IATC

On 2-3 April 2018 Stephan van der Merwe represented the Clinic at the International Advocacy Training Council Conference (in association with the General Council of the Bar of South Africa) which was held at Stellenbosch. The IATC is a body consisting of advocates who primarily practice but also teach advocacy skills to junior (and senior) advocates around the world. The conference was attended by many prominent international members of the bench and bar, including the incumbent Deputy Chief Justice of the South African Constitutional Court, Judge Raymond Zondo. The conference theme was centered around questions of Legal Reasoning and Written Advocacy, and Stephan presented as part of the panel that included Judges Dennis Davis and Owen Rogers, and addressed the issue of “What’s wrong with the present state of legal reasoning?”. In his presentation he discussed the circumstances which served as catalyst for the development of lectures on the topic of “Applied logic and critical reasoning”, which are now presented annually as part of the clinical legal education module Practical Legal Training 471.