Legal Competitions and Practical Advocacy

Norwegian/English
ELE 3802
7.5 Credits

Introduction

This course provides students with an opportunity to apply legal principles in practice, through participation in simulated courtroom proceedings. A simulated trial will replicate court proceedings, with students assuming roles of attorneys, judges and arbitrators. Students will learn to present their arguments in a persuasive and structured manner, experience the challenges of an adversarial legal settings, and learn to handle complex court dynamics.

The simulated proceedings will be in the form of internal, national and international legal competitions. At the beginning of the semester, students will be given a comprehensive set of legal documents resembling a real-world dispute and will be expected to represent a client party. The legal problem will be provided either externally, through established national and international legal competitions, or internally, through a course-organized competition. Students will be expected to develop the skills to argue against other course participants, as well as external parties.

Students will work in teams to research the case, prepare legal briefs, and develop oral arguments. To successfully complete the course, students must submit a written memorandum on behalf of the party they represent, as well as present oral arguments in the case. The course is graded based on the simulated internal hearing and is not contingent upon performance and results of an external competition.

Course content

This course centers on competitive legal proceedings, simulating real-world courtroom environments. Students participate in adversarial mock trials, assuming roles of legal professionals such as attorneys, judges, and arbitrators. The course utilizes internal, national, and international legal competition formats to structure these simulations.

At the semester's start, students receive a set of legal documents representing a complex dispute. This case material may come from established external competitions or be developed internally for the course. Working in teams, students represent assigned client parties. They engage with both course participants and, where applicable, external international and national competitors. The legal issues covered vary, reflecting the diverse nature of competition problems, which may span multiple areas of law.

Students will be expected to develop a comprehensive set of written legal arguments resembling a formal legal submission in a complex dispute. Following this, they will present their claims on the topic in an adversarial legal setting, and are expected to both present their own arguments, and address counter-arguments by other parties.

Disclaimer

This is an excerpt from the complete course description for the course. If you are an active student at BI, you can find the complete course descriptions with information on eg. learning goals, learning process, curriculum and exam at portal.bi.no. We reserve the right to make changes to this description.