scholarly journals Promoting Clinical Legal Education and Democracy in India

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sital Kalantry

Clinical legal education emerged in the United States in the 1960s to givevaluable skill-based instructions to law students while providing legal servicesto people who could not otherwise afford them. This essay proposesanother reason why both Indian and American law schools should supportthe development of law clinics. Drawing on the works of John Dewey andMartha Nussbaum, I argue that clinical legal education promotes democracy.Both elite American and Indian universities are largely unrepresentativeof the respective population demographics of their countries. In clinics,law students bridge this divide by undertaking representation for peoplefrom different racial, caste, and income backgrounds than themselves.These exchanges generate empathy and knowledge among students aboutthe challenges marginalized groups in the society.face. Consequently, theylearn to recognize other citizens as equals and to formulate policies thatwill enhance the welfare of society(y as a whole. There is an urgent needto formalize clinical legal education programs in Indian law schools bothfor purposes of enhancing the democracy as well as providing skill-basedtraining to law students and much-needed legal services to the poor.Published: Promoting Legal Education and Democracy in India, 8 National University of Juridical Science 1 (2015).

2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 821-844
Author(s):  
Lawrence Donnelly

In this article, Lawrence Donnelly, an American born and trained attorney who is now a Lecturer & Director of Clinical Legal Education in the School of Law at the National University of Ireland, Galway, considers Professor Brian Tamanaha's seminalFailing Law Schools, a comprehensive critique of legal education in the United States. The article first thoroughly outlines and analyses the central lines of argument inFailing Law Schoolsand then evaluates the scholarship written in response to it. The article next compares and contrasts the state of play in legal education in the US with what is happening in Western Europe and posits that, for a variety of reasons, law schools on the eastern side of the Atlantic Ocean may actually be better – and more realistically – placed at present than their US counterparts. Lastly, the article urges that legal educators around the world continue an open dialogue on the “crisis” Professor Tamanaha presciently identifies in a concerted effort to ensure that law students receive the best possible training to equip them for working in legal careers that may not closely resemble those pursued by their predecessors in light of rapid globalization, ever-improving technology and consequent changes to how legal services are provided.


2004 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 335-338 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry Bakken

During the past decade many American law schools have identified and responded to the opportunity and necessity of training law students and lawyers for the challenges created by globalization. Opportunities are certainly available to schools with strong business, international trade and human rights programs. Opportunities are, however, also available to schools with interests and strengths in the newer disciplines such as conflict resolution, intellectual property and environment protection. Law schools which have ventured into global oriented training have recognized that the market is not simply a one-way-street for domestic students but also includes training of foreign law students and lawyers. Private foundations in the United States and abroad, foreign governments and our national government have helped finance foreign lawyer visits and training events throughout America. When international lawyers visit the United States, domestic law schools are involved as hosts, training sites, and sources of professional expertise. There has also been a simultaneous movement of domestic lawyers and law students through foreign law school programs and other study abroad opportunities. When all these international experiences are taken together one realizes the need for law schools to become more involved in the development and implementation of training and development of globally oriented legal education.


2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (6) ◽  
pp. 1078-1096
Author(s):  
Rogelio Pérez-Perdomo

In the 1960s, law graduates from Latin American and other civil law countries started flocking to American law schools. Comparative law scholars have discussed the wide differences between American and civil law systems of legal education and predicted trials and tribulations for students going to the United States. This article argues that such students do not experience the predicted shock mainly because American law schools have undergone major changes themselves and legal education in civil law countries has also changed. These changes are part of globalization. The article also speculates about other possible consequences of the globalization of legal education. En la década de 1960 graduados en derecho de América Latina y de otros países de tradición romanista comenzaron a frecuentar las escuelas de derecho de los Estados Unidos. Los comparatistas predijeron graves dificultades de adaptación por las diferencias en la concepción del derecho y en la educación jurídica. El artículo sostiene que la adaptación ha sido más fácil de lo esperado tanto por las transformaciones de las escuelas de derecho de los Estados Unidos como los cambios en la educación jurídica en los países romanistas. Esto es parte de la globalización de la educación jurídica. El artículo examina otras consecuencias posibles de la globalización.


2006 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-247 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce A. Kimball

Case method teaching was first introduced into American higher education in 1870 by Christopher C. Langdell (1826-1906) of Harvard Law School (HLS), where it became closely associated with—and emblematic of—a set of academic meritocratic reforms. Though regnant today, “the ultimate triumph of [Langdell's] system was not apparent” for many years. The vast majority of students, alumni, and law professors initially derided it as an “abomination,” and for two decades case method and the associated reforms were largely confined to Harvard. During the subsequent twenty-five years between 1890 and 1915, a national controversy ensued as to whether case method teaching—and the concomitant meritocratic reforms—would predominate in legal education and, ultimately, professional education in the United States.


2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 334 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann Thanaraj ◽  
Michael Sales

<p>This practice paper offers a modest proposition that could make law graduates more capable of serving their clients in a modernised and efficient manner. We propose that in addition to law clinics and other forms of experiential activities, law schools could add a new type of clinical component to their curriculum that teaches students to use technology to assist in the delivery of legal services. Digital lawyering skills will help law students learn core competencies needed in an increasingly technological profession, and it may help close the gap between offering access to justice by making legal services available online in the most accessible and convenient way possible and in equipping law graduates with a modernised and digital legal education. </p>


2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 535-578
Author(s):  
Bruce A. Kimball

Between 1915 and 1925, Harvard University conducted the first national public fund-raising campaign in higher education in the United States. At the same time, Harvard Law School attempted the first such effort in legal education. The law school organized its effort independently, in conjunction with its centennial in 1917. The university campaign succeeded magnificently by all accounts; the law school failed miserably. Though perfectly positioned for this new venture, Harvard Law School raised scarcely a quarter of its goal from merely 2 percent of its alumni. This essay presents the first account of this campaign and argues that its failure was rooted in longstanding cultural and professional objections that many of the school's alumni shared: law students and law schools neither need nor deserve benefactions, and such gifts worsen the overcrowding of the bar. Due to these objections, lethargy, apathy, and pessimism suffused the campaign. These factors weakened the leadership of the alumni association, the dean, and the president, leading to inept management, wasted time, and an unlikely strategy that was pursued ineffectively. All this doomed the campaign, particularly given the tragic interruptions of the dean's suicide and World War I, along with competition from the well-run campaigns for the University and for disaster relief due to the war.


2003 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 621-622 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce Kercher

Peter Karsten asks why there might be a greater comparative propensity among CANZ historians than among those of the United States. Part of the reason may lie in the legal education many of us in Australia received, and in the formal legal status of many commonwealth countries until recently. As recently as the early 1970s, Australian law students were taught that English law was as significant as that made in the Australian courts. Appeals from the Australian Supreme Courts to the Privy Council were finally abolished only in 1986. From that time onward, there was a drive within the law schools to find differences from England, to look toward comparisons with other places than England.


2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 53
Author(s):  
Tymoteusz Zych

More Theory, more Practice? Interdisciplinary and NonDogmatic Education in American Law School CurriculaSummaryWhile American legal education is very often invoked as a modelfor Polish law faculties, the actual role of interdisciplinary and non--dogmatic courses in the curricula of American law schools has not beencoherently analysed yet. The American example shows that the conceptof legal education has a significant impact on the development of thelegal system. Interdisciplinary courses have been present in the curricula of university law schools since the beginning of American history.Currently the American Bar Association requires law schools to includenon-dogmatic contents in their curricula to obtain accreditation. Thewidest range of non-dogmatic courses is offered by the most prestigiouslaw schools. Leading American legal thinkers of all currents emphasisethe importance of interdisciplinary and non-dogmatic subjects in theeducational process. The paper concludes with a comparative analysisof the role of interdisciplinary subjects in law school curricula in Polandand in the United States.


2014 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence Donnelly

<p>This article details the incipient efforts of one Irish university law school, the National University of Ireland, Galway (NUI Galway), in the field of clinical legal education. While clinical legal education, which began in the United States some fifty years ago, has made significant advances throughout the rest of the common law world, it remains at a very early stage in Ireland.1 In fact, Irish efforts in the field to date more closely resemble what is known in the United States as the “externship model” of legal education, rather than what are commonly identified as law clinics in other jurisdictions.2 And for a variety of reasons that will be touched upon later in this article, the law school clinic is unlikely to develop here to the same extent it has elsewhere. As such, this article explores what Irish clinical legal education currently looks like and what it might look like in the future.</p><p>It begins with some background on and consideration of legal education in Ireland, then, using NUI Galway as a case study, details the emergence of skills teaching in the curriculum and the consequential increase in participation in moot court competitions and in student scholarly output. The article next examines the establishment, organisation and maintenance of a placement programme for final year law students. In so doing, it reflects on what has worked and what has not at NUI Galway from the perspectives of the clinical director, placement supervisors and students. The article concludes with some realistic, yet sanguine, observations as to what future clinical legal education has in Ireland.</p>


Author(s):  
Willem Hendrik Gravett

It is a sad fact that at most university law schools in South Africa, a student can graduate without ever having set foot in a courtroom, and without ever having spoken to, or on behalf of, a person in need of advice or counsel. The past several years have witnessed a swelling chorus of complaints that the current LLB curriculum produces law graduates who were "out of their depth" in practice. My purpose is to make a case for the inclusion in the LLB curriculum of a course in trial advocacy. This endeavour of necessity invokes the broader debate over the educational objectives of a university law school – a debate memorably framed by William Twining as the two polar images of "Pericles and the plumber". My thesis is that the education of practising lawyers should be the primary mission of the university law school. The first part of this contribution is a response to those legal academics who hold that the role of the law school is to educate law students in the theories and substance of the law; that it is not to function as a trade school or a nursery school for legal practice. With reference to the development of legal education in the United States, I argue that the "education/training" dichotomy has been exposed as a red herring. This so-called antithesis is false, because it assumes that a vocational approach is necessarily incompatible with such values as free inquiry, intellectual rigour, independence of thought, and breadth of perspective. The modern American law school has shown that such so-called incompatibility is the product of intellectual snobbery and devoid of any substance. It is also often said that the raison d'être of a university legal education is to develop in the law student the ability "to think like a lawyer". However, what legal academics usually mean by "thinking like a lawyer" is the development of a limited subset of the skills that are of crucial importance in practising law: one fundamental cognitive skill – analysis – and one fundamental applied skill – legal research. We are not preparing our students for other, equally crucial lawyering tasks – negotiating, client counselling, witness interviewing and trial advocacy. Thinking like a lawyer is a much richer and more intricate process than merely collecting and manipulating doctrine. We cannot say that we are fulfilling our goal to teach students to "think like lawyers", because the complete lawyer "thinks" about doctrine and about trial strategy and about negotiation and about counselling. We cannot teach students to "think like lawyers" without simultaneously teaching them what lawyers do. An LLB curriculum that only produces graduates who can "think like lawyers" in the narrow sense ill-serves them, the profession and the public. If the profession is to improve the quality of the services it provides to the public, it is necessary for the law schools to recognise that their students must receive the skills needed to put into practice the knowledge and analytical abilities they learn in the substantive courses. We have an obligation to balance the LLB curriculum with courses in professional competence, including trial advocacy – courses that expose our students to what actually occurs in lawyer-client relationships and in courtrooms. The skills our law students would acquire in these courses are essential to graduating minimally-competent lawyers whom we can hand over to practice to complete their training. The university law school must help students form the habits and skills that will carry over to a lifetime of practice. Nothing could be more absurd than to neglect in education those practical matters that are necessary for a person's future calling.


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