Learn to build a world where everyone belongs. Take free classes at OBI University.   Start Now

*

Breadcrumb

Stephen Menendian

Stephen Menendian is the Assistant Director and Director of Research at the Othering & Belonging Institute, where he supervises or leads many important initiatives, including projects advising state, local, and federal housing authorities. Stephen is the author of many scholarly publications and journal articles, including the landmark books Structural Racism: The Dynamics of Opportunity and Race in America and Belonging Without Othering: How We Save Ourselves and the World (with john a. powell) from Stanford University Press.

Stephen’s primary areas of expertise are structural racism, civil rights, fair housing, belonging, affirmative action, targeted universalism, and educational equity, and his research focuses on the production of inequality between social groups, how institutions and communities can foster belonging (moving beyond “diversity, equity, and inclusion”), and the optimal design of equitable race-conscious policies as permitted by law, including California’s anti-affirmative action ballot initiative, Proposition 209.

Stephen’s most recent scholarly publications in refereed journals include “The Past, Present, and Future of Zoning Reform in the United States,” an examination of recent zoning reform efforts at the local, state and federal levels for the Rutgers Journal of Law & Public Policy, “Race and Politics: The Problem of Entanglement in Gerrymandering Cases,” which critically explores the divergent constitutional standards governing judicial review of partisan gerrymandering versus racial gerrymandering claims for the Southern California Law Review, and “The Shadow Constitution: Rescuing Our Inheritance from Neglect and Disuse,” a survey of a dozen federal constitutional provisions that have fallen into disuse for the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law.

Among other Institute projects, Stephen spearheaded the “Roots of Structural Racism,” a multi-faceted, interactive study revealing the persistence of racial residential segregation and its harmful consequences, and directs the California Zoning Atlas, a comprehensive database and analysis of restrictive zoning regulations in California. Stephen also directs the “Structural Racism Remedies Project,” an exhaustive repository and analysis of policy recommendations aimed at addressing racial inequality, the Racial Disparities Dashboard, an interactive tool for assessing racial inequality and progress across a broad range of indicators, and the Zoning Reform Tracker, a repository for tracking municipal zoning reform initiatives across the United States. Stephen also co-leads the Inclusiveness Index, an annual ranking of global and US state inclusivity, and supervises the Campus Bridging Project, an initiative designed to create connections between social groups at Berkeley and to inculcate a deeper sense of belonging on campus.

Stephen co-chaired “Race & Inequality in America: The Kerner Commission at 50 conference,” a conference held in the spring of 2018 that brought together the nation’s leading experts on race and housing, the criminal justice system, employment, transportation and heath care in order to envision a contemporary racial justice agenda. The proceedings are archived on our Kerner@50 conference page, including “The Road Not Taken: Housing and Criminal Justice 50 Years after the Kerner Commission Report,” a retrospective report analyzing the failure to heed the warnings and adopt the policy recommendations advanced by the Kerner Commission in the realms of housing and policing, co-authored with Richard Rothstein.

Stephen developed and co-authored the Institute's Amicus brief in the United States Supreme Court case of Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. the Inclusive Communities Project, which was cited by the Supreme Court in its landmark decision recognizing disparate impact claims under the federal Fair Housing Act. He also co-authored the Institute’s Amicus brief in Fisher v. Texas asking the Court to uphold the University of Texas’ race-conscious admissions policy in 2016.

Stephen regularly presents on the subjects of fair housing, affordable housing, racial segregation and inequality, zoning and land use policies, structural racism, Proposition 209 and race-conscious policymaking, targeted universalism, bridging practices and operationalizing belonging. In 2022, for example, Stephen was a featured speaker at the UC Center Sacramento, where he unpacked the “housing crises,” and served on a panel for the San Francisco Ed Fund on how to promote educational equity.

He has been interviewed, and his work covered, by CNN, Time, Newsweek, the Atlantic, the Guardian, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, Five Thirty Eight, The Root, Axios, Bloomberg News, the New York Post, and the East Bay Times, among other print media, and many local radio and television stations across the country (see media mentions below).

Stephen also regularly advises and provides technical assistance to policymakers, foundations, non-profits and other institutions on creative ways to promote diversity, equity and inclusion within the bounds of law and on equity metrics, such as measures of segregation, opportunity and belonging. For example, Stephen testified before the California Reparations Task Force on housing segregation and the racial wealth gap, before a joint hearing of two California General Assembly committees on the subject of racial disparities in homeownership and policies to reduce them. Stephen was also an expert reviewer for the “Stronger Democracy Award,” and has served as an expert witness in multiple disparate impact housing lawsuits. Stephen is a licensed attorney.

Selected Publications:

Books:

Journal Articles and Chapters:

Selected Institute Publications:

Media Mentions