Cheaper by the Hour: Temporary Lawyers and the Deprofessionalization of the Law
by Robert A. Brooks
Temple University Press, 2012 Paper: 978-1-4399-0286-8 | Cloth: 978-1-4399-0285-1 | eISBN: 978-1-4399-0287-5 Library of Congress Classification KF299.T46B76 2011 Dewey Decimal Classification 331.25729
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
ABOUT THIS BOOK
Recent law school graduates often work as temporary attorneys, but law firm layoffs and downsizing have strengthened the temporary attorney industry. Cheaper by the Hour is the first book-length account of these workers.
Drawing from participant observation and interviews, Robert A. Brooks provides a richly detailed ethnographic account of freelance attorneys in Washington, DC. He places their document review work in the larger context of the deprofessionalization of skilled labor and considers how professionals relegated to temporary jobs feel diminished, degraded, or demeaned by work that is often tedious, repetitive, and well beneath their abilities.
Brooks documents how firms break a lawyer's work into discrete components that require less skill to realize maximum profits. Moreover, he argues that information technology and efficiency demands are further stratifying the profession and creating a new underclass of lawyers who do low-end commodity work.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Robert A. Brooks is Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of Criminal Justice at Worcester State University in Massachusetts.
REVIEWS
"Law schools paint bright illusions of their graduates’ earnings potential. This book is the reality. Nowhere near courtrooms or plush offices labor an exploited, minimally paid underclass of lawyers in a Dickens-meets-Dilbert world of 'document review,' in which professionals with advanced degrees live tenuous existences sorting documents into categories, work that ninth graders could accomplish and with nothing lawyerly about it.... Brooks presents a firsthand account of his own experiences and interviews coworkers in these dead-end jobs with no benefits, no chance for promotion, and no possibility to even act as a lawyer. It’s a scary world showing that nobody has any security. VERDICT Would-be law students must read this look at the profession’s dark underbelly... this is essential for law school libraries and a good purchase for comprehensive labor collections and large public library systems, as well."
—Library Journal
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Preface
1. Degraded and Insecure: The “New” Workforce
2. “Basically Interchangeable”: The Creation of the Temporary Lawyer
3. Life on the Concourse Level: Doing Document Review
4. Box Shopping in “Nike Town”: Struggles over Work
5. “Keeping Count of Every Freakin’ Minute”: Struggles over Time
6. “A Glorified Data Entry Person”: Struggles over Identity
7. “I Would Rather Grow in India”: The Emerging Legal Underclass
Appendix A: Document Review Project Summary
Appendix B: The Questionnaire
Appendix C: The Attorneys
References Index
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
Cheaper by the Hour: Temporary Lawyers and the Deprofessionalization of the Law
by Robert A. Brooks
Temple University Press, 2012 Paper: 978-1-4399-0286-8 Cloth: 978-1-4399-0285-1 eISBN: 978-1-4399-0287-5
Recent law school graduates often work as temporary attorneys, but law firm layoffs and downsizing have strengthened the temporary attorney industry. Cheaper by the Hour is the first book-length account of these workers.
Drawing from participant observation and interviews, Robert A. Brooks provides a richly detailed ethnographic account of freelance attorneys in Washington, DC. He places their document review work in the larger context of the deprofessionalization of skilled labor and considers how professionals relegated to temporary jobs feel diminished, degraded, or demeaned by work that is often tedious, repetitive, and well beneath their abilities.
Brooks documents how firms break a lawyer's work into discrete components that require less skill to realize maximum profits. Moreover, he argues that information technology and efficiency demands are further stratifying the profession and creating a new underclass of lawyers who do low-end commodity work.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Robert A. Brooks is Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of Criminal Justice at Worcester State University in Massachusetts.
REVIEWS
"Law schools paint bright illusions of their graduates’ earnings potential. This book is the reality. Nowhere near courtrooms or plush offices labor an exploited, minimally paid underclass of lawyers in a Dickens-meets-Dilbert world of 'document review,' in which professionals with advanced degrees live tenuous existences sorting documents into categories, work that ninth graders could accomplish and with nothing lawyerly about it.... Brooks presents a firsthand account of his own experiences and interviews coworkers in these dead-end jobs with no benefits, no chance for promotion, and no possibility to even act as a lawyer. It’s a scary world showing that nobody has any security. VERDICT Would-be law students must read this look at the profession’s dark underbelly... this is essential for law school libraries and a good purchase for comprehensive labor collections and large public library systems, as well."
—Library Journal
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
Preface
1. Degraded and Insecure: The “New” Workforce
2. “Basically Interchangeable”: The Creation of the Temporary Lawyer
3. Life on the Concourse Level: Doing Document Review
4. Box Shopping in “Nike Town”: Struggles over Work
5. “Keeping Count of Every Freakin’ Minute”: Struggles over Time
6. “A Glorified Data Entry Person”: Struggles over Identity
7. “I Would Rather Grow in India”: The Emerging Legal Underclass
Appendix A: Document Review Project Summary
Appendix B: The Questionnaire
Appendix C: The Attorneys
References Index
REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE
If you are a student who cannot use this book in printed form, BiblioVault may be able to supply you
with an electronic file for alternative access.
Please have the accessibility coordinator at your school fill out this form.
It can take 2-3 weeks for requests to be filled.
ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE