Therapeutic Jurisprudence Courses at U.M.
The following therapeutic jurisprudence courses are taught at the law school:
New Directions in Lawyering: Interviewing, Counseling, and Attorney-Client Relational Skills (3 credits)
Increasing concern about lawyer dissatisfaction has given rise to a number of new approaches to lawyering. There is increasing concern with lawyer de-professionalism, the transformation of law from a profession into a business, low public esteem for the legal profession, professional burnout, high rates of alcoholism and substance abuse within the profession, and higher rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide for lawyers than for other professions. In response, a number of new ways of viewing the lawyering role have emerged that use non-adversarial, psychologically beneficial, and humanistic ways to solve legal problems, resolve legal disputes, and prevent legal difficulties. These include therapeutic jurisprudence, preventive law, restorative justice, collaborative law, holistic law, creative problem solving and a variety of newly emerging problem-solving courts. These approaches seek to broaden traditional conceptions of the legal profession by adding an interdisciplinary psychologically oriented paradigm that concerns itself with client needs and emotional well-being as well as rights.
This course will explore these new approaches and the skills they bring to the lawyering process. Particular emphasis will be placed upon an exploration of ethical issues in the newly defined role. In addition, particular emphasis will be placed on developing ways of bringing increased personal satisfaction, professionalism, and lawyer well-being to law practice, and increasing creative problem solving, preventive lawyering, interpersonal relations, interviewing, counseling, and negotiation skills.
Students will be required to participate in a number of interviewing and counseling exercises and to write a short paper exploring application of one or more of these new approaches to dealing with a particular legal problem or problems. They also will engage in drafting, negotiation, and mediation exercises. The course is designed to teach lawyering skills in a non-litigation context, emphasizing the attorney/client relationship. In addition to participating in simulated exercises, students will interview and counsel juveniles in the Juvenile Detention Center in Miami-Dade County under the supervision of Bernard Perlmutter and Carolyn Salisbury of the Children and Youth Law Clinic and Public Defenders from the Miami-Dade Public Defender’s Office. In preparation for this client-counseling experience, students also will learn relevant law and procedure relating to the representation of juveniles in the direct file process, in which the State Attorney decides whether their cases should be heard in Juvenile or Adult Criminal Court.
Students participating in the Children and Youth Law Clinic will be required to take this course, unless waived by the instructors.
Materials will include Practicing Therapeutic Jurisprudence: Law as a Helping Profession (2000), co-edited by Professor Winick, David B. Wexler, and Dennis P. Stolle, and additional distribution materials. The Class will also read materials on interviewing and counseling, including one of the leading books in the area.
Therapeutic Jurisprudence Seminar (2 credits)
Bruce J. Winick
Bernie Perlmutter
Therapeutic jurisprudence is the study of law’s healing potential. An interdisciplinary approach to legal scholarship that has a law reform agenda, therapeutic jurisprudence seeks to assess the therapeutic and counter-therapeutic consequences of law and how it is applied and to produce legal change designed to increase the former and diminish the latter. Although the field started out in mental health law, it soon expanded to consider other areas of law ranging from criminal law, family law, juvenile law, and health law to contracts and commercial law, tort law, evidence law, and legal profession. In addition to studying and attempting to reform substantive legal rules and legal procedures, therapeutic jurisprudence focuses attention on how law is applied by various legal actors such as judges, lawyers, police officers, and expert witnesses assisting the courts. In recent years, there has been growing interest in the application of therapeutic jurisprudence to judging and lawyering. This seminar will survey the field and its many applications, including its increasing use in international contexts. The University of Miami School of Law recently established a Therapeutic Jurisprudence Center that will conduct empirical research, publish books and articles, and hold symposia and conferences. The seminar will be taught by Professor Bruce J. Winick, the Director of the Therapeutic Jurisprudencc Center, and co-founder of therapeutic jurisprudence. Students in the seminar will prepare a 30-40 page paper on a therapeutic jurisprudence topic or theme, and will have the opportunity to participate in research or law reform activities conducted by the Therapeutic Jurisprudence Center.
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