'Shame on American Legal education': An Critical reading of Alan Watson

Abstract

The author takes advantage of reading Alan Watson's book "Shame on American Legal Education" to reflect on what is happening today in iusfacultaire culture. On the basis of Watson's assertion that American legal education is shamefully bad and deficient, the author examines successively the false Socratism, which today, in an anti-pedagogical way, undermine the teaching of law; the lure of the case-book method and the legal incompetence that is lodged there; and the phenomenon of poorly trained professors and shoddy research that are becoming more and more widespread. The author deplores the fact that a new legal anti-culture has taken root in the shortcomings and that there is a rampant stupidisation of legal education. He takes a stand in favor of a legal education promoting intelligence and rationality, which takes seriously the demands of modern law and above all its quality, and who can manage the indispensable dialogue between theory of law and practice of law.