Law Students, the External Market, and Socialization: Do We Make Them Turn to the City?

Abstract

The market for lawyers has made a complete about-turn since the early 1980s. 1 With the downturn of the economy in the late 1970s and early 1980s the cry was that too many lawyers were being produced for the places and work available. The situation began to reverse in the mid-1980s and now the legal profession faces a 'crisis' of recruitment and retention of its lawyers. How are the university and polytechnic law schools, which provide the first 'academic' stage of undergraduate legal education, to fit into this changing picture of downswings and upturns in the market? In particular, the enormous demand for new lawyers in the shape of articled clerks comes from the larger 'City' firms which by themselves could swallow annually almost all the law students who wish to go into practice after their university or polytechnic education. Are law students affected mainly by the external market for their hire or by the influences of curriculum, teachers, and colleagues at university? This paper sets out the findings of a cross-sectional, questionnaire-based study carried out at the School of Law, University of Warwick, into the socialization effects of undergraduate legal education at Warwick. One aim of the study has been to explore issues of social origin, law school experience, and career expectations with a view to discovering whether students possess, or develop, a set of values and expectations that emphasize the role of 'big city' practice over other forms of legal work. In doing so, it draws on an extensive body of research on legal socialization, most of which has been undertaken in the United States of America.2 The study is informed by the necessary assumption that students do not develop in isolation. They may be influenced by their experiences prior to entry into law school and by cues they receive from the law school and its curriculum, as well as from the external market for legal services.