Call for Papers--What Does the Option Mean?

JOURNAL OF CATHOLIC SOCIAL THOUGHT

CALL FOR PAPERS

THE FOURTH ANNUAL SYMPOSIUM ON

CATHOLIC SOCIAL THOUGHT AND THE LAW

The Meaning of the Preferential Option for the Poor for Law and Policy

Villanova University School of Law

Villanova, Pennsylvania

October 27, 2006

The "preferential option for the poor" is one of the fundamental principles of Catholic social teaching. It is rooted in the Gospel and expressed in Pope Paul VI's Pastoral Letter Octogesima Adveniens 23 (1971) as "the preferential respect due to the poor and the special situation they have in society." In the 1980's the American bishops recognized the option as "the obligation to evaluate social and economic activity from the viewpoint of the poor and the powerless . . . The prime purpose of this special commitment to the poor is to enable them to become active participants in the life of society . . . [and] to enable all persons to share in and contribute to the common good" (Pastoral Letter, Economic Justice for All 88). In essence, the preferential option asks us to define what law and public policy would look like if consideration for the poor was at the heart of our conception of the common good.

For all its apparent definitiveness, and the clarity of its elaboration of the Gospel's command to love one's neighbor, the option's usefulness for Catholic social action and theoretical critique has been undermined by disagreement about its meaning and practical implications. Its association with liberation theology has led it to be criticized as politicization of the faith. In the United States, it has been derided as a pretext for smuggling "statist" ideology and policies into religious discourse. Application of the principle poses acutely the problem of how to translate a broad moral imperative into specific prudential judgments about complex social and economic problems.

These controversies raise questions about the utility of the preferential option for the poor as a basis for reform of legal systems and specific laws. Hypothetically, the option could be used to evaluate and critique any aspect of law that could have an effect on the poor. This would include not only poverty-specific law, such as welfare law, but wide swathes of the law of taxation, bankruptcy, domestic relations, immigration and much more. But how does the option for the poor resolve specific legal issues that effect the poor? How does it tilt the scales on highly contested questions such as the role of the state in the remediation of poverty, the determination of equitable labor policies, globalization and trade policy and much more? Is the concept sufficiently determinate to make a real difference in formulating law and policy? How do other principles such as solidarity and the common good provide a context for understanding the implications of the option? This symposium will explore both the theoretical questions and the relevance of the preferential option for the poor in specific legal and policy contexts. In addition, it will explore the relationship of this religiously-grounded principle to secular approaches to poverty law and policy.

Paper proposals are invited from both legal academics and those from other disciplines for this interdisciplinary symposium. The papers will be considered for publication in the symposium issue of the Journal of Catholic Social Thought, a peer-reviewed journal published by Villanova University. Proposals should be sent by March 31, 2006 to Mark A. Sargent, Villanova University School of Law, Villanova, PA 19085, or

[email protected]

-- Mark

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