The Empathetic Lawyer's Training Ground: Fostering Resilience to Vulnerability in Legal Education Through Transformation of Reactive Institutions to Reflective Institutions and Waking the Sleepy Responsive State

Abstract

This paper applies vulnerability theory to mental health issues in the context of the legal profession. A vulnerability approach argues that the “autonomous liberal legal subject” is the veritable linchpin of modern legal thought and fails due to the concept’s inability to capture the realities of the human condition and, thus, should be replaced with a “vulnerable legal subject.” Vulnerability theory recognizes that both individuals and institutions, including state government and private corporations, can be vulnerable subjects. The vulnerable legal subject, as theorized, is embodied and embedded in all social contexts.