Benchmarking and Accreditation Goals Support the Value of an Undergraduate Business Law Core Course

• Author: Thomas L. Wesner,Richard E. Powers,Christine Neylon O'Brien
• Date: 01 December 2018
• Published date: 01 December 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jlse.12074

Journal of Legal Studies Education

Volume 35, Issue 1, 171–189, Winter 2018

Benchmarking and Accreditation

Goals Support the Value of an

Undergraduate Business Law Core

Course

Christine Neylon O’Brien,∗Richard E. Powers,∗∗

and Thomas L. Wesner∗∗∗

I. INTRODUCTION

This article provides information about the value of a core course in busi-

ness law and why it remains essential to business education.1Joseph Wharton

recognized business law as one of the five subjects necessary to the business

school curriculum.2Many of our colleagues in the Academy of Legal Studies

of Business (ALSB) have written about the advantages that business law educa-

tion provides to our students. In 2000, Professor George Seidel published an

∗Professor of Business Law, Carroll School of Management, Boston College.

∗∗Associate Professor of the Practice, Carroll School of Management, Boston College.

∗∗∗

Associate Professor of the Practice, Carroll School of Management, Boston College, The

authors thank Margo E.K. Reder, of Boston College, for her research assistance.

1John R. Allison, The Role of Law in the Business School Curriculum,9J.LEGAL STUD.EDUC. 239,

239 (1991) (discussing law as vital component of undergraduate and graduate business curricu-

lum because it encourages students to recognize and manage legal risks, to understand legal

processes, while also increasing ethical sensitivity and contributing to the general education of

business students).

2See Robert Prentice, An Ethics Lesson for Business Schools,N.Y.TIMES, Aug. 20, 2002 (includ-

ing business law as one of five basic business school disciplines since 1881); Robert Bird &

Janine Hiller, Rediscovering the Power of Law in Business Education, AACSB BLOG, Feb. 23, 2016

(discussing Wharton school founding and business law as one of five key subjects in the busi-

ness school curriculum), http://www.aacsb.edu/blog/2016/february/rediscovering-the-power-

of-law-in-business-education.

C2018 The Authors

Journal of Legal Studies Education C2018 Academy of Legal Studies in Business

171

172 Vol. 35 / The Journal of Legal Studies Education

article demonstrating that “[s]enior managers from a variety of industries . . .

conclude[d] that law ranks among the three most valuable subjects in the

core curriculum.”3In a recent article, Professor Seidel explained why law

is more important than ever to business success.4He notes that law is “one

of a handful of functions that over time have enabled business success” and

ties the growth in the importance of business law to the rise in government

regulation and litigation as well as to globalization of business.5Professor

Robert Prentice has written that corporate scandals may be attributed to “in-

sufficient knowledge, appreciation for and, yes, fear of the law.”6Professor

Henry Lowenstein has written about the need for business schools to “expand

coverageofbusinesslawtopics...forthesoundpreparationofourstudents

to successfully operate in the real world of business today, and . . . to func-

tion as good corporate citizens.”7Several of our colleagues have written on

the strategic advantages that law provides to business.8With this research in

mind, this article focuses on the critical importance of business law within the

core curriculum of undergraduate business schools. The authors are business

law professors at Boston College where business law has been a part of the

curriculum in the Carroll School of Management since the school’s incep-

tion in 1938.9In business law and legal environment courses, our students

learn essential rules and decision-making paradigms that train them to be

better managers and leaders. They also improve their critical thinking skills;

3George J. Seidel, Six Forces and the Legal Environment of Business: The Relative Value of Business

Law Among Business School Core Courses,37A

M.BUS. L.J. 717, 742 (2000). The data was gathered

from senior managers who attended executive programs at the University of Michigan Business

School. Id. at 717.

4George J. Seidel, Business School Learning Goals: The Legal and Regulatory Context of Organizations

in a Global Economy,34J.L

EGAL STUD.EDUC. 325, 328–29 (2017).

5George J. Seidel, Law and the Business School Curriculum,BIZED, Mar. 15, 2017.

6Robert Prentice, An Ethics Lesson for Business Schools,N.Y.TIMES (Aug. 2002),

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/20/opinion/an-ethics-lesson-for-business-schools.html?

mcubz=3.

7Henry Lowenstein, Building the Manager’s Toolbox,30J.LEGAL STUD.EDUC. 347, 348 (2013).

8See Robert C. Bird, The Many Futures of Legal Strategy,47AM.BUS. L.J. 575 (2010).

9See David P. Twomey, The Business Law Department, First Fifty Years (1998), copy on file with

authors.