Whose Phronesis - Which Phronimoi: A Response to Dean Kronman on Law School Education

Abstract

Dean Anthony Kronman of the Yale Law School has produced one of the most widely discussed contemporary critiques of legal practice and, specifically, of legal education. This commentary will focus on Dean Kronman's central notion of practical wisdom. We begin with a preliminary question: Is there really such an identifiable thing as practical wisdom, as described and elaborated by Kronman? This cannot simply be taken for granted. After all, many of us were at one point convinced of the reality of phlogiston or of the aether through which light propagates. It is also possible that the practically wise person might exist without being readily or reliably detectable. So if we assume that practical wisdom, precisely as Kronman develops the idea, does exist, we should still ask whether a client, a group of persons, or a society can consistently recognize the possession or exercise of genuine practical wisdom by specific persons. We may call this problem that of identifying the phronimoi, or those persons who exercise practical wisdom. Once we have disposed of this preliminary question, we will turn to the law school context specifically. We ask whether, as Kronman argues, the traditional Socratic appellate case method, when well-practiced, tends distinctively to promote the development of practical wisdom as specifically envisioned by Kronman. At this point, we then pose our final question. It seems hard to object, in the abstract, to the general idea of practical wisdom. But Kronman develops and elaborates a particular conception of practical wisdom. We might see value in the general idea of practical wisdom without endorsing Kronman's specific account. So we must ask, finally, whether we ought to promote practical wisdom as conceived of by Kronman, in light of any available alternatives.