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TragedyOfTheANTI-COMMONSOfLawyers 3 - 12 Apr 2008 - Main.JaredBaumgart
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As i took a 6 hour train to upstate new york this weekend, I had a lot of time to ponder my property readings from this semester. Then, I had an idea which I immediately wanted to put in writing so we could discuss it as a class. | | | While it easier to envision smaller offices providing a better work environmnent, in many ways size has nothing to do with the problems of large corporate firms. Anywhere that destroys your autonomy is likely a bad place to work, whether it be Cravath or your overbearing uncle's electronics store. The point, I think, is not to go small, but to go independant, even if independance means a collaborative relationship with your partners and colleagues.
-- AdamCarlis - 12 Apr 2008 | |
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I'm not sure that Heller's anticommons theory is quite on point. His theory seems to focus on the right to exclude. Here, lawyers wouldn't have the right to exclude. Unlike patents which give monopolies, no lawyer has a monopoly over a client's problem. If various small offices can't agree on a solution, the client can always find different lawyers who will collaborate better (lawyers are plentiful, substitutes are readily available). Whereas a drug company may need a certain patent, which probably has few if any substitutes, a client should be able to assemble a team of lawyers from the available pool of individuals. If you believe lawyers pooled from various offices will have a hard time collaborating, raising the transaction costs, then I suppose the result is the same as the anticommons problem exists (ie, too many chefs spoil the soup)
If collaboration is the problem, I don't think big firms are the sollution. Just because 2 lawyers work for the same firm doesn't mean they'll work well together, it just means they have to work together. It might even be more efficient if lawyers chose who they work with, rather than being forced to work with other lawyers in their firm.
-- JaredBaumgart - 12 Apr 2008 | | | |
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