The Legal Profession in the Age of Digitalization: An outline of Three Potential Transformations in Legal Education

Werner Schäfke-Zell; Ida Helene Asmussen

doi:10.36633/ulr.454

The Legal Profession in the Age of Digitalization: An outline of Three Potential Transformations in Legal Education

Werner Schäfke-Zell^*, Ida Helene Asmussen

^*Corresponding author af dette arbejde

WELMA - Center for Retlige Studier i Velfærd og Marked

Abstract

There is consensus within the legal profession that the legal profession needs to adapt to the on-going digitalization of the legal market and the changing means of production of the legal commodity. This adaptation will also necessitate a transformation of legal education to assimilate the changes that the legal profession will undergo. The question is, however, how might the legal profession adapt to its digitalization? In this article, we will derive three possible pathways that the legal profession might follow. These are based on synchronous sociological models of the dynamics of the legal profession and the legal market as well as diachronous sociological descriptions of the history of the legal profession over the past century. In order to concretise these hypotheses, we will focus on the legal profession in three similar countries between which there is some level of comparability: Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands. The three hypothetical pathways are understood to be non-mutually-exclusive. We will then answer our core question: How must legal education be trans-formed to take into consideration the digitalization of the legal profession? To answer this question, we will describe three possible transformations in legal education that would take into account the pathways that the legal profession might pursue to adapt to the digitalization of its market and the production of its commodity.

Originalsprog	Engelsk
Tidsskrift	Utrecht Law Review
Vol/bind	15
Udgave nummer	1
Sider (fra-til)	65–79
Antal sider	15
ISSN	1871-515X
DOI	https://doi.org/10.36633/ulr.454
Status	Udgivet - 13 dec. 2019

Adgang til dokumentet

10.36633/ulr.454Licens: CC BY

https://www.utrechtlawreview.org/articles/10.36633/ulr.454/Licens: CC BY

Citationsformater

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title = "The Legal Profession in the Age of Digitalization: An outline of Three Potential Transformations in Legal Education",

abstract = "There is consensus within the legal profession that the legal profession needs to adapt to the on-going digitalization of the legal market and the changing means of production of the legal commodity. This adaptation will also necessitate a transformation of legal education to assimilate the changes that the legal profession will undergo. The question is, however, how might the legal profession adapt to its digitalization? In this article, we will derive three possible pathways that the legal profession might follow. These are based on synchronous sociological models of the dynamics of the legal profession and the legal market as well as diachronous sociological descriptions of the history of the legal profession over the past century. In order to concretise these hypotheses, we will focus on the legal profession in three similar countries between which there is some level of comparability: Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands. The three hypothetical pathways are understood to be non-mutually-exclusive. We will then answer our core question: How must legal education be trans-formed to take into consideration the digitalization of the legal profession? To answer this question, we will describe three possible transformations in legal education that would take into account the pathways that the legal profession might pursue to adapt to the digitalization of its market and the production of its commodity.",

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N2 - There is consensus within the legal profession that the legal profession needs to adapt to the on-going digitalization of the legal market and the changing means of production of the legal commodity. This adaptation will also necessitate a transformation of legal education to assimilate the changes that the legal profession will undergo. The question is, however, how might the legal profession adapt to its digitalization? In this article, we will derive three possible pathways that the legal profession might follow. These are based on synchronous sociological models of the dynamics of the legal profession and the legal market as well as diachronous sociological descriptions of the history of the legal profession over the past century. In order to concretise these hypotheses, we will focus on the legal profession in three similar countries between which there is some level of comparability: Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands. The three hypothetical pathways are understood to be non-mutually-exclusive. We will then answer our core question: How must legal education be trans-formed to take into consideration the digitalization of the legal profession? To answer this question, we will describe three possible transformations in legal education that would take into account the pathways that the legal profession might pursue to adapt to the digitalization of its market and the production of its commodity.

AB - There is consensus within the legal profession that the legal profession needs to adapt to the on-going digitalization of the legal market and the changing means of production of the legal commodity. This adaptation will also necessitate a transformation of legal education to assimilate the changes that the legal profession will undergo. The question is, however, how might the legal profession adapt to its digitalization? In this article, we will derive three possible pathways that the legal profession might follow. These are based on synchronous sociological models of the dynamics of the legal profession and the legal market as well as diachronous sociological descriptions of the history of the legal profession over the past century. In order to concretise these hypotheses, we will focus on the legal profession in three similar countries between which there is some level of comparability: Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands. The three hypothetical pathways are understood to be non-mutually-exclusive. We will then answer our core question: How must legal education be trans-formed to take into consideration the digitalization of the legal profession? To answer this question, we will describe three possible transformations in legal education that would take into account the pathways that the legal profession might pursue to adapt to the digitalization of its market and the production of its commodity.

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