This is an authoritative and practical student guide to clinical legal education, a subject that plays an increasingly important role within UK law schools.
This is an authoritative and practical student guide to clinical legal education, a subject that plays an increasingly important role within UK law schools.
Clinical Legal Education (CLE) can be defined in broad terms as the study of law through real, or simulated, casework. It enables students to experience the law in action and to reflect on those experiences. CLE offers an alternative learning experience to the traditional lecture/seminar method and allows participants to take the study of law beyond the lecture theatre and library. CLE has been a part of English law schools for several decades and is becoming an increasingly popular component of a number of programmes. It is also well established in North America, Australia and many other countries around the globe. In some law schools, CLE is credit-bearing; in others, it is an extracurricular activity. Some CLE schemes focus on social-welfare law, whilst others are commercially orientated. A number are run in conjunction with third-sector organisations and many are supported by private practice law firms. This edited collection brings together academics, lawyers, third-sector organisations and students to discuss the present experience and potential of CLE. As such, it will be of interest to a wide and diverse audience, both within and outside the UK.
Legal education is currently undergoing a paradigm shift. Traditional law instruction, lecturing and memorizing have become a fading fashion, with legal clinics increasingly cropping up. These allow law students to practice while studying and to contribute to social justice as part of the educational process. Students no longer accept one-way interaction from their professors, and demand interaction with their peers in various corners of the globe. The Middle East is no exception here. Legal clinics can be found in most countries of the region, though there is scant literature on legal education in the area, particularly with regards to clinical legal education. This book fills this gap, and offers comparative cases that will benefit legal educators and justice practitioners in the Middle East and beyond. The region needs reform in all dimensions, including the political, economic, social, religious, legal, and educational. Legal education lies at the heart of securing such long awaited reforms. The book examines legal education within selected locations in the region, underscoring successful pedagogical models from various parts of the world. This peer-reviewed book focuses on practical legal education, where learning is student-centered, particularly clinical legal education, field work, street law, pro bono service, legal advice, simulations, placements/internships, moot courts and mock trials, problem-based learning, case analysis, group work, role-play, and brainstorming. The book brings together 28 chapters written by leading legal scholars from across the globe, all concerned with the advancement of legal education, with making it more interactive, and contributing to bridging the gap between powerful and powerless communities.
Reinventing Legal Education explores how clinical legal education - a new frontier for European public interest lawyering - is reforming law teaching and practice in Europe.
This book makes the case for a more legally literate society and then addresses why and how a law school might contribute to achieving that. Moreover examining what public legal education (PLE) is and the forms it can take, the book looks specifically at the ways in which a law school can get involved, including whether that is as part of an academic, credit-bearing, course or as extra-curricular activity. Divided into five main chapters, the book first examines the nature of PLE and why its provision is so central to the functioning of modern society. Models of PLE are then set out ranging from face-to-face tuition to the use of hard-copy material, including the growing importance of e-based technology. One model of PLE that has proven to be very attractive to law schools – Street Law – is described and analysed in detail. The book then turns to look at the considerations for a law school wishing to incorporate PLE into its offerings be that as part of the formal curriculum or not. The subject of evaluation is then raised – how might we find out if what we do by way of PLE is effective and how it might be improved upon? The final chapter reaches conclusions, some penned by the book’s author and others drawn from key figures in the PLE movement. This book provides a thorough examination of PLE in a law school context and contains a set of templates that can be implemented and/or adapted for use as the situation and jurisdiction dictate. An accessible and compelling read, this book will be of interest to law students, legal academics, practising lawyers, community activists and all those interested in PLE.
The editors' earlier book Delivering Family Justice in the 21st Century (2016) described a period of turbulence in family justice arising from financial austerity. Governments across the world have sought to reduce public spending on private quarrels by promoting mediation (ADR) and by beginning to look at digital justice (ODR) as alternatives to courts and lawyers. But this book describes how mediation has failed to take the place of courts and lawyers, even where public funding for legal help has been removed. Instead ODR has developed rapidly, led by the Dutch Rechtwijzer. The authors question the speed of this development, and stress the need for careful evaluation of how far these services can meet the needs of divorcing families. In this book, experts from Canada, Australia, Turkey, Spain, Germany, France, Poland, Scotland, and England and Wales explore how ADR has fallen behind, and how we have learned from the rise and fall of ODR in the Rechtwijzer about what digital justice can and cannot achieve. Managing procedure and process? Yes. Dispute resolution? Not yet. The authors end by raising broader questions about the role of a family justice system: is it dispute resolution? Or dispute prevention, management, and above all legal protection of the vulnerable?
Recent years have seen social justice emerge as a powerful driver for work, both in law schools and the legal services sector. However, questions remain about how that term is understood and given meaning within the legal academy and beyond. This edited collection explores the meanings that have emerged and might subsequently be developed, together with a practical exploration of projects that have sought to bring the social justice agenda to life in law schools and in communities around the world. Over the course of eighteen chapters, this volume engages with a range of social justice and legal education themes, including clinical legal education, innocence projects, access to justice, cause lawyering, LGBTQ identities, and sustainability in law schools. In addition, it also explores themes of ethics and values in contemporary legal education in Africa, Australia, North America, and the UK.
Thinking About Clinical Legal Education provides a range of philosophical and theoretical frameworks that can serve to enrich the teaching and practice of Clinical Legal Education (CLE). CLE has become an increasingly common feature of the curriculum in law schools across the globe. However, there has been relatively little attention paid to the theoretical and philosophical dimensions of this approach. This edited collection seeks to address this gap by bringing together contributions from the clinical community, to analyse their CLE practice using the framework of a clearly articulated philosophical or theoretical approach. Contributions include insights from a range of jurisdictions including: Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Ethiopia, Israel, Spain, UK and the US. This book will be of interest to CLE academics and clinic supervisors, practitioners, and students.