Law and Technology

Overview

The practice of law is changing rapidly in the face of technical innovations. This module module will familiarise students with some of the ways in which legal practice is being transformed through AI, electronic search; document management etc. What, we ask do these changes mean for how law knows and for what law is? What are the technologies that are being brought to bear on practice? The module is explicitly aimed at employability given the growing demand for an appreciation of technologies within the legal profession. The module assumes no previous skills or knowledge of technological change on students’ parts.

Learning Objectives

At the end of the learning process students should have acquired:
1. knowledge and understanding of the social and legal challenges that legal technologies address, including emerging practices within the legal profession
2. a critical appreciation of debates around the application of technologies to legal problems
3. Basic awareness of data and data manipulation
4. An appreciation of concepts in machine learning and artificial intelligence
5. familiarity with tensions between computational techniques and legal practice

Skills

At the end of the module each student will be able to demonstrate:
1. knowledge and understanding of technological advances in the practice of law
2. a theoretical understanding of both the implications of technology for legal practice
3. synthesise relevant and directed readings with independent research, and present findings
4. manage basic coding challenges and communicating findings

Assessment

All 3 assignments