Educating Lawyers for the Future Legal Profession

Abstract:     
What today's law students do as lawyers will be profoundly affected by changes their clients experience. Clients are likely to face more global competition than earlier generations could imagine, and they are likely to value lawyers who understand the non-legal aspects of their problems. Tomorrow's lawyers are likely to have to be more specialized than their predecessors, and many will deliver services that are less personal, more commodity-like, and less financially rewarding. Legal education, in turn, faces challenges producing lawyers capable of functioning in that world. Future lawyers will have to be simultaneously more specialized and more capable of responding to change than were earlier generations. To meet these needs, entering students should be introduced to fundamental issues that cut across all fields, including more public law and international material than most students now encounter. Upperclass students should be given opportunities to specialize and study more non-legal subjects that will make them better able to understand clients' needs. Pressure to control costs, in turn, may lead to an increased use of technology to provide some of the instructional content.

Keywords: Ethics, Legal Education, Specialization

JEL Classifications: K00, K40

Accepted Paper Series