Let's take a look at an article about the rule of law published by Mr Sun Xiaoxia in the evening paper.

Published in the ninth edition of Legal Daily on April 8, 2009.

What changes did the new J.M. cause in 2009?

□ Sun Xiaoxia

Sun Xiaoxia, Professor and Dean of Guanghua Law School of Zhejiang University, Doctor of Law of China Academy of Social Sciences, Senior Visiting Scholar of Harvard University.

1999 presided over the preparation of the new Zhejiang university law school; He has been the editor-in-chief of the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Justice. As a member of the expert group, I participated in the demonstration and implementation of the "National Unified Judicial Examination" system. At present, the chief expert presides over the revision of the national master of laws professional degree training program, and is a member of the Expert Advisory Committee of "Rule of Law in Zhejiang" of Zhejiang Provincial Committee. He is also the vice president of China Law Research Association and a member of the National Master of Laws Education Steering Committee. In 2002, he was awarded the "Top Ten Outstanding Young and Middle-aged Jurists" in the 3rd China.

The research field is jurisprudence-philosophy of law, specializing in judicial principles, procedural law and public law theory. Representative works include procedural law, control of administration according to law, legal phenomena and concepts, etc.

According to the decision of the State Council Academic Degrees Committee and the Ministry of Education, the National Steering Committee for Professional Degree Education of Master of Laws (J.M for short) has made it clear that from this year, the professional degree education of Master of Laws will be geared to the enrollment of law graduates. This breakthrough change will inevitably lead to major changes in law education in China, causing structural problems for law graduates. Is it miserable? Hey? Hurt, jealous, making noise, stealing? /span>。

The former non-law majors apply for full-time master of law, which enables students to have compound knowledge and ability between non-law majors and law majors. We call it a compound master of law. This change is not the legendary "enrollment expansion for employment", but a structural adjustment of law graduate training, which is of great significance. It will inevitably lead to three major changes in the training of legal talents:

First, the change from academic to professional; The Ministry of Education and the Academic Degrees Office clearly put forward that it is necessary to reduce the degree education of master of laws and let these talents mainly engage in academic research; Gradually increase the training of professional legal talents.

Second, from compound J.M. to the coexistence of compound and specialization. The institutional innovation of this decision is to recruit undergraduates majoring in law and train masters of law with more profound legal business and more skilled skills in a professional way. Therefore, I call it "specialized J.M." Its "compound J.M." constitutes two training modes of professional legal talents.

Third, the four-year academic system is gradually changed to 4+2 or 4+3. Bachelor of Laws graduates study for Master of Laws, which is determined to be a two-year academic system; The three-year academic system of J.M. for illegal undergraduates meets the requirements of society and legal profession for high-level legal talents. Undergraduate students who have been trained for four years can not meet the needs of society and occupation for talent level as a whole.

I believe that our legal professional departments and legal practice institutions will welcome this type of master graduates more. However, we can't help worrying: will the original "infantile disease" of J.M. education and the new J.M. in this "expansion" or "recruitment" cause J.M. to depreciate and be despised? My fears are not groundless. Some colleges and universities choose some candidates to study J.M. in LLM enrollment this year, which gives people the illusion that candidates who have not passed LLM can study J.M., which is a terrible misunderstanding. Therefore, it is extremely necessary to widely publicize this new model of degree education so that students, teachers and even the leaders of relevant institutions can fully understand the significance of the new changes in J.M education.

In the past 12 years of teaching and training practice, full-time master of laws has trained tens of thousands of compound senior legal talents for the country and society for non-law graduates. They play the role of legal experts in their respective industries in different jobs, and combine their professional skills with legal professional skills for comprehensive application. For example, medical students have played the role of senior legal talents in medicine and health after studying compound J.M., which is irreplaceable by any type of legal talents. Such compound senior legal talents are still needed in the future, and we should continue to do a good job in training this part.

At the same time, with the deepening of China's reform and opening up, the continuous development of socialist market economy and the continuous progress of socialist rule of law, legal issues in social and economic life are increasingly extensive, accurate and in-depth, and the country and society need a large number of specialized legal persons. Therefore, while continuing to train "compound" senior legal talents, it is also necessary to vigorously train a number of high-level "specialized" senior legal talents.

The undergraduate education of law is an educational model that takes general education as the leading factor and cultivates junior legal talents. According to the division of disciplines in 1992, Master of Laws and Doctor of Laws are scientific degrees, mainly "theoretical" or "academic" legal talents; Master of Laws (LLM) is a "compound" professional degree for illegal undergraduate students. From the perspective of national and social development, China currently needs a large number of "professional" senior legal talents, which cannot be replaced by those with bachelor of law, master of law and doctor of law degrees; In other words, China lacks a special training mode for senior legal talents. At present, the enrollment of law graduates is a special professional degree, which has the obvious characteristics of specialization in the talent model. According to my observation, the basic spirit of setting up this professional degree is:

First, adjust the training structure of legal talents. The purpose of recruiting LLM students is to adapt to the needs of social development and greatly adjust the training structure of legal talents. Over the years, the opinions and suggestions of legal departments on legal education in colleges and universities mainly focus on: how can law schools train legal persons who really meet the needs of professional departments?

Second, follow the law of legal education. For a long time, China's legal education and legal practice circles have been paying attention to the transformation of our talent training mode, hoping that the legal education circles can pay attention to their own laws and the characteristics of legal education; It has avoided many old problems that law education has been criticized, such as taking law education as general education, the lack of vocational training in the training mode of master of laws, and the serious disconnection between J.M. education and legal profession, which is a positive response.

Third, absorb domestic and foreign educational experience. The establishment of legal professional degree should not only absorb the experience of China's master of law degree and the training experience of other professional degrees for more than 10 years, but also absorb the experience and achievements of professional degrees at home and abroad, especially the legal education reform in Asian countries and regions in recent years. If the compound J.M. draws lessons from the JD model of the United States, then the specialized J.M. draws lessons from the reform experience of the "Institute of Law Science and Technology" in Japan and South Korea.

Fourthly, reform the legal education mode in China. Through this postgraduate enrollment reform, J.M. education has been extended to law graduates, followed by a reduction in the enrollment scale of Master of Laws research, which has positioned Master of Laws as the training channel for academic talents, and J.M. education, which is positioned as the training channel for professional legal talents, will inevitably become the main channel for future legal education.

Master of Law is to recruit undergraduate students majoring in law and cultivate senior specialized legal talents with socialist concept of rule of law and both ability and political integrity to meet the needs of China's market economy and the construction of a country ruled by law. According to my understanding, the training characteristics of specialized J.M. should pay attention to the following five aspects:

First, recruiting students from law graduates truly embodies the universal laws of law education at home and abroad, such as "consistent system", "orthodoxy", "adult skills" and "long academic system", and forms a 4+2 full-time "consistent system" model, which will become a main channel for cultivating professional senior legal talents in China in the future. As soon as possible, master of law and doctor of law should be positioned as the training channels for legal academic or theoretical talents. The cultivation of two kinds of talents plays an equally important role.

Secondly, it emphasizes the cultivation and training of the professional quality of legal talents, and integrates the professional ethics and professional skills requirements of applied, practical or applied talents advocated for a long time into the training mode of specialized talents. According to the needs of the quality of senior specialized legal talents, the curriculum system, teaching content and teaching methods have been redesigned. The designed course is not only different from the master of law course, but also different from the current full-time master of law degree course content, even different from the undergraduate stage.

Third, adhere to the standard of training senior legal talents, taking the master's education after undergraduate as the standard, that is, the talent training mode at the master's education level, that is, the so-called "senior specialized legal talents." No matter in curriculum education, legal practice, graduation thesis, etc. , must meet the requirements of the master's degree level. The total credits are not less than 75 credits.

Fourth, the organic unity of the first-level discipline and the direction of law. On the first-level discipline platform of law, the principle of "wide caliber and thick foundation" is adopted. Different from the nine disciplines, LLM's major is meticulous, which avoids the inconvenience or deficiency of narrow caliber that may occur in political and legal practice. At the same time, according to the actual needs of legal practice, it is divided into judicial legal affairs, government legal affairs and commercial legal affairs, which makes talent training more practical and targeted.

Fifth, pay attention to the training mode. Specialized J.M talents are professional and practical talents, so we should pay special attention to practical training. If possible, we should have more time, more detailed training process, more systematic training plan and stricter requirements than in the past. In the two-year academic system, there may be no less than a quarter of the time to enter the judicial practice training stage. In the training scheme, we should avoid the theoretical, systematic and general teaching of the course, but pay attention to the practicality, application, practicality and topicality of the course content, and pay attention to the teaching of legal knowledge, professional language, professional thinking, legal methods and professional technology and cultivate students' professional ability.

According to the development trend of legal profession and legal education in China, its practical characteristics will be more valued and favored by legal practice departments than any previous law degree education (bachelor of law, master of law, doctor of law). According to my prediction, in the future development, specialized J.M will become the main channel for training professional senior legal talents in China.

Viewpoint 1: Analyze the role of training professional master of law.

Master of Laws (Law) is a new training direction for law postgraduates in 2009. When this trick comes out, a stone stirs up a thousand waves. There are doubts and enlightenments. My point is simple:

First, the enrollment of master of laws may shrink, and it is really necessary to train theoretical talents to prepare for the training of doctor of laws; Secondly, although the traditional LLM was born on the basis of learning from the United States, it did not play its due role and may not be suitable for China's national conditions. A 4+3 so-called advanced legal application-oriented talent is, to put it bluntly, a double degree, and both majors are sloppy and not proficient. It is hard to imagine what kind of legal concept and belief a person who has left the basic legal theory and legal thinking to study for a master's degree will have, which is too utilitarian. After all, the law is not just the recitation and application of provisions. Therefore, I don't think that the traditional master of laws trains senior legal talents.

Of course, the financial crisis is a big environment, and it is a reality that undergraduate employment is difficult, and it is even more realistic that undergraduate employment in law is difficult. On the one hand, we need legal talents, on the other hand, we seem to have a surplus of legal talents, and a large number of law undergraduates can't find corresponding jobs. Then, I can only say that the financial crisis is just a cover, and it is time to reform our legal education and legal talent training model. Thus, Master of Laws (Law) came into being.

I don't know the national policies and ideas, but I think that maybe in the future, LLM and LLM should be divided into undergraduate studies of law, rather than recruiting some "double degrees". Undergraduates' understanding and pursuit of legal thick lines determine their choice, either to engage in theoretical research or to engage in practice. Both of them have received four years of formal undergraduate education in law, and they have an accurate grasp of the legal spirit, legal provisions and legal beliefs. On this basis, the division may really cultivate senior legal talents. If, as before, the Master of Laws has trained a group of utilitarian "double bachelors", although the Master of Laws emphasizes theoretical research, it is undeniable that many Master of Laws are also for slow judicial examination, employment, legal practice and master's degree, not really for theoretical research. As a result, LLM graduates face the competition with LLM (double-degree type) and law undergraduates, and few really continue to engage in theoretical research. Even so, it goes against the original intention of dividing Master of Laws and Master of Laws (double-degree type).

The cultivation of law postgraduates should be based on the division of master of law and master of law. The traditional master of laws can certainly exist, but it should not become the mainstream, and the mainstream should be the first two. Law is not simply reciting articles and applying them. Without the support of theory and the pursuit of faith, the talents trained under the traditional master of laws system, that is, the "double-degree talents" ridiculed by many people or the utilitarian cottage legal professionals, and even the law has become the easiest and easiest occupation for everyone.

Viewpoint 2: Explain people's prejudice against LLM.

I think the emergence of Master of Laws (LLM) will definitely widen the gap between LLM and LLM.

Due to the differences of undergraduate majors, there is no comparability between law and law. However, the setting of Master of Laws (Law) now really provides "comparability" for the original two majors. Master of Law (Law) is easily regarded as a member of the Master of Law by the outside world in terms of its training direction and name. The students of Master of Law (Law) are all those who failed to get into the Master of Law, that is, they lost at the starting line from the beginning. So, from A & gtB& amp； A > can be easily inferred from B=C; C.

Don't naively hope that the two training directions of "research" and "practice" will increase the "incomparable" of these two majors. In fact, employers don't have any hope for legal education in China at all, but pay more attention to where the best children go (the best evidence is that both Peking University and Tsinghua have the saying of "Bachelor of Gold, Master of Silver and Doctor of Bronze", and a graduate of Peking University is often more recognized by employers than a master's degree being admitted to other schools). Personally, I never think that Master of Laws is better than Master of Laws, but I am worried that the involvement of Master of Laws will increase people's misunderstanding on this issue.

There is no need to question the rigor of the above logic. I just think this is what ordinary people, that is, future employers, are likely to feel. Moreover, this possibility will be very large.

Viewpoint 3: Emphasize practical experience and social reality.

If it's all mixed up, it's all a waste.

Still talking about academic degrees, it's all bullshit.

Employer?

Smart employers can probably directly recruit some experienced graduates when there are more and more graduates. Freshman? Especially those kids who are full of scholar spirit, unrealistic, too self-centered and don't know how to respect people, why are they recruited? Waste.

Not just the law. The same is true of many other majors, especially those that are relatively public and can make small achievements through self-study. For example, several foreign majors who have just had tea in my study have all passed the judicial examination and are working as lawyers, including traffic engineering and planning.

Computer, art, music, nursing, etc., at sixes and sevens; For example, I am studying sociology, psychology, philosophy and economics.

Research type? Send your "research results" to have a look?

Application? Please provide the cases or legal opinions you have handled? And please attach the customer's contact information to help me check his evaluation of you?

Shorts are taller than others. When will they stop?

Many friends upstairs, especially those at school, if you are still so poor after graduation, accidentally bump into my hand during an interview or internship and shoot them directly.

By the way, I am an ordinary undergraduate, a master of the so-called "prestigious school", and I plan to take a more "prestigious school" doctor. At present, I have worked as a lawyer, construction site, shop assistant, business manager, teacher, personal assistant, etc.

Maybe I'm a little too big to say so, which will make people feel unprofessional.

Then I'll add a little extra thought.

1. If you don't know how the world works, where you are, how you intervene and coordinate the world around you, or partially transform your world, if you don't know humility and indifference, but only warm words and conversations, then you are not qualified to enter this world, and you should also go to the construction site for a period of time.

2. Personally, I feel that the current Master of Laws course is really suspected of having two bachelors. First of all, should we go through all the main courses of French books? Understand legal thinking and legal methods, right? Then you can do "special research" and then write your dissertation. In just two or three years, this span is really too big. Often, the courses of law books are not made up, and the special research is not in-depth, so they have already graduated.

But in comparison, I don't think the master of law is strong. Especially two-year projects. 1 year course, where can I do "special research"? 1 year, I will find a job or take an exam, and the time will pass. So later, I simply thought that the so-called master's degree, for most people, is not more significant than taking the civil service exam and taking the exam. In short, being a lawyer or a judge is a practical legal profession, and the undergraduate course is completely sufficient; A master's degree is not enough to be a researcher or a teacher.

In fact, whether it is "research" or "application", in the final analysis, it is not all:

(1) Describe the world you know; As far as legal persons are concerned, learn to distinguish between general social phenomena/social events and legal phenomena/legal events;

(2) Explain the reasons behind the events or phenomena you see-at this point, I certainly respect those very profound legal persons and admire their legal thinking and legal methods; However, I have to point out that, unlike natural science, which pursues accuracy or even uniqueness, as far as social science is concerned, putting the same research object in different research backgrounds (contexts) and adopting different research methods or approaches may lead to correct conclusions, although they are not consistent. In a sense, these different conclusions are often correct when judged independently; But once compared with other conclusions, it is inevitable to be "narrow" because of the loss of comprehensiveness. In short, for the same object, when you choose an angle or position, you may get a conditional "right", but once this condition is diluted, it is obvious that you cannot escape "one-sided".

(3) critical transformation? Or a forecasting guide? -For example, a critical paper with suggestions; Or settle disputes that arise; Or guard against possible legal risks?

-These three points are basically a summary of the experience and lessons learned from years of study and work. Later, I went on reading and found that I basically thought so, whether it was Fiona Fang's A Course in Social Research Methods, Barbie's Social Research Methods or Weber's Methodology of Social Science.

Then come back, friends, especially friends at school, can you reflect on the above three points? How much have you learned at school? Can I use it freely? -Obviously it is difficult. Because in my opinion, it is not enough to talk on paper or have indirect experience. A lot of things, you have to do it yourself, in order to truly understand, describe and explain, and then know how to predict or guide or transform.

Viewpoint 4: Analyze the awkward position of Fa Shuo (law) today.

Views on the setting of master of law, master of law and master of law (law)

First of all, we understand the problem from the perspective of master's enrollment

1, Master of Laws are all undergraduate graduates except law majors.

2.LLM students are full-time undergraduate graduates.

I don't understand this. As a practical senior legal talent, Master of Laws can only enroll illegal undergraduate students, but as the enrollment object of Master of Laws engaged in legal research, any undergraduate can participate. There will be three very contradictory formulas.

Master of Laws with China Characteristics = four years of non-law majors+social practice of non-law majors+three years of master of law majors+practical legal social practice = advanced talents with China characteristics.

Undergraduate students majoring in law have no chance to become our practical senior legal talents.

Master of Laws with China Characteristics = Four-year Bachelor of Law+Social Practice of Law Discipline+Two-year Master of Law Discipline+Research-oriented Legal Social Practice = Research-oriented Senior Talents with China Characteristics.

or

Master of Laws with China characteristics = four-year non-law undergraduate course+non-law social practice+two-year master of law+research-oriented legal social practice = China characteristic research-oriented senior talents.

Question 1: Why can't law graduates develop in the practical direction?

Question 2: As a research-oriented senior legal talent, why can you not need a four-year bachelor's degree in law? After all, a research-oriented legal talent must have a solid legal spirit, which is indispensable for four-year undergraduate legal education.

Question 3: Regarding the Master of Law, it will definitely lead to the difference between the Master of Law and the Master of Law in social reality, so many traditional conservative people, units and enterprises only agree with the Master of Law.

Question 4: The appearance of Master of Laws (LLM) seems to me to be a very boring and harmful move by the country. If we deliberately distinguish between Master of Laws (LLM) and Master of Laws, it will inevitably lead to the society's only recognition of LLM for practical senior legal talents, and LLM will be in a very helpless situation. It's like the state deliberately distinguishes between LL.M. and LL.M., and the result is the same, which is very unfair to the students who take the law exam across disciplines.

My own opinion: I think that the countries that train law graduates in China should adhere to openness and fairness, and I think that according to China's current national conditions, the enrollment targets of law graduates should be open and unfair, and it is necessary to deliberately distinguish between law undergraduates and illegal undergraduates, which will inevitably lead to the disadvantage of illegal undergraduates.

If you are engaged in the training of research-oriented master of law, you can not distinguish between law undergraduate and illegal undergraduate. Why do you deliberately distinguish these in order to cultivate a practical master of law?

In the postgraduate examination of law in China, the comprehensive examination candidates should not only get good written test results through study, but also examine the comprehensive legal quality and legal literacy of the candidates through interviews, so I think the candidates who have passed the postgraduate examination are all outstanding talents with comprehensive legal quality and literacy reaching a certain level. In the face of this fair and comprehensive examination, I think everyone is equal, and there is no difference between a law undergraduate and an illegal undergraduate.

In order to better train law graduates, I think we should optimize the mode of training illegal undergraduates. Whether it is a master of law or a master of law, we should adhere to the principle of inadvertently distinguishing between law and non-law, reflecting more help and promotion for non-law undergraduates. For example, illegal undergraduates can be encouraged to take part in undergraduate law courses in their spare time or take the examination mode to offer relevant counseling courses, so as to bridge the gap between law and non-law.

My own point of view:

In recent years, it is best to take a wait-and-see attitude and analyze the development degree, social recognition and the lack of retraining system and institutional setup of this training model. However, if this training mode can be developed and improved, it will be an important legal training mode.