Where Law School Still Rules In the Age Of AI
People are still at the core of the legal experience
I am heading into strong winds, because most commentators, many practicing lawyers, and even a few academics, think law schools are in the early stages of a death spiral. The average scores of enrolled students are dropping, the number of enrolling students has dropped, the demand for graduates is low, and in between sit law schools living the past rather than embracing the future. All correct, though some schools have dabbled with the future.
I want to look at what law schools still do that should be retained and even increased as we look toward that future. To complete this task, I will have to use what is increasingly becoming the four letter word of everything — human. Law schools still embrace the human as the core unit of law, and that may be the most important thing they have going for them.
The fundamental unit of law always has been the person. When we talk about contracts, those contracts are between people or between organizations formed and run by people. Property is created or transferred by people. People lay at the root of every tort, and of course crimes are committed by people or organizations run by people. To understand and govern, you need to understand people.
Law schools, like most schools, still rely on group activities for instruction. People sitting in classrooms interacting with people. The online movement has not been blessed to takeover legal education (“earn your law degree between midnight and 5 am with the new “John Marshall” app — download it now from iTunes”).
Living in law school soup sharpens the skills of advocates by making them interact with each other. This happens informally in the halls, over meals, and, occasionally, over beers in the local craft brewery. It happens formally in the classroom and in the innumerable competitions that are now part of law school life (moot court, trial practice, appellate practice, mediation, negotiation, etc.). The one thing law schools do not lack is opportunities to law students to sharpen their skills through interaction.
When we talk about reform, we must keep in mind that this person-to-person interaction has been key to the success of lawyers. And it seems, it will be key to the success of lawyers and others as computers move onto the field. We are still a long way from having robots that truly empathize, sympathize, or even realize the significance of people-to-people interaction.
Computers, remember, excel at pattern recognition. A computer watching the face of the person talking to it can catch micro expressions. These expressions cross our faces in 1/25th of a second, too fast for most of us to catch. But the computer can not only see them, it can categorize them: joy, sorrow, fear, and so on. But what to do when you know the other person felt fear? A computer may know the options, but choosing the correct one and implementing it are well-outside its capabilities (no matter what the Japanese care-giver robot manufacturers tell you).
Yet, in many situations the essence of lawyering ties closely to reading those verbal and visual cues, tying them to the context of the discussion, and immediately implementing the proper response. We have obvious examples — deposing a witness or cross-examining a witness — but other examples populate the practice of law. Sitting across a table negotiating a deal, finding a compromise for warring spouses, leading a distraught tenant through a landlord-tenant dispute, all have person-to-person components that are hard at times to separate from law.
This raises one of the many questions not receiving sufficient attention today — the normative question of what law to automate and what law to leave to people. Just because we can do it does not mean we should do it. That last sentence applies on a greater scale to AI itself. Sometimes the wisest person in the room is the one who refrains from exercising her power.
The future of the legal profession is uncertain. Those who argue that AI and automation will take over much of that future are savvy enough to know that predicting the end of the legal profession may not get them many speaking gigs. The refrain we hear constantly is “there will always be a place for people.” But what is that place? How big is it and what are people expected to do in that place?
Law schools should keep the focus on the people skills, and probably increase that focus by sloughing off some of the pedestrian things to computers. I think we can all agree the time students spend learning to Bluebook is not a valuable use of student, faculty, or anyone or thing’s time. Let’s find the pockets of waste and re-direct what we do to value.
Law schools, like law firms, law departments, and any other “law” organization you know, are stressed. They must continue to deliver what the ABA requires them to deliver (a bland, outdated product whose shelf-life has passed) and yet somehow attract the best and brightest. They are under pressure to either deliver three full years of value at a reasonable price, or cut back to two years (maybe less) at their current price. They have everyone telling them what to do, but no one showing them doing any of those things will work.
Automation and AI have a place in the future of law. But people will be at the core of why we need and use law. Until that day when computers become better than people at understanding and governing people, we need to educate people on the things we value. Law schools have played a roll in that process for a long time, something we should not forget or easily abandon.
Ken is a speaker and author on innovation, leadership, and on the future of people, process, and technology. On Medium, he is a “Top 50” author on innovation and leadership. You can follow him on Twitter, connect with him onLinkedIn, and follow him on Facebook.
