Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T22:05:20.379Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - Legal Professions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 March 2023

Lynette J. Chua
Affiliation:
National University of Singapore
David M. Engel
Affiliation:
State University of New York, Buffalo
Sida Liu
Affiliation:
The University of Hong Kong
Get access

Summary

The legal professions in Asia are a plural concept. Many Asian countries are civil law jurisdictions in which lawyers, judges, and prosecutors are separately licensed. Even in common law jurisdictions, lawyers rarely are a homogeneous group. Moreover, there are paralegal or unauthorized occupational groups that parallel the profession of lawyers. The meaning of being a “lawyer” in Asia, therefore, is often more complex and controversial than in North American or European contexts. The different types of legal professions range from barristers and solicitors in Hong Kong and unified legal professions in other former British colonies, to Continental-style judges and prosecutors in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, Soviet-style “iron triangles” of police, procurators, and judges in China and Central Asia, and to unlicensed “barefoot” lawyers across the continent. This chapter provides an overview of the plurality of legal professions and their demographic and sociological characteristics. It goes on to highlight the legal service market, demonstrating the connections between lawyers and different kinds of clients and practice areas, and the interactions between the legal professions, judicial system, and state. The chapter concludes with readings on the role of lawyers in transforming the state—and the impact of state transformations on lawyers themselves.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Primary Sources

Ballakrishnen, Swethaa S. 2019. “Just Like Global Firms: Unintended Gender Parity and Speculative Isomorphism in India’s Elite Professions.” Law & Society Review 53 (1): 108–40. doi: 10.1111/lasr.12381Google Scholar
Chan, Kay-Wah. 2012. “Setting the Limits: Who Controls the Size of the Legal Profession in Japan?International Journal of the Legal Profession 19 (2–3): 321–37. doi: 10.1080/09695958.2012.783990CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galanter, Marc, and Robinson, Nick. 2013. “India’s Grand Advocates: A Legal Elite Flourishing in the Era of Globalization.” International Journal of the Legal Profession 20(3): 241–65. doi: 10.1080/09695958.2014.912359CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gillespie, John. 2013. “The Juridification of Cause Advocacy in Socialist Asia: Vietnam as a Case Study.” Wisconsin International Law Journal 31: 672701.Google Scholar
Hsu, Ching-fang. 2019. “The Political Origins of Professional Identity: Lawyers, Judges, and Prosecutors in Taiwan’s State Transformation.” Asian Journal of Law and Society 6 (2): 321–46. doi: 10.1017/als.2018.35CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lev, Daniel S. 1976. “Origins of the Indonesian Advocacy.” Indonesia 21: 135–69. doi: 10.2307/3350960CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liu, Sida. 2011. “Lawyers, State Officials and Significant Others: Symbiotic Exchange in the Chinese Legal Services Market.” The China Quarterly 206: 276–93. doi: 10.1017/S0305741011000269Google Scholar
Shafqat, Sahar. 2018. “Civil Society and the Lawyers’ Movement of Pakistan.” Law & Social Inquiry 43 (3): 889914. doi: 10.1111/lsi.12283Google Scholar
Tam, Waikung. 2013. Legal Mobilization under Authoritarianism: The Case of Post-Colonial Hong Kong. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9781139424394.009Google Scholar
Tungnirun, Arm. 2018. “Practising on the Moon: Globalization and Legal Consciousness of Foreign Corporate Lawyers in Myanmar.” Asian Journal of Law and Society 5 (1): 4967. doi: 10.1017/als.2017.30CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Secondary Sources

Abbott, Andrew. 1988. The System of Professions: An Essay on the Division of Expert Labor. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. doi: 10.7208/chicago/9780226189666.001.0001Google Scholar
Abel, Richard L. 1989. American Lawyers. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Heinz, John P. and Laumann, Edward O.. 1982. Chicago Lawyers: The Social Structure of the Bar. New York: Russell Sage Foundation. doi: 10.2307/2578996Google Scholar
Michelson, Ethan. 2007. “Lawyers, Political Embeddedness, and Institutional Continuity in China’s Transition from Socialism.” American Journal of Sociology 113 (2): 352414. doi: 10.1086/518907CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ota, Shozo, and Rokumoto, Kahei. 1993. “Issues of the Lawyer Population: Japan.” Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law 25: 315–32.Google Scholar
Schmitthener, Samuel. 1968. “A Sketch of the Development of the Legal Profession in India.” Law & Society Review 3: 337–82. doi: 10.2307/3053007CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fu, Hualing, and Cullen, Richard. 2011. “Climbing the Weiquan Ladder: A Radicalizing Process for Rights-Protection Lawyers.” The China Quarterly 205: 4059. doi:10.1017/S0305741010001384Google Scholar
Ishida, Kyoko. 2017. “Deterioration or Refinement? Impacts of an Increasing Number of Lawyers on the Lawyer Discipline System in Japan.” International Journal of the Legal Profession 24: 243–57. doi: 10.1080/09695958.2017.1324557Google Scholar
Rajah, Jothie, and Thiruvengadam, Arun K.. 2013. “Of Absences, Masks, and Exceptions: Cause Lawyering in Singapore.” Wisconsin International Law Journal 31: 646–71.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Legal Professions
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Legal Professions
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.007
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Legal Professions
  • Lynette J. Chua, National University of Singapore, David M. Engel, State University of New York, Buffalo, Sida Liu, The University of Hong Kong
  • Book: The Asian Law and Society Reader
  • Online publication: 02 March 2023
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108864824.007
Available formats
×