Professor Roberta Romano of the Yale Law School speaks to Western Law students as part of the Business Law Scholars Seminar Series. The series brings some of the world's leading business law scholars to Western Law. [read full story]
Business Law in the Global Environment
Western Law’s focus on business law in the global environment is unique among all Canadian law schools. As Canada’s premier business law school, our vision of business law is multi-dimensional, encompassing a wide range of economic, critical, public law and social justice perspectives.
Indeed, our strength in business law complements our nationally and internationally recognized strengths in many other areas, including, among others, criminal law, international and comparative law, law and philosophy, public law, and intellectual property information and technology law.
Western’s Business Law Tradition
For many years, the majority of our graduates have begun their working lives in large law firms with corporate practices, principally in Toronto and other large Canadian cities, but also in major international financial centres such as New York and London (U. K.). Our alumni today include some of the most well-known and highly respected business law practitioners in the nation.
And Western Law boasts a long tradition of leadership in the research and study of business law. In the 1960s, Earl Palmer and Dan Prentice (who later became the Allen and Overy Professor of Corporate Law at the University of Oxford) developed the first published teaching materials in Canada on corporate law.
In the 1970s, former Dean David Johnston (now President of the University of Waterloo) wrote the first Canadian text on Securities Regulation. More recently, Prof. Richard McLaren’s multi-volume works on Secured Transactions and Commercial Reorganization have become recognized as the leading treatises in their areas in Canada. Similarly, Prof. Bruce Welling’s treatise, Corporate Law in Canada: The Governing Principles, now in its third edition, is the only work of its kind in Canada.
Prof. Christopher Nicholls joined our Faculty in 2006 and brings a wealth of expertise—both professional and academic—to the business law area. He has published widely in the field and has most recently published Mergers, Acquisitions and Other Changes of Corporate Control (Irwin, 2007). Prof. Nicholls is the director of Business Law at Western and oversees the area of concentration in business law. This area of concentration is designed to allow students to develop knowledge and expertise in business law and policy.
We also offer expertise in the fields of commercial law and international business law. Prof. Tom Telfer's research and teaching interests include bankruptcy law, secured transactions and consumer law. Prof. Chi Carmody teaches and writes in the areas of international business transactions and trade law. Prof. Carmody also serves as Canadian Director of the Canada-United States Law Institute.
Western’s national reputation for excellence extends as well to cognate areas of
business law. The National Tax Centre, based in the Law Faculty is headed up by Prof. Tim Edgar and Prof. Daniel Sandler two of Canada’s foremost tax scholars.
Western is also a recognized leader in the fields of intellectual property, information and technology law, offering an extensive program of courses in these subjects, and an opportunity for interested students to complete an Area of Concentration in this area as well.
We also enjoy a national reputation for leadership in industrial relations law and insurance law. Recent appointments to the Faculty in business law-related areas further include outstanding scholars in international law and bankruptcy and insolvency law.
Western Law and the Richard Ivey School of Business
The Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario is one of the world’s leading business schools, and Western Law regularly collaborates with our colleagues at the Ivey School.
Western Law, for example, offers two joint programs with the Ivey School: the Concurrent HBA/LLB program and the LLB/MBA program which, we are proud to say, is the only three-year LLB/MBA program offered in Canada.
In addition, we have a Joint arrangement with the Ivey School whereby second and third year law students and second-year MBA students may cross-register in courses offered by the other faculty. This reflects the natural community of interest shared by the law and business schools in much of what we do.
Unparalleled Programs and an International Focus
Our approach to business law combines a commitment to expose our students to the world’s most influential business law scholars, as well as to cutting-edge regulatory and practical business law issues. On the academic side, for example, in 2007-08, some of the world’s leading business law scholars visited Western Law to discuss their research. Visitors included:
- Roberta Romano (Yale),
- Reinier Kraakman (Harvard)
- Ronald Gilson (Stanford)
- William Bratton (Georgetown)
- Brian Cheffins (Cambridge)
- Merritt Fox (Columbia)
From the practice perspective, in the fall of 2007, some of Canada’s top mergers and acquisitions and tax practitioners—proud alumni of Western law—participated in a special seminar at the school on mergers and acquisitions transactions. Participants included William Braithwaite (Stikeman Elliott), Gary Girvan (McCarthy Tétrault), Grant Haynen (Bennett Jones), Ronald Durand (Stikeman Elliott), and Joan Weppler (Dofasco).
And of course, the law school is also home to the Western Business Law Clinic, which provides small start-up and early stage businesses with affordable legal counsel, while at the same time creating an environment for students to learn invaluable practical skills.
The Western Advantage
Our depth of faculty expertise, our rich array of academic and practical educational opportunities, and our keen appreciation for the breadth and diversity of all dimensions of the modern law school curriculum and a commitment to a vision of law that is mindful of the goals of human development and the demands of social justice, make the business law program at Western Law an exciting, dynamic and enriching experience for our students, faculty and friends.
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