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Converting the lawyers: the dynamics of competition and accountability reform

Law Faculty, University of New South Wales, Sydney

The success of competition and accountability reform to the Australian legal profession is found to be as dependent on the process by which it is introduced as on its substantive merits. A diversity of opinions on, and experiences of, reform proposals was gathered through interviews with forty-one lawyers selected by the difference discovery method. Their varied responses to reform were analysed using the constant comparative method and placed into two broad categories: (a) conversion stories based on community responsiveness, persuasive dialogue, discovery of self-interest, pragmatic acceptance of fate and surrender to market forces; and (b) defiance stories induced by discredit and disrespect. It was found that individual lawyers and professional associ ations have responded constructively to persuasion and dialogue especially when they also see reform as inevitable. They have resisted when change is introduced in a way that denies them a role in their own regulation and reform.

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