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 "@type": "DefinedTerm",
 "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/entities/legal-profession",
 "identifier": "kaal:entity:legal-profession",
 "name": "Legal profession",
 "termCode": "legal-profession",
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 },
 "author": {
  "@type": "Person",
  "name": "Wulf A. Kaal",
  "identifier": "https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0757-275X"
 },
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/617681-019",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:617681-019",
   "text": "European lawyers may advise clients to incorporate at home simply because those lawyers do not want to deal with the courts and lawyers of another Member State, which suppresses cross border incorporation independently of statute quality.",
   "abstract": "European lawyers thus may advise clients to incorporate at home simply because these lawyers do not want to deal with the courts and lawyers of another Member State.",
   "citation": "Christian Kirchner, Richard W. Painter, Wulf A. Kaal, Regulatory Competition in EU Corporate Law after Inspire Art Unbundling Delaware's Product for Euro (2004). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=617681",
   "datePublished": "2004",
   "claim_type": "failure",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "European legal education and practice, where procedural differences across Member States are large"
   ],
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-002",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-002",
   "text": "Disruptive innovation in law renders obsolete many and probably most of the traditional legal skills and characteristics that law schools currently cultivate.",
   "abstract": "Yet, disruptive innovation in law9 obviates many if not most of the traditional legal skills and characteristics of traditional lawyers.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "failure",
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   "is_failure_mode": true,
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-003",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-003",
   "text": "Even the law firms that are best at finding innovative solutions for clients remain reluctant to fully adopt Legal Tech innovations, so quality of client service does not predict willingness to adopt.",
   "abstract": "While the better firms often find innovative solutions to their clients' problems, even those firms are reluctant to fully embrace Legal Tech innovations.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-010",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-010",
   "text": "Legal Tech startups will force the legal profession to innovate perpetually, a demand that overextended and cumbersome legal organizations which have lost the capacity for agile reinvention cannot easily meet.",
   "abstract": "the legal profession will be forced by such startup companies to innovate in perpetuity, a task that is not easily accomplished by overextended and — often — cumbersome legal organizations that have lost the capacity for agile re-invention.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "failure",
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   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-013",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-013",
   "text": "The counseling, deal making, matchmaking, gatekeeping, and enforcement roles historically performed by lawyers are increasingly performed by technology, and blockchain technology and smart contracting will accelerate that substitution.",
   "abstract": "However, the counseling, deal-making, matchmaking, gatekeeping, and enforcing roles are increasingly performed by technology.43 This trend is likely to accelerate in the near future, enabled by blockchain technology and smart contracting.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
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   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-015",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-015",
   "text": "Intermediaries, lawyers among them, are replaced by code, connectivity, crowd, and collaboration.",
   "abstract": "Intermediaries, including lawyers, are replaced by code, connectivity, crowd, and collaboration.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "mechanism",
   "confidence": "asserted",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
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    "transactions capable of being executed on blockchain infrastructure"
   ],
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-025",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-025",
   "text": "Contrary to the widespread belief among legal professionals that code can only handle very simple transactions, blockchain enabled smart contracts generally do not require legal involvement across the spectrum of transactions.",
   "abstract": "While blockchain-enabled smart contracts generally do not require legal involvement across the spectrum of transactions, legal professionals often still believe that \"code\" in smart contracts can only deal with very simple transactions",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "mechanism",
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   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "transactions capable of being coded",
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   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/2939127-036",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:2939127-036",
   "text": "Most lawyers and law industry representatives underestimate the implications of emerging Legal Tech.",
   "abstract": "Most lawyers and law industry representatives underestimate the implications of the emerging Legal Tech.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P. M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in the Blockchain Revolution (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2939127",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "empirical",
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   "is_failure_mode": true,
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    "law firm and corporate lawyers in Asia, Europe, and the United States"
   ],
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3071378-003",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3071378-003",
   "text": "Because the public blockchain is public and immutable, the technology increases transparency while significantly reducing transaction costs, and intermediaries including lawyers are replaced by code, connectivity, crowd, and collaboration.",
   "abstract": "Because the blockchain (at the least the public blockchain) is in fact public and immutable, the technology increases transparency, while at the same time significantly reducing transaction costs. Intermediaries, including lawyers, are replaced by code, connectivity, crowd, and collaboration.24",
   "citation": "Wulf A. Kaal, Blockchain Technology and Race in Corporate America (2017). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3071378",
   "datePublished": "2017",
   "claim_type": "mechanism",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "public blockchains rather than private ones"
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   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-002",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-002",
   "text": "Lawyers have historically been most effective and most socially useful when acting as transaction engineers who facilitate new business and social relationships, and the engineering of the near future will largely be code based.",
   "abstract": "Historically, lawyers have been at their most effective – and socially useful - when they operate as \"transaction engineers,\" i.e., facilitating new forms of business and other social relationships.6 It seems obvious that the \"engineering\" of the near-future will, to a large extent, be code-based.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "mechanism",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "periods of fast paced technological change"
   ],
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   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-007",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-007",
   "text": "A transaction engineer is a crucial intermediary who brings together, in a safe environment, parties holding different but mutually compatible interests and expertise.",
   "abstract": "In this sense, we can see how lawyers functioned as \"transaction engineers,\" i.e., crucial intermediaries that brought together in a \"safe\" environment various parties with different but mutually compatible interests and expertise.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "definitional",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
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   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
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  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-008",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-008",
   "text": "Lawyers have often failed to perform the function of active transaction engineer and have instead become a hindrance or obstacle to transactions.",
   "abstract": "The problem, however, is that lawyers have often failed to perform this function of being active transaction engineers and have become a hindrance or obstacle to transactions.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
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   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-009",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-009",
   "text": "The major cause of lawyers obstructing transactions is the tendency to standardize or proceduralize legal solutions and to use standard form templates, because fixed standardized solutions imposed on complex, dynamic transactions produce frustration and difficulties.",
   "abstract": "This can happen for many reasons but the tendency to standardize – or \"proceduralize\" - legal solutions and to employ standard form \"templates\" is one major factor. Fixed and standardized solutions are imposed on complex, dynamic transactions resulting in frustration and difficulties.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "mechanism",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
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   ],
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  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-010",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-010",
   "text": "The result of this pattern is reputational: lawyers have developed a reputation as the least trusted of professions.",
   "abstract": "As a result, lawyers have developed a reputation as the least trusted of professions.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "empirical",
   "confidence": "evidenced",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
   "scope_conditions": [],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-011",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-011",
   "text": "Legal tech will profoundly disrupt the legal profession, and because these technologies are code based, lawyers must be able to understand and talk about code in order to participate in designing them.",
   "abstract": "\"Legal tech\" will profoundly disrupt the legal profession18 and since these technologies are code-based lawyers need to be able to understand and talk about code to participate in the design of such legal technologies",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "condition",
   "confidence": "asserted",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "legal technologies built on software code"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-013",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-013",
   "text": "Junior legal professionals and legal support staff are the first casualties of the Legal Tech evolution, because applications will soon perform most junior lawyer work without the human elements that create imprecision, flaws, inaccuracies, possible lawsuits and delay.",
   "abstract": "Junior legal professionals and legal support staff are likely the first victims of the Legal Tech evolution.32 Legal Tech applications will be able to perform most of the junior lawyers' work soon without the human elements that create imprecision, flaws, inaccuracies, possible lawsuits, and delay.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "predictive",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "continued decentralization of legal services by startups"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-015",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-015",
   "text": "Contrary to commentators who predict the end of lawyers, the authors reject that claim but hold that lawyers of the future can only function as effective transaction engineers if they understand the power of code.",
   "abstract": "We certainly don't make this claim, but we do think that if the lawyers of the future are to function as effective transaction engineers, they are going to need to understand the power of code.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "condition",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "lawyers seeking to function as transaction engineers in a digital economy"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-016",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-016",
   "text": "Lawyers of the future will need to act as project managers or at least as active participants in the multi-disciplinary teams that design the solutions and transactions of the future.",
   "abstract": "Firstly, lawyers of the future will need to be able to assume the role of project managers or, at least, active participants in the new multi- disciplinary teams that are going to design the solutions/transactions of the future.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "predictive",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "design of code dependent solutions and transactions"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3227967-041",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3227967-041",
   "text": "If standardized legal work and legal research can be performed by algorithms, the result is an opportunity rather than a threat, because it frees lawyer time for assisting clients with the new and very specific challenges of the digital world.",
   "abstract": "If the \"standardized work\" and legal research activities can be performed by algorithms, there is more time for assisting the client with the new and very specific challenges of the digital world.",
   "citation": "Mark Fenwick, Wulf A. Kaal, Erik P.M. Vermeulen, Legal Education in a Digital Age Why 'Coding for Lawyers' Matters (2018). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3227967",
   "datePublished": "2018",
   "claim_type": "predictive",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": false,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "successful algorithmic automation of standardized legal work"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "f6e13b956f864ab32ec3305d095a35a127770327d75b3688f785cefc437d369f",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/3411897-016",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:3411897-016",
   "text": "RegLegalTech startups will force the legal profession to innovate, but that task is not easily accomplished by overextended and cumbersome legal organizations that have lost the capacity for agile reinvention.",
   "abstract": "Second, and most importantly, the legal profession will be forced by such startup companies to innovate, a task that is not easily accomplished by overextended, and often cumbersome, legal organizations that have lost the capacity for agile reinvention.",
   "citation": "Wulf A. Kaal, Decentralization - Past, Present, and Future (2019). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3411897",
   "datePublished": "2019",
   "claim_type": "failure",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "applies to incumbent legal organizations facing RegLegalTech entrants"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "82f0aea026b3e3a526ec51bc073b3b864dc06cd9083ff9c54c550037045edaa9",
   "status": "current"
  },
  {
   "@type": "Claim",
   "@id": "https://wulfkaal.github.io/claims/6421319-038",
   "identifier": "kaal:claim:6421319-038",
   "text": "The legal profession faces a structural problem that incremental reform cannot solve, because its obsolescence curve is steeper than the curriculum adaptation curve.",
   "abstract": "The profession's obsolescence curve is steeper than the curriculum's adaptation curve. A structural problem that incremental reform cannot solve.",
   "citation": "Wulf A. Kaal, The Collapse of Scarcity Economics (2026). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=6421319",
   "datePublished": "2026",
   "claim_type": "failure",
   "confidence": "argued",
   "is_failure_mode": true,
   "scope_conditions": [
    "applies to the legal profession and legal education"
   ],
   "source_pdf_sha256": "0f4f68e56ee48bb8b2d73d3ab7fd96fa572e76c195694ffa740360704c1b172d",
   "status": "current"
  }
 ],
 "description": "21 claims in the published works of Wulf A. Kaal carry the concept tag 'legal-profession'. Derived node: a roster, not an adjudicated definition."
}