Daniela Tagtachian

Daniela Adriana Tagtachian is a community lawyer with a focus on poverty law and a sociology PhD student at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). Prior to joining CUNY, she was a community lawyer and supervising attorney at the University of Miami School of Law Environmental Justice Clinic. While there, she worked with low-to-moderate income minority communities and sought to address systemic inequity through the development of anti-displacement strategies and policies and by supporting toxic tort lawsuits.

She is a qualitative scholar, and her research interests include municipal equity and the empowerment of marginalized communities, legal estrangement, inclusion/exclusion through civic engagement, structural inequity, the role of law in the perpetuation of inequality, social justice, democracy and civic participation, theories and modalities of social change, community organizing, and social movements. She is also interested in expanding the legal curriculum to include organizing fundamentals, power-building frameworks, and an assessment of successful campaigns for economic and racial justice. Aspiring lawyers and agents of positive social change should learn how the law can be used to bring about sustained, transformative change and have the tools, skills, and opportunities to respond to the needs of the current moment.