Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Law
Becoming Global Lawyers? A Comparative Study Of Civic Professionalism, John Bliss
Becoming Global Lawyers? A Comparative Study Of Civic Professionalism, John Bliss
Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship
Through their professional education and training, new lawyers are generally encouraged to adopt a civic vision of professional identity. This article explores convergences and diverges in how new lawyers entering an increasingly globalized legal profession conceive of their civic roles in different national contexts. In particular, I examine corporate lawyers-in-training in the U.S. and China, drawing on interviews and a cross-cultural identity mapping method to compare their accounts of the lived experiences of civic professionalism. I find that professional identity formation in the U.S. sample is largely marked by role distancing and a sense of constrained public-interest expression. In contrast, …
Divided Selves: Professional Role Distancing Among Law Students And New Lawyers In A Period Of Market Crisis, John Bliss
Divided Selves: Professional Role Distancing Among Law Students And New Lawyers In A Period Of Market Crisis, John Bliss
Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship
In the terms of Erving Goffman’s classic role distancing analysis, newly admitted law students often aspire to an “embraced” lawyer role that directly expresses their personal and political values. Empirical research has suggested that during law school these students are instructed in an amoral and apolitical vision of professionalism. The literature has paid less attention to how students internally experience these norms within their continual processes of self-construction. This article takes an exploratory microdynamic look at professional identity formation drawing on longitudinal interviews and identity mapping with three student cohorts. I find that over the course of their legal education …