La idea de cambiar o reformar la educación jurídica ha sido recurrente en América Latina y hemos tenido cambios sucesivos desde comienzos del siglo XIX. Para muchos de quienes proponen tales reformas la percepción es que los contenidos y métodos de enseñanza se han perpetuado en el tiempo y que necesitan ser cambiados porque están atrasados respecto de los cambios en la sociedad, de las nuevas maneras de concebir el derecho, o de las exigencias de la profesión jurídica. Para otros, más escépticos o más viejos, las reformas sucesivas son esfuerzos grandes, como el de Sísifo arrastrando la piedra, para que al final del día la piedra vuelva a su mismo lugar. Esto es lo que explicaría que la reforma de la educación jurídica permanezca en agenda desde hace tanto tiempo.The idea of changing legal education has been recurrent in Latin America, resulting in successive reforms since the beginning of the 19th century. For many of those who propose reforms today, the perception is that the old content and methods of teaching have persisted and that they need to be updated to respond to changes in society, new ways of conceiving the law, or the needs of the legal profession. For others, more skeptical or older, successive reforms have required substantial effort and have had little effect. Like Sisyphus rolling the stone up the mountain, at the end of the day the stone is back in its place again. This would explain why the reform of legal education has remained on the agenda for so long. This article argues against these two perceptions. The reforms of legal education that we have lived through have responded to needs and produced results. Frequently, these results are mixed. There are things that are lost or gained and also unintended consequences, and if we do not analyze the reform effects carefully, the impression is that nothing has changed. This paper proposes that social history of law gives us the tools to conduct this analysis.

Universidad de Chile. Facultad de Derecho