Law Schools and the Continuing Growth of the Legal Profession

24 Pages Posted: 31 Jul 2013

Date Written: May 16, 2013

Abstract

In most countries for which data are available, the size of the legal profession has continued to grow over the last 40 plus years. This continued growth reflects the perceived attractiveness of a career as a legal professional (i.e., the demand) and the incentives of the institutions that provide legal education, and hence serve as primary gatekeepers, to maintain or increase the number of students they enroll. In some countries, perhaps most prominently the United States, structural changes in the opportunities for careers in the legal profession are likely to put pressure on law schools that could result in changes in the supply of opportunities to obtain the legal education required to become a lawyer.

En la mayoría de los países de los que se dispone de datos, el número de abogados no ha dejado de crecer desde hace más de 40 años. Este crecimiento constante, refleja el atractivo que se percibe en una profesión como la abogacía (esto es, la demanda), y los incentivos de las instituciones que imparten estos estudios, y constituyen la primera barrera para mantener o aumentar el número de estudiantes que aceptan. En algunos países, tal vez de forma más destacada en Estados Unidos, es probable que los cambios estructurales en las oportunidades de trabajar como abogado obliguen a las facultades de derecho a modificar la oferta para acceder a la carrera de derecho.

Keywords: Legal profession, Legal education, Abogacía, Educación legal

Suggested Citation

Kritzer, Herbert M., Law Schools and the Continuing Growth of the Legal Profession (May 16, 2013). Oñati Socio-Legal Series, Vol. 3, No. 3, 2013, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2221281

Herbert M. Kritzer (Contact Author)

University of Minnesota Law School ( email )

229 19th Avenue South
Minneapolis, MN 55455
United States

Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?

Paper statistics

Downloads
164
Abstract Views
1,868
Rank
371,609
PlumX Metrics