Native American Law Center
Special Projects
UW NALC AFGHAN LAW FACULTY CUSTOMARY LAW PARTNERSHIP
Throughout the world, many countries are struggling to maintain justice systems
reflective of community values which also conform with human rights concerns, predictability
in modern commercial dealings, and expectations of fairness. The Afghan Legal Educators
Project at the Asian Law Center at the University of Washington School of Law has
worked to strengthen legal education in Afghanistan by providing advanced legal
education for Afghan law faculty and professionals. Over the last four years, the
Native American Law Center’s Tribal Court Clinic has worked closely with eleven
law professors and graduates from several Afghanistan law schools.
This project,
a partnership with the UW Asian Law Center, enrolls both secular and Sharia law
professors and other legal professionals as students in the Clinic and allows them
to experience clinical teaching from both the student and faculty perspective. The
Afghan faculty participating in the Clinic also receive a specialized tutorial from
Assistant Clinic Director Molly Cohan in which they study clinical teaching methods,
analyze the Afghan legal system, and develop strategies for the improvement of Afghan
legal education. As part of the tutorial, the scholars also explore manners in which
customary law may be incorporated into a system which also provides modern safeguards
of due process and equal treatment. Many of the Afghan law faculty also attend the
annual NALC training at the Navajo Nation. Participation in the trip is quite helpful
to the Afghan scholars given the success of the Navajo Nation in incorporating traditional
and customary law in a modern tribal justice system.