Change is occurring in the Australian legal sector and the future of the profession is unclear. In this special report, Lawyers Weekly draws on the opinions of expert legal thinkers and internal staff writers to share their vision on what life for a lawyer might be like in the year 2020.

Editorial Note

Predicting the future is certainly an ambitious task and one sure way to open this publication to criticism from readers on what we have, and have not, chosen to include.

Why embark on this project in the first place, and why chose 2020 as the target year?

For one, the state of legal services across the globe has experienced much change over the last 18 months and Australian lawyers have not been immune. With the pace of change currently moving at lightning speed, there has been much debate over what the future of the profession will look like and where it simply must change in order to survive.

Over just 18 months, we've seen the emergence of Generation Y moving into stronger decision-making roles in the profession, law firms strip their staff numbers, outsourcing processes taking a front seat in the delivery of legal services, more international firms landing on our shores and the increasing corporatisation of legal services and the growing dominance of the mid-tier market.

We've seen the once lucrative job markets of overseas legal jurisdictions all but dry up for Australian lawyers and the mass influx of Australian lawyers returning to our shores - filling the local legal market with better skills, better experience, but smaller ambitions.

With so much change, it's only natural that concern should mount as to what the future will hold, and the year 2020 seemed an ideal start-point. Not only is it (almost) a neat decade away, but it also lays out enough time for the profession to move from its current bust cycle back into a boom, and potentially a bust again - thus creating enough of a time frame for the lessons of the current crisis to either be remembered or forgotten like those learnt from previous downturns.

The year 2020 is also the year the Rudd Government slated for its 2020 Summit, which called for ideas on what Australia should aim for. The year 2020 is an endpoint in the future that sits well with the potential of most people's imaginations.

Meanwhile, the number 2020 represents an analogy of its own - perfect vision.

Yes, it is an ambitious task. But it's not over just yet. What has been presented here is merely a snapshot from some minds across the legal profession. Off these initial ideas, we're calling on readers to also participate and share their visions at

See what our contributors had to say below. And have your say in the comments section...

Angela Priestley