Abstract
This article argues that legal education is currently grappling with three narratives of technology’s role in either augmenting, disrupting or ending the current legal services environment. It identifies each of these narratives within features of curriculum design that respond to legal professional archetypes of how lawyers react to lawtech. In tracing how these influential narratives and associated archetypes feature in the law curriculum, the article maps the evolving intersection of lawtech, the legal profession and legal services delivery in legal education. It concludes by proffering the additional narrative of ‘adaptive professionalism’, which emphasises the complex and contextual nature of the legal profession, and therefore provides a more coherent direction for adaptation of the law curriculum. Through this more nuanced and grounded approach, it is suggested that law schools might equip law graduates to embrace technological developments while holding on to essential notions of ethical conduct, access to justice and the rule of law.
Highlights
As the legal profession seeks to adapt to a changing legal services environment, including the introduction of digital technologies into legal practice (‘lawtech’),[2] the legal education curriculum and its function have again come under the spotlight.[3]
In the final part of this article, we make a case for adaptive professionalism as a more comprehensive conception of the legal professional and of the purpose of a law curriculum that has evolved in terms of lawtech
Consistency of approach to doctrine is evidenced by almost any Australian law text’s coverage of a core substantive law subject, which tends to be relatively predictable. We suggest that this apparently widely understood conception of the contemporary curriculum reflects the status professionalism narrative of the law, whereby the profession ‘occupie[s] a niche high in the system of social stratification.’[37] notwithstanding diversity in teaching method or approach, we suggest that the law curriculum is emblematic of status professionalism in three ways
Summary
As the legal profession seeks to adapt to a changing legal services environment, including the introduction of digital technologies into legal practice (‘lawtech’),[2] the legal education curriculum and its function have again come under the spotlight.[3]. The ‘True Legal Professional’ represents a narrative of status professionalism, the ‘Technological Disruptor’ is derived from Christensen’s innovators,[16] and ‘Death’ embodies Susskind’s vision of radical decomposition of the traditional professional.[17] While not assuming that the current monopoly idea of professionalism as the sole supplier of future ‘legal industry workers’ is the only pathway to a desirable integration of legal professional skills and technologies, we focus here on the contemporary Australian law curriculum as delivered by law schools We analyse this curriculum with reference to the core regulated subjects and case studies of curriculum innovation in lawtech to illustrate how legal education can be interpreted as a response to these three archetypes. In the final part of this article, we make a case for adaptive professionalism as a more comprehensive conception of the legal professional and of the purpose of a law curriculum that has evolved in terms of lawtech
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
