someone who you know is paying for their health care through another another means.
00:26:05
Speaker
If you don't have right um everybody kind of participating in an insurance pool, then you're only going to have sick people left in the insurance pool and the entire enterprise is going to go under. So I think right through everyone's premiums are going to skyrocket. that That kind of sense of mutuality um You know, if we don't invest as a society in um in vaccine development, in in cancer cures, right, then those those are public goods that are not available for anyone.
00:26:37
Speaker
I feel like that's something that we need to to grapple with. Maybe it's easy to set aside when they're in times of affluence, but I think this is a time where um we're sort of seeing kind of the horizon of some of the possibilities. And I think we we't just need to face that truth head on. And I think it's very apparent um across a lot of different domains in the healthcare system.
00:26:58
Speaker
I completely agree. That is certainly a call to action for us. I want to switch gears now and talk about ah the the South African constitutional law class that that you lead every other year and that that I had the the pleasure of joining you on – ah over a year ago now. Yeah, and we want you to join more. I would love to. I would love to. And and so for our listeners, you you bring law students from both Newark and Camden to South Africa to explore the intersections of law, history, and society through direct interactions with students, attorneys, judges, activists, and local communities.
00:27:39
Speaker
and And alumni are welcomed on the annual spring break trip as well. and And some people, including some of the folks who were on the trip that you and I went on together, described this as really life-changing. And ah I made the trip, as I mentioned, in 2024. And it was really an amazing experience to watch the students engage with with their counterparts in South Africa with the material. And and it was ah really transformative for for a number of them.
00:28:09
Speaker
why Why is this immersive class, in your view, so important to the law school experience? um So I feel this this law school or this class delivers um on sort of some of the core missions of the law school in so many ways. i just may not be able to mention them all, but one thing that um I think is ah is important for Rutgers Law School is that we have just been um such a um sort of diverse in the best ways, you know, sort of community and sort of our student body comes from everywhere. And it's incredibly, global too, right? And so, um, so I think we do a good job of delivering, a global legal education to an audience that, um, is, is, is positioned to become sort of the global lawyers of the future. So, um, so in that sense, I think it's really important that we give students, um,
00:29:15
Speaker
you know, confidence and skill in um in being able to operate in legal materials um that are from sort of other jurisdictions. um And South Africa is a sort of, you know, great kind of jurisdiction for them to um to get their feet wet, right? Because it's the materials are in English, they're accessible to common law system. And so, you know, every again, every year is just like watching that transformation when people go from, you know, feeling like, oh, how am I supposed to understand the law of another country to, oh, I'm just in here and I know, you know, they're talking about concepts that I and i learned in my first year class, right? And
00:29:57
Speaker
So that that that um that transformation is something that um that you know might might not be obvious from the trip, but it is also something that I'm always looking for in in the class. um But the trip itself, you know there's so many things about it. One so one other thing I'll just say from a health law scholar's perspective is you know in the U.S.,
00:30:21
Speaker
you know, and this is connected with, i think, my book project, but in the U.S., there aren't as many opportunities for us to show students what it is that a common law system can do to protect a socioeconomic right, like the right to health, right? And I think, once again, right, sort of part of this, um deep you know, um sort of unborn to denormalization of the right to health that has happened over time is, is, you so maybe this falsehood that the, you know, that, that courts can't cope with something like a right to health. And so one thing I just wanted to show people is just, you know, they're obviously courts, you know, common law courts that are not very different from ours who um are able to cope with a socioeconomic right, like the right to health. And, and so, so that sense of possibility is sort of, you know, on the table for them.
Ballet and Law: A Unique Intersection
00:31:14
Speaker
Um, you know But the other thing is that I think I want them to know that, um you know, a juridically trained person can speak to people all around the world who are juridically trained, right? And that's also sort of incredibly precious, right? That's, that's some you know, we're we're somehow all in this same project of...
00:31:35
Speaker
you know, i you know ah ah one of the early constitutional court justices in South Africa, because and we're all engaged in the culture of justification, right? And so we all know what that looks like and and and know the value of it. And so I feel like that's something that's important to to bring to people. And then also I just think, you know, um as a way to sort of reflect on on who you are and and who you could be and how things are different, um you know, but maybe how things are the same. And so and so that, you know, is very hard to put in words, but that that's something that i um I hope that all students, right, get experience in their lives too. So I'm happy to be part of being able to bring it to some of them. Right, right. Absolutely. Well, you you captured so much of what is valuable about that experience. So thank you for that.
00:32:26
Speaker
ah Now we're going to switch gears a little bit. Usually we ask faculty on the podcast what they would be doing if they were not law professors. But in this case, we actually know. ah we We already have an idea anyway.
00:32:40
Speaker
and And that goes back to ah my introduction of you as a ballerina. So tell us about when you first discovered ballet. um So I was enrolled in ballet class when I was, I think it was three or four. um so I was really young. And, um ah you know, I was like one of those kids, extremely active, a little too much energy.
00:33:04
Speaker
So moms put me in ballet and, try you know, dance classes to try to um help me kind of, you know, just have an outlet for that. Right. Yeah.
00:33:16
Speaker
So I think that ah that is what started, but I also think that sort of, you know, I had sort of done a lot of music throughout my childhood as well. And I'm actually not that good of a musician, but so ballet became this way for me to honor how much I loved music. Of course. And right music was not a very good way for me to honor it. Well, you found another outlet that's very resourceful.
00:33:40
Speaker
yeah yeah So so that's that that was part of it. And then, um you know, I like to tell students sometimes that there's there's similarities in the sense that...
00:33:51
Speaker
um ballet particularly, it's a sort of classical art form. It has a lot of this these systems and these codes, right? And these this sort of these roles and rituals and a language. And I feel like that is similar to what we're being educated in in law school as well, right? So you're learning these whole systems, these codes, and there's just like a tradition, right? And um and sort of, um you know, so being socialized to all that is not that different from from from learning. actually that That's so interesting. Those are parallels I have never thought about, but it's fascinating to me.
00:34:28
Speaker
and And I know that you regularly take ballet classes now and and that you performed as a child in in traveling ballet shows. So do you still perform publicly or is that is that ah a thing of the past? And and do you teach at all?
00:34:44
Speaker
So that is a thing of the past. i and i don't um And I don't get to teach publicly. So, ah but ah I think one of the things that I do try to bring into my class is a sense of, you know, think sometimes we can think of the practice of law um and some of the sort of core concepts that underlie rule of law as being sort of cold and abstract and disembodied and arm's length. And um I do try to bring, particularly given that my field is health law, a sense of the importance of the
00:35:20
Speaker
face-to-face, of the viscerality, of kind of the material stakes about the, um you know, even sort of to draw an analogy, the clinical encounter is something where the kind of physical presence and face of the other person, you know, um has an effect, has a meaning. um In some sense, it makes a claim on you, right? And and that's true in in dance too, right? Sort of um when you're dancing with someone else, right? that The spacing, the um the presence of the other person, that that is all something that um that carries meaning and that you perceive and you become sensitized to. And I think that that's a little, yeah. So even though I'm not teaching
00:36:03
Speaker
dance per se. I do want to bring a little bit of that sort of understanding and correct maybe a blind spot um that people might otherwise have when it comes to understanding the law. I love that. It's such a thoughtful perspective.
00:36:17
Speaker
up So during the pandemic, you started classes with stretching and vocalization exercises, which I also love. But but I'm curious about how your students responded. What what was the what was the student response to that?
00:36:32
Speaker
Well, one thing that i would and that i found amazing is that sort of everyone just did them, right? and when there was no There was no questioning of why we were doing it. And so I felt like, oh, they immediately understand what the value is of this, right which which I loved, right?
00:36:47
Speaker
And it... um you know, it more and in fact, I feel like one of my students said to me that like they started doing their, I don't know what student group they were part of, but they they started opening their student group meetings with a little bit of this, right? And it's just in an acknowledgement that we are together and um let's let's mark the beginning of this time that we're together, that we mark it by sort of saying, let's engage, let's do something active. So it just maybe a little bit easy to sort of kind of um
00:37:18
Speaker
sit back on your heels a little bit and be a little bit more passive when you're in Zoom class. So so during the pandemic, I felt it was particularly important that we would just wanna mark that. And then, um and it's a little, how do I say it? You know, sometimes when, um you know, so you think about sort of doing a stretch together. It's a little moment of care, right? So so um so I wanted us to kind of share share that because teaching is like a little bit of care. yeah Absolutely. And it's also sending the signal that that students should be thoughtful about their own self-care, right? And and that is important. Right. That's an important message too. want to renew ourselves in order to be able to give. So just, yeah.
00:37:55
Speaker
Right, right. And does your does your work in law ever collide with your passion for ballet You know, collide is probably the word that I don't know that it collides, but I do think it just if it it's it's, you know, lot, there are a lot of ways, some of which I talked about today, that sort of the things that I know from ballet or things that I've learned from ballet, might sort of seep into kind of, right? How I think about about my work in law. And I'll just mention one thing that has been, you know, I've been trying to worry through it myself, but um some of that I've been interested in lately.
00:38:34
Speaker
There is I think there's a lot of thinking. I think we talked about how we need to think about how to build back, but also build back better, Right. i i And there was a Boston Review article from around the, I want to say in 2020 during the pandemic, when Greg Gonsalves and Amy Kapsinsky at Yale had um written a call for a new politics of care. right um And there have been legal scholars, including Blake Emerson at UCLA, who have tried to respond to that call and say, what would it look like for our legal system to respond to the need for a new politics of care. And I feel like as a health law scholar, um you know, I'm sitting in a place where I can really think about that.
00:39:20
Speaker
Right. um And I think we have a lot of resources um from our field of people who have been thinking about what is it that makes health law distinctive that can be sort of brought to bear and sort of, um you know,
00:39:33
Speaker
maybe sort of a way of thinking about how um law law outside the health law field can also benefit from those lessons. so So that's a project that I've been working on. And one of the things that um has really influenced me is there was a there' was a health law scholar who's also a bioethicist at ah UVA, Lois Shepherd, who's written about um um this French philosopher, Emmanuel Levinas, who himself, he was, um his his family was was ah was killed in the Holocaust and he um himself was a prisoner of of war. And then after World War ii um he developed this this, a lot of thinking that was maybe a little bit in contrast to a sort of very abstract kind of Kantian idea of individuals and their autonomy. It very much emphasized this idea of sort of
00:40:30
Speaker
face-to-face, the interlocutor, the our our obligations and responsibilities toward the other. um And I feel like this is like a rich set of resources. And it's a rich set of resources that I feel like I'm sensitized to in part because of dance. No, what you're describing absolutely makes sense to me. There is that, that sensitivity to yeah to the other and you're in dialogue with the other in dance in the same way. Yeah. And there's something about sort of being face to face in the presence of the other that is a, is a claim and a responsibility. um
00:41:03
Speaker
And yeah, I think that that's like a perspective that we could sort of bring more into. I mean, maybe our our duties aren't arm's length bargaining duties. Maybe we have a little more fiduciary duty to one another, right? Maybe we, um you know, like in malpractice, right? there' they're The standard of care is not something that we can contract around, right? And maybe, right, in healthcare, we bring the public utility model more to sort of how we how we organize our institutions. So I just think there's like a lot of... um There are a lot of implications that can be spun out from this that um that are are you know
00:41:39
Speaker
that preserve what we have but do it better and enrich it. Fascinating. So I'm going to ask you now about things that you're proud of. what are you What are you most proud of in terms of your accomplishments in the legal context? And then also, what are you most proud of in the context of ballet?
00:41:59
Speaker
So I want to, see the the way posed the question is so so great and prerogative because it makes me try to think about sort of what's common about what I what i feel gratified by um in terms of sort of both areas of pursuit. And one thing that I want to say is think I feel gratified by just my ability to persist in both, right? So I think there's like real value to sort of The fact that you just put one foot in front of the other and you keep on going. Right. And, you know, um
00:42:35
Speaker
you you you you have a lot of years, right? And it's a marathon. It's not a sprint. um And so that's how I think of my legal career, too, right? You don't have to do everything all at once, but everything that you do feeds into the larger project and you bring everything that you have learned over time to the next thing. And so just that longevity, just that, um you know, ability to kind of ride the ups and downs and, you know, keep on going with the sort of, you know.
Advice for Law Students and Future Plans
00:43:07
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. It requires resilience that, you know, putting one foot in front of the other day after day yeah on some days, it requires a lot of resilience, but, but I, I see that as, as a product of the determination that you're talking about.
00:43:21
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. well That is something to be proud of. Yeah. Yeah. um you know, and sort of in dance, I suppose the goal is like, you know, I'm 51 now. It's still to be dancing at 71. Right. So, so it doesn't have to be stunning at any given moment of time, but it's just, the fact of it is is enough. Absolutely. i know day I hope you are still dancing at 71. I truly do.
00:43:51
Speaker
i truly do ah Okay, let me let me switch gears now and ask you about any advice that you might have for law students who want to go to law school. What would you what would you advise them? What would you tell them about the experience? but What advice would you give?
00:44:11
Speaker
one Well, one thing that I always tell students coming in, mean, I have a lot of people's advice, but this is this is one that I always tell students, right? I always tell students that law school is a process of socialization, yeah And you want to be open to that, right? um That took me a while to understand, right? It's not a, mean, it's not like a physics or something where you come in and you kind of absorb it wholesale. What you're doing is, through what you're when you listen to other people, when you, um
00:44:43
Speaker
you know, try out how to talk to other people and sort of get feedback. That's as much as anything, it's sort of, you know, socializing yourself to what are the kinds of reasons that people find persuasive in this discourse? What are the ways that people try to make a certain kind of point? um You know, what are the ah types of, you know,
00:45:11
Speaker
in terms of arguments that fly, um you know, and and and and so forth. So I guess that's that's something that I, the relationships, right, then that you make are sort of so crucial to that. It's not just the knowledge in the in the books. So I guess that's a piece of it that i that I like for students to kind of just have in the back of their minds.
00:45:32
Speaker
That's important advice, for sure. ah And my final question for you, is what is next? What's next for you, either in law or in ballet?
00:45:48
Speaker
That's a great question. I mean, I do feel like so I spent 2023, 2024 leave in the Biden administration.
00:46:03
Speaker
And I was working at OMB, was in management budget, in part, I think, because carrying this idea of, right, um you know, my mentors had done that. And, you know, willy nilly, I came to understand that that that was actually a really crucial and vital place to be.
00:46:23
Speaker
And I think that, right, that that's just always, I think the pattern or the the model, right, of sort of people who you, their careers you feel like you you respect and you honor, that's just always going to be in the back of your mind and is going to color what sort of your your your next steps are. So I think I've just found a great way to sort of be engaged while having a
00:46:54
Speaker
this this career where I can also teach others how to be engaged. And i sort of love that. It operates on so many registers. And so sort of I'll just hopefully just be able to keep on operating on all of this registers. Right. I have no doubt that you will. That is that is fantastic. And i love I love your sense that you are passing along something valuable and energizing to your students that that that you received at some point as a student. So that that's a wonderful notion. Yeah.
00:47:23
Speaker
and I want to thank you for joining us today. It's been a fantastic conversation. I've loved it. And um I really appreciate you taking the time. Oh my gosh. Thank you for having me. The Power of Attorney is a production of Rutgers Law School.
00:47:37
Speaker
With two locations just minutes from New York City and Philadelphia, Rutgers Law offers the prestige and reputation of a large nationally known university with a personal small campus experience.
00:47:50
Speaker
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