Intercultural Human Rights Law Review
First Page
133
Abstract
This is the story of how we put an immediate-need and longer-term TPS service effort together, the lessons we learned in doing so, and what we believe to be a sustainable clinical pedagogy, and law school service model built around disaster assistance and recovery. We begin by examining how lawyers and law students have traditionally made valuable contributions to disaster response by using their legal training. All too often, those efforts have been hampered by the post-disaster ad hoc nature in which they have been constructed, and by the limitations inherent in the relatively small number of lawyers available to offer significant amounts of time to the overwhelming number of disaster-affected individuals. Recognizing this, many volunteer agencies and legal services providers have sought to improve the response time, quality, and quantity of post-disaster legal assistance by preparing materials and training volunteer lawyers in advance. Our proposal incorporates and builds on these improvements by arguing that law students and law clinics are a veritable "army" of untapped potential legal resources that could be configured to provide quick legal responses to emergencies and disasters, targeted to enforce disaster victims' basic needs. We encourage the legal community that is already working on emergency and disaster preparedness, relief and recovery to include law school clinics and students in their present efforts; and we encourage law school clinical instructors, and pro bono programs to give serious consideration to incorporating legal first response into their pedagogical and service programs.
Recommended Citation
Melissa Gibson Swain & JoNel Newman,
Helping Haiti in the Wake of Disaster: Law Students as First Responders,
6
Intercultural Hum. Rts. L. Rev.
133
(2011).
Available at:
https://scholarship.stu.edu/ihrlr/vol6/iss1/7