Educating for Justice

The fundamental topic of this book is that legal education matters. The primary function of law is to uphold the values of a humane and civilized society. The maintainance of the social values in law may require lawyers to use law proactively, and therefore law teachers need to develop amongst their students an appropriate spirit of enquiry and social awareness. The interface between law school and social change lawyering is a dynamic source of creative energy. This source of energy is explored in this book, and the fulfilling role the law school can play in developing, transmitting and understanding the use of law to bring about social change to the advantage of subordinate people. It is within the law school that the most promising and dynamic initiatives to develop social change lawyering are born, though equally the process of legal education can hinder this. The essays presented in this book highlight the extent to which awareness of social values affects every aspect of legal education, and cover clinical legal education, environmental law, human rights law, legal ethics, and case studies.