A critical analysis of the role of legal higher education and training in the institutionalisation of the English legal profession: quo vadis for English law schools?

This article focusses on the development and current state of the relationship between the English legal profession and higher education institutions invested in the education and training of its members. A historiography in Parts 2 and 3 reveals the development of an originally unintended relationship that came about by chance and out of necessity and ultimately gave rise to a peculiar mix of practical legal training and university education that exist to this day. It is against this background and with reference to the Larson/Abel market control theory and Clark's triangle heuristic, that the analysis in Part 4 explores how the English legal profession continues to exert control over its market by adopting the credentials of education institutions in the training and accreditation of its own members (control over the production of producers), and by also prescribing to its members the scope and nature of the services they may provide (control over the production by producers). The organisational alliance that has so been forged between the English legal profession and higher education institutions is critically reflected upon, also in terms of how higher education institutions can possibly consider more fundamentally their stake in the maintenance of this legal professional enterprise.