How are Australian Universities and Law Schools Approaching Sustainability in their Curricula and what are the Implications for Legal Education?

This article examines how Australian universities and law schools are approaching sustainability in their curricula and then explores the implications for legal education. It first looks at some broader questions about the interpretation of sustainability and the relationship between sustainability, development and the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs) which influence the decisions about how to structure sustainability in a law curriculum. The article analyses the strategic and sustainability plans of a sample of Australian universities for the objectives they set for teaching and learning about sustainability and how they measure performance. It then analyses how sustainability is treated at the law school level. The conclusion of this article is that there is no common approach to the implementation of sustainability in university curricula in Australia, or in Australian law schools. There is considerable diversity in teaching and learning about sustainability and the degree of commitment to it. So far sustainability has achieved limited penetration in legal education in Australian universities. The article finishes by commenting on some opportunities to improve that.