What to Study to Save the World: Law
Students interested in studying the law are in luck. With dozens of legal specializations, degree types, and career paths for students to choose from, the possibilities in the legal field are versatile, lucrative, and stretch far beyond the horizon. Pop culture has been glamorizing traditional law careers for generations in books, television shows, and movies. Think about To Kill A Mockingbird, Matlock, Perry Mason, Devil’s Advocate, Suits, A Time to Kill, and How to Get Away With Murder.
Criminal prosecutors and criminal defense attorneys typically take center stage, with trial, corporate, and family lawyers often sharing the spotlight. However, there are many different forms a legal career can take. More specifically, there are many different ways for eager students with bright ideas and good intentions to make a positive impact on the world with the tools of law, policy, and advocacy.
Pursue Social Justice by Advocating for Civil and Political Rights
There are many different classes of rights, with civil and political rights being among the most well-known. Civil and political rights ensure our entitlement to participate safely and equally in society by protecting our personal and political freedoms from being infringed upon by governments, organizations, or other individuals.
The primary goal of civil rights law is to balance government power and individual liberties. So, civil rights attorneys advocate for social justice by working on cases of discrimination based on sex and gender, race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, and other identity markers. They often work for nonprofit organizations, public interest law firms, and larger law firms with diverse practices. However, civil rights lawyers like Thurgood Marshall, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Johnnie Cochran, Amal Clooney, and President Barack Obama have risen to generational notoriety for challenging cultural norms and righting systemic injustices.
Practicing civil rights law and advocating for citizens’ social and political liberties is a time-honored tradition amongst scholars in all modern civilizations. It’s one of the best ways for students to take matters into their own hands to effect change in the world.
Relevant Research Programs:
Set the Tone Globally with International Law
Students can make a significant impact on humanity by working closely with some of the most powerful people in the world through international law.
Public international law, global law, and the law of nations–known colloquially as international law–are the rules and principles that govern global relations between countries, organizations, and individuals. The core mission of international law is to promote world peace and economic and social development by addressing global issues like health, diplomacy, human rights, environmental preservation, and war crimes. The United Nations cites developing a body of international law as one of its crowning achievements.
International, or global, lawyers can pursue careers as diplomats, researchers, human rights advocates, and policy analysts. They can work within governments, international organizations like the WTO or the WHO, corporations, private law firms, and more. In addition to representing clients, they advocate for policy that affects nations, draft and negotiate international agreements like treaties, and help settle international disputes peacefully.
By becoming a global lawyer, students can dedicate their careers to tackling the most significant, life-altering problems in the world, including decolonization, climate change, drug addiction, disease epidemics, poverty, and world hunger.
Relevant Research Programs:
How Do Politics and Political Institutions Shape Public Policies and the Economy?
Poverty Alleviation Programs, Stakeholders, Interventions, and Key Success Factors
Become a Judge and Dispense Justice Firsthand
Judges wield an incredible amount of power within the legal system. While there are mandatory sentencing laws on the books, like the “Three Strikes” Law, judges are still responsible for overseeing the legal process, resolving disputes, interpreting laws, and rendering legal verdicts. Lawyers can advocate for clients and do their best to influence judges, juries, and the court of public opinion to win their cases, but judges are required to stay removed from the sparring, competitive world lawyers occupy and are almost solely responsible for determining the course of people’s lives.
While the actual rate of wrongful convictions in the United States is difficult to calculate precisely, studies have shown that four to six percent of incarcerated people in the U.S. are actually innocent. That may not seem like much, considering this implies 94 to 96 percent of prisoners are guilty, but the United States also holds over 20 percent of the world’s prison population. So, four to six percent translates to tens of thousands of wrongfully imprisoned people. There are many factors that both led to the phenomenon of mass incarceration and exacerbate it today, but judges have the power to slow and ultimately end wrongful convictions, thereby improving the criminal justice system from the inside out.
Judges also keep dangerous criminals and repeat offenders off the streets, where they hurt innocent people, and out of the boardrooms, where they implement harmful systems by corrupting entire companies, towns, states, and even countries. Students who want to pursue a career in the judicial system should be prepared to gain experience by first working as lawyers to develop an innate understanding of the law and court proceedings. Becoming a judge may take a little longer than becoming an attorney, but the impact one can have in the role makes the journey worth it.
Relevant Research Program:
Legal Dilemmas and Philosophical Quandaries: How To Think About Life’s Most Challenging Questions
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the employment of legal experts is expected to increase by five percent over the next decade. That translates to roughly 35,600 job openings for lawyers each year through 2033. Students who pursue legal or judicial careers have bright futures ahead of them and ample opportunities to make the world a better place.