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THE COMPREHENSIVE LAW MOVEMENT: Law as a Healing Profession

THE COMPREHENSIVE LAW MOVEMENT: Law as a Healing Profession. Professor Susan Daicoff Florida Coastal School of Law. PREVIOUS RESEARCH. Lawyer, Know Thyself – empirically-derived traits of the “lawyer personality”

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THE COMPREHENSIVE LAW MOVEMENT: Law as a Healing Profession

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  1. THE COMPREHENSIVE LAW MOVEMENT: Law as a Healing Profession Professor Susan Daicoff Florida Coastal School of Law

  2. PREVIOUS RESEARCH Lawyer, Know Thyself – empirically-derived traits of the “lawyer personality” The Tripartite Crisis: deprofessionalism, low public opinion, lawyer distress and dysfunction Focus on solutions for atypical lawyers (e.g., those with an “ethic of care,” humanitarian traits)

  3. ABA SURVEY - 1993Peter D. Hart Research Associates

  4. PUBLIC OPINION POLL - 1991

  5. DEPRESSIONAmong Law Students & Lawyers

  6. ALCOHOLISMPercentage of Alcoholic Drinkers

  7. PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTRESSBeck, 1995-96 2.27%

  8. CAREER SATISFACTIONSatisfaction With the Practice of Law

  9. GROWING DISSATISFACTION?Summary of ABA/YLD Surveys

  10. LAWYER DISTRESS: A Constant 20%?

  11. HOW LAWYERS DIFFER...

  12. THE “LAWYER PERSONALITY” need for achievement; ambitious under stress pessimism? materialism; value economic bottom-line competitiveness DRIVE 2 ACHIEVE “Thinking” MBTI preference aggressive under stress INTERPERSONAL RELATING STYLE “rights” orientation dominance interpersonal insensitivity

  13. Testosterone Levels: Lawyers, Blue Collar Workers, and Other Professionals

  14. THINKING/FEELING (Myers-Briggs Dimensions - Richard, 1994) Lawyers - Male Lawyers - Female Most Females Most Males

  15. “THINKING” vs. “FEELING”Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Dimensions • THINKERS: value justice, rationality, truth, & objectivity; decisions don’t reflect own personal values; can be cold & calculating; good problem-solvers • FEELERS: value harmony, interpersonal rel’ps., praise & mercy; apply their own personal values to make decisions; seek to do what’s right for self & others; sensitive to the effect of decisions on others

  16. MORAL ORIENTATION(Gilligan-Based Categories - Weissman, 1994) 17% 22% 33% 43% 35% 50%

  17. “ RIGHTS ORIENTATION” vs. “ETHIC OF CARE” Gilligan-Based Dimensions • RIGHTS: weighs conflicting rights & duties; seeks fairness, justice, & equality; maintains & applies rules, standards, & role oblig’ns. to arrive at clear, absolute answers • CARE: contextual; focuses on harm to people; seeks to avoid harm, maintain & restore rel’ps. & protect others from hurt; decides by assessing relative harm to & vulnerabilities of parties

  18. “NEW” Lawyer STUDIES • Undergraduates more likely to acquit when defense attorney was aggressive & male • Male and female trial lawyers’ testosterone levels higher than nontrial lawyers; lawyers’ levels like other white-collar workers’ but trial lawyers’ like blue-collar workers’ • Lawyers evaluate options economically ($); nonlawyers swayed by psychological factors

  19. “NEW” Lawyer STUDIES • Private practice lawyers = prefer Introversion, Intuition, Thinking (NT); ISTJ, ENFP, INTJ ESTP, ISFP, ESFJ, ESFP • Judges = prefer Thinking, Judging (ST); ISTJ, ESTJ ISFP • Admin. Attorneys = prefer Intuition, Thinking, Judging (NT); INTJ, ENTJ • Lawyers just like corporate executives (TJ)

  20. “NEW” Law Student STUDIES • Interest in public interest work diminishes in law school • Ethic of care is not the same as Feeling • Pessimism linked to high grades & depressn (bad things all my fault; good things pure luck / ISG vs. EUS attributions) • Optimism linked to low grades • Introversion & Thinking linked to high grades

  21. LINK BETWEEN PERSONALITY & SATISFACTION • “Thinking” Associated With Satisfaction: • “Thinking” and “Judging” Associated With Greater Job Satisfaction Among Attorneys (Richard, 1994) • Rights Orientation Correlated With Satisfaction: • Rights Orientation Correlated With Career Satisfaction Among Female Attorneys (Weissman, 1994)

  22. TRADITIONAL LAW PRACTICE • Competitive • Aggressive • Ambitious • Emphasis on winning (dominance) • Rights-oriented • Logical, analytical • Materialistic, law-as-a-business

  23. ATYPICAL LAWYER TRAITS • “Feeling” Preference on MBTI • Ethic of Care in Moral & Ethical Decisionmaking • Altruistic • Nonmaterialistic • Collaborative • Noncompetitive • Nonaggressive

  24. LAW AS A HEALING PROFESSION - The Movement • Coalescing • Extraordinary Fit With Atypical Traits • 10+ “Vectors:” • Transformational Mediation • Creative Problem Solving -Procedural Justice • Therapeutic Jurisprudence -Holistic Justice • Restorative Justice -Collaborative Law • Preventive Law -TJ/PL • Problem Solving Courts -Law & Socioeconomics? • Law & Spirituality, Mindfulness Meditation, …

  25. March, 1998: The Vectors of the CL Movement Preventive law Therapeutically oriented preventive law Problem Solving courts (DTCs, DV cts, MH cts, UFCs) Therapeutic jurisprudence Holisticjustice Creative problem solving Restorative justice Collaborative divorce law Procedural justice Law & socioeconomics? Transformative mediation

  26. Shift to Post-Enlightenment philosophical values (connectedness, community) End of the Cold War (them vs. us mentality) Tripartite crisis in legal profession Societal overuse of litigation to solve problems Influx of women and others into legal profession PRECURSORS: Why now?

  27. INTERSECTION of the Vectors • OPTIMIZING HUMAN WELLBEING (harmony, healing, reconciliation, moral growth…) • ”RIGHTS PLUS:” FOCUS ON EXTRALEGAL CONCERNS (needs, goals, beliefs, morals, resources, relationships, community, psychological state of mind …) Preventive law Therapeutic jurisprudence Therapeutically oriented preventive law Drug treatment courts; domestic violence courts; mental health courts Creative problem solving Law & socioeconomics Holisticjustice Transformative mediation Collaborative divorce law Restorative justice Procedural justice

  28. SubIntersections • Avoid Interpersonal Conflict & Litigation • Share Equal Power • Collaborative • Therapeutic • Interdisciplinary • Consistent w/ Lawyers’ Own Morals

  29. ORG’L CHART OF THE CL MOVEMENT - Plus Lenses: Holistic Therapeutic Jurisprudence Procedural Justice Traditional (win/lose – binary) Religious/Spiritual CreativeProblemSolving Law & Socioeconomics Processes: Negotiation/Settlement DTC’s; specialized courts Collaborative Law Evaluative Mediation Restorative Justice Facilitative Mediation TJ/PL Arbitration Preventive Law Litigation & other judicial processes Transformative Mediation

  30. CHALLENGES • Need for synthesis; divisiveness of vectors • Ethics code’s emphasis on zealous advocacy • Law’s traditional emphasis on individual rights • CLP seen as paternalistic • Need for addt’l training of lawyers • Personality misfit for many lawyers • Glacial rate of change in legal education • Marginalization as feminine, female

  31. PROPELLERS • Low public & client satisfaction w/lawyers • Low public opinion of lawyers • Lawyer job dissatisfaction & distress • Overuse of litigation as problemsolving strategy; litigiousness of society • Societal need for better conflict resolution processes • Philosophical shift towards “connectedness” • Feminine values balancing masculine values

  32. APPLICATIONS • Law school courses • CLE for lawyers • Post-graduate LL.M. programs • Retooling of experienced, burnt out lawyers • Attracting different personality types to law school • Improving client and societal satisfaction with law and lawyers • Improving society’s conflict resolution skills

  33. CONCLUSIONS • “Lawyer, Know Thyself” • Goodness of Fit Between Personality and Practice • Equality of Comprehensive Law Approaches and Traditional Law Practice

  34. Thank you for viewing. All information derived from empirical studies conducted by others.Citations available on request or in my bibliography (on web page). Comments welcome - please e-mail me at sdaicoff@fcsl.edu

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