June 2-3 work in Law School Clinic

Thursday and Friday were devoted to the law school clinic. On Thursday morning, I completed my review of the CHRD policy on selecting cases for strategic litigation. Although CHRD has a well-thought-out policy as to how to select such cases, involving both determinations of what cases are important, issues with respect to clients, proving the case, and considering the relief that may be awarded, Chimge had stressed that it was important for me to provide feedback, which I was happy to do.

On Thursday afternoon, we met with the third law student group. This group was not as well prepared as the first two groups, but had considered two cases which might be interesting. One of these cases involve the issuance of a license for a possible uranium mine. The company had been issued a mining exploration license prior to 2008, but had not applied for or received a new license after Mongolia adopted a Nuclear Energy Law in 2008. Mongolia has significant uranium deposits, and the mining of these deposits is expected to be very profitable. The new law attempts to regulate this mining. 

The other case involved an application for a mining exploration permit. In both cases, the students need to get a lot more information for us to evaluate the cases. 

On Friday, we met with the students as a group, to discuss case selection criteria. Building on my experience of reviewing CHRD's policy, I prepared a presentation, describing the general concerns of selecting a case, including a discussion of the distinction between cases that a public interest organization affirmatively seeks out to promote its purposes, and cases that the organization accepts because of situations that are presented.

I tried to focus on the issue of identifying the legal issue before collecting the factual background. In Mongolia, a plaintiff is required to submit a full evidentiary showing at the time that the complaint is filed. It seemed to me that the students were focusing on indiscriminate collection of facts, without a clear understanding of the legal theories that supported the case. I wanted to stress to them that the first thing to do in analyzing a case is to understand which legal questions are important, so that the gathering of factual material could be oriented towards the relevant questions. 

The presentation took a little over three hours. I need to adjust my estimates of time to allow for the delays caused by translation. Also, while I tried, with some success, to generate as much discussion as possible rather than lecture, it seemed difficult to focus on the issues, and to elucidate the answers that I wanted. The so-called Socratic method may be difficult enough, without the problems caused by translation and possibly a lack of understanding of the different legal education that students receive in Mongolia. However, the presentation seemed very well received.