Curriculum Guide · Courses

Professor Silver

J.D. Seminar 119 (cross-listed) | 3 credit hours

The seminar will investigate the relationship of globalization and the legal profession (including, for example, the market for legal services, professional regulation, the organizations in which lawyers practice and legal education). We will take a comparative approach by reading about lawyers and the role of law within and outside of the U.S., including in jurisdictions in Europe, South America and the Asia-Pacific region. In studying national professions, our concern is with a broad range of issues, including whether law is an elite profession in a particular country (and the backgrounds and professional ambitions of individuals who become lawyers); how legal education has responded to the forces of globalization, if at all; the relationship of lawyers working for the state to those in private enterprises, including in-house counsel; interaction between the national legal profession and foreign lawyers; and the role played by competition from non-law professionals. Our focus will be on the relationship between local and national actors and transnational or foreign actors.

In addition to this comparative study, we will investigate certain substantive areas of law in which globalization’s influence is visible, for example through the recognition of a core group of actors whose work leads to governing standards for that area of law, or of a supra-national rule-making organization.

We will spend some time learning about regulation of lawyers and their work, but also will read more broadly to include multidisciplinary perspectives. Students will write research papers and also have an opportunity to work on brief empirical projects (the latter may be in teams).

This seminar requires a paper. J.D. students must register for the 3 credit section of the seminar if they wish to write a paper fulfilling the Upperclass Legal Writing Requirement. The paper requirements of the 2 credit section will not fulfill the Upperclass Legal Writing Requirement.