Department of Juridical Studies
Department of Current Legal Studies
Department of Global Legal Studies
Department of Political Science
Consumer law addresses the rights and roles of consumers, corporate law addresses laws relevant to corporate activities, and environmental law addresses laws and policies to protect the global environment. Students in the Department of Current Legal Studies utilize computers to study these groups of laws from a perspective that sees them as “contemporary laws” and to develop thinking skills and data utilization competencies appropriate to the information age.
Classes include special seminars (Legal Information Processing Seminar 1 and 2, etc.), information technology subjects (Information Processing 1-4, Law of Privacy and Disclosure, and Law and Artificial Intelligence, etc.), and consumer, corporate, and environmental law classes.
The Department offers a particularly extensive range of consumer law courses. In addition to full-time faculty members who are well-versed in legal practice, outside practitioners provide practical learning experiences related to the legislation, enforcement, and other aspects of major consumer laws. In Seminar on Consumer Law by Practitioners (a required course), students engage in practical studies of consumer law via small-group seminars.
The Department arranges internships with a focus on consumer affairs centers in city and ward offices as well as consumer organizations. Seeing how laws and policies they learned about in the classroom are being implemented is an opportunity for students to think about their own career path.
In the environmental law course group, students acquire the knowledge of the natural sciences required when considering environmental law while examining laws and regulations concerning the protection of the natural environment and preservation of living environments. In the corporate law course group, they study the various laws which stipulate the rules for corporate activities that underpin the economy.
As a department that deals with the latest laws, we provide advanced computer-based education. Students refine their IT skills in small classes and acquire the ability to gather and disseminate documents and information related to the law. In their third and fourth years, students engage in the specialized and advanced study of law with a focus on three cutting-edge legal fields. They acquire a high level of legal knowledge, and also develop an awareness of issues and the ability to solve problems via their self-directed learning in exercises.
AI has become part of our daily lives, as demonstrated by AI speakers and machine translation, and society is entering a phase of dramatic change. While AI is becoming an indispensable source of behind-the-scenes support for society, it is also expected to cause various problems. In order to find solutions to such problems, students learn the basics of AI and study the role that the law will play in a society where AI is ubiquitous.
Students learn how to apply the theories they learned at university through on-the-job experience at local governments, consumer-related organizations, and the like.