Friends:
Have you read "Integral Spirituality" yet? This is a truly important book! Way to go Ken!
Lynne: I support your efforts in advancing "Integral Law" and hope you are hugely successful.
Would you mind telling us all in true honesty what you see on the road ahead? Are any fires being lit? Where are you seeing eyes light up? Just lay it on the line for us. We can handle it.
Personally, I am very concerned.
Reviewing the various posts, the discussion bounces back and forth and back and forth between an integral theory of "law" and the "practice of law" by integrally-informed lawyers.
Can I humbly propose "Integral Legal Theory" as the title of the former and "Integral Lawyering" for the latter?
The distinctions are sufficiently numerous and basic to warrant this bifurcation.
We need to do this now or the discussions and comments will continue to lack focus.
I know many very smart and effective lawyers who will have no interest in learning the "Integral" vision. They are suspicious of any "new theories" that promise to re-order our perspectives. Law is founded on respect for the old and the bedrock. You do not fly in at mid-night and re-arrange the minds of the legal community.
Life makes sense for them, and they are not bothered in the least by the absence of a map that integrates the highest and lowest of physical, mental and spiritual life in an integrated and unified theory of reality! For them, whether scientists dismiss the reality of mind and spirit and whether people accept this is of no significant import. Chakras, Spiral Dynamics, Ever-Present Awareness, Boomeritis, etc? Whatever! Hope y'all have fun!
In my humble estimation, there may be no community of professionals less sympathetic to inviting an "integral" vision into their domain that the successful judge/attorney/law professor class.
So, where are we going and who are we trying to touch?
Personally, in 15 years of practice as a criminal lawyer, I have never billed a single client. Not because of my supreme benevolence, but because I work for "Mother Fed" who pays me a salary and prevents me from billing clients.
(Can I make a plug for the military? I would like to say that many people trash the military men and women, officers and enlisted alike, but if you look hard, you will find that in its frustratingly complex corpus of rules, regulations, and customs, the military represents one of the most "integral" communities in America.
I am a Navy Officer. I have a mandatory regime to maintain physical fitness. If I stray, I am out of a job. You want to talk about Integral Body training? How about having your career and the support of you and your spouse and your 4 children depend on your ability to maintain a 40 inch waste at a height of 72 inches? I must adhere to customs and mores of the Navy. I cannot be friends with the people who work for me. If I stray, I face trial by court-martial. I must maintain proficiency in my technical field. If I lag, I err, and may be charged with dereliction of duty under a law (the UCMJ) enacted by your Congressional representatives. I have ethical guidelines in spades that have the full force and effect of laws (via "lawful general orders"), the violation of which can land me in the brig (i.e. jail.) I am subject to the Joint Ethics Regulations (a directive having the full force and effect of law, signed by the Secretary of Defense.) If I sexually harass anyone a ton of bricks comes down on my head. Same thing if I discriminate in any way against anyone based on their gender, religion, or sexual orientation. I cannot accept gifts from people who work for me, give gifts to those I work for, come to work late, use drugs, solicit prostitutes, speak disrespectfully to my boss, disobey an order (no matter how mundane) from a superior, or fail to report any of the above to my superiors. Any of these things is very likely to get me a "federal criminal conviction."
In its very large and old way, the U.S. military, is, quite interestingly, one of the most integrally pure communities in America. And if you are an American tax-payer, you are paying for this!)
Now, back to selling an Integral Vision to the civilian legal bar.
Can I remind all of us idealistic integralists: most lawyers earn their bread by billing their clients based on the time spent working on the client's "matters." That means that the financial success of most lawyers is directly related to their ability to prolong and entangle litigation.
Let's say a client comes in to the firm of Schmuckatelly, Noload, and Gried. The client is concerned that his ex-wife is taking advantage of him by failing to adhere to the terms of their custody agreement.
You are an integrally informed lawyer. You have the overpowering sense that these two former spouses could be united at the mediation table where the problem could be solved through inspired "alternative dispute resolution." Heck, they might even get back together again, (you might be able to move them just a tad in this direction), and hey, the kids would certainly like this, wouldn't they? Winners all around!
You bring your vision to the Senior Partner, Mr. Gried. (Remember, he ultimately takes home most of what you earn.)
Presented with two options: one, a quick and healthy mediated solution where everyone (except you and Mr. Gried) wins, and the other, a fierce offensive against the ungrateful ex- which can only lead to tens of thousands of dollars in billable hours, how will Mr. Gried, Esquire direct you to proceed? How will you proceed, knowing that your main competitor for "partner", T. Willington Booth, just brought home $437,000.00 in bacon for the firm last year by dropping nuclear bombs on the cross-town firm of Sheik, Raddle, and Rowl.
This is the very real reality of law as practiced by real lawyers with real bills to pay and real desires to drive a Jaguar next year.
This applies to both "Integral Legal Theory" and "Integral Lawyering."
I believe I see the point of insertion, however.
There is a mini-crisis in American law practice today - many lawyers are falling apart! More and more, stress levels are higher, drug and alcohol use grows, competition is fiercer, job satisfaction is lower, and collegiality is gone.
What has happened?
Collectively, I believe we are all suffering under the power of the Internet. Pre-Internet, your access to "the law" was through books which you held in your hands. You turned the pages one by one and found the law, took notes, and checked cases and cites using the books in your library. The expectations about the scope of your research were moderate and humble and the time allotted for research and writing was often generous. (You could even slip in a quick back nine at the golf course at lunch, and enjoy a 1972 Lafitte Burgundy, or two...)
Nowadays, fuhgeddabowdit! Legal victory goes to the single-minded grinder.
In the old days, your clients either visited you in person, or called you on a land-line telephone to make an appointment to visit you. Life was balanced and you could breathe.
Clients did not "shoot you an email" with 35 questions cut and pasted from e-conversations with their attorney brother-in-law and stuff they found on the Internet. And they did not e-mail your legal work product to 6 other knowledgeable persons with a personal interest in opining that you don't know what you are doing.
Today, every source is available instantaneously. And there are many lawyers who are ravenous in their ability to quickly chew up legal e-matter, collating it into truly impressive and lengthy briefs. They are like meth addicts, working 14 hours a day, 6 days a week. These maniacally successful lawyers are setting the standard for others to emulate. And, many lawyers are now collapsing under this new and "improved" model of "success."
To survive as a lawyer today, you have to read faster, search faster, and speak faster. And there is no time to pick a flower, let alone smell it!
And it is getting to a point where the art of argument and on-point citation of case law is being abandoned, simply because there is so much available. We have gone trans-rational where argument is used when needed, but mainly we just throw our weight around.
In 1850, the Supreme Court wrote enormously important opinions in 15 pages. Perhaps one Justice would dissent in a 3 page opinion. You can read the whole thing and find the black letter matter in 30 minutes.
In 2024, the Supreme Court writes opinions on relatively mundane issues that take up 50 pages, and there are 2 lengthy concurring opinions, and a vicious and lengthy dissent, as well. It takes days to figure out what they are holding. We throw up our arms and resort to b.s.
Many lawyers are getting "crushed" (figuratively) by the pace of the law today. They are good, ethical lawyers who cannot keep up.
Aside from the pure intensity of modern day law practice in America which is taking down many victims, I also would like to make the following point.
In my sense and experience, the lawyers who are most falling apart are also those who are not and never have been really "effective" as lawyers. They might be good people, awesome parents, and excellent neighbors, but ... they do not do well in law practice.
A good modern lawyer is congenitally integrated. S/he has a strong grounding in primordial survival skills. S/he is not afraid to fight and to love. S/he understands intimately the old myths and values that always lie at the core. S/he is well-read, knows an array of literary and historical themes that resonate, and can elevate an issue to a principle. S/he is verbally competent and skilled at writing, speaking, and and arguing. S/he is skilled at stating and interpreting rules using language that is rational and acceptable. S/he has a healthy "green" capacity to see the value of alternative perspectives. And, s/he has a first person taste of a transcendent reality that prevents mis-identification of self and other with limited perspectives, aka "hell." For a good modern lawyer, the practice of law is fun and rewarding on many levels.
The modern American lawyer may be second only to the Priest/Spiritual Guide in practicing an avocation that inherently calls for and rewards "integrated" skills, while punishing via personal melt-down those who cannot bring "integral skills" to bear.
You can be an "integrally informed" plumber, basketball coach, taxi driver, or waste management professional, but your success in those endeavors is largely independent of your "integral" awareness.
But the modern lawyer who lacks an "integral" vision, not only does not enjoy resounding success, but, often, crashes hard and miserably.
"Integral Lawyer Therapy" is a very timely topic. And the Integral Legal Theory/Integral Lawyering vision is most perfectly tailored to those lawyers who are good and ethical people who are at this moment falling apart across America under the insane imbalance of modern law practice.
Lawyers and judges who are having a grand time and making gross amounts of money and sharing in the power and glory are not going to be impressed with a new proposal to "integrate" law practice in their respective jurisdictions.
But lawyers who are having a really hard time because their lives are messed up, their heads are messed up, the speed of practice is crushing them, their skills are deficient in different areas, or their interpretations of what they are doing and what it means are mis-guided, these lawyers will be immensely open and receptive to hearing how an "Integral" perspective can get them back on their feet again to where they are functioning, happy, healthy, and effective.
Can't you apply "Integral" vision to any group of troubled people? Yes, you can. But, a troubled lawyer may very well be one of the most complexly troubled people around!
And yet, s/he also has the ability to grasp the concepts of the "Integral" vision. (Remember - they passed a "bar exam" at some point in their lives, which is no small feat of intellect.) That may not be the case for, say, the class of high-school drop-out felons doing hard time for methamphetamine manufacturing. You can talk quadrants all day with these folks and get nowhere.
So, I am suggesting that if someone really wants to do something helpful and meaningful, approach the director of the local chapter of the bar's "troubled lawyer" group, and begin offering seminars, rehabilitating troubled lawyers with "Application of the Integral Vision to the Practice of Law." Include actual modules of Integral Life Practices.
Once you have saved 25 souls, write an article for your bar's law journal. Include testimonials from each lawyer about what they were doing before that did not work and what they are doing now that is more "integrated" and therefore, more healthy and successful. Now you are making an "Integral" dent in modern American law practice.
I will tell you what prompted this vision. I am licensed in the State of Washington. I receive the monthly bar journal, and last month, there was an article in it by a member of our bar who is native American and who practices on his reservation (the Yakima, if I recall correctly.) His article was the most soulful thing I have ever read in our bar journal. He acknowledged his good fortune to practice law, but mostly he stated in very straight-forward terms how disappointed he is, at the end of his career, with what he has actually done and accomplished as a lawyer in trying to help members of his tribe. I got the sense he has been trying to push a round peg through a square hole.
As I read his honest and heartfelt account, it struck me that a native American lawyer may be uniquely suited to suffer more than any other lawyer in America from the unhealthy aspects of modern legal practice. His people and community already suffer enormously from simply trying to integrate western truths (and untruths) in their lives. And s/he has the added burden of trying to integrate and apply western legal conceptions and the imbalances that accompany them to people who are struggling to maintain their non-western customs and identities.
I have a dream. A vision of "Integral Indian Lawyering!" The beauty of launching something like this, under "Indian Nation" jurisdiction, would be that the tribes have big swatches of sovereignty that allow them to make their own internal rules! You don't have to go to Tibet. The fertile territory is in your own back yard!
Many people don't realize this, but inside of the United States of America, there are many "sovereign nations." (Heck, come to think of it, as a kid, I used to wander from U.S. territory to Indian territory and steal salmon berries from a foreign ruler, i.e. the Puyallup Indian tribe of Washington.). You don't have to convince conventional western minds and rule-makers to expand a legal system toward Integral. You instead convince Indian minds to restore the dignity of their lives while at the same time upgrading their cultures with the best of the west.
Can you imagine how delicious it would be for "Integral Indian Lawyering" to serve as a compelling model that inspires non-Indians toward an "integrally-informed" practice of law?
So, in summary:
1. I am skeptical about the impact you can have in trying to introduce Integral Legal Theory or Integral Lawyering into the conventional American legal community. Remember Critical Legal Studies? Some of the best legal minds around beat that drum for 15 years, and no one even listened to them.
2. I am confident that you can have an enormous impact if you introduce "integral" principles to lawyers who are not functioning well. They are smart, receptive, and "screwed up." And often, the reason they are "screwed up" is because the "non-integral" nature of their practice has caught up with them (like it will catch us all ultimately.)
3. I suspect one could have an almost landmark impact by using an "integral" platform to restore the dignity and identity of native Americans through the integral training of native American attorneys. You can combine theory and practice, both integral, with Indian hosts in a way that will hardly be tolerated in the conventional American legal community.
Now, a final offering. Something that I just need to say about lawyers in America.
I have lived and worked in China, Japan, and Italy for extended periods of time. There is an exquisite "feeling" of "being" in each of those cultures that is not found in America. And especially not among American lawyers!
It is hard to describe. The best way I know to point at it is through the Chinese word 'xin' or 'hsin.' This means 'heart' but not merely in the sense of a physical organ or in the sense of courage. It refers instead to a way of seeing the world and relating to it that springs from the heart center. It is not emotional gushing or sentimentality. Instead, it is a full and potent freeing of life force which allows one to feel empathy, see beauty, intuit justice, and remain embodied in a secure and relaxed place.
Whenever I interact with lawyers who are not "forgetting" 'hsin', invariably the encounters are productive, healthy, and satisfying. Conversely, whenever I interact with lawyers who live only in their heads and who are choking off or chronically freezing their 'hsin', nothing ever works out right and everything ends up with a bad taste.
My take on "Integral Legal Theory" and "Integral Lawyering" is that, if nothing else, it should strive to restore a good "taste" to "law in America" through the unfreezing of 'hsin' in our practice.
Best Wishes, Schalk