The July 2025 issue of Boston College Law Review is now available. The issue features one Article, two student Notes, and eight student Case Comments. For more information about each piece, please see below.

The full texts are聽.

Article
Bridging Movement Lawyering and International Human Rights Advocacy聽by Citalli Ochoa

The human rights field is often criticized for its lack of enforcement and implementation, lawyering methodologies, and its roots in imperialism, exceptionalism, and Eurocentric values. In response to some of these critiques, human rights scholars and advocates have embraced more grassroots approaches that in many instances resemble the movement lawyering methodologies employed in social justice advocacy in the United States. In the same way that movement lawyers have centered impacted communities and engaged in long-term, coordinated legal and political advocacy to achieve normative change, human rights advocates have used the international human rights framework to exert political pressure, facilitate coalition building, and articulate new theories of change. Despite these similarities, movement lawyering and human rights advocacy operate in silos, and there is a gap in the scholarship examining the two methodologies in tandem. This Article is the first to explore the intersection of international human rights advocacy and modern social movement lawyering. It evaluates the international human rights legal framework and related advocacy from a movement lawyering perspective, theorizing that movement lawyering principles and methodologies can be tools to allay common critiques and limitations in international human rights work. Additionally, this Article suggests that movement lawyering principles can bring international human rights strategies into the fold of contemporary domestic movements, moving the human rights framework to a place where it can more productively contribute to the difficult and long-term project of challenging structural power dynamics in the United States.

Notes
Blame It on the A-a-a-a-a-al-gorithm? Inapplicability of Design Defect Doctrine to Alleged Mental Health Harms of Social Media聽by Jared Berson

Social media may be the most important invention of the twenty-first century; it is undoubtedly the most controversial. This Note explores the intersection of strict products liability law and social media, to opine on whether social media platform providers (providers) should be liable to their consumers for purported design defects within their platforms that allegedly contribute to negative mental, physical, and emotional health consequences for adolescent users. This requires determining the proper standard for how direct the harm that the defect causes must be for liability to attach. Because internet companies are currently rendered immune from claims related to third-party content on their platforms by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 (CDA), this Note scrutinizes claims that could survive summary judgment against a Section 230 immunity defense. It compares the ongoing multidistrict litigation in聽In re Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation, in which a number of design defect claims survived summary judgment despite defendants鈥� Section 230 defenses, with litigation against e-cigarette companies, opioid companies, and slot machine manufacturers. This Note argues that product defect claims against social media platforms alleging general harm fall outside the contours of strict products liability doctrine and are better served to be addressed by legislatures. The Note further outlines how the indirect and attenuated nature of the harms allegedly caused, along with the positive utilities of social media, should shift the onus to the legislature to define parameters for providers.

Liar, Liar, Democracy on Fire: A Federal Elections Exception for Social Media Jawboning聽by Kristie-Valerie Ho脿ng
Free speech is a cornerstone of American democracy, but the actual meaning of 鈥渇ree speech鈥� is increasingly misunderstood in an age the Framers of the Constitution never could have foreseen. The Framers could never have accounted for the unprecedented influence of social media, one sprouting trolls, memes, and posts from every corner of the internet. Social media has undoubtedly ushered in an era defined by misinformation鈥攖he detrimental repercussions of which are best exemplified by the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. To reduce social media misinformation, federal officials have resorted to 鈥渏awboning,鈥� or the informal pressuring of private entities by government officials to take actions the government could not legally mandate through legislation or regulation. Even though the federal government can be well-intentioned in these efforts, resorting to unconstitutional jawboning poses a greater threat to democracy than the problems it purports to solve. It will be impossible for the government to lawfully discard all the fallacies from social media and such risks enabling another insurrection. To remedy this predicament, this Note argues for a reimagined jawboning framework that permits some collaborative government communication with private actors. The government should be permitted to work with social media companies to share essential election information grounded in facts without violating protections against coerced speech. The First Amendment cannot be protected today without tackling the dangers posed by social media鈥檚 digital distortions.

Comments

  • Flushing the Circuit Split: The Title IX and Equal Protection Implications of Gender-Affirming Bathroom Bans聽by Hannah M. Coulter
  • What Child Is This:聽Raskin聽and the Right to Represent Your Children Pro Se聽by Alexander C. Kurtz
  • Addressing Perpetual Pay Inequity: A Continued Muddying of the Equal Pay Act鈥檚 Strict Liability Standard聽by Julide Ozmeral
  • Struggling to Stay Standing: Circuit Courts鈥� Varying Approaches to Civil Rights Testers and Article III Standing Requirements聽by Lauren Pezzi
  • A New Frontier for Voting Rights: Private Plaintiffs鈥� Rights of Action Under 搂 2 of the Voting Rights Act Following聽Arkansas NAACP聽by Michael J. Sanders
  • Black and Blue in 鈥淭he Land of the Free鈥�: Wrongful Incarceration and the Unrectified Constitutional Injuries to Family Integrity聽by Justin Sells
  • Manifest Destiny? The Fourth Circuit鈥檚 Inevitable Expansion of 鈥淩egisters鈥� Under the ACPA聽by Jacqueline Short
  • Two Steps Closer to聽Brady鈥檚 Abandoned Promise: The Fourth Circuit鈥檚 Cumulative Materiality Test for聽Brady聽and聽Napue聽Claims聽by Sara Womble
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