scholarly journals Dimensions of Legal Ethics in the Light of Paul Ricoeur’s ‘Petite Éthique’

2019 ◽  
pp. 20-28
Author(s):  
Marcin Pieniążek
Keyword(s):  
Codes Of Ethics ◽  
Legal Ethics ◽  
Legal Advisor

The article investigates the multidimensional phenomenon of legal ethics, whose complexity justifies looking for adequate tools for its systematization in philosophy. An attempt is made to characterize a number of aspects of legal ethics in the perspective of Paul Ricoeur’s “little ethics” (French: la petite éthique). The concept makes it possible to order the reflection on the phenomenon of ethics in, among others, the teleological and deontological dimensions, as well as in the intrapersonal (i.e. within a person), interpersonal, and institutional (corporate) dimensions. The article also refers to the question of the textual dimension of legal ethics, including the co-conditioning of the substance of the codes of ethics and the personal “text of action” of a barrister, legal advisor, etc. This provides context for discussing the question of the dialectic of the prescriptive and descriptive aspects of codes of ethics on the basis of Ricoeur’s narratological considerations against a broader background of the dispute between cognitivism and noncognitivism.

On Analyzing The Law of Legal Ethics: An American Perspective

1981 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Ray Patterson
Keyword(s):  
Code Of Ethics ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Codes Of Ethics ◽  
Undesirable Effect ◽  
Legal Ethics ◽  
Ethical Problems ◽  
American Perspective ◽  
Adversary System ◽  
The Common ◽  
Duty Of Loyalty

My purpose in this paper is to present some propositions relevant to the analysis of legal ethical problems. In working my way to those propositions, however, I shall first discuss the need for them and explain why I deem them to be important.My basic thesis is that historically the profession's codes of ethics constituted a jurisprudential anomaly with two unfortunate consequences. First, they had an undesirable effect on the conduct of lawyers in the representation of their clients. Second, and more importantly, they served to impede the development of a satisfactory law of legal ethics.The first proposition is more difficult to establish than the second and I do not propose to dwell on it. But, if you accept the notion that lawyers have used their duty of loyalty to the client to arrogate to themselves the power of acting in accordance with the client's wishes regardless of the consequences to society or to others, I think you will agree with the point. This is not to say that lawyers always exercise that power, and few lawyers, I think, take seriously Lord Brougham's infamous dictum that an advocate “must not regard the alarm, the suffering, the torment, the destruction which he may bring upon any other” in defense of his client. But the fact that the dictum lives on tells us something about the lawyer's perception of his duty of loyalty. Ultimately, I suppose, the notion of the lawyer's duty of loyalty to the client must be attributed to the common law adversary system of trial, but the duty received its most fulsome expression in the profession's code of ethics. Courts never gave loyalty the imprimatur of approval that the profession stamped on it with the rules of ethics.

Legal Ethics in the American Practice of Law

2019 ◽  
pp. 196
Author(s):  
WILLIAM ELLIOTT BUTLER
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Code Of Ethics ◽  
Legal Education ◽  
Legal Profession ◽  
Codes Of Ethics ◽  
The United States ◽  
Professional Responsibility ◽  
Professional Conduct ◽  
Legal Ethics ◽  
Bar Association

The author examines in this article the professional legal ethics in the United States, more commonly known as “professional responsibility”, as a subject to an unusual pattern of “codification”. Detailed rules historically originated with the legal profession itself, initially in legal doctrine and then a Code of Ethics published in 1887 by the Alabama State Bar Association. Whatever borrowing occurred among states when introducing their own “codes of ethics”, the Alabama model was drawn upon when, in 1908, the American Bar Association approved “32 Canons of Professional Ethics”. The sources of law regulating the professional conduct of lawyers in the United States are several. The legal ethics within state courts is regulated by the courts, the legislative (or parliamentary) organ, and the Bar of each state. Professional responsibility, in the spirit of David Hoffman, has become an integral part of legal education and licensing. Law students take a compulsory course in professional responsibility and are required to pass the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination administered nationally in the United States by the National Conference of Bar Examiners. The author concludes, that legal ethics has been an integral part of American legal education since the early nineteenth century. In the twentieth century the legal profession itself introduced “private” canons of ethics which were then accepted by the highest courts in virtually all states as rules of professional conduct binding upon all members of the Bar. It remains a distinctive element of the American legal system that binding rules of professional conduct are formed mostly by the courts, and not by the legislature. These rules are initially “codified” by a voluntary non-State organization, adopted by the courts, and then applied by the courts in cases which ultimately become components of the law of precedent; that is, a separate and distinct source of law.

Defining the Competence of Psychologists with a View to Public Accountability *

1997 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 293-300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ype H. Poortinga ◽  
Ingrid Lunt
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Professional Training ◽  
Professional Competence ◽  
Codes Of Ethics ◽  
The Body ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Rigorous Evaluation ◽  
Judicial Proceedings ◽  
Psychological Knowledge

In national codes of ethics the practice of psychology is presented as rooted in scientific knowledge, professional skills, and experience. However, it is not self-evident that the body of scientific knowledge in psychology provides an adequate basis for current professional practice. Professional training and experience are seen as necessary for the application of psychological knowledge, but they appear insufficient to defend the soundness of one's practices when challenged in judicial proceedings of a kind that may be faced by psychologists in the European Union in the not too distant future. In seeking to define the basis for the professional competence of psychologists, this article recommends taking a position of modesty concerning the scope and effectiveness of psychological interventions. In many circumstances, psychologists can only provide partial advice, narrowing down the range of possible courses of action more by eliminating unpromising ones than by pointing out the most correct or most favorable one. By emphasizing rigorous evaluation, the profession should gain in accountability and, in the long term, in respectability.

How far ethics education positively influences ethical decision making of the young lawyers in Kedah?

2007 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 83
Author(s):  
Anida Mahmood ◽  
Haswira Nor Mohamad Hashim ◽  
Kamarul Ariffin Mansor
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Ethics Education ◽  
Ethical Decision ◽  
Current Practice ◽  
Ethical Decision Making ◽  
The State ◽  
Legal Ethics ◽  
Basic Premise ◽  
Law Faculty ◽  
Ethics Course

This paper was written based on part of the findings of a survey made on young lawyers who are practicing in the state of Kedah. Young lawyers are advocates and solicitors with less than seven y ears of active practice. The objective of this study is to determine what factors positively influenced young lawyers' ethical decision making. Data was collected from /33 young lawyers who are practicing in the state of Kedah between January - June 2006 through self-administered and close- end questionnaires. The finding suggests that knowledge in professional legal ethics gained at the law faculty, pupil age and short ethics course does not contribute much to the ethical decision making of the young lawyers. Moved by this finding. this paper attempts to discuss the current legal ethics education in Malaysia. The main contention of the writers is their firm belief that the current practice of professional legal ethics education in Malaysia is insufficient and far from being adequate in producing ethical lawyers. Therefore the writers have proposed for professional legal ethics education in Malaysia to be reformed and this proposal serves as the basic premise of this paper.

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