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Abstract: One of the issues currently facing World Trade Organization (WTO) Member States is whether to extend to the legal profession and other service providers the WTO Disciplines for Domestic Regulation in the Accountancy Sector [Accountancy Disciplines]. The Accountancy Disciplines document applies to regulatory measures that would be considered domestic regulations under Article VI:4 of the GATS, rather than market access or national treatment measures under Articles XVI or XVII of the GATS. This paper argues that in order to meaningfully discuss whether to extend the Accountancy Disciplines to the legal profession, U.S. policy-makers and stakeholders need to understand the type of lawyer regulations to which the Disciplines might apply. The paper sets forth the principles that will be used to determine whether a particular legal services measure would constitute a domestic regulation measure that would be subject to any future Disciplines. The second part of this paper is an Appendix that provides specific examples of legal services measures. This Legal Services Examples List is intended to be a legal services-specific counterpart to the Examples list assembled by the WTO Secretariat. (The WTO Secretariat's Examples paper does not address legal services specifically and is no longer publicly available.) The examples contained in this Appendix will provide a concrete context in which policymakers and stakeholders can debate the application of the principles discussed in the first part of the paper.
GATS, legal services, Accountancy Disciplines, Disciplines, WTO, Article VI(4), domestic regulation
Abstract: Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Thomas Friedman has stimulated and changed the popular dialogue in the U.S. about globalization in his New York Times columns and books such as his bestseller "The World Is Flat." It is clear that globalization has affected U.S. lawyers who practice law in global law firms. But most U.S. lawyers do not practice in global law firms. What about these U.S. lawyers? Has or will globalization affect the average U.S. lawyer? This article uses Friedman's book "The World is Flat" as the lens through which to view the potential impact of globalization on U.S. lawyers who do not practice in global law firms. The first section of this article analyzes each of the ten flattening forces Friedman describes, including outsourcing and offshoring, and explains whether they have already affected the practice of law in the U.S. or will do so in the future. This section concludes that globalization is an important phenomenon even for those lawyers who do not practice in global law firms. The second section of the article poses the question of how U.S. lawyers might respond to globalization. The article suggests that U.S. lawyers - wherever and whatever they practice - think about globalization both offensively and defensively and consider both the opportunities and challenges globalization presents.
legal services, Friedman, World is Flat, outsourcing, offshoring, globalization, legal ethics
Abstract: In the past fifty years, one has heard debates about whether law is a business, a profession, or both, what these terms mean and whether it matters. Regardless of what one thinks about these debates, there is a new paradigm that must be added to the mix, which is the paradigm of lawyers as "service providers." In the "service providers" paradigm, the legal profession is not viewed as a separate, unique profession entitled to its own individual regulations, but is included in a broader group of "service providers," all of whom can be regulated together. This new paradigm represents a fundamental, seismic shift in the approach towards U.S. lawyer regulation. This perspective already has affected some aspects of U.S. (and non-U.S.) lawyer regulation and is likely to have profound implications for the future. This article reviews developments that illustrate the new "services providers" paradigm and reveals how this paradigm has and will affect who it is that regulates U.S. lawyers and how U.S. lawyers are regulated. The article argues that regulation of the U.S. legal profession in the future must take this new paradigm into account and should think about the best way to preserve that which is fundamental to the legal profession while adapting to new circumstances. The article concludes by offering concrete suggestions about processes and actions the U.S. legal profession should adopt.
lawyers, legal ethics, legal profession, service providers, trade in legal services, FATF, EU competition, GATS
Abstract: Virtually all European countries are in the midst of a massive multi-year project intended to dramatically restructure higher education in Europe. This project, which is known as the Bologna Process or Sorbonne-Bologna, began less than ten years ago when four European Union (EU) countries signed a relatively vague agreement. The Bologna Process has now grown to forty-six countries, including all of the EU Member States and nineteen non-EU countries. The Bologna Process participants have agreed to form the European Higher Education Area or EHEA by 2010; among other goals, the EHEA is intended to help Europe better compete in the higher education field.
Although a number of U.S. higher education organizations are familiar with the Bologna Process and its implications for the U.S., the U.S. legal education community does not appear to have paid particularly close attention to these developments. This article provides a brief history and overview of the Bologna Process, including its ten action lines and information about its effect on European legal education. The article then explains the implications of the Bologna Process for U.S. law schools, legal educators and administrators, and the AALS. This article recommends several concrete steps that the U.S. legal education community should take in response to these developments.
Bologna Process, legal education, EHEA, Sorbonne-Bologna, Lisbon Strategy
Abstract: This article addresses issues related to legal services and the General Agreement on Trade in Services or GATS. GATS Article VI:4 requires Member States to develop "any necessary disciplines." WTO Members currently are in the process of deciding whether to extend the WTO Accountancy Disciplines, S/L/64, to other service sectors, including legal services. In December 2002, the WTO sent the International Bar Association (IBA) (and other non-governmental organizations) a "consultation letter" requesting the IBA's views about changes it would like to see in the WTO Accountancy Disciplines. The IBA responded to the WTO consultation with the May 2003 IBA GATS Forum held in Brussels. Following the IBA GATS Forum, the IBA Council unanimously adopted two resolutions relevant to the GATS and legal services: one resolution specified the IBA's recommended changes to the Accountancy Disciplines; the second resolution recommended Terminology to use in GATS negotiations, but did not go so far as to endorse a classification system. This article analyzes these events, provides a legislative history of the September 2003 IBA resolutions, and includes as appendices documents related to the IBA GATS Forum and subsequent IBA Resolutions.
legal services, legal profession, legal ethics, GATS, WTO, accountancy disciplines, classification
Abstract: This article reviews developments in transnational legal practice during 2006 and 2007, including international developments, U.S. developments and regional developments in Australia and Europe. The primary focus of the international developments section is the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). This article discusses GATS Track 1 Activities related to legal services, including the Legal Services Collective Requests and issues related to GATS Track 2 and the potential development of GATS disciplines. This section also surveys GATS-related initiatives of the American Bar Association and the International Bar Association and U.S. implementation of foreign lawyer multi-jurisdictional practice rules. In other areas, the international developments section addresses the development of a code of conduct for defense counsel practicing before the International Criminal Court and developments in the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). With respect to U.S. transnational legal practice developments, the article reviews U.S. bilateral free trade initiatives, lawyer discipline cooperation initiatives and significant litigation. The regional developments section documents the emergence in Australia of the first publicly-traded law firm and Australia's efforts to promote greater multijurisdictional practice for Australian lawyers in the U.S. This section also reviews various European developments, including European competition law initiatives, the Akzo Nobel case currently pending before the European Court of Justice, and developments related to the free movement of lawyers, codes of conduct, money laundering and lawyer education.
legal services, GATS, Akzo Nobel, ABA, legal education
Abstract: The Bologna Process is a massive, multi-year project designed to create the European Higher Education Area by the year 2010. It began approximately ten years ago when four European Union (EU) countries signed a relatively vague declaration. It has now grown to forty-six countries, including all of the EU Member States and nineteen non-EU countries. The Bologna Process countries have agreed on ten action lines for restructuring European higher education. These action lines are nothing short of revolutionary - they address everything from adoption of a three-cycle degree system (e.g., bachelor-master's-doctorate degrees), European-wide quality assurance efforts, mobility of higher education students and staff, recognition in one European country of studies undertaken in another European country and the suitability of education for the marketplace. In 2007, the Bologna Process members formally acknowledged the global setting of their efforts. Because of the number of countries participating in the Bologna Process, its ambitious goals, and its demonstrated commitment to achieving those goals, the Bologna Process is an extremely significant development that will be important not only in Europe but elsewhere in the world. An earlier article by this author (57 J. Legal Ed. 237) briefly addressed the implications of the Bologna Process for U.S. legal education. This comprehensive article is designed to provide one stop shopping for information about the Bologna Process so that the reader can learn about all of its initiatives and action lines. Although many have heard about the degree change aspects of the Bologna Process, it is a much more comprehensive initiative. This article covers developments through the May 2007 London Ministerial meeting, but should also provide the groundwork for understanding future developments. The article includes appendices that synthesize the results in the Bologna Process Stocktaking exercises and the impact of the Bologna Process on European higher education, including legal education.
Bologna Process, legal education, EHEA, Sorbonne-Bologna, Lisbon Strategy, CCBE
Abstract: This Article reviews the influence of comparative law during the past 100 years on the field of U.S. legal ethics. It begins by defining the field of legal ethics and then divides the last 100 years into three distinct comparative legal ethics eras. The first era consists of the time period between 1904 and 1973, during which there was both domestic and comparative legal ethics scholarship, although a relatively small amount compared to later years. The second time period, which dates from 1974, when legal ethics became a required course, to 1997, represents the coming of age of domestic legal ethics scholarship. This time period also included a significant amount of legal ethics scholarship employing a comparative or global perspective. The Article continues by analyzing the time period from 1998 to the present and offers the thesis that in 1998, there was a fundamental transformation or sea change that occurred with respect to the use of global and comparative perspectives to discuss U.S. legal ethics issues. The Article cites several post-1998 examples to demonstrate the coming of age of these perspectives. The final section of the Article identifies various factors that contributed to, and have helped sustain, these heightened comparative and global perspectives.
legal ethics, lawyers, legal services, international ethics, MDPs, comparative ethics
Abstract: This article, which is Part 1 of two articles, examines the CCBE Code of Conduct. CCBE is the acronym used to describe the Council of the Bars and Law Societies of the European Community; the CCBE has been recognized as the official representative of the legal profession with the European Community. In 1988, the CCBE adopted a code of conduct that was intended to apply to situations in which lawyers from one CCBE Member of Observer State were involved with lawyers from another CCBE State. This article summarizes the development of the CCBE Code of Conduct, explains who it applies to, and analyzes its substantive provisions. The second part of this article offers a thesis about why the CCBE Code differs in some, but not all, respects from the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct. The article suggests that these differences may be a function of different ways of looking at the role of the lawyer. The CCBE Code of Conduct and the CCBE Explanatory Memorandum are included as Appendices to this article. Part 2 in this series is An Introduction to the European Community's Legal Ethics Code Part II: Applying the CCBE Code of Conduct, 7 Georgetown J. of Legal Ethics 345 (1993). It discusses the application of the CCBE Code, including its treatment of double deontology issues. Part 2 also addresses the implementation of the CCBE Code of Conduct, with a special focus on its implementation in Austria.
Lawyers, legal ethics, legal services, trade in legal services, CCBE, double deontology, EU, GATS
Abstract: This article, which is Part 2 in a series, examines the CCBE Code of Conduct and continues where the prior article left off. See An Introduction to the European Community's Legal Ethics Code Part I: An Analysis of the CCBE Code of Conduct, 7 Georgetown J. of Legal Ethics 1 (1993). "CCBE" is the acronym used to describe the Council of the Bars and Law Societies of the European Community; the CCBE has been recognized as the official representative of the legal profession with the European Community. In 1988, the CCBE adopted a code of conduct that was intended to apply to situations in which lawyers from one CCBE Member of Observer State were involved with lawyers from another CCBE State. The prior article summarized the development of the CCBE Code of Conduct, analyzed its substantive provisions, and offered a thesis about differences between the CCBE Code of Conduct and the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct. This article continues by analyzing the situations in which the CCBE Code of Conduct applies, including an analysis of the CCBE Code's response to the "double deontology" situation in which a lawyer might be subject to more than one set of conduct rules. This double deontology analysis focuses on substantive EU law, particularly the EU Lawyers' Services Directive (77/249). The second part of this article addresses the implementation of the CCBE Code of Conduct, including its application in lawyer discipline cases. The article concludes by focusing on the implementation of the CCBE Code in one country - Austria.
Abstract: This paper contains two separate sections. The first section analyzes the different approaches that have been used to respond to global cross-border legal practice. The article distinguishes among several different models of regulation, including models that have been used where there is no single regulatory authority and models that have been used where there is a single regulating authority. The paper observes that one possible model to use where there is no single regulatory authority is the "hybrid approach" in which an agreement is reached between regulatory authorities and private sector lawyers (or their representatives). The second section of this paper examines the 1994 agreement between the American Bar Association and the two Bar Associations that regulate Brussels lawyers; the Agreement is an example of the hybrid model of regulating cross-border legal practice. This section of the paper provides background information about the legal situation in Brussels before 1994 and a summary of the Brussels Bars' dealings with foreign lawyers up until the Agreement. It continues with a "behind-the-scenes" explanation of how the Agreement was developed. The article continues by analyzing the substance of the Agreement, including its provisions related to forms of association, scope of practice, and ethics and discipline issues. This second section provides information about the implementation of the Agreement. It concludes with an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the hybrid model for facilitating cross-border legal practice. The appendices to the article include the Agreement and the Brussels Bars' foreign lawyer registration forms.
lawyers, legal ethics, Brussels, ABA, global legal practice, cross-border practice, trade in legal services, legal ethics, scope of practice, forms of association, ethics and discipline
Abstract: This Foreword introduces the 2004 Global Legal Practice Symposium of the Penn State International Law Review; this Symposium published papers from the Global Forum on International Legal Ethics and Risk Management Legal Practice that was jointly sponsored by the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers (APRL) and the University of Oxford in Florence, Italy in October 2002. The conference brought together some of the world's leading policy makers and opinion-leaders on issues related to international legal practice. This Foreword places in context the articles written by Robert Anello, Wayne Carroll, Jonathan Goldsmith, Mark Harrison and Mary Gray Davidson, Hans-Jurgen Hellwig, Steven Mark and Georgina Cowdroy, and this author. The articles in the Global Legal Practice Symposium include: Sarbanes-Oxley's Wake Up Call to Attorneys; Liberalization of National Legal Admissions Requirements in the European Union: Lessons and Implications; Global Legal Practice and GATS: A Bar Viewpoint; The Ethical Implications of Partnerships and Other Associations Involving American and Foreign Lawyers; Challenges to the Legal Profession in Europe (addressing the impact on lawyers of the proposed European Union Directive on Services in the Internal Market and the European Union's Competition in Professions Services report); Incorporated Legal Practices - A New Era in the Provision of Legal Services in the State of New South Wales and Lawyers, GATS, and the WTO Accountancy Disciplines: The History of the WTO's Consultation, the IBA GATS Forum and the September 2003 IBA Resolutions.
lawyers, legal ethics, legal services, global legal practice, transnational practice, EU Directives, GATS, foreign lawyers
Abstract: This article was written for a symposium on "Teaching Legal Ethics" and discusses how to incorporate global and comparative perspectives into the required Professional Responsibility course. The scope of the paper is much broader, however. The first half of the paper explains why global and comparative perspectives are relevant to contemporary law practice. This section explains why global perspectives are relevants to clients and lawyers and explains why lawyer regulators now use a more global approach to regulation than previously. The second half illustrates how one can introduce global and comparative perspectives into a professional responsibility course without taking up much class time and without engaging in an inordinate amount of class preparation time. It demonstrates how to introduce these perspectives even if one only has time to read and incorporate the perspectives in one document-the CCBE Code of Conduct. The article continues by identifying five additional documents that a professor might read and refer to in order to provide additional global and comparative perspectives. For those who want to pursue the topic further, the article identifies additional documents that a professional responsibility professor might want to consult. The article concludes by identifying several free electronic newsletters that one can subscribe to in order to keep track of global professional responsibility developments. The article includes an addendum with hyperlinks to the recommended documents.
legal ethics, global, comparative, CCBE, teaching, legal education, professional responsibility
Abstract: This article reviews developments in transnational legal practice during 2008, including international developments, U.S. developments, and regional developments in Australia and Europe. The article begins by reviewing international legal services statistics and information about legal education developments. The next section focuses on legal services developments related to the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), including the status of the 2008 negotiations regarding GATS Track #1 (market access) and Track #2 (domestic disciplines). This section also introduces the International Bar Association’s September 2008 “market access-skills transfer” resolution and reviews the state implementation status of the ABA’s foreign lawyer multijurisdictional practice resolutions and state rules permitting foreign in-house counsel. The article highlights other international developments including the resolutions by the Conference of Chief Justices and the Council of the Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) regarding lawyer discipline cooperation, the European Court of Justice’s attorney-client privilege case called Akzo Nobel, the October 2008 adoption of the Risk-Based Guidance for Legal Professionals by the intergovernmental Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and the ongoing implementation of the 2007 U.K. Legal Services Act, including the adoption of rules that took effect in March 2009 that permit legal disciplinary practices by solicitors in England and Wales. The article also discusses a number of new developments, including the Legal Services Initiative of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), various ABA “summits,” the Conference of Chief Justices’ adoption of a resolution endorsing ABA MJP Recommendation #9 regarding temporary practice by foreign lawyers, and the issuance of a report on Global Professional Responsibility by an American Society of International Law task force. The article concludes with a review of some of the recent resources and conferences that had focused on the topic of legal outsourcing.
legal services, GATS, Akzo Nobel, ABA, legal education, FATF, CCBE, CCJ, international legal ethics, legal profession
Abstract: Many in the U.S. have now heard about the U.K. Clementi Report, which provided the impetus for the reforms in the 2007 UK Legal Services Act, which has dramatically changed the regulation of the legal profession in England and Wales. Most are not aware, however, that a similar initiative exists in the European Union and that it too has led to wide-ranging reform proposals. This article addresses the European Commission's Professional Services Competition Initiative. It reviews the context and background of this initiative, the Commission's stocktaking efforts and its resulting reports, which asked EU Member States to consider whether certain aspects of their lawyer regulatory rules were anti-competitive. The areas identified by the European Commission include lawyer qualification rules, lawyer monopoly rules, alternative business structure prohibitions (such as prohibitions on publicly trade law firms and multidisciplinary partnerships), fee rules, and advertising rules. This article also examines the reactions of some of the major stakeholders, including the European Parliament and the Council of the Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE). Finally, this article discusses the implications of this EU initiative, which is one of several initiatives worldwide that is at the intersection of antitrust law (known in Europe as competition law) and lawyer regulatory law.
legal profession, legal services, competition, antitrust, EU, CCBE, ABS, MDPs, regulatory objectives
Abstract: One of the most significant regulatory developments for legal services is their inclusion in the 1994 General Agreement on Trade in Services or GATS. The GATS was the first world trade agreement to cover services rather than goods and it applies to legal services. The GATS in Limerick is a light-hearted but nonetheless serious effort to address the most important legal services-related GATS developments in the last twelve years. These verses cover the basic principles of the GATS, the ongoing market access negotiations and the efforts to develop disciplines on domestic regulation.
GATS, Disciplines, Domestic Regulation, legal services, trade in services, professional responsibility, legal ethics
Abstract: In February 2002, the European Court of Justice issued its opinion in Wouters v. NOVA (Case C-309/99), which addressed a Netherlands Bar rule that prohibited multidisciplinary partnerships (MDPs) between lawyers and accountants. Wouters decided: 1) that the bar was an undertaking that was subject to the competition (antitrust) provision in the EU Treaty; 2) that the Dutch MDP ban restricted competition and that this restriction on competition was appreciable and affected intra-community trade; 3) that the Dutch MDP ban could reasonably be considered necessary in order to ensure the proper practice of the legal profession; and 4) that it was reasonable for the Dutch Bar to conclude that its objectives could not be attained by less restrictive means. This article, which was written two weeks after the Wouters decision for an MDP Symposium, contends that the Wouters case is extremely significant for the European legal profession. After summarizing the facts of Wouters v. NOVA case, which I first addressed in Laurel S. Terry & Clasina B. Houtman Mahoney, What If...? The Consequences of Court Invalidation of Lawyer - Accountant Multidisciplinary Partnership Bans in Private Investments Abroad - Problems & Solutions in International Business in 1998, Chap. 7 (Matthew Bender 1999), this article continues by noting that much of the publicity connected with the Wouters case has focused on the rulings about MDPS. This publicity has focused on the blow Wouters gave to the MDP movement. This article contends that the more significant rulings are the first two rulings noted above. These rulings are extremely important because they articulate significant conditions to bars' abilities to regulate lawyers. The article also argues that bars should not expect to have all decision-makers in the future act as this European Court of Justice did in deferring so completely to the bars' judgment about whether a rule is necessary and whether an objective could be attained by less restrictive means.
Lawyers, legal ethics, MDPs, Wouters v. Nova, trade in legal services, CCBE, EU, EU competition, article 85(1)
Abstract: This Article examines the impact of the General Agreement on Trade in Services, or GATS, on legal services, and more specifically on the legal ethics rules in the United States. The Article begins by explaining background information about the global nature of legal services. Then, the Author details the structure and operation of the GATS, including its relevant exemptions, and its applicability to legal services. Next, the Article explores developments that have occurred since the signing of the GATS, including the possible significance to U.S. regulation of the legal profession. Subsequently, the Author identifies remaining questions about the effects of the GATS on U.S. legal ethics in the twenty-first century and identifies possible scenarios to which the GATS might be applied. Lastly, the Author calls for an increase in monitoring of, and participation in, the ongoing GATS negotiations by U.S. lawyers who may be affected by its results.
GATS, WTO, legal services, legal ethics, lawyers
Abstract: This article focuses on the 1998 Paris Forum on Transnational Practice for the Legal Profession and introduces the papers contained in the Paris Forum Symposium. The Paris Forum was the first meeting of lawyers from around the world devoted solely to the topic of transnational legal practice. Before the Paris Forum, some bar organizations had set aside time during their meetings to discuss the transnational practice of law and issues related to transnational legal services also had been included as topics in general conferences. The multi-day Paris Forum, however, was the first multi-day conference devoted to this topic. This paper includes statistics about transnational practice of law and provides examples of regulatory responses to this phenomenon. The paper explains the objectives of the Paris Forum, including the relationship between the General Agreement on Trade in Services or GATS and the Paris Forum. This paper continues with an explanation of the preparations undertaken for the Paris Forum. It addresses the work product of, and events at, the Paris Forum, including the conference agenda, the closing communiqué, and the discussion papers prepared by the CCBE, the Japanese Federation of Bar Associations and the American Bar Association Section of International Law and Practice, who were the three major sponsors of the Paris Forum. The paper concludes with observations about the future of transnational legal practice regulation.
Abstract: This article is the third of four major articles or book chapters that I have written about MDPs. This article focuses on German multidisciplinary partnerships (MDPs) between lawyers and accountants. The German MDP experience is important because Germany is one of the few jurisdictions that expressly permits MDPs and because conferences about World Trade Organization's General Agreement on Trade in Services (the GATS) have cited to Germany when suggesting that other countries' MDP bans may be unnecessarily restrictive. After introducing common MDP regulatory issues, this article focuses on Germany. The article explains Germany's current regulation of MDPs and provides a brief history of this regulatory development. The article then presents empirical and anecdotal data about the ways in which MDPs function in Germany. The article concludes by offering recommendations about German MDP rules worth emulating.
Lawyers, legal ethics, MDPs, Wouters v. Nova, trade in legal services, CCBE, EU, Germany
Abstract: This article is the second of four major articles or book chapters that I have written about MDPs. "MDPs" refers to multidisciplinary partnerships or multidisciplinary practices between lawyers and nonlawyers. Prior to 1998, virtually all U.S. states had lawyer discipline rules that prohibited a lawyer from sharing legal fees with a nonlawyer or practicing law in partnership with a nonlawyer. In 1998, however, the American Bar Association created a Commission on Multidisciplinary Practice to reconsider these rules. One impetus for the creation of this Commission was the increasingly large numbers of lawyers who were working for the Big 5 Accounting Firms doing work that was similar to the work traditionally done in law firms. This Article examines whether the current MDP prohibition should be replaced with rules that set the conditions under which lawyers may work in an MDP setting. The article reviews both the U.S. rules regarding MDPs and the MDP developments outside the U.S. The article then identifies the common regulatory questions that have emerged in the U.S. and elsewhere. The article uses these regulatory questions as the basis for analyzing the ABA MDP Commission's June 1999 Report. The article's conclusion is that it is better for regulators to respond to the MDP phenomenon by trying to regulate it, rather than by ignoring the phenomenon or trying to stop it. This article includes as an Appendix an MDP "Issue Checklist."
lawyers, legal ethics, MDPs, Wouters v. Nova, trade in legal services, CCBE, EU, Issue Checklist
Abstract: This Foreword introduces the 2008 Global Legal Practice Symposium of the Penn State International Law Review, which is the second such Symposium it has published. The papers in this Symposium were based on presentations at the 5th International Conference of the Association of Professional Responsibility Lawyers (APRL). This Foreword provides context for these articles, which were written by U.S. and European academics, as well as U.S. and European lawyers who actively participate in developing the lawyer regulatory rules in their countries. In addition to placing these articles in context, this Foreword provides a brief summary of the articles by Robert J. Anello, Floris Bannier, James I. Ham, Hans-Jurgen Hellwig, Ellen A. Pansky, Milton C. Regan, Jr., Taru Spronken and Jan Fermon, and Christopher J. Whelan. Like the 2004 Global Legal Practice Symposium, which included articles about partnerships between U.S. and foreign lawyers, the EU's MJP system, Sarbanes Oxley, GATS disciplines, and Australia's rules allowing publicly-traded law firms (written by the Legal Services Commissioner who would later regulate the world's first-publicly traded law firm), the 2008 Symposium provides a cutting-edge look at important issues that are destined to remain significant long into the future. For example, the 2008 Symposium includes articles on outsourcing and the 2007 U.K. Legal Services Act. (The Legal Services Act established the framework for the multidisciplinary partnership rules that took effect in England and Wales on March 31, 2009 and permits future rules allowing publicly-traded law firms.) The Symposium also includes articles by U.S. and Dutch authors on conflicts of interest and addresses attorney-client privilege from both a U.S. perspective and European perspective (including the applicability of the European Convention on Human Rights to attorney-client privilege). Finally, the Symposium addresses the dilemma practitioners face when they are subject to multiple sets of ethics rules and are given little or no guidance about how to navigate among conflicting or inconsistent rules.
legal services, lawyers, ethics, UK Legal Services Act, international conflicts of interest, confidentiality, double deontology, choice of laww
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