Undergraduate Course: Global Law (LAWS08144)
Course Outline
| School | School of Law |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 8 (Year 1 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 40 |
ECTS Credits | 20 |
| Summary | The course critically introduces the idea of Global Law and the core legal concepts and legal skills required to study and practice law from a global perspective. It also introduces the main actors, norms and practices associated with law in a global context. |
| Course description |
The course introduces and critiques the ideas of law as a ¿global¿ discipline and profession and situates the idea of global law compared to domestic, regional, international and transnational law; locates the practice of global law by exploring the idea of the 'global' as a space of legal activity; introduces the main actors relevant to global law; and identifies the sources of global law. The course also introduces practical legal skills such as legal research, interpretation, argumentation and reasoning. It promotes an understanding of law as a series of encounters between complex, plural, and overlapping legal phenomena that exist beyond the state - an idea that is further developed in Global Legal Systems and Global Jurisprudence - and introduces the relationships between legal systems - further developed in the proposed Global Legal Systems course.
Through a series of applied and in depth 'case studies' in Semester 2, the course introduces real-world problems that exist across and beyond individual jurisdictions and regimes, and introduces comparative and transnational methods to think about these.
The course builds foundational knowledge of global law and important skills in global legal practice.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 0 |
| Course Start |
Full Year |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
400
(
Lecture Hours 22,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 8,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
370 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Reflective Essay (30%)
Group Research Project (30%)
Essay (40%) |
| Feedback |
Students will receive feedback on the Reflective Essay
Students will receive the following feedback on the Group Research Project:
- peer feedback and instructor feedback on the oral presentation (Semester 2, end)
- peer feedback after the presentations; will consist of feedback internal to the group on how well they worked as a team and external to the group on how well the project was communicated
- instructor feedback will be continual during workshops when students have the chance to work on research project (Semester 1 and 2)
Individual and class instructor feedback on the 40% essay (end Semester 2) |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of the forms, concepts, actors, and methods of Global Law as a scholarly and professional discipline and in its wider context, and as compared to other disciplinary approaches such as politics, economics, business, sociology and others
- demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of the legal concepts, sources, principles, procedures and institutions from a global law perspective.
- demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of the relationship between legal systems.
- demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of legal analysis and legal reasoning relevant to law in a global context.
- demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of what it means to have a global perspective of law.
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Reading List
There is no Global Law reader or textbook, therefore the readings will consist of excerpts from the likes of:
Boaventura de Sousa Santos Toward a New Legal Common Sense. Law, Globalization, and Emancipation. (Cambridge University Press, 2020)
M.S. Sornarajah, "Why 'No' to Transnational Law," CTLS Transnational Legal Studies, eds. Nicole Pillard, Daniel Cole, and Franz Werro (London: Center for Transnational Legal Studies, 2011)
Jessup, Philip C. Transnational Law. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1956)
Neil Walker, Intimations of Global Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014)
Elaine Fahey, Introduction to Law and Global Governance (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2018)
Manfred Steger and Amentahru Wahlrab, What Is Global Studies? Theory and Practice (New York and London: Routledge, 2017)
Eve Darian-Smith and Phil McCarty, The Global Turn. Theories, Research, and Methods for Global Studies (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2017).
Each week will have specific readings. These will be outlined in the course document. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Skills and abilities in Research and Enquiry
1. Differentiate between and use appropriately primary and secondary sources of law, and identify, retrieve and use relevant and appropriately up-to-date legal information using paper and electronic sources by using sources that are up-to-date from relevant paper and electronic repositories; using sources that are appropriate to the context; using recognised methods of citation and reference; using sources that are current at the point of assessment; using sources to support arguments and conclusions.
2. Apply knowledge and understanding of law to complex situations in a global context, in order to provide argued conclusions to concrete legal problems (actual or hypothetical)
3. Identify accurately the issues which require to be researched, and to formulate them clearly.
4. Analyse, evaluate, and interpret primary and secondary legal sources relevant to the topic studied, including through transnational and comparative legal methods.
5. Demonstrate awareness that arguments require to be supported by evidence, and therefore to produce a synthesis of relevant evidence (e.g. doctrinal and policy issues) in relation to a topic in order to allow the student to present and make a reasoned choice between alternative solutions, while recognising ambiguity and dealing with uncertainty.
6. Make a critical judgment of the relative and absolute merits of particular arguments and solutions.
7. Understand a distinction legal approach to research and enquiries, as opposed to a sociological, political, economic or other approach, and introduce an understanding of the value and method of interdisciplinary approaches.
Skills and abilities in Personal and Intellectual Autonomy
1. Act independently in planning and undertaking tasks in areas of law which he or she is studying or has already studied and be able to work to deadlines.
2. Undertake independent research in areas of law which he or she has not previously studied starting from legal sources (both paper-based and electronic) without reference to a reading list.
3. Reflect on his or her own learning, and to seek and make use of feedback.
4. Work collaboratively in groups to test, modify, and strengthen his or her individual views.
5. Think critically about law and its place in global society.
6. Develop a curiosity for learning and a passion to engage globally and locally.
7. Develop informational and digital literacy and think critically about appropriate sources of information and evidence.
Skills and abilities in Communication
1. Understand and use the English language proficiently in relation to legal matters, systematically structure academic writing, express views and ideas succinctly, pursue an argument with proper care and attention to academic literature and with proper recognition of counter-arguments.
2. Read and discuss legal materials which are written in technical and complex language.
3. Use language proficiently in relation to legal matters and specifically to use appropriate legal terminology in work, adopting recognised methods of citation and reference.
4. Communicate in plain English, using legal terminology where appropriate.
5. Contribute effectively in group work, working collaboratively on projects as part of a team in order to reach defined goals and outputs.
Skills and abilities in Personal Effectiveness
1. Work effectively with others in groups, contributing, understanding, and valuing diverse experiences, skills, and thinking of each group member.
2. Demonstrate an ability to organise and prioritise time and effort effectively in the performance of the student's work.
Technical/practical skills
1. Produce a word-processed essay or other text and to present such work in an appropriate form.
2. Use electronic information retrieval systems, especially specialist legal databases.
3. Use a library for the recovery of information, and related research skills, including the ability to discriminate between and evaluate different sources of information.
4. Understand the appropriate use of AI-generated responses and how these should be used and references where relevant. |
| Keywords | global law,legal skills,legal sources,actors,norms and processes of global law |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Gail Lythgoe
Tel:
Email: Gail.Lythgoe@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mr Ryan McGuire
Tel: (0131 6)50 2386
Email: Ryan.Mcguire@ed.ac.uk |
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