Facing an access-to-justice crisis and an onslaught of new legal technologies, the legal profession is on the cusp of a revolution. This volume examines the civil justice status quo and sketches how reformers can create a more equitable and accessible system going forward.
For decades, American lawyers have enjoyed a monopoly over legal services, built upon strict unauthorized practice of law rules and prohibitions on nonlawyer ownership of law firms. Now, though, this monopoly is under threat-challenged by the one-two punch of new AI-driven technologies and a staggering access-to-justice crisis, which sees most Americans priced out of the market for legal services. At this pivotal moment, this volume brings together leading legal scholars and practitioners to propose new conceptual frameworks for reform, drawing lessons from other professions, industries, and places, both within the United States and across the world. With critical insights and thoughtful assessments, Rethinking the Lawyers' Monopoly seeks to help shape and steer the coming revolution in the legal services marketplace. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.
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This volume examines lawyers' stranglehold on legal services and presents reform visions for a more equitable and accessible justice system.
Introduction: envisioning the future of legal services David Freeman
Engstrom and Nora Freeman Engstrom; Part I. Framing the Issue:
Conceptualizing the Challenge of Access to Justice and Legal Services
Regulation:
1. Justice futures: access to justice and the future of justice
work Rebecca L. Sandefur and Matthew Burnett;
2. Race and the political
economy of civil justice Brian Libgober;
3. The hypocrisy of attorney
licensing Rebecca Haw Allensworth;
4. The case for the traditionalists W.
Bradley Wendel; Part II. Lessons from the Field: On-the-Ground Efforts to
Effect Positive Change:
5. What can legal services reformers learn from court
efforts to assist self-represented litigants Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl;
6. Civil
[ justice] engineering: leveraging the tools of community, research, and
fiscal impact to build bridges to justice Neil Steinkamp and Samantha
DiDomenico;
7. Beyond access to justice: power, organizing, and civil legal
inequality Jamila Michener;
8. The puzzle of anemic 'legal tech' and the
future of legal services David Freeman Engstrom and Jess X. Lu; Part III. The
Comparative Lens: What Can Be Learned from Others?:
9. How power undermined
the medical profession Allison K. Hoffman;
10. Lessons from medicine's
experiment with nurse practitioners and physician assistants Philip G.
Peters;
11. The statutory influence of tribal lay advocates Lauren van
Schilfgaarde;
12. Necessary but insufficient? Reforms to legal services
regulation, technology and the role of the courts in increasing access to
justice in England and Wales Natalie Byrom;
13. Legal tech companies and
access to justice in Germany Giesela Rühl; Part IV. New Frontiers: Charting
the Future of Legal Services:
14. Professional speech, the lochnerized first
amendment, and the unauthorized practice of law Genevieve Lakier;
15.
Rethinking 'our bar federalism' David Freeman Engstrom and Daniel B.
Rodriguez;
16. Access to advice as a linchpin of family justice Rebecca
Aviel;
17. Putting railroad justice back on track Samuel Issacharoff and
Beverly B. Martin.
David Freeman Engstrom is the LSVF Professor in Law and Co-Director of the Deborah L. Rhode Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford University. An award-winning scholar, longtime litigator, and nationally recognized expert on procedure and law and technology, Engstrom is a member of the American Law Institute, where he serves as Reporter for Principles of the Law, High-Volume Civil Adjudication, a member of the Administrative Conference of the United States, and a faculty affiliate at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence. Nora Freeman Engstrom is the Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Deborah L. Rhode Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford University, and she also holds the R. Ammi Cutter Reporter's Chair of the American Law Institute. A nationally recognized authority on tort law, professional responsibility, and complex litigation, she is the author of numerous award-winning scholarly articles, the co-author of two leading casebooks, and a Reporter for two Third Restatement of Torts projects.
