Disjuncture in the Legal Profession: Public Regulation and Firm Policies

Abstract:     
This paper examines the disjuncture that has developed in the Australian legal sector between the expectations of the large firm employers and new law graduates. This disjuncture is causing hardship to graduates and undermining versatile skill development in the sector. Under current conditions of entry to the profession, corporate law firm policy largely determines the experience of private practice. Yet the promotion to partner tournament is losing its motivating power as the firms grow to their maximum market size and the new generation of graduates want more flexibility in their jobs and employability across the sector. This disjuncture is being expressed in several ways: indirectly through the pressure on the curriculum and orientation of the public university degree programs, more closely in the arrangements for graduates to obtain the practical legal training for admission to the profession, in the regulation of the private practice traineeships and continuing professional development, finally in the reshaping of the firms themselves with provision for MDPs and corporate legal services. It raises the question whether local regulatory institutions can continue to play a role coordinating a social system of production of legal knowledge and skills training. Will the large firms break free of the local state and professional institutions and enter an independent world of international services? What does the small Australian experience indicate about changes in the profession globally?

Keywords: expectations of large law firms, new law graduates, public regulation, law firm policies

Working Paper Series