The number of international students studying law in Australia has increased dramatically in recent years. Why Australia, and why law?

The attraction of Australia is easy enough to understand. A large, open, friendly and easy-going country, with a spectacularly attractive climate, a uniquely diverse natural environment, cutting-edge technologies and communications, an enviably high standard of living, a passion for sport and the outdoors, and yet, almost counter-intuitively, a parallel love of the arts and intellectual pursuits. Moreover, Australians take a large pride in their achievements in these fields on the world stage, achievements that are out of all proportion to the relatively small size of the population (around 20 million people).

Australians are also very welcoming to international students. Positive benefits flow in two directions. All international students take back with them to their home countries, in their hearts and their minds, a little bit of Australia. And while they are in Australia, international students culturally enrich campuses that might otherwise be boringly monolingual, homogeneous and even parochial. Despite the hint of hyperbole, it is not an overstatement, in my view, to say that international student exchanges and foreign study have the potential to make a major contribution to international understanding and world peace.

Why law? What attracts international students to Australia to undertake legal study? What is distinctive about studying law in Australia?

There are two dimensions to legal study: focused training for professional practice, and the broader pursuit of law as an intellectual discipline. Professional training is undertaken in the LLB or JD, taken either at undergraduate level, often in combination with a liberal arts or other degree, or as a graduate of another discipline. This professional training must cover a core curriculum for accreditation purposes, but it also incorporates the broader study of law. The LLB and JD are recognised for admission to legal practice, not only in Australia but also in some other countries, at least on completion of whatever additional requirements those other countries may impose.

Many international students undertake the LLB or JD in Australia, even though those degrees are usually only partially transferable back to their home countries as qualifications to practise law there. Most, however, undertake graduate programs: diplomas, master's degrees, and doctoral degrees, by coursework or research or a combination of both. These programs may offer further specialisations of particular relevance to legal practice, or broad explorations of legal themes, including jurisprudential theory, international law, and problems of law and society.

Unlike the United States, all Australian law schools are accredited for the admission of their graduates to legal practice in Australia. However, not all run graduate programs. The details of all of the programs offered by Australian law schools may conveniently be found in an annual publication of the Council of Australian Law Deans (CALD) entitled Studying Law in Australia. The latest version is on the CALD website at http://cald.anu.edu.au

Why the interest in law?

In addition to the attractions of legal practice, students are drawn to the study of law for broader reasons. Legal training in Australia confers broad generic skills such as the skills of incisive analysis, logical reasoning, creative problem-solving, clear communication, and practical negotiation, all of which transcend their legal context and equip graduates for a surprisingly wide variety of careers. Law students in Australia, undergraduate and postgraduate, also have an interest in studying law beyond the immediate demands of legal practice simply because they are interested in it for its own sake. There is a certain fascination, and an understandable one, affecting local and international students alike, in endeavouring to understand law as part of the glue that holds society together, and how it connects with other disciplines such as economics, history, philosophy, psychology and political science.

What, though, is the particular attraction to the international student of studying law in Australia?

I think it is a combination of everything I have noted above. You get to come to a wonderful country, with a long tradition of commitment to the rule of law as a fundamental underpinning of a healthy and robust democracy, and a mature and sophisticated legal system, in the complicating but interesting context of a federal state. The Australian legal system can claim in many ways to have set international benchmarks. At different times, the High Court of Australia has been regarded as the intellectual leader amongst national courts in the common law world. Australian jurists are held in high esteem throughout the world. Australian law graduates are recognised internationally for their high levels of legal skills and knowledge. It is a great place in which to undertake the study of this basic discipline: a relatively young country that has absorbed many foreign influences, moulded them into something unique, and can now export the resultant product—in this case, Australian legal education—with confidence and pride.

There are 29 law schools in Australia—on a per capita basis more than twice the equivalent number of accredited law schools in the United States—reflecting the high demand for legal education here, whether it be for professional training, the acquisition of generic skills, or simply to satisfy a thirst for general legal knowledge. The large number of law schools offers the prospective international student a wide choice of location, style, and program content.

In making that choice, you may wish to peruse CALD's Studying Law in Australia, or to consult your local Australian Embassy or High Commission. But wherever you go, you can be assured of a warm Aussie welcome and an intellectually and culturally enriching experience.

Author:
Professor Michael Coper
Dean of Law, Australian National University
Chair, Council of Australia Law Deans