Taking Values Seriously: The Democratic Intellect and the Place of Values in the Law School Curriculum

Abstract

This paper treats values, including specifically ‘legal’ and ‘professional’ values, as distinct from the normative standards of legal and professional ethics as commonly understood. It treats values as powerful motivating and aspirational constructs, an important element both of individual identity construction, and of what defines and holds our academic and professional communities together. Values help us to negotiate the complex web of social roles and commitments, and are important in understanding the dynamic way in which lawyers (and others) respond to morally complex or challenging situations.

However, the law school has become relatively inhospitable territory for discussions about values and the moral content of law, largely as a consequence of a flawed notion of value-neutrality and a continuing unwillingness to explore the value-laden character of either the formal or hidden curriculum. A solution is proposed that draws on and adapts the notion of the ‘democratic intellect’, a tradition of higher education that emphasises a commitment to civic values, to (applied) philosophical enquiry, and which regards knowledge in itself as a public good. The paper concludes that, while there is still significant theoretical work to be done in mapping legal values, law schools must be more willing to engage in debate about values, to take values positions consistent with their liberal (or ‘post-liberal’) mission, and to engage with the critical issues of curriculum design and learning process that would flow from the decision to take values seriously.

Keywords: legal education, legal values, democratic intellect, professional responsibility, legal ethics