Surveys clinical scholarship about the lawyer's role in constructing a case from facts and law. Contends that this literature is creating a deeper analysis of what lawyers do when they represent clients, and that this developing analysis of the lawyer's role can improve the ability of practicing lawyers to anticipate problems and resolve them, and…

Explores the more purely theoretical side of the legal scholar's vocation, using Max Weber's text on the scholar's role titled "Science as a Vocation." Discusses the consequences of the tension between law schools' generalist "pretensions" and increasingly specialist character, and Weber's fact/value distinction. (EV)

Considers what is at stake in the debate about the political nature of law, why conservatives have been so much more successful in escaping the taboo against blurring the line between the two, and the "largely unfortunate" influence of the taboo on nonconservative academic work. (EV)

Law reviews should contain articles that are more than useless compendia of rules. They should be about law, the legal system and how it operates or might operate, so they become truly practical knowledge. Editors should boldly reject articles that do not advance understanding about law. (MSE)

Directed at junior law faculty, describes pervasive variables affecting the acceptance of their scholarship within tenure decisions and poses strategic questions to help them in decisions about their scholarship. Seeks to promote a better understanding of the "expectations, ethics, and etherealness" of tenure scholarship. (EV)

Empirical research--the uncovering of facts about how individuals and institutions within our legal culture actually behave--is a marginal activity in the legal academy. The neglect of empirical work is so deeply embedded in the incentive structure and professional norms of law schools that they are resistant to change. (MLW)

Both teaching and scholarly writing make sense only if they are part of an ongoing intellectual dialogue. When the audience for creative legal scholarship is small, as it often is, scholarship becomes primarily self-education, with publication a willingness to share ideas. (MSE)

Surveyed writings by senior professors of 16 elite law schools and published between September 1985 and August 1995. Explored their preferences for type of publication (book versus article) and constituency (academy, students/public, or profession). Found that half produced on average more for students/public than for other constituencies, and…

There are large numbers untenured law faculty, and that group must publish. However, authors are now sending out copies of each article to huge numbers of law reviews. Some guidelines are suggested, including, that one should have more than five copies of any manuscript circulating for consideration for publication. (MLW)

The lack of knowledge of and sensitivity to the basic features of foreign legal systems on the part of lawyers doing international work is related to a general lack of legal scholarship. The methodology and subject matter of comparative law must be renewed and revived at a time when barriers between legal systems seem to be increasing. (MSE)

One important technique by which legal scholars shape their work is the "internal scholarly jury." The jury is made up of those people who are reading the work and whose presumed reactions of pleasure or disappointment shape decisions about such things as topic, approach, method of analysis, and materials. (MLW)

Three traditions in legal scholarship are discussed and disputed: conceptualism, policy analysis, and a functionalist view that rejects both of the others. All are found unpersuasive and possibly harmful, confusing rather than clarifying the issues. (MSE)

Since the case method can be taught to any intelligent person in six months, one has time in law school to explore creative scholarship, finally to get the education missed as an undergraduate preparing to get into law school. It is important to cultivate a breed of liberally educated professionals. (MSE)

Institutionally, basing tenure decisions on scholarship is seen as a very attractive matter. Real scholarly achievement should be celebrated in a law school, but in considering the role of scholarship in tenure, what passes for acceptable scholarship in legal academe must be looked at closely. (MLW)

Tenured law professors are generally exempt from threat of "publish or perish," but not because of excessive professorial power, cowardice, or institutional inertia. Except in clear cases of sloth, the exemption is essential to postprobationary academic freedom. After tenure, the institution trusts the scholar to monitor himself. (MSE)