The Public Law Center (TPLC) launched the International Legislative Drafting Institute in 1995 in response to increasing global demand for training of legislative drafters. The Institute draws together diverse domestic and international faculty members experienced in the legislative process.
The world is still challenged by the stresses of a global pandemic and armed conflict. We need the Institute more than ever in these troubled times. This summer, we will bring together a worldwide community of legislative policymakers whose work contributes so much to calming troubled waters. Institute training promotes rule of law, which in turn fosters transparent and accountable government.
Global economic development and new trading networks among nations have created a need for more sophisticated and technically proficient legislative research and drafting. Countries entering the global marketplace and adapting to democratic influences at home and abroad need new laws regulating the environment, economic development, labor relations, and other aspects of the free trade regime. The Institute meets these needs with a curriculum of lectures, readings, drafting exercises, site visits, computer research, and technological instruction.
Participants will learn by doing through drafting exercises, research assignments, and preparation of a formulary for use in their own drafting offices.
Participants share ideas and information with each other, learning how we did it" in response to numerous common problems of interest to drafters.
Guest lecturers drawn from among the ranks of legislative drafters, lobbyists, academia, agency personnel, and legislators instruct participants in the preparation of a variety of legislative instruments - bills and resolutions, constitutional amendments, ordinances, appropriations, agency regulations ("subordinate legislation"), committee and floor amendments. Lecture topics may include the ethics of drafting, confidentiality, matters of style (gender-neutral language, grammar, and punctuation), agency rulemaking, constitutional revision, international trade agreements, and codification agencies.
The training also emphasizes the importance of public participation and describes an appropriate role for interest groups and individuals in the legislative process.
Our distinguished array of drafting and subject-matter experts will share their wisdom on best practices in legislative drafting and engage participants in active learning.