Leiter responds re PhD's and interdisciplinary work

A few days ago, a few of us posted thoughts (here, here, and here) regarding Professor Brian Leiter's suggestion that a "Ph.D. is essential" to do "competent, cutting edge work in interdisciplinary areas like law and economics, or law and philosophy, or law and psychology."  In response to the invocation, by Michael S. and Fr. Araujo, of the (apparent) contrary examples of Alasdair MacIntyre and Fr. Fredrick Copleston, Professor Leiter observes, via e-mail:

A generation or more ago, it was still common for philosophers, especially from the UK, to enter the profession without doctoral training.  The discipline of philosophy has changed, and this no longer happens (not even in the UK).  Since I was rather explicitly talking about the kind of background and skills required for interdisciplinary work *these days*, the case of philosophers who entered the field 40 or more years ago is neither here nor there.

I'm sure that Professor Leiter is correct that things have changed dramatically -- not only in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences, but in law as well -- in terms of the credentials and training that are expected of university-level teachers and scholars.  I guess I'm still not convinced, though, that a Ph.D. is "essential", as opposed to "valuable" or "helpful."  It seems to me that, these days, the best (not all) J.D. programs do about as well preparing the best law students to do serious academic work as do many (not all) Ph.D. programs.

Professor Stephen Feldman, by the way, published not long ago a fascinating essay, "Toy Story too", about interdisciplinary work and the "crisis of identity" among legal academics.  He compared law professors to Buzz Lightyear.  Here is the abstract: 

Law professors today must confront a crisis of identity. Since the post-Civil War era, legal academics have perceived themselves first and foremost as lawyers. They viewed their scholarship, which typically advocated for law reform, as a means of participating in the legal system. This self-identity is currently collapsing. An increasing number of legal academics instead view themselves primarily as university professors. This Article begins by tracing the historical development of the legal academic, focusing in particular on the importance of professionalization. The Article then explores the current crisis in the self-identity of law professors as they face a distant and largely uninterested legal profession of lawyers and judges. Finally, the Article looks to the future. If legal academics are to think of themselves chiefly as university professors rather than as practitioners, then they might carve out a new professional niche by becoming interdisciplinary experts.

In the course of exploring what it might mean to be an "interdisciplinary expert[]", Feldman cautions against the idea that "interdisciplinary" work must necessarily conform to the standards and practices internal to the "other" discipline.  At Notre Dame, we had a lively faculty colloquium about the paper a few weeks ago.  Check it out.

Rick