Law, Ethics, and Society
Divisional Home: Division V
Minor Advisor: Dan Huck
The Law Ethics, and Society [LES] divisional minor provides opportunities for coherent, disciplined, and multi-disciplinary study of law that is rooted in the liberal arts and the aims of liberal learning. Paramount purposes include students developing careful, normative understandings of law, justice, and society, both in the United States and internationally. This approach aims to supplement and complement students’ major disciplinary study, whether they are preparing to enter graduate study or the world of work beyond Berea.
The LES minor explores law as an enterprise in which moral argument, distinctive practices of interpretation and reasoning, and coercive force are employed to structure society, address conflicts, effect social change, and engage social, political, ethical/moral, and economic issues that arise for institutions, organizations, and people. The LES minor offerings rely on legal and other materials to explore questions that are both theoretical and practical/applied; that affect both public and private life; that involve quandaries about justice and injustice; that address tensions between liberty and authority, community and individual, process and outcome; and, that engage matters of proper interpretation and reasoning in and about law.
The Law Ethics and Society minor consists of five (5) full-credit courses: one (1) required core course -- LES 215: Law, Ethnics, and Society -- and four (4) distribution courses. One (1) of the required distribution courses must be taken from the "Structures of Law" list, and one (1) required distribution course must be taken from the "Law and Ethics" list (see below). Beyond these three (3) required courses (LES 215, plus one "Structures of Law" and one "Law and Ethics"), students can choose their additional two (2) courses from any of the three lists of courses below. No more than two (2) courses from the same departmental rubric (e.g., PSC, SOC, etc.) can be used to satisfy the overall requirement of successfully passing five (5) courses for the LES minor. Students should strongly consider taking the LES 215 course as a first foundational course in the LES sequence before completing all other courses required for the minor.
To earn the minor in Law, Ethics, and Society, a student must pass five (5) courses as follows:
- LES 215: Law, Ethics, and Society;
- at least one (1) course from the "Structures of Law" list below;
- at least one (1) course from the "Law and Ethics" list below; and;
- two (2) additional courses from any of the three (3) lists below ("Structures of Law", "Law and Ethics", or "Additional courses").
- however, in no case may two (2) courses using the same departmental rubric (e.g., PSC, SOC, etc.) be applied toward earning the LES minor
LES minor requirements
| LES 215 | American Law Principles | 1 Course Credit |
Structures of Law
Students must complete at least one (1) course from the list below:
| BUS 240 | Business Law | 1 Course Credit |
| CFS 350 | Family Law and Policy | 1 Course Credit |
| PSC 100 | Intro to Study of Politics | 1 Course Credit |
| PSC 110 | American Government | 1 Course Credit |
| PSC 314 | American Constitutional Law | 1 Course Credit |
| PSC 317 | The Judicial Process | 1 Course Credit |
Law and Ethics
Students must complete at least one (1) course from the list below:
Additional Courses
In addition to completing LES 215 and the required minimum of one course from each of the two above lists, the LES minor requires a student to choose two (2) additional courses from either of these lists above and/or from the "Additional Courses" listed below or an alternative LES signified course when offered as Special Topics, Independent Study, Directed Study, or Internship (see Opportunities Common to Many Fields of Study).
NOTE: Students must first take LES 370 for one full credit before taking LES 371 for one additional full credit.
| LES 370 | Legal Reasoning & Advocacy I | 1 Course Credit |
| LES 371 | Legal Reasoning & Advocacy II | 1 Course Credit |
| PHI 106 | Introductory Reasoning | 1 Course Credit |
| PSJ 113/COM 113 | Conflict and Mediation (COM) | 1 Course Credit |
| or | |
| COM 113/PSJ 113 | Conflict and Mediation (PSJ) | 1 Course Credit |
| SOC 215 | Juvenile Delinquency | 1 Course Credit |