Sciences Po Law School

With the Bologna Process, the master's degree in law became assimilated to other "master's degrees" that could have had "law" as a specialty. Yet, originally, only the master's degree in law ("maîtrise en droit") was giving access to the legal profession. As soon as 2004, fearing for the access to the bar and legal professions to be open to institutions that are not law schools, 54 professors of law signed a long text in the 'Recueil Dalloz' (major French legal journal), called "The Fight for the Law". According to them, institutions like Sciences Po or business schools should stay complementary to a program in the universities and not replace them. They pointed out in particular the problem of the quality of the knowledge of legal professionals and of their deontology, should it be otherwise. They managed to have the education in law to have a special place in the French Code of Education. The move was co-led by Guillaume Drago, professor at University of Paris II Panthéon-Assas, and François Gaudu, professor at University of Paris 1 Pantheon-Sorbonne.[8]

In 2007, however, a governmental decree authorized Sciences Po students to pass the Bar exam, providing they take a masters degree with the mention "law". Academics in law labelled such a move as a "coup" and created an online petition called "call against the questioning of the utility of legal studies in the education of lawyers" ("appel contre la remise en cause de l'utilité des études juridiques dans la formation des avocats"). 445 academics publicly signed the petition, which is 15% of all French academics in law. The unity of the French academic body was noted: left- and right-wing professors, professors from Paris and outside Paris, in public law or private law… were in favor of the move. Students’ unions supported it. The union of (French) law school’s deans "totally" associated itself to the move too. They called for candidates in the 2007 French presidential election to take a stance on this issue and they went to court to contest the legality of the decision. The governmental decree was not eventually cancelled, by the new government or by the Conseil d’État.[8]

These critics said that it would not be a problem if Sciences Po was offering 8 semesters of law, as required as a general rule, to access to the bar. However, Sciences Po would be offering only general courses in social sciences with only a "sprinkling of law" in the masters programs. That would not be enough to become a barrister ("avocat") and would put into question the utility of the law to become one. It would be creating barristers with a cheap education in law and would be detrimental, in particular, for the citizens who would take the services of barristers who did not have a proper education in law.[8]

To them, with this decree, the law was becoming a marketing product in a service of a school of political sciences that has many connections with politicians. They would have preferred Sciences Po to keep with political sciences.[9]

They also criticized the fact that the government is giving much more money per student to Sciences Po and this undue access to the bar with only light courses in law would create an unfair competition between French law schools and Sciences Po.[9]

Richard Descoings, president of Sciences Po, responded in the media saying that the students are doing "lots of law" during their whole education and that Sciences Po is not responsible for the lack of funding of universities. He also argued that before 1994, Sciences Po students already could become barristers.[10]

In 2009, Sciences Po created the "Sciences Po Law School", in a new meaning for France, since it is not a faculty of law (see the disambiguation page, third meaning).

In 2008, partly as an answer to the announcement of the creation of a "law school" in this new meaning in Sciences Po, University of Paris II Panthéon-Assas, created a "law college" (undergraduate level) and then a "law school" (graduate level) on top of its faculty of law to attract top students in France (see the disambiguation page, second meaning). It was widely reported in the media as the creation of a "way of excellence in law" for "brilliant students".[11][12][13] Several universities followed this model, and created these highly selective schools.[14]

• George Bermann, international arbitration lawyer
• Emmanuel Gaillard, head of Shearman & Sterling's International Arbitration practice