Today I had the last seminar in International Law. I had to present three cases, two WTO cases and one NAFTA case, where environmental and developmental goals clashed with free trade objectives. It went quite well, given that I only had a few hours effectively to work on the presentation. On Friday I had to present six cases in Environmental Law and that also went quite well.

International Environmental Law and International Economic Law is so fascinating. These areas mix economic, political and legal considerations - but at the same time they touch on ethical criteria and discussions of fairness and justice. I am convinced that the development of international law in this field will determine whether humanity can solve the problems it is facing right now. Even Dr. Gehring, the lecturer, seemed to enjoy more talking about Environmental Law than talking about Countermeasures, State Responsibility or Sources of International Law.

In these four months that I am studying International Law in Cambridge, I have learned more about decision-making then in the four years of my Bachelor Studies of Philosophy and Economics. I can’t believe that they still claim that “The Syllabus in Bayreuth is the best organized” and “We want to educate experts in complex decision situations.”

This is rubbish. In my experience, decision-making can not be studied by looking at philosophical theory. In order to make good decisions - be it in politics, in business, in academia, in science - you need to have three things: practical experience on the ground, detailed knowledge about the rules of the game, and a strong mental focus on your objective. None of these things you can learn in Bayreuth in the studies of Philosophy and Economics.

Today I had a look at the syllabus of the last semester in Bayreuth. There was no course in law required. But according to the advertisement-leaflet alumni should be able to work in Consultancies, Management Teams in Companies and Governments, International Organisations, Media or Education Facilities.

How is it possible to work in Business Consultancies without having a little glimpse of how Civil Law and Tax Law works? Well, you can probably pick up a lot on the job. Yet Bayreuth does not even make an effort to teach students some principles of Corporate Law. Not even in the field of the department’s specialisation, Business Ethics, can you find a course that teaches CSR-Standards or Corporate-Governance-Standards.

How can you work in Goverment if you have no clue about Public Law? Good governance is knowledge about how law is made and implemented. Sure enough, it helps to understand the Economic Impact of Law, and it helps to understand the basic principles which govern the major legal systems, but a course in Legal Philosophy will not help you in any decision-making.

How can you work in International Organisations if you don’t know how the relations between states are regulated and how international laws are created and changed? How can you discuss development and global justice if you don’t know how the dispute mechanisms in the major economic organisations work?

I am not saying that lawyers have an edge in all of these issues. To make good decisions, you need to have knowledge about economy as well as psychology and probably lots of politics. I picked up some of this of years in volunteering and NGO-work, but I know that very soon I will have to jump into the waves and try whether my intuitions work in the real world out there. Yet I know that the classes in Bayreuth were not doing anything to help me or my classmates making a succesful jump into this exciting world.

When the syllabus is created, the lecturers in Bayreuth do not think about how the taught knowledge can help students make meaningful decisions in the real world out there. Instead, they enforce their own research agenda on the students and pretend that these are meaningful treasures to be discovered in the vast oceans of human knowleddge. They don’t ask themselves how to develop the intellectual potential of the students in the best possible ways.

To be fair, some things are improving in Bayreuth. But the big legal gap in the Bayreuth syllabus (despite excellent facilities offered by the Law Faculty) can not be overlooked. Even though lawyers don’t have the answer to everything, without knowledge of law, you don’t even know how to ask the question.