Legal Sciences and Doctoral Schools. Selected Problems

Abstract

The purpose of the article is to indicate the selected potential and desired consequences of establishing doctoral schools to educate doctoral students in the field of legal sciences, with a special consideration of the interdisciplinary nature of such schools. The paper addresses the Polish legal framework. The article proposes a thesis that doctoral schools have a chance to benefit the education of future doctors of law, especially thanks to their interdisciplinary nature, which involves educating doctoral students of law together with representatives of other scientific disciplines. Other issues raised include also the opportunities and risks involved in the new form of doctoral education – including those resulting from some higher education institutions adopting only apparently interdisciplinary solutions. The article is an original work, the subject matter has not been covered in other academic papers, and concerns a new legal form of educating doctoral students – meaning doctoral schools, which have been operating since the 2019/2020 academic year. The theses proposed in the article may be significant to both the theory and practice of educating doctors of law at Polish higher education institutions and research centres.