A Profession in Transition? — Lawyers, The Market and Significant Others Gerard Hanlon* There is an ever increasing literature on the changing nature of the professions 1 and middle class work. 2 Accompanying this, is a growing interest amongst academics about the future of professionalism within law. 3 This paper seeks to address certain aspects of these debates by concentrating on the emergence of two relatively independent sets of firms. It will analyse the possible transformation of the legal profession into two spheres within the area of commercial law and, by implication, the profession more generally. The paper suggests that this transformation is important as it threatens the striking degree of homogeneity which was found in the profession for much of the fifty years after 1930. 4 In the past where fragmentation existed it was largely based around spatial location. 5 However, it will be argued that today’s transition and, possibly fragmentation, is not solely based on spatial location (although this is obviously an element within this change) but on three inter-related factors: The Modern Law Review Limited 1997 (MLR 60:6, November). Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA. 798 * Management Centre, King’s College, University of London. This paper is one part of a research project which was funded by the University of Sheffield’s New Academic Development initiative and was based at the University’s Institute for the Study of the Legal Profession. I would like to thank my former colleagues at Sheffield for their assistance with this work, particularly John Birds, Rob Bradgate, Graham Ferris, Joanna Shapland and Charlotte Villiers, all of whom participated in the project. I would also like to thank Simon Roberts, Roger Brownsword and an anonymous referee for comments on an earlier draft of this paper. And finally, I must acknowledge the Max-Planck-Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law in Freiburg where I spent a wonderful summer as a Visiting Research Fellow preparing, amongst other things, the final version of this paper. 1 The terms profession, professional, etc are used merely as labelling devices. The paper will not attempt to define what a profession is, rather the term is used to denote those categories of work which the general public acknowledge as ‘professional’. I would endorse the view that professions are merely occupations which have achieved a certain status and power, as a result of various struggles over past centuries. Hence they are subject to change and indeed those that do not adapt sufficiently well or quickly are downgraded and lose their professional status. 2 T. Butler and M. Savage (eds), Social Change and the Middle Classes (London: UCL Press, 1995); Gerard Hanlon, The Commercialisation of Accountancy: Flexible Accumulation and the Transformation of the Service Class (London: Macmillan, 1994); Eliot Freidson, Professionalism Reborn (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994); M. Savage, J. Barlow, P. Dickens and T. Fielding, Property, Bureaucracy and Culture (London: Routledge, 1992); K. Russell and N. Abercrombie (eds), Enterprise Culture (London: Routledge, 1991); Harold Perkin, The Rise of Professional Society (London: Routledge, 1989). 3 Michael Burrage, ‘From a Gentlemen’s to a Public Profession — Status and Politics in the History of English Solicitors’ (1996) 3 International Journal of the Legal Profession 45–80; Alan Paterson, ‘Professionalism and the Legal Services Market’ (1996) 3 International Journal of the Legal Profession 137; Hilary Sommerlad, ‘Managerialism and the Legal Profession: A New Professional Paradigm’ (1995) 2 International Journal of the Legal Profession 159; Avrom Sherr, ‘Come of Age’ (1994) 1 The International Journal for the Study of the Legal Profession 1, 3; Philip A. Thomas, ‘Thatcher’s Will’ (1992) 19 Journal of Law and Society 1; R.G. Lee, ‘From Profession to Business — The Rise and Rise of the City Law Firm’ (1992) 19 Journal of Law and Society 1, 31; Christopher Stanley, ‘Justice Enters the Marketplace’ in K. Russell and N. Abercrombie (eds), ibid; Cyril Glasser, ‘The Legal Profession in the 1990s — Images of Change’ (1990) 10 Legal Studies 1, 1; Richard Abel, The Legal Profession in England & Wales (Oxford: Blackwell, 1988). 4 Burrage ibid, Paterson ibid. 5 Brian Abel-Smith and Robert Stevens, Lawyers and the Courts (London: Heinemann, 1967).