Law with Law Studies in Europe
Law with law studies in Europe is a degree that combines the full depth of an Oxford legal education with the opportunity to spend a year studying law at a European university, in this variant focusing on Spanish law. The degree reflects a recognition that law is not only a domestic system but a field with profound European and international dimensions, and that lawyers who can engage with other legal traditions are equipped for a world of cross-border practice, international business, and comparative scholarship that purely domestic legal education cannot fully prepare you for.
At the University of Oxford, this four-year full-time programme provides the full Oxford law degree, one of the most intellectually rigorous legal educations available, alongside a year spent studying law in Spain at a Spanish university. You will study Spanish and develop sufficient linguistic competence to engage with legal materials and teaching in that language, and you will encounter a civil law system that differs profoundly in its structure and methods from the common law tradition of England and Wales. Spanish law is derived from the Roman law tradition and influenced by the Napoleonic codification of the nineteenth century, and engaging with it from an English common law perspective is an exercise in comparative legal thinking of considerable intellectual depth.
Oxford's tutorial system means your English law education is conducted through intensive engagement with expert academic lawyers, and the year abroad adds an international and comparative dimension that distinguishes the degree from the standard Oxford LLB. The language learning built into the programme gives you a Spanish competence that is professionally useful throughout a legal career with any European or Latin American dimension.
Graduates move into barrister training, solicitor training with commercial and international firms, European Union institutions, international organisations, diplomatic service, and academic legal careers.