Fueled by a bequest from Christopher Baldy, a 1910 UB law graduate and prominent Buffalo attorney, the center's activities are geared to adapt to the ever-changing dynamics of law and society here and abroad.

"Our activities make us more visible throughout the country and around the world and help us to draw outstanding students and faculty members to our campus," says center director and law professor David M. Engel.

"Today, the program at UB is mentioned in the same breath with programs at Berkeley, Wisconsin, New York University and Oxford."

The broad outline of an interdisciplinary program took root under then law-school dean Richard D. Schwartz, becoming the Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy in 1978 under the deanship of Thomas E. Headrick, SUNY Distinguished Service Professor. Barry B. Boyer, professor of law, served as director for 14 years before becoming law-school dean in 1992.

Today, the center provides a forum for more than 100 affiliated UB faculty members and interested students to discuss and collaborate on research dealing with legal and social issues here and abroad. Interests and expertise intersect through more than a dozen disciplines in the Law School, School of Social Work, School of Management, College of Arts and Sciences and the Libraries.

The Baldy Center sponsors faculty-level sociolegal research, lectures and instruction within five broad research programs:

- Children, Families and the Law. Members of this program explore how law and policy deal with children as legal subjects, victims, witnesses and as perpetrators of illegal acts. Studies have addressed such topics as parental and medical perceptions of child abuse, the veracity and credibility of child witnesses in legal proceedings, prosecution of child abuse homicides, child protective services processing of cases, and adolescent delinquency and substance abuse. The program is directed by Murray Levine, SUNY Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Psychology, and Susan Mangold, associate professor of law.

- Community and Identity. Research in this program investigates the processes of law and social change that operate within communities to include some persons and groups while excluding others. It examines the role of law in creating norms or perceptions through which groups attempt to define themselves as dominant and others as subordinate or deviant. It also examines the capacity of law to transform or reverse these processes of exclusion and subordination. Studies in this program have focused on such groups as the poor, racial and ethnic minorities, persons with disabilities, prisoners, women in the labor movement and the job market, the working classes generally and the elderly. The program is directed by a steering committee that includes Meghan Cope, assistant professor of georgraphy; David Gerber, professor of history; Bruce Jackson, SUNY Distinguished Professor in the Department of English, and Frank Munger, professor of law.

- Gender, Law and Social Policy. Research in this program explores the intersections of legal, social and political constructions of gender and gender-related issues. One group of studies addresses issues related to reproductive rights, such as legal interpretations of reproductive injury and pain (DES litigation), abortion-rights activism and reproductive technology. A second group addresses issues related to women of color, such as African-American women in the military and public-interest advocacy for women of color. A third group explores women's participation in the paid labor force and the issues their participation has raised for policymakers, judges, arbitrators and union activists. A fourth group is engaged in community-based research on various issues relating to violence against women. The program is directed by law professor Lucinda Finley.

- International and Comparative Legal Studies. The Program on International and Comparative Legal Studies fosters and encourages interdisciplinary research and scholarship in the rapidly expanding fields of international and comparative law. Members of this program conduct research on the national and transnational arenas where law and policy impact each other to generate social phenomena and practices. Co-directors of the program are Claude E. Welch, SUNY Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Political Science, and law professor Makau Mutua.

- Regulation and Public Policy. Research in this program explores the purpose of government and the policy methods chosen to implement social goals. Several members are interested in the political economy and political philosophy of the welfare state. Other members are interested in organization theory as applied to regulation. Examples of current research projects include a philosophical inquiry into the justification of progressive taxation and its relation to collective decision-making, and an examination of changes in U.S. workers' compensation systems. Program co-directors are Martha McCluskey, associate professor of law; and Govind Hariharan, assistant professor of finance and managerial economics.

Although it does not directly fund research projects, the center provides seed money for selected proposals from affiliated faculty and funds support services for student research assistants, and research-related travel and other expenses.

It regularly publishes the "Baldy Bulletin," which lists news items, and upcoming center-sponsored events and activities.

The center's "Working Paper Series" publishes results of faculty members' research. The center also serves as the home for Law & Policy, an interdisciplinary journal of law and social science.

Each fall, the Short Course Series is taught by distinguished visitors who have included two ambassadors to the United Nations and one of the most influential authorities on women and the law.

Conferences also have been sponsored on "Poverty, Low-Wage Labor and Social Retrenchment," "The New York State Death Penalty and "Collaborative Interventions in Family Violence Cases in Western New York."

The center's three-member, full-time staff is headed by associate director Laura Mangan.