Why Lawyers should Assess Lawyers' Ethics

There has been a growing interest in empirical research on law firms and lawyer conduct for more than a decade. Recent studies have reached the same conclusion as studies from the 1960s and 1970s – the ethical culture in the law office is critical to the ethical behavior of the individual lawyers in the office. With this in mind, the question becomes this: What should the legal profession do to encourage better law firm management to promote ethical behavior? In ASSESSING LAWYERS' ETHICS, Adrian Evans maintains that law societies and bar associations could improve lawyers' ethical behavior through various strategies to assess their ethics. Evans moves the discussion from "what went wrong?" to "how can we fix it?" ASSESSING LAWYERS' ETHICS is a welcome contribution to literature focused on understanding and improving the ethical conduct of lawyers. This review of Evans' book focuses on the empirical findings underlying his recommendations and analyzes the positions Evans takes.