Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T23:51:26.488Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Changing Character of Lawyers' Work: Chicago in 1975 and 1995

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

John P. Heinz ,
Robert L. Nelson ,
Edward O. Laumann  and
Ethan Michelson
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

This article compares findings from two surveys of Chicago lawyers, the first conducted in 1975 and the second in 1995. The earlier study indicated that the Chicago bar was then divided into two broad sectors or “hemispheres,” one serving large corporations and similar organizations and the other serving individuals and small businesses. Analyses of the structure of co-practice of the fields of law indicate that the hemispheres are now less distinct. The fields are less tightly connected and less clearly organized—they became more highly specialized during the intervening 20 years and are now organized in smaller clusters. Clear indications of continuing separation of work by client type remain, however. Estimates of the amount of lawyers' time devoted to each field in 1975 and 1995 indicate that corporate practice fields now consume a larger share of Chicago lawyers' attention, while fields such as probate receive a declining percentage. Growth is most pronounced in the litigation fields, especially in business litigation. The organizational contexts within which law is practiced both reflect and contribute to these changes. The scale of those organizations has increased greatly, and the allocation of work within them has been divided along substantive, doctrinal lines. As a result, there is a greater disaggregation of work and workgroups within the profession today.

Type
Articles
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 32 , Issue 4 , 1998 , pp. 751 - 776
Copyright
Copyright © 1998 by The Law and Society Association

Footnotes

Support for this work was provided by the American Bar Endowment, Northwestern University's Institute for Policy Research, the National Science Foundation (#SBR-9411515), and the Chicago Bar Foundation. The article was prepared for delivery at the 1997 annual meeting of the Law & Society Association, St. Louis, 29 May 1997.

References

Abel, Richard L. (1989) American Lawyers. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.Google Scholar
American Bar Association (1992) A Review of Legal Education in the United States, Fall 1991. Chicago: American Bar Association.Google Scholar
Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (1977) Annual Report. Chicago: Supreme Court of Illinois.Google Scholar
Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (1981) Annual Report. Chicago: Supreme Court of Illinois.Google Scholar
Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (1995) Annual Report. Chicago: Supreme Court of Illinois.Google Scholar
Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission (1996) Annual Report. Chicago: Supreme Court of Illinois.Google Scholar
Auerbach, Jerold S. (1976) Unequal Justice: Lawyers and Social Change in Modern America. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Cappell, Charles L. (1979) “Organization and Specialization of Legal Activity.” Unpub. MS., American Bar Foundation.Google Scholar
Curran, Barbara A., with Rosich, Katherine J., Carson, Clara N., & Puccetti, Mark C. (1985) The Lawyer Statistical Report: A Statistical Profile of the U.S. Legal Profession in the 1980s. Chicago: American Bar Foundation.Google Scholar
Curran, Barbara A., & Carson, Clara N. (1994) The Lawyer Statistical Report: The U.S. Legal Profession in the 1990s. Chicago: American Bar Foundation.Google Scholar
Galanter, Marc, & Palay, Thomas (1991) Tournament of Lawyers: The Transformation of the Big Law Firm. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Hagan, John, & Kay, Fiona (1995) Gender in Practice: A Study of Lawyers' Lives. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Heinz, John P., & Laumann, Edward O. (1982) Chicago Lawyers: The Social Structure of the Bar. New York: Russell Sage Foundation; Chicago: American Bar Foundation.Google Scholar
Illinois Legal Times (1997) “100 Largest Law Firms in Illinois,” Illinois Legal Times, July, p. 20.Google Scholar
Kordana, Kevin A. (1995) “Law Firms and Associate Careers: Tournament Theory versus the Production-Imperative Model,” 104 Yale Law J. 1907–34.Google Scholar
Litan, Robert E., & Salop, Steven (1992) “More Value for the Legal Dollar: A New Look at Attorney-Client Fees and Relationships.” Presented at American Bar Association annual meeting, San Francisco.Google Scholar
Martindale-Hubbell (1995–96) Martindale-Hubbell Law Directory. Winter, CDROM ed. New Providence, NJ: Reed Reference Publishing.Google Scholar
Nelson, Robert L. (1988) Partners with Power: The Social Transformation of the Large Law Firm. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nelson, Robert L. (1994) “The Futures of American Lawyers: A Demographic Profile of a Changing Profession in a Changing Society,” 44 Case Western Reserve Law Rev. 345–406.Google Scholar
Reed, Alfred Z. (1921) Training for the Public Profession of the Law. New York: Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.Google Scholar
Sandefur, Rebecca L., & Laumann, Edward O. (1997) “Changing Patterns of Income Stratification in the Chicago Bar.” Presented at Law & Society Association annual meeting, St. Louis.Google Scholar
Sander, Richard H., & Williams, E. Douglass (1989) “Why Are There So Many Lawyers? Perspectives on a Turbulent Market,” 14 Law & Social Inquiry 431–79.Google Scholar
Williams, E. Douglass (1992) “A Little Theorizing about the Big Law Firm: Galanter, Palay, and the Economics of Growth,” 17 Law & Social Inquiry 391–414. Seron, Carroll (1996) The Business of Practicing Law: The Work Lives of Solo and Small-Firm Attorneys. Philadelphia: Temple Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Sikes, Bette H., Carson, Clara N., & Gorai, Patricia (1972) The 1971 Lawyer Statistical Report. Chicago: American Bar Foundation.Google Scholar
Starr, Paul (1982) The Transformation of American Medicine. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Stevens, Robert B. (1982) Law School: Legal Education in America from the 1850s to the 1980s. Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1976) 1972 Census of Selected Service Industries, vol. 1. Washington: U.S. Department of Commerce.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1977) Statistical Abstract of the United States. 98th ed. Washington: GPO.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1986) 1982 Census of Service Industries. Washington: U.S. Department of Commerce.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1996a) 1992 Census of Service Industries. Washington: U.S. Department of Commerce.Google Scholar
U.S. Bureau of the Census (1996b) Statistical Abstract of the United States. 116th ed. Washington: GPO.Google Scholar
Van Hoy, Jerry (1997) Franchise Law Firms and the Transformation of Personal Legal Services. Westport, CT: Quorum Books.Google Scholar