세계화 시대의 한국의 법학교육

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Although the Korean Bar Association has strongly opposed liberalization of legal market, claiming that it will lead to the foreign domination of Korea's legal market, the Korean government plans to liberalize its legal market in 2007 in compliance with its WTO obligations. Liberalization of legal market can only be successful on condition that Korea should implement proper legislative revisions and educational reform. However, a plan to introduce American-style law schools in 2008 will be postponed to 2009, as the National Assembly failed to pass a bill to introduce the law schools due to the student quota issue. But, there can be no change in the task that the Korean legal educational system should be modified accordingly to provide lawyers with expertise capable of successfully practicing amidst global competition.
Realizing the shortcomings of its legal education, Japan implemented the new Japanese law school system in 2004. In Korea, many consider the Japanese law school system as falling short of expectation. Perhaps the biggest source of discontentment with it is the number of law schools and their students. Given the similarities between Korean and Japanese legal systems, Korea needs to watch any new developments in the Japanese law school system with a critical eye.
The Korean law school plan has faced much opposition since its inception. Especially some have questioned the suitability of a U.S. modeled system in Korea. But we can hope that we are able to adopt the best features of American legal education, such as strong teaching of analytical skills and a high level of personal interaction, without giving up the best features of Korean legal education, such as the explication and teaching of law as a systematic body of rules. Some day, just as Korean legal educators now seek to learn from foreign, especially American and Japanese experiences, foreign legal educators may seek to learn from Korean experiences.