Marion Crain
Wiley B. Rutledge Professor of Law
Office
Anheuser-Busch Hall
Room 559
About Marion Crain
Professor Marion Crain, an expert in labor and employment law, and the Wiley B. Rutledge Professor of Law. She also holds joint appointments (by courtesy) with the Brown School of Social Work and the Department of Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies in the College of Arts & Sciences. Her scholarship examines the relationships among gender, work, and class status with a particular emphasis on collective action, labor relations and social movements. She is the author, co-author or editor of a labor law casebook, an employment law casebook, two university press books and a commercial press book, as well as numerous law review articles and book chapters on labor and employment law, labor unionism, and the working poor. Professor Crain is a member and past Chair of the Labor Law Group, an international collective of labor and employment law professors who work collaboratively to improve labor and employment law pedagogy through the production of course materials, and serves on the editorial board of the Employee Rights and Employment Policy Journal. In addition to her legal research and scholarship, she received the David M. Becker Professor of the Year Award in 2009 for excellence in teaching. Professor Crain’s administrative duties with the provost’s office include oversight of initiatives designed to stimulate and facilitate interdisciplinary teaching and research, including the Bring Your Own Idea program and the Beyond Boundaries Cross-School Teaching Grant program. She also serves as the liaison for the provost to several university-wide centers and institutes, including the Danforth Center on Religion & Politics, the Gephardt Institute for Civic and Community Engagement, and the Institute for Public Health. For the 2016-17 year, Marion is serving as Leader of the University Libraries. Before joining Washington University’s faculty, Professor Crain served as the Paul Eaton Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, where she directed the Center on Poverty, Work & Opportunity and served as Associate Dean for Faculty Research and Development. She has previously taught or visited at the University of Michigan, George Washington University, Duke University, the University of Alabama, West Virginia University, and the University of Toledo. Prior to entering law teaching, she practiced labor and employment law with Latham & Watkins in Los Angeles and clerked for the Hon. Arthur L. Alarcon, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Education
- J.D., UCLA School of Law, 1983
- B.S., Cornell University, 1980
Courses
- Labor Law
- Employment Law
- Seminars on Work & Law
- Family Law
- Feminist Legal Theory
Areas of Expertise
- Labor Law, Employment Law
Scholarship
Books:
- INVISIBLE LABOR: HIDDEN WORK IN THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD [Marion Crain, Winifred Poster & Miriam Cherry, eds.] (University of California Press 2016).
- WORKING AND LIVING IN THE SHADOW OF ECONOMIC FRAGILITY [Marion Crain & Michael Sherraden, eds.] (Oxford University Press 2014).
- ENDING POVERTY IN AMERICA: HOW TO RESTORE THE AMERICAN DREAM [Senator John Edwards, Marion Crain & Arne Kalleberg, eds.] (The New Press 2007).
Textbooks:
- LABOR RELATIONS LAW: CASES AND MATERIALS, 14th edition (Carolina Academic Press 2021) [Charles Craver, Marion Crain & Grant Hayden] (also 10th, 11th, 12th and 13th editions, 1999, 2004, 2010, 2016).
- WORK LAW: CASES AND MATERIALS, 4th edition (Carolina Academic Press 2020) [Marion Crain, Pauline Kim, Mike Selmi & Brishen Rogers] (also 3rd editio 2015, second edition, 2010, and first edition, 2005).
Book Chapters:
- Law and the Collective Struggle for Economic Justice, in THE GREAT POLARIZATION: HOW IDEAS, POWER AND POLICIES DRIVE INEQUALITY, chapter 13, pp. 348-66 (Rudiger von Arnim & Joseph Stiglitz, eds.] (Columbia University Press, 2022).
- Assembly Rights and Collective Action, in THE CAMBRIDGE HANDBOOK OF U.S. LABOR LAW: REVIVING AMERICAN LABOR FOR A 21ST CENTURY ECONOMY [Rick Bales & Charlotte Garden, eds.] (Cambridge University Press 2018)
- Consuming Work, in INVISIBLE LABOR: HIDDEN WORK IN THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD [Marion Crain, Winifred Poster & Miriam Cherry, eds.] (University of California Press 2016).
- Unionism, Law, and the Collective Struggle for Economic Justice (with Ken Matheny), in WORKING AND LIVING IN THE SHADOW OF ECONOMIC FRAGILITY [Marion Crain & Michael Sherraden, eds.] (Oxford University Press 2014).
- Sex Discrimination as Collective Harm, in THE SEX OF CLASS: WOMEN TRANSFORMING AMERICAN LABOR [Dorothy Sue Cobble, ed.] (Cornell University Press 2007).
- The Story of Emporium Capwell: Civil Rights, Collective Action, and the Constraints of Union Power (with Calvin Sharpe & Reuel Schiller), in LABOR STORIES [Laura Cooper & Catherine Fisk, eds.] (Foundation Press 2005).
Articles & Essays
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Profit, Mission and Protest at Work, forthcoming 108 Minn. L. Rev. — (2024).
-
Sexual Harassment and Solidarity 87 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 56 (2019)(with Ken Matheny).
-
Labor Unions, Solidarity and Money, 22 Emp. Rts. & Emp. Pol’y J. 259 (2018)(with Ken Matheny).
- The ‘New’ Labor Regime, 126 YALE L. J. FORUM 478 (April 24, 2017) (with Ken Matheny).
- Re-Assembling Labor, 2015 ILLINOIS L. REV. 1791 (with John Inazu).
- Beyond Unions, Notwithstanding Labor Law, 4 UNIV. OF CALIF.-IRVINE L. REV. 561 (2014) (with Ken Matheny).
- A Holistic Approach to Teaching Work Law, 58 ST. LOUIS U. L.J. 7 (2013) (with Pauline Kim) (symposium on teaching labor and employment law).
- Work, Free Will and Law, 23 EMPLOYEE RESPONSIBILITIES AND RIGHTS JOURNAL (December 2012).
- An Imminent Hanging, 26 ABA J. LAB. & EMP. L. 151 (2011) (GW/NLRB Symposium on The National Labor Relations Act at 75: Its Legacy and Future).
- Arm’s Length Intimacy: Employment as Relationship, 35 WASH. U. J. LAW & POL’Y163 (2011) [Symposium on For Love or Money?, sponsored by the Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Work & Social Capital].
- Managing Identity: Buying Into the Brand at Work, 95 IOWA L. REV. 1179 (2010).
- Work Matters, 19 KANSAS J. LAW & PUB. POL’Y 365 (2010) [Symposium on Employment Law in Recessionary Times].
- Introduction to Conference on Wealth Inequality and the Eroding Middle Class, 15 GEORGETOWN JOURNAL ON POVERTY LAW & POLICY 411 (2008) [conference co-sponsored by the UNC Center on Poverty, Work & Opportunity and the American Constitution Society].
- Branded: Corporate Image, Sexual Stereotyping, and the New Face of Capitalism (with Dianne Avery), 14 DUKE JOURNAL OF GENDER, LAW & POLICY 13 (2007) [symposium issue on Makeup, Identity Performance and Discrimination].
- Strategies for Union Relevance in a Post-Industrial World: Reconceiving Antidiscrimination Rights as Collective Rights, LAB. LAW J. 158 (Fall 2006) [Symposium on Labor Law, George Washington University].
- Afterword: The American Romance with Autonomy, 10 EMP. RTS. & EMP’T POL’Y J. 187 (2006) [Summit on Poverty sponsored by UNC Center on Poverty, Work & Opportunity].
- Disloyal Workers and the “Un-American” Labor Law (with Ken Matheny), 82 NO. CAROLINA L. REV. 1705 (2004).
- The Transformation of the Professional Workforce, 79 CHI.-KENT L. REV. 543 (2004) [Kenneth M. Piper lecture].
- Whitewashed Labor Law, Skinwalking Unions, 23 BERKELEY J. OF EMP. & LAB. LAW 211 (2002).
- Colorblind Unionism, 49 UCLA L. REV. 1313 (2002).
- Labor’s Identity Crisis (with Ken Matheny), 89 CALIFORNIA L. REV. 1767 (2001).
- Making Labor’s Rhetoric Reality (with Ken Matheny), 5 GREEN BAG 2D 17 (Autumn 2001).
- Comments on UNBENDING GENDER: WHY FAMILY AND WORK CONFLICT AND WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT, 49 AMERICAN UNIV. L. REV. 910 (2000) (symposium).
- “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” Marriage and Breadwinning in Postindustrial Society, 60 OHIO STATE L.J. 1877 (1999).
- “Labor’s Divided Ranks:” Privilege and the United Front Ideology (with Ken Matheny), 84 CORNELL L. REV. 1542 (1999).
- Women, Labor Unions, and Hostile Work Environment Sexual Harassment: The Untold Story, 4 U. TX. J. WOMEN & THE LAW 9 (1995).
- Between Feminism and Unionism: Working Class Women, Sex Equality, and Labor Speech, 82 GEO. L.J. 1903 (1994).
- Confronting the Structural Character of Working Women’s Economic Subordination: Collective Action vs. Individual Rights Models, 3 KANSAS J. LAW & PUB. POL’Y 26 (1994).
- Gender and Union Organizing, 47 IND. & LAB. REL. REV. (CORNELL UNIVERSITY) 227 (1994).
- Rationalizing Inequality: An Antifeminist Defense of the “Free” Market – A Review of FORBIDDEN GROUNDS, 61 GEO. WASH. L. REV. 556 (1993).
- Feminism, Labor and Power, 65 SO. CALIF. L. REV. 1819 (1992).
- Images of Power in Labor Law: A Feminist Deconstruction, 33 BOSTON COLLEGE L. REV. 481 (1992).
- Feminizing Unions: Challenging the Gendered Structure of Wage Labor, 89 MICH. L. REV. 1155 (1991).
- Building Solidarity Through Expansion of NLRA Coverage: A Blueprint for Worker Empowerment, 74 MINN. L. REV. 953 (1990).
- Expanded Employee Drug Detection Programs and the Public Good: Big Brother at the Bargaining Table, 64 N.Y.U. L. REV. 1286 (1989).
- Has ‘Labor Law’ Failed? A Rejoinder to Richard Trumka, 89 W. VA. L. REV. 903 (1987).
- The Unenforceable Successorship Clause: A Departure From National Labor Policy, 30 UCLA L. REV. 1249 (1983).
Media
Activity & Affiliations
- Interim Provost & Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, 2019-2020.
- Vice Provost, Washington University, since 2012-2019
- Leader of the University Libraries, 2016-2017
- Director, Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Work & Social Capital, 2010-2014
- Faculty Fellow, Provost’s office, 2009-2012
- Director, Center on Poverty, Work & Opportunity, University of North Carolina, 2006-2008
- The Labor Law Group, member since 1996; Chair, 2011-2015
- American Association of Law Schools, Section on Labor & Employment Law, Chair, 1998-1999
- Board of Editors, Employee Rights & Employment Policy Journal, 1997-2019
Courtesy Washington University Faculty Appointments:
- George Warren Brown School of Social Work
- Department of Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies, College of Arts & Sciences
- Sociology Department, College of Arts & Sciences
Honors & Awards
- Israel Treiman Research Fellow, Washington University, 2010-11
- David M. Becker Professor of the Year, Washington University, 2009
- National Science Foundation, Division of Law & Social Science, 1992-93 (grant)
- Fund for Labor Relations Studies, 1993 (grant)
- Professor of the Year, West Virginia University College of Law, 1988
- ABA Rookie Program of the Year, Volunteer Income Tax Program Coordinator, 1988