In order to deeply discuss the current problems, opportunities and challenges facing the legal ethics education, and innovate the legal ethics education system, the School of Juris Master, China University of Political Science and Law (CUPL) successfully held the "International Conference of Legal Ethics Education" on the Xueyuan Road campus on May 22-23, 2021. To meet therequirements of COVID-19 prevention and control, this seminar conducted online and offline, with the working languages both in Chinese and English.
More than 80 people, including experts, scholars and representatives of practice departments from well-known universities at home and abroad, participated in the conference, including: Yasutomo Morigiwa, President of the International Association for Legal Ethics and Professor from Nagoya University, Japan; Judy McMorrow, Professor at Boston College Law School; Professor Bradley Wendel, Chair Professor fromLaw School of Cornell University; Eli Wald, Professor at University of Denver Law School; Joshua Davis, Professor at University of California, San Francisco; Angelo Tandy, Professor at University of Genoa, Italy; Adrian Evans, Professor Emeritus from Monash University, Australia; Hu Huisheng,Associate Professor from Faculty of Law, University of Hong Kong;Ding Xiangshun, Professor at Renmin University of China Law School; Sun Xiaoxia, Professor atSchool of Law, Fudan University; Professor Xiao Jinming, Dean of Law School of Shandong University Weihai Campus;Qiu Zhaoji, Deputy Director of the Higher Education Research Institute of Northwest University of Political Science and Law and Professor at the School of Juris Master;Professor Yang Xiaolei, Vice Dean of Peking University Law School; Yin Bo, Associate Professor of Beijing Normal University Law School;Liu Xuebin, Associate Professor at Law School of Jilin University; Dr. Shang Lina,Koguan School of Law, Shanghai JiaotongUniversity; Professor Shi Jianzhong, Vice President of CUPL;Wang Jinxi, Professor at the School of Juris Master, CUPL; Liu Kunlun,Deputy Director of Center for Law Education Studies and Evaluates, CUPL;Xu Shenjian, Dean ofthe School of Juris Master, CUPL; Han Wensheng, Party Secretary of CUPL; Liu Zhihui, Deputy Dean of School of Juris Master of CUPL;Liang Min, Deputy Dean of School of Juris Master, CUPL; Associate Professor Yin Chao, Associate Professor Liu Xuanlin, Dr. Gao Qing, Dr. Li Lin, Dr. Li Xiao, Dr. Chen Xi, Dr. Ding Yaqi, Dr. Zhang Xian, Dr. Zhang Ran; etc.
The opening ceremony of the seminar was presided over by Professor Xu Shenjian, Dean ofthe School of Juris Master, CUPL. Professor Shi Jianzhong, Vice President of CUPL, delivered a speech at the opening ceremony. On behalf of the school, Vice President Shi Jianzhong first expressed his sincere congratulations on the convening of the seminar and extended a warm welcome to the guests attending the conference. He pointed out that,in order to implement the guiding spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's “morality education, morality and law education, and training high-quality talents of the rule of law”, the Ministry of Education has included the course of “legal ethics” in the core compulsory course of law major, and the legal ethics education is throughout the whole process of training talents of the rule of law. At present, all legal colleges and universities have offered compulsory courses on legal ethics education, continuously increasing the training of legal ethics for legal professionals, and various studies on related theories, systems and practices are also vigorously carried out. However, China's legal ethics education started relatively late, and basic theoretical research is still weak. In particular, we should learn from each other in terms of theoretical achievements and practical experience of different legal systems, countries and regions. Therefore, it is necessary and timely to hold this seminar. He hopes that starting with this conference, experts and scholars from different countries and regions work together to promote the reform and innovation of legal ethics education. He said that the School of Juris Master is a vibrant and energetic college, and this international conference organized by the School of Juris Master will surely be a complete success.
The seminar has three theme forums: "Theories and Methods of Legal Ethics Education", "Basic Theory of Legal Ethics", and "Ethical Issues of Various Legal Professionals". There is also a special " Student Forum on Legal Ethics Education" to showcase the teaching achievements of legal ethics education. The guests at the meeting shared their views and insights on theories, educational reforms and innovations related to legal ethics.
The first theme forum is "Theories and Methods of Legal Ethics Education". The forum is divided into two stages:
The first stage was presided over by Professor Liu Zhihui, Deputy Dean of School of Juris Master of CUPL, and commented by Professor Xu Shenjian, Dean of School of Juris Master of CUPL. Moriji Yasuo, Professor at Nagoya University, Japan, Professor Judy McMorrow, Deputy Dean of Boston College Law School, and Eli Wald, Professor at University of Denver Law School, delivered speeches successively.
Titled "Legal Ethics in Unknown Territories: A More Practical and Comprehensive Educational Method", Professor Yasutomo Morigiwa pointed out that we need to strengthen the application of legal ethics in the unknown field, and proposed to carry out legal and moral education in the unknown field with a more practical and comprehensive method.
Themed on "The Challenges of American Legal Ethics" Professor Judy McMorrow raised the question of how the legal ethics curriculum evolves in practice, and believed that legal ethics education should run through the entire process of legal careers.
In his keynote speech on "Reflection on the Necessity of Legal Ethics Course", Professor Eli Wald introduced and reflected on the current situation of mandatory legal ethics course in the United States, and discussed many factors that should be considered in the design of the legal ethics course.
Professor Xu Shenjian commented on the guest's report at this stage and thought that the guest's speech was very enlightening. He believes that professional ethics are very important for ethical decision-making; legal ethics should also explore new frontiers and unknown areas; legal ethics should emphasize practical education and also pay attention to cross-disciplinaryprofessional ethics issues.
The second stage was presided over by Liang Min, Associate Researcher and Deputy Dean of School of Juris Master, CUPL, and commented by Yin Chao, Associate Professor of School of Juris Master, CUPL. Speakers at this stage include Bradley Wendel, Professor at Law School of Cornell University,Hu Huisheng, Associate Professor from Faculty of Law, University of Hong Kong, Liu Kunlun, Deputy Director of Center for Law Education Studies and Evaluates, CUPL, and Liu Xuebin, Associate Professor at Law School of Jilin University.
Professor Bradley Wendel, with the title of "History and Theory of American Legal Ethics Teaching", introduced the history and current situation of legal ethics teaching in the United States, as well as the supervision of lawyers after the Watergate incident, emphasized the importance of legal ethics education, and raised questions that need attention in legal ethics education.
Associate Professor Hu Huisheng gave a keynote speech on "Promoting Global Legal Ethics Education in the Greater Bay Area: Theory and Methods". He introduced the courses of legal ethics in the School of International Law of Peking University and the School of Law of Hong Kong University, two major law schools in the Greater Bay Area, the theoretical basis, professional value and teaching mode of the courses, and analyzed the related influence of legal ethics teaching.
Associate Professor Liu Kunlun gave a keynote speech on "Some Thoughts on the Construction of Legal Ethics Course System", shared his thoughts on the construction of legal ethics curriculum system from the aspects of the legal ethics curriculum's positioning, systematization, the relationship with other major courses, and the relationship with the uniform legal profession qualification examination.
Associate Professor Liu Xuebin’s speech was titled "Experiences and Reflections on Online Teaching of Legal Ethics Courses". He shared the challenges of COVID-19 epidemic to the education of "Legal Ethics", and his experience and thoughts on the online teaching of " Legal Ethics " by taking Jilin University Law School as an example.
Associate Professor Yin Chao commented that the guests’ explanations of legal ethics education from different perspectives are very inspiring and meaningful. He introduced his understanding of the theoretical development and teaching practice of legal ethics in the United States, and talked about the necessity of discussing the construction of legal ethics curriculum system from a disciplinary perspective. He believes that experiential teaching is of great reference forteaching of legal ethics and the training of foreign lawyers.
The second theme forum is Basic Theory of Legal Ethics
The forum was hosted by Professor Han Wensheng, Party Secretary of the School of Juris Master, CUPL, and commented by Wang Jinxi, Professor at the School of Juris Master, CUPL. Sun Xiaoxia, Professor at School of Law, Fudan University, Adrian Evans, Professor at Monash University, Australia, Joshua Davis, Professor and Director, Center for Law and Ethics at University of San Francisco, Xiao Jinming, professor and dean at the Law School of Shandong University (Weihai), and Professor Yang Xiaolei, Vice Dean of Peking University Law School, Yin Bo, Associate Professor of Beijing Normal University Law School, and Qiu Zhaoji, Deputy Director of the Higher Education Research Institute of Northwest University of Political Science and Law and Professor at the School of Juris Master, delivered reports successively.
In his speech themed on "How do we misunderstand legal ethics?", Mr. Sun Xiaoxia believes that there are misunderstandings of legal ethics in China's legal ethics education, which are also the problems faced by legal ethics education. He analyzed the causes of these doubts and misunderstandings and provided corresponding solutions.
In a report entitled "The Advantages and Disadvantages of Different Legal and Ethical Frameworks", Professor Adrian Evans analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of different legal and ethical frameworks in both broad and narrow senses of the rule of law, social moral framework, and lawyers' moral types.
Focused on the theme of "Non-Natural Law: Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Consciousness and Legal Philosophy", Professor Joshua Davis interpreted the related problems of artificial intelligence, ethics and consciousness from the perspective of legal philosophy, and proposed how to understand artificial intelligence conceptually and the ethical issues involved.
Professor Xiao Jinming gave a report entitled "Several Thoughts on the Construction of Legal Ethics in the New Era". He said thatemphasizing people’sjudicatureand people-centered is the foundation of legal ethics in the new era. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen the research on legal ethics, improve the quality and effect of legal ethics education, and make legal ethics become the eternal theme of legal personnel training and education forlegal teams.
Professor Yang Xiaolei gave a report entitled "Professional Ethics of Legal Knowledge". He talked about his understanding of professional ethics and professional ethics education from the aspects of the knowledge attribute of law, the role, function, technology and strategy of the legal profession at the micro level, and the operation and development of law at the macro level.
Associate Professor Yin Bo gave a lecture entitled "Performance Evaluation System andIncreased Immoral Crisis of the Legal Profession". He believed that contemporary legal ethics is facing an immoral crisis that gradually deviates from popular moral concepts, and judicial business evaluation is intensifying this trend. To this end, he advocated to incorporate the code of conduct and the moral quality of actors into the category of professional ethics, to promote the optimization of performance evaluation, to build a moral evaluation mechanism that truly reflects the inner conscience, and to improve the evaluation system of judicial business.
Professor Qiu Zhaojiarguedinhisspeechentitled "Criticism and Reconstruction of Judge 's Professional Ethics—Based on the Text of Marx and Engels" that Marx and Engels had a lot of discussions on legal ethics, which made profound criticism and reconstruction on the judiciary not serving the people, the independence of judicial judgment and the arbitrary judgment of judges, etc., which has been a revelation for us to study the professional ethics of judges now.
Professor Wang Jinxi pointed out in his review that there were manyinterdisciplinarytopics at this stage, and the methods discussed by scholars were different, but the views of scholars were instructive. He expressed his views on the construction of the value of legal ethics, artificial intelligence and ethics, legal ethics and public ethics, performance evaluation and the immoral crisis of legal profession, as well as the ethical attributes of legal knowledge. Finally, he also raised a question of how to construct legal ethics with Chinese characteristics under the background of internationalization of lawyers.
The third forum is themed on "Ethical Issues of Various Legal Professionals".
The forum was hosted by Yin Chao, Associate Professor from the School of Juris Master of CUPL, and commented by Professor Han Wensheng, Party Secretary of the School of Juris Master of CUPL. Professor Ding Xiangshun of Renmin University of China Law School, Professor Xu Shenjian, Dean of School of Juris Master of CUPL, Shang Lina, lecturer of Koguan School of Law, Shanghai Jiaotong University, and Angelo Tandy, Professor at University of Genoa, Italy, delivered speeches successively.
Ding Xiangshun made aspeechentitled "Taking Adversary System of Trial Seriously: Ethics Issues Revealed in Sun Yang's Doping Case from the Court of Arbitration for Sport". He took the Sun Yang's case as an example, and proposed to strengthen the training of Chinese foreign-related legal personnel based on the analysis of the characteristics of the extraterritorial adversary system of trial.
Xu Shenjian’s report is titled "Self-discipline and Heteronomy in the Management of Lawyers in Securities Industry". He took the "Xintai case" as an example to raise an issue of insufficient self-regulation ofsecurities lawyers and pointed out that the Lawyers Association should strengthen the vocational capacity building and professional skills training of securities lawyers so as to give full play to the role of self-discipline and heteronomy mechanisms.
In a report entitled "Reflections on Lawyers’ Communal Obligations", Dr. Shang Lina stated that the construction of a legal ethics system needs to go beyond the existing codes of professional legal ethics in China and integrate the content of China’s long traditional morality into the content of lawyers’ communal obligations. It will also be considered comprehensively in light of China’s current special circumstances concerning party political discipline and political guidance.
Professor Angelo Tandy introduced the concept of "Lawyers Law" in the keynote speech of "Lawyer Law Facing the New Value and Eternal Value of Legal ethics", introduced the discussion on the new value and eternal value of legal ethics, and noted challenges faced by legal ethics.
Professor Han Wensheng commented that the issues of professional ethics exposed in the Sun Yang’s case made us seriously think about the training of foreign-related legal talents. He proposed that the continuing education of legal ethics for lawyers should be strengthened to effectively protect theprofessional rights of lawyers. He also emphasized that more legal ethics education shall be integrated into various courses including substantive law and procedural law in teaching.
The last forum is "Student Forum on Legal Ethics Education".The student forumisdivided into two themes: "Lawyers’ " and "Legal Ethics of Judges, Prosecutors, and Supervisors". They were hosted by Rose and Tian Yinghao,two students from the School of Juris Master in CUPL,.Commented separately byAssociate Professor Yin Chao, Dr. Gao Qing and Professor Han Wensheng.Professor Liu Zhihui made a concluding remark.
Professor Han Wensheng made a speech at the student forum. He said that the optimization of thelegal ethics curriculum shouldadopttheideas of experts and scholars at home and abroad as well as the suggestions of students; he looks forward to cultivating more outstanding legal professionalsthrough ourjointefforts.
11 postgraduate students including Yi Peiyuan, Xiao Huihua, Li Yuzhuo, Shi Boyuan, Nong Qiyun, He Yu, Wang Shuo, Li Yuwen, Ren Fanglei, Fan Zhen and Lei Xiaodi from the School of Juris Master, respectively expressed their views on issues such as the conflict resolution model of defense lawyers’ obligations, the boundaries of lawyers’ freedom of speech, the legal ethics standards of judges, and the professional attributes and professional ethics of supervisors.
Professor Liu Zhihui said in the summary of the student forum that this seminar provides students with an opportunity to showcase their learning outcomes and express their own opinions. He hopes that students will be able to express and revise their opinions in the future and achieve self-actualization.
Following the conclusion of the international conference, a closing ceremony was held.Liang Min, Associate researcher and deputy dean of the School of Juris Master, CUPL, presided over the closing ceremony. She said that afterintense and efficient discussions, various agendas were accomplished with fruitful results. This international conference on legal ethics education is cutting-edge and in-depth. The results of the conference also provide valuable experience and innovative ideas for the School of Juris Master's legal ethics education and teaching.
Professor Xu Shenjian, Dean of the School of Juris Master of CUPL, made a summary of the meeting. Hereviewed the achievements of this meeting and noted that this is the reflection of the School of Juris Master's serious treatment of legal ethics education, focusing on the cultivation of legal talents, and striving to explore the issues related to the legal ethics education throughout the whole process of talent cultivation. He congratulated the successful holding of the meeting. He said that in foreign countries, legal ethics courses have attracted people's attention and are linked to the "Watergate Affair" in the United States. It has even changed the American legal education and bar exam system.In China, legal ethics education has become a compulsory course of law, which is inseparable from General Secretary Xi Jinping’s visit of CUPL. This also makes legal ethics educationshift from the edge to the center of legal education. This is the big day of courses in legal ethics.He believes that the course of legal ethics is an ideological and moral course for legal professionals, which is of vital importance. In addition to strengthening the construction of the course teaching system, it is also necessary to attach importance to practical teaching, theoretical discussion and discipline construction. Finally, he set expectations for the future of legal ethics education, and expressed his sincere gratitude to the domestic and foreign guests who participated in the conference and the conference team who extended great efforts for the successful convening of the conference.
The "International Conference of Legal Ethics Education" ended successfully in a warm atmosphere.
