Academic agenda is organized around certain broad principles such as:

1. Human Rights and Democratic Governance-Governance is a central issue in any legal study programme. In a liberal democratic framework as in India, if people ought to be the focus, the status and scope of human rights in all its dimensions will remain the organizing principle for legal scholarship. Its relation to justice is obvious. Instead of studying the status of citizen after looking at the authority and functions of the State, this approach will start with ''WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA''. Study of Public Law subjects will assume a new dimension and relevance in this approach and the social change function of law will receive greater attention than the social control or social ordering function. If case study method of the management school and the field project techniques of the social work school can suitably be adopted in the teaching of Public Law, there are better prospects of taking the law school towards justice education.

2. Sustainable Development-Economic and business laws have assumed great importance in the legal curriculum. It does give a variety of strategies and skills for managing markets, and distributing risks and rewards. The regulatory and supervisory role of law and legal institutions have not been successful in protecting public interest particularly in developing economies. Negotiating justice in private relationships in unequal societies has been a difficult exercise for law and legal institutions. Given the public costs of ''development'' and the national implications of a globalised market, law has to direct change rather than manage change, if it has to be promotive of justice to weaker sections in society.

3. If sustainable and equitable development is part of the goals of justice education, the law school of the future has to organize inter-disciplinary studies, cross-border comparisons and alternate models both in policy development and in dispute resolution. It is indeed challenging for the curriculum to capture the range and variety of this approach within the limited resources available to the average law school. Therefore, would it be worthwhile to seek joint programmes with the business or management schools? What is the scope of specialisation in the law curriculum? Would linkages with business and industry be promotive of justice goals? Does development law inject social responsibility in an otherwise market oriented corporate law studies? These concerns of goals and strategies inform the academic programmes at NUJS

4. United Nations and a Just World Order-The emergence of the global village as a result of technological developments has brought about revolutionary changes in the way we conceived relationships between nations and peoples. Mutual inter-dependence is incessantly pushing a series of changes in social, economic, cultural and political relations. In this context, the interface between law and science (technology) needs greater attention from the legal world. The new world order being evolved under WTO will necessarily draw justice-minded lawyers particularly in developing countries more intensely for evolving alternate remedies to social problems. Managing change is more critical here than initiating change or directing change. This may require several skills and capacities difficult even to imagine by an average law teacher. The international movement of NGOs of all shades and sizes could perhaps offer partnerships to law schools to develop capacities in this delicate task of evolving legal roles in international ordering for equity and co-operation.

5. Professionalism and Accountability-If justice is the product to be manufactured by the skills and expertise of law persons, legal education has to be developed around the learning of skills, values and attitudes. Broadly speaking, this is what clinical education is aimed to achieve. In a report submitted by a Task Force set up by the American Bar Association in 1989, the following ten skills were identified as fundamental to lawyering: Problem Solving; Legal Analysis and Reasoning; Legal Research; Factual Investigation; Communication; Counselling; Negotiation; Litigation and Alternate Dispute Resolution Procedures; Organization and Management of Legal Work; and Recognising and Resolving Ethical Dilemmas.

For the law school involved in justice education, the ABA recommended lists of skills and values seem to be insufficient agenda for instilling sense of accountability and responsiveness to suffering and injustice. Would the Code of Ethics of the profession give the additional norms and standards necessary for justice promotion in private and professional conduct? If they do, how much of it can be taught in the law school and through what programmes? Does legal aid clinic provide opportunities for justice education while imparting training in skills? What are the programmes and activities which have been found suitable to accomplish the tasks? Should they be part of the required curriculum or kept co-curricular and optional?

From the existing curriculum and the methods of its teaching in most law schools, one gets an impression that much of law can be studied as an autonomous discipline with a rigorous analytical approach depending mainly on statutes and judicial opinions. As a response to challenges from critics, some conventional law schools have reluctantly accommodated a few clinical courses as if the right balance can be achieved with a little sensitization to justice concerns at the end of the law school study. Our experience tells us that such an approach has little impact on the students and does disservice to the goals of justice education. Therefore, an integrated approach at the macro and micro levels in the entire law school curriculum and the way it is taught is necessary to take legal education nearer to justice education. This integration is still a challenge to the law teaching community, the resolution of which will determine the extent of transformation possible towards justice education.

At NUJS, the Faculty and students are continuing their endeavour to find the best programmes and strategies for the transformation of legal education into JUSTICE EDUCATION.