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September 5, 2004

In Search of Reforms

Legal education in Bangladesh

Mohammad Monirul Azam

The law and legal system are being called upon to advance arguments and develop tools to compel the state to abide by the social justice mandate of the constitution and to promote the human rights of the under-privileged section of the society. But in Bangladesh existing legal system presents a picture of a country with a statute book rich in progressive laws but lacking a system to translate them into real benefits to millions of people who most need the support of the legal system.

As a law teacher, in this article, I tried to identify the problems and possible way outs to reform our legal education, by which future law graduates could use law as an instrument for social reforms and social justice and be able to develop innovative and new strategies to challenge the injustice, unjust and unfair system and thereby serve the society and humanity as a whole.

Some of the Existing Drawbacks of Legal Education in Bangladesh
(a) Admission criteria: Under the present system there is no option to examine the applicant's analytical skill, writing ability, attitude, aptitude and vision to study law. In the end, law degree are conferred upon students who are not qualified to get law degrees and are not committed to use the law as a tool for social justice and reforms.

(b) Appointment procedure and Facilities of Law Teachers
Unlike Europe and America, the facility of a lawyer or law teacher in Bangladesh is not full of roses. The country also lacks mechanisms to ensure accountability and motivation for teacher to strive for teaching excellence. In addition, appointment of law teachers is not flawless, sound and unblemished. It is unfortunate that without emphasising on teaching quality and research ability most of the universities appoint law teachers based on only academic result, with the aid of active political support and lobbying.

(c) Absence of Practical orientation: It is apparent that legal education in Bangladesh is without practical orientation or with little orientation, which is not able to produce graduates capable to practice law effectively.

(d) Traditional Curriculum: The curriculum, which is followed in the Public Universities and law colleges, are too much traditional without any change for decades. Nevertheless, the curriculum of Chittagong and BRAC university are time worthy and accommodates some innovative and practical skills like conveyencing, drafting, moot court and mock trial, environmental law, Alternative Dispute Resolution etc.

(e) Teaching Method: Teaching of Law in its traditional method has been found to be inadequate to prepare a law graduate to practice law and to understand the role of a lawyer in the society in a developing country like ours. In Bangladesh with a few exceptions in most of the classrooms, teachers deliver lectures and students listen. There is no or little opportunity of exchange, deliberation, discussion and interaction between the teachers and the students.

(f) Assessment and Examination Technique: To do well in the existing system of evaluation, memorising of eight to ten set questions based on earlier examination questions is enough. This kind of evaluation does not comply with in depth learning even students need not to read the whole syllabus and therefore discourage innovation, critical mind and interdisciplinary approach in learning law.

(g) Research facility and field studies: From the first day of first year LL.B Class to the last day of 4th year, a student might pass without being involved in any sort of research work or field studies. S/he even can do so called brilliant result without reading a law journal and having no connection with the recent legal developments.

(h) Human Rights sensibility: The norms, values, inspirations and enlightenment essential to fight against the violation of human rights are hardly reflected in teaching and learning process of law in Bangladesh.

(i) No link between the study of domestic and international law: Creating links between the study of domestic and international law is necessary for legal education because in our new global reality even domestic lawyers will need to address issues of international law. But this reality and challenges of globalisation are yet to be reflected in the legal education of Bangladesh.

(j) Challenges of Information and communication Technology (ICT): To accommodate the challenges posed by the ICT and utilisation of ICT for legal education like video conferencing, online live class web based legal research is yet to be placed in the legal education in Bangladesh.

Reforming the Legal Education in Bangladesh
Sound system of Legal education able to challenge injustice and draconian provisions in law is a sina qua non for establishing social justice and social reform and thereby ensuring social change and promotion of human rights. The following changes should be introduced in the legal education in Bangladesh to make it fit in terms of present trends and needs-

(a) Curriculum development: As mentioned earlier curriculum followed in law faculties and colleges mostly cover traditional subjects of law, which have to be changed and updated immediately

i) Lack of social relevancy and humanistic approach in the curriculum alienates and suppress various values, ethics, gender perspectives and views of minority etc.

ii) Law faculties may also include the perspectives of other academic disciplines by way of offering joint degree programs with other faculties like joint LL.B (Hons.)/M.B.A or LL.B (Hons.)/M.A. etc. This can also be achieved through faculty exchanges with professors from other academic disciplines and allowing law students to take a limited number of credits in other academic department.

iii) Another important feature of change in curriculum would be creating links between the study of domestic and international law to accommodate the concern of new global reality. And in this respect international human rights law and obligations should be associated with all subject areas of law as a system of values, not just a system of abstract rights.

b) Change in Teaching method and Student-Teacher Selection Process: There are several teaching methods i.e., lecture method, Socratic method, case method co-operative teaching, group discussion, moot court, assignments, clinical education and independent research. No single method may satisfy the need. It may be necessary to consider a combination of various methods.

As mentioned earlier, selection of students for law study and appointment of teachers for law teaching is not flawless and most of the times skills necessary for law study or teaching as the case may be is a secondary concern while earlier academic records political affiliation and lobbying rules the system. As a result, today university law teacher, at least a significant portion of the community, is not innovative, lacks practical skills and initiative, is not research oriented, is not respectful to ethical values and standards of legal education, vision is short sighted, knowledge and teaching aptitude is also questionable.

Hence, without a change in the students' selection and teachers' appointment, procedure, mere change in teaching method would not be successful.

(c) Practical skills training: There is an unduly long gap between the legal education in the institution and in practice. Hence, most important part of learning and significant skill is left to chances in future, which may or may not materialise. That is why, mandatory practical skills training under the umbrella of clinical method should be introduced in legal education, which would cover following broad objectives

i) to cultivate the 'legal mind' of each student by increasing a student's ability to analyse issues from legal perspective or simply the ability to 'think like a lawyer' specifically, this involves developing the capacity to analyse complex facts, recognise fine distinction and identify the legal principles applicable to a situation to get the essence of legal problems.

ii) to acquaint the students with the lawyering process and to develop skills of advocacy.

iii) To expose students to the social reality and in still sense of societal responsibility in professional work.

iv) To make one aware of the limits of legal system and appreciate alternative lawyering skills and

v) To develop a sense of professional ethics etc.

However, for getting maximum benefit from the practical skills training, there should be a close and constant interaction between the Bar and the faculty.

(d) Change in Evaluation/Examination Technique: Traditional assessment technique should be changed by introduction of problem/case oriented question, open book brain storming question, analytical and innovative factual question with legal problems along with constant evaluation by way of regular class tests, tutorial, assignment and short dissertation paper on critical issues of law.

(e) Community Involvement, Diversity and Pro-People Practice: High ideals of our liberation struggle as reflected in our Constitution will continue to remain mere promises, if we fail to ensure that every individual citizen has access to justice and access to the law just law, justly and equitably administered. That is why, students should be encouraged for field studies on communities and research on them and thereby understand the problems faced by the communities and propose legal solution to their problems.

Concluding Remarks
Legal Education in Bangladesh should be changed to make it cope with the modern challenges and to prepare law graduate to be able to fulfill the dreams, demands and aspirations of our people and society aspirating to march forward as a modern nation through democracy, development and good governance.

As mentioned earlier in this paper present system of Legal education in Bangladesh is not able to meet the needs of present time and national goals and therefore only change of Legal education in content quality and objectives in line with modern challenges, national goals and global order, would be able to produce law graduates having vision in working to establish a just and equitable society through a democratic polity, where rule of law and human rights are maintained as a cardinal principle in all walks of life.

As law teachers, judges and lawyers, we have the responsibilities to contribute in this process. We cannot predict right now the end result of our efforts but we do know that participating in this process from our own respective position is vital to contribute towards our legal system.

Mohammad Monirul Azam is a Lecturer, Department of Law, Premier University, Chittagong, Bangladesh.