The place of law in a business studies curriculum

Abstract

LEGAL ETHICS are the values that inform the practice of law. This article establishes what and how Australian law schools teach about legal ethics and suggests what and how Australian law schools should teach about legal ethics.

First, the article establishes that Australian law schools tend to teach legal ethics as if it were only concerned with the law of lawyering. It also establishes that Australian law schools tend to teach legal ethics discretely over the course of one subject out of the whole undergraduate curriculum.

Secondly, this article suggests the adoption of a new approach to legal ethics as the ability to exercise legal ethical judgment. It also suggests a pervasive method of instruction that integrates issues of legal ethics and the process of legal ethical judgment into every subject in the undergraduate curriculum in combination with discrete subjects on the context and substance of the law of lawyering.     

Intensive teaching in law subjects

The use of intensive teaching is increasing in Australian law schools. For some Australian law schools, most of their masters subjects are now taught on an intensive basis. This article reviews the literature on intensive teaching. The observation is made that there has been little discussion in the literature of the merits of such teaching in law schools. The article also reports the results of a statistical analysis comparing the student evaluations of a subject in the masters program of an Australian law school that was taught on an intensive basis with the student evaluations of the same subject taught by the same teacher across a full semester. Finally, the article reports the results of interviews with teachers at one Australian law school that makes extensive use of intensive teaching in its masters program. The teachers identify successful teaching techniques and they also identify some challenges with intensive teaching.     

论诸法学流派对法律方法的理论支援

法律方法理论不仅受规范法学理论的制约和支持,而且也受其他法学流派的制约和支持。不同法学流派所支持的具体法律方法不尽相同。如价值法学之于价值衡量、社会法学之于事实替代、规范法学之于效力识别、经济分析法学之于利益衡量、多元论法学之于法律续造等,都更容易产生支持效果。尽管不同法学流派各自支持不同的法律方法,但这不否定某一法律方法受多个法学流派理论支援的情形,也不否定一个法学流派可以支持多种法律方法的情形。     

The limits and benefits of international mobility: an empirical examination of the biographies of Australian legal academics

ABSTRACT

Academics are becoming increasingly internationally mobile, and yet there is still limited research into the nature, outcomes and limits of academic mobility. This paper examines the biographies of over 700 academics employed within Australian law schools. It identifies legal academics who hold academics qualifications have been employed outside of Australia. Almost a quarter of legal academics in our sample hold a first degree outside of Australia, over a third hold a non-Australian post-graduate degree. While it could be expected that possessing international experience would broaden an academic’s cultural experiences, we also found that the internationally mobile academics have typically studied and worked previously within an elite international law school, and are now employed within an elite Australian law school. In addition, experiences of international mobility are not equally distributed, and male legal academics are significantly more likely to have international experience than female legal academics.     

It is the worst time in living history to be a law graduate: or is it? Does Australia have too many law graduates?

According to the Australian legal profession and media, law schools are producing too many graduates relative to the number of vacancies within the profession. This claim, however, is hardly new. This paper identifies a number of junctions at which there has been concern about the overproduction of law graduates, showing that this discourse appears during periods of major economic stress. It also shows that until the most recent episode of concern, the perception that there are too many law graduates relative to employment opportunities has not been supported by empirical evidence. In the past, the increasing supply of law graduates has been met with increasing demand. However, the legal profession is now facing unprecedented market competition and restructure, and opportunities in the profession for new graduates have declined. This still does not mean that the law schools are producing too many graduates. The current cohort of graduates is likely to continue into a professional occupation, although not necessarily in private legal practice, and there is a lack of lawyers working in disadvantaged communities.     

Law Professors: A Profile of the Teaching Branch of the legal Profession

In the United States, law schools provide the principal route of entry into the legal profession. Indeed, education in a law school is the only experience that virtually all members of the modern legal profession have in common. The gatekeeping function of law schools places the nation's law teachers in a most influential position. Although law professors play a vital role in selecting and molding the members of the profession, little research has been done on them. This article presents the results of the American Bar Foundation's first major study of law teachers. The author finds them to be a most highly credentialed group of lawyers, the overwhelming majority of whom are graduates of a small group of elite law schools. She also finds that possession of a degree from one of these schools appears to be not only highly determinative of who become law teachers but also of the nature of teachers' academic careers.     

公立高等学校性质的行政法透视

近些年发生的以高校为被告的案件层出不穷,但司法机关应当以何种立场来解决涉高校的诉讼案件却缺乏统一标准,究其根本原因乃在于对高等学校性质是什么或者应当是什么没有足够的认识。事实上,无论是将公立高等学校定位于一般的事业单位,还是行政法意义上的法律法规授权的组织抑或第三部门,都难以自恰地解释高等学校在实践中存在的多重身份以及由此产生的多重法律关系和法律纠纷,但如果将其定位于公务法人则可以在某种程度上克服上述缺陷。     

The Path of the Law Review: How Interfield Ties Contribute to Institutional Emergence and Buffer against Change

Early neoinstitutional theory tended to assume institutional reproduction, while recent accounts privilege situations in which alternative models from outside an organizational environment or delegitimizing criticism from within precipitate institutional change. We know little about institutions that persist despite such change conditions. Recent advances in sociological field theory suggest that interfield ties contribute to institutional change but under‐theorize how such ties may reinforce institutions. Extending both approaches, I incorporate self‐reinforcing mechanisms from path‐dependence scholarship. I elucidate my framework by analyzing the student‐edited, student‐reviewed law review. Despite its anomalous position relative to the dominant peer‐reviewed journal model of other disciplines, and despite sustained criticisms from those who publish in them, the law review remains a bedrock institution of law schools and legal scholarship. I combine qualitative historical analyses of legal scholarship and law schools with quantitative analyses of law‐review structures and field contestation. The analysis covers law review's entire historical trajectory—its emergence, its institutionalization and coherence of a field around it, and its current state as a contested but persistent institution. I argue that self‐reinforcing mechanisms evident in law review's ties to related fields‐legal practice, law schools, the university, and legal periodicals—both enabled its emergence and have buffered it against change.     

Teaching collaborative problem-solving skills to law students

This article describes and critically evaluates a collaborative dispute resolution activity conducted in a mid-degree law subject at an Australian university. Australian law degrees are required to be vocational. Teaching problem-solving to law students is an effective way to impart key professional skills. However, it requires planning and preparation. It is therefore important to reflect on whether the aims of the activity have been achieved. In particular, three ideas about what constitutes good teaching are explored. The first is that good teachers do not simply deliver content – they give their students problems to solve. The second is the expectation employers have that law graduates will readily collaborate with their colleagues. Finally, giving students an opportunity to reflect on what they have learned will enable students to transfer what they have understood and articulated to legal practice. By delineating each of these three teaching aims, it is possible to assess the value and effectiveness of the problem-solving activity. This paper also reflects on the positive impact that is achieved when authentic and ethical legal processes are embedded into student-centred learning.     

Innovation in the Australian legal profession

Over the next decades, advances in technology and new business practices will challenge a traditionally conservative legal profession. With a focus on the Australian legal profession, this article explores the nature of the challenges and, in particular, considers whether the challenges pose a threat of disruptive innovation. The article aims to add to understanding of how Australian law firms are responding to the challenges by drawing on empirical data that examines the drivers and inhibitors of innovation in Australian law firms, the areas where Australian legal firms are innovating, and the outcomes of their innovation. The article concludes that there is limited evidence of incumbent displacement and that, gradually, the profession is rising to the challenges.     

Through a screen,darkly: Electronic legal education in Europe

Abstract

Electronic legal education involves the use of information, communication and instructional technologies to enhance students’ learning of the law and to provide law teachers with environments and tools for teaching the law. With the fast growth of the Internet many Law schools and Law faculties are moving their education and training into web environments. This may open new ways of teaching and learning the law by providing students with an environment in which they can manage legal information and legal knowledge for their personal professional use. However, it is clear that throughout Europe there are divergent as well as convergent uses of the web and IT This article explores some of the issues inherent in this, and suggests a number of projects that would enable ICT in legal education to facilitate the aims of the Sorbonne‐Bologna process.     

EMPOWERMENT,INNOVATION, AND SERVICE: LAW SCHOOL PROGRAMS PROVIDE ACCESS TO JUSTICE AND INSTILL A COMMITMENT TO SERVE

Law schools around the country seek to fill the legal needs of their communities in ways that are both innovative and mutually beneficial to clients and students. This article describes five pro bono and clinical programs, at the University of Richmond School of Law, The Earle Mack School of Law at Drexel University, Catholic University Columbus School of Law, the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, and Vermont Law School, where law students, under the supervision of law professors or community professionals, provide assistance or legal representation to underserved and often marginalized populations needing help with family law problems, including parents accused of abuse and neglect, youth aging out of foster care, homeless families, survivors of domestic violence, homeless veterans with addiction problems, and female prisoners. To develop their programs, the five law schools from the outset collaborated with partners in the community, and they continue to do so as their programs expand and evolve. In addition to helping and empowering clients, these law schools are providing experiential learning opportunities that are transformative for their students. The authors hope that these programs will be instructive for law schools, other academic institutions, the legal community, and community organizations in developing creative collaborations to ensure better access to justice.     

论作为"制度"的法学院

法律职业为限制性的职业,目前两大法系主要国家都在制度上将法学院教育作为进入法律职业的第一道门槛;法律的技艺性、智识性和一定的神秘性及其规范特征决定了法律职业必须具备共同的职业素养,凭借法学教授、法学图书资科和法学院的社区生活三要件,制度性法学院而非仅仅作为场所的法学院培育这些素养并促使法律职业共同体形成。我国现实呼唤在制度上确立法学院教育的门槛地位,建设胜任于培育法律人的制度性法学院。     

反思与改革：法学本科实践教学创新模式研究——以法律职业教育为视角的一种思考

法学教育的定位应当是通识教育与职业教育的“合成体”,其教育模式与内容应着眼于培育“法律人”群体职业素养。我国法学本科教育更为注重传授通识教育和法律基本知识,职业教育内容缺失。在缺少独立的法律职业教育环节的背景下,我国法科院校的本科实践教学“职业化”改革就显得尤为重要,其内容不仅是注重培养法律实务操作能力,更重要的是形成法律思维、职业道德和社会责任感。     

Legal education in France and England: A comparative study*

Abstract

Despite the fact that part‐time law students comprise a significant proportion of law undergraduates, there continues to be an absence of legal research that considers the experiences and aspirations of such students as a distinct group. Against this backdrop, it is argued that these students require further research and attention for a number of reasons. First, their location allows a consideration of the extent to which broader governmental objectives for higher education are being met within law schools. Second, the extent of their presence in higher legal education places an important obligation upon law schools to explore the specific needs of this cohort and to consider the extent to which part‐time law students can be legitimately subsumed into the undergraduate cohort in terms of resources and planning. Third, the legal ambitions of many part‐time law students require a fresh consideration of the expectations of the recruiting legal profession and the legal profession's commitment to broadening social diversity within its ranks. Finally, as the experiences of part‐time and full‐time students become closer, a proper analysis of part‐time law students may provide invaluable information as to how law schools could adapt to meet the needs of all students in the future.     

The rights of donor inseminated children to know their genetic origins in Australia

Twenty years after it was recognised that adopted children have rights to understand their origins, the dawn has finally broken with respect to children conceived as a result of the Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART), specifically donor insemination (DI). Recipients and practitioners of conception technologies focus their energies and ethical deliberation on the achievement of pregnancy and the successful birth of the child. Law, in contrast, must focus beyond birth to enshrine respect for the rights of the child, who is 'not legally capable of defending [his or her] own future interests.' This article undertakes an assessment of what is in the best interests of a child using empirical studies to ground a position that should be adopted by law in Australia. This article also critically evaluates the current legal position of the various States and Territories with regards to a DI conceived child's rights to know of their form of conception; access to identifying information of their donor; at what age they may access information; the position of DI children born before existing legislation; record-keeping; and finally whether international law grants such children rights. Australian children must enjoy the right in theory and practice to know they were donor conceived and the identity of their donor. It is disappointing that New South Wales, as the most recent State to propose legislation on ART, has not utilised international empirical research on the best interests of DI children or even followed the Infertility Treatment Act 1995 (Vic) which seems to be far more progressive in recognising how best to protect the rights of DI children. The current legal position is chaotic. States and Territories should confer power on the Federal Government to legislate uniform and explicit regulation of ART for the benefit of DI children.     

Objectives of Russian law schools today: what is the “ideal jurist”?

ABSTRACT

This article describes how Russian law schools understand their objectives today and whether there is an ideal model of a jurist to which law schools should conform. Different qualitative methods were used in this study, including a review of the post-Soviet legal education reforms, analysis of regulations governing higher legal education, analysis of websites, and expert semi-structured interviews with heads of law schools. The results demonstrate the difficulties faced by law schools, which are forced to balance the state standards of higher education and external legal, social, economic, and political challenges. The study concludes that law schools are experiencing serious difficulties with respect to understandings of their objectives as well as the current redefinition of the normative ideal model of a jurist. The study also makes it possible to draw conclusions about the importance of legal knowledge, different ways of understanding prestige in the legal profession, and the revival of features of the Soviet model of the “ideal jurist.”     

“法律人”建构论纲

立足于法学学科基点的设定,必须提炼“法律人”的人学模式。所谓法律人,即参与法律生活的普通民众,他们依存于法律、参与法律及受制于法律。法学体系、法律基础、法律分析及法律发展方面的需要,为法律人模式的构建奠定了坚实基础,而人类行为的常态、法律制度中人的观念的引入及法学流派有关人的模式的竞争,使法律人模式的构建得以可能。至于法律人的具体特性,论文以“拟制人”、“一般人”、“正常人”、“复合人”进行了概括。     

Thinking like a lawyer/acting like a professional: communities of practice as a means of challenging orthodox legal education

Increasingly, there is pressure upon law schools, in Australia and elsewhere, to impress upon students the significance of the ethical and professional obligations of legal practice. The recent Carnegie Report explicitly looked to law schools “to initiate novice practitioners to think, to perform, and to conduct themselves (that is, to act morally and ethically) like professionals”. Many law students, however, have little appreciation of legal ethics and any concept they may have of professionalism tends to be envisaged as applying only after graduation. In this paper, we explore the idea of a “community of practice”. Lave and Wenger, who coined the phrase, contend that “learning is conceived as a trajectory in which learners move from legitimate peripheral participant to core participant of the community of practice”. We will argue that law students should appreciate that they are entering the legal profession's community of practice and that all aspects of their conduct relevant to professionalism – not only academic integrity, but matters such as time management, teamwork, relationships with peers and staff – relate to this transition into a legal professional community. Such an approach may not only serve to impress upon students the significance of “professionalism” and ethics, but inculcate in them a sense of belonging to a professional community.     

Constructing C.A.L. tutorials

ON THE assumption that law schools should seek to foster a legal profession which takes ethics seriously, this article explores how it may promote the moral development of its students. Having examined how legal education currently fails in this regards, it explores competing psychological theories of moral development and argues that law schools should seek to start students on a ‘moral apprenticeship’ leading to the development of the necessary moral character to equip them for the ethical challenges of practice. The article then looks at the extent to which ideal methods for promoting moral development can be implemented given the current climate in legal education. In particular, it argues that an excellent and viable means of assisting in the process of moral character development is through student involvement in live‐client clinics, particularly if they are run on an extra‐curricular basis.