1. 1. The wrong story: regulation, innovation and research in the future of legal educationProfessor Paul Maharg Australian National University College of Lawhttp://paulmaharg.com/slides/
2. 2. preview 1. Avoid technification Regulation easily erodes into technification of regulation: we need to resist that.2. Renew learning spaces Adopt fresh approaches that can improve regulation and the quality of legal education - focus on experiential learning.3. Re-design relations Shape the future with regulators, redesign relations between academy & profession, recast curriculum design, learn & implement from other disciplines, professions, jurisdictions.4. Map and improve legal educational research Many gaps; almost no organized research programmes; insufficient historical understanding of sub-disciplines and practices; little shared understanding across the field. 2
3. 3. 3Thanks to Doug Belshaw
4. 4. 2. Renew learning spaces Adopt fresh approaches that can improve regulation and the quality of legal education focus on experiential learning.4
5. 5. 2renew learning spacesLegal Education & Training Review (LETR)5
6. 6. 2renew learning spacesremitAddress the following issues: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.What are the skills/knowledge/experience currently required by the legal services sector? What skills/knowledge/experience will be required by the legal services sector in 2020? What kind of legal education and training (LET) system(s) will deliver the regulatory objectives of the Legal Services Act 2007? What kind of LET system(s) will promote flexibility, social mobility and diversity? What will be required to ensure the responsiveness of the LET system to emerging needs? What scope is there to move towards sector-wide outcomes/activitybased regulation? What need is there (if any) for extension of regulation to currently non-regulated groups? 6
7. 7. 2 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.renew learning spacesremitWhat are the skills/knowledge/experience currently required by the legal services sector? What skills/knowledge/experience will be required by the legal services sector in 2020? What kind of legal education and training (LET) system(s) will deliver the regulatory objectives of the Legal Services Act 2007? What kind of LET system(s) will promote flexibility, social mobility and diversity? What will be required to ensure the responsiveness of the LET system to emerging needs? What scope is there to move towards sector-wide outcomes/activitybased regulation? What need is there (if any) for extension of regulation to currently non-regulated groups? See esp Lit Rev, chapter 3, Legal education and conduct of business requirements, http://letr.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/LR-chapter-3.pdf 7
8. 8. 2renew learning spaceseg technology / curriculum innovations required1. Information management Better, more powerful and social platforms, enabling visualisation & sharing of legal data.2. Managing voice, register and genre on digital platforms Focus on a post-digital Ciceronian rhetoric3. Make legal research and problem-based learning &experiential learning meaningful eg by use of sims, clinic, PBL, breaching the fourth wall of the law school, and many more4. Socialising processes in relational spaces Create a zone, where students can discuss and reflect on their work, try out identities that are at once professional & personal, make mistakes or learn from others mistakes, and learn how to communicate consistently & accurately with colleagues, in any register. 8
9. 9. 9Transactional learning, example 1
10. 10. https://wiki.mozilla.org/Learning/WebLiteracyStandard10
11. 11. 11Transactional learning, example 2Transactional learning @ ANU
12. 12. 3. Re-design relations Shape the future with regulators, redesign relations between academy & profession, recast curriculum design, learn & implement from other disciplines, professions, jurisdictions.12
13. 13. 3redesign relationsconceptual change in law school identityWisdom is not the only virtue that is having a poor time of it in the modern university. Patience, humility, generosity, perseverance, thoroughness, carefulness, quietness: these might once have been felt to be signs of a strength of character. No longer. In an age of self-promotion, selfpresentation, visibility, efficiency, work-rate, personal performance indicators and sheer competitiveness, character traits such as these come to be seen as signs of personal weakness. Barnett, 1994, 151213
14. 14. 3redesign relationsconceptual change in law school identityNow is your time to begin Practices and lay the Foundation of habits that may be of use to you in every Condition and in every Profession at least that is founded on a literary or a Liberal Education. Sapere and Fari quae sentiat are the great Objects of Literary Education and of Study. ... mere knowledge however important is far from being the only or most important attainment of study. The habits of Justice, Candour, Benevolence, and a Courageous Spirit are the first objects of Philosophy, the constituents of happiness and of personal honour, and the first Qualifications for human Society and for Active Life. Adam Ferguson, Lectures, 1775-6, MSS, University of Edinburgh14
15. 15. 3redesign relationsregulatory relationshipsColin Scotts approach: a more fruitful approach would be to seek to understand where the capacities lie within the existing regimes, and perhaps to strengthen those which appear to pull in the right direction and seek to inhibit those that pull in the wrong way meta-review: all social and economic spheres in which governments or others might have an interest in controlling already have within mechanisms of steering whether through hierarchy, competition, community, design or some combination thereof (2008, 27).15
16. 16. NormsFeedbackBehavioural modificationExampleHierarchicalLegal RulesMonitoring Powers/Dutie sLegal SanctionsClassic Contractual Agency Model Rule-making & EnforcementCompetitionPrice / Quality RatioOutcomes of CompetitionStriving to Perform BetterMarketsCommunitySocial NormsSocial ObservationSocial Villages, Sanctions, eg Clubs OstracizationProfessional OrderingDesignFixed with ArchitectureLack of ResponsePhysical InhibitionSoftware CodeParking BollardsVariantPromotion SystemsModalities of control (Murray & Scott 2002)16
17. 17. 3redesign relationsregulatory alternatives?Shared spaces concept in traffic zones: Redistributes risk among road users Treats road users as responsible, imaginative, human Holds that environment is a stronger influence on behaviour than formal rules & legislation. All those signs are saying to cars, this is your space, and we have organized your behaviour so that as long as you behave this way, nothing can happen to you. That is the wrong story. Hans Monderman, http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-monderman/Drachten, Laweiplein, Netherlands Thanx to Fietsberaad ,http://bit.ly/1dOwpRA 17
18. 18. 3redesign relationsparticipative regulationPortrait of the regulator as democratic designer: Not QA but QE Quality Enhancer, to focus on culture shifts towards innovation, imagination, change for a democratic society A hub of creativity, shared research, shared practices & guardian of debate around that hub Initiating cycles of funding, research, feedback, feedforward Archive of ed tech memory in the discipline Founder of interdisciplinary, inter-professional trading zones, for cross-disciplinary learning 18
19. 19. 3redesign relationsLETR recommendationRecommendation 25A body, the Legal Education Council, should be established to provide a forum for the coordination of the continuing review of LSET and to advise the approved regulators on LSET regulation and effective practice. The Council should also oversee a collaborative hub of legal information resources and activities able to perform the following functions: Data archive (including diversity monitoring and evaluation of diversity initiatives); Advice shop (careers information); Legal Education Laboratory (supporting collaborative research and development); Clearing house (advertising work experience; advising on transfer regulations and reviewing disputed transfer decisions).19
20. 20. 4. Map and improve legal educational research Many gaps; almost no organized research programmes; insufficient historical understanding of sub-disciplines and practices; little shared understanding across the field. 20
21. 21. 4improve researchfuture research needs?1. Map the field & create taxonomiesfor research data2. Organise systematic datacollection on law school stats across entry/exit points, across jurisdictions (eg using Big Data Project methods) 21
22. 22. 4improve researchfuture research needs?3. Focus on learning,not NSS league tables see US LSSSE4. Provide meta-reviews and systematic summaries of research, where appropriate 22
23. 23. 4improve researchhow might HEA contribute to this?1. Targeted funding for research initiatives, eg CochraneCollaboration type of initiative 2. Funding & admin support to start-up and analyze innovation eg PBL, public education in law, legal informatics, data visualization, etc 3. Financial & other support to enable round table meetings with regulators and comparative work with other jurisdictions globally 4. Creation and maintenance of a digital hub.23
24. 24. references Barnett, R. (1994). The Limits of Competence. Knowledge, Higher Education and Society, Buckingham: Open University Press. Hamilton-Baillie, B. (2008). Shared space: reconciling people, places and traffic. Build Environment, 34, 2, 161-81. Legal Education & Training Review Report (2013). Available at: http://letr.org.uk Monderman, H. (n.d.) http://www.pps.org/reference/hans-monderman/ Murray, A., Scott, C. (2002). Controlling the new media: hybrid responses to new forms of power. Modern Law Review, 65, 4, 491-516. Scott, C. (2008) Regulating Everything. UCD Geary Institute Discussion Paper Series, Inaugural Lecture, 26 February.24
25. 25. Email: Web:paul.maharg@anu.edu.au paulmaharg.com 25