Learning social justice through a transformative and emancipatory framed LLB internship programme.
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Date
2023
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Abstract
Debates and discontent regarding the South African LLB programme culminated in a
qualification standards document compiled by the Council on Higher Education. Dated
May 2015, the LLB Standards qualification document set benchmarks for all South
African law schools. An abbreviated extract from the qualification standards relevant
to this study is that an LLB graduate must be able to critically reflect on his/her work
and the work of others, transfer legal knowledge, apply social justice imperatives,
promote social justice goals and understand the profession’s responsibilities of service
to the community. Therefore, it is required to explore whether South African law
graduates sufficiently understand social justice imperatives in the law context as
required by the LLB standards document. Moreover, constant calls for legal education
reform emerged from academia, the legal fraternity, and the judiciary. The study sought
to address the calls for reform and the LLB standards by designing and implementing
an internship programme framed by a transformative and emancipatory pedagogy and
social justice orientation in a clinical law setting within the University of KwaZulu-Natal
Howard College Campus Law Clinic. There is a dearth of local South African legal
literature on legal internships, and international literature indicates that most legal
internship programmes focus on teaching law students’ legal skills. The internship
programme under study focuses on learning about social justice as its primary aim
while also acquiring legal skills. It explores how a final year LLB student can best learn
to critically reflect on his/her work and the work of others, transfer legal knowledge,
apply social justice imperatives, promote social justice goals and understand the
profession’s service responsibilities to the community.
The facets of social justice the study participants encountered relate to vulnerable
groupings in the community. The internship consisted of an 84-hour contact
programme. Data were collected from eight final-year clinical Law LLB students before,
during, and after the internship programme's implementation during the July 2015
University term break. The data production strategy included a pre-internship self-administered questionnaire to explore the interns' understanding of social justice—
daily reflective journal entries reflecting on the day's activities and post-internship
interviews. Data collection analysis followed the themes identified in the literature and
the theoretical framing of the study. The study results relate to the perspective transformation of the intern participants on a personal level, how the intern participants
relate to society, and the perspective transformation of the intern participants from a legal and educational perspective. The study adds to the knowledge on legal internships, particularly those emphasizing social justice concerning vulnerable groupings in society.
Description
Doctoral Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.