The legal profession has long been identified as a power broker between political, corporate, state-bureaucratic and academic elites. Recent research has focused on the emergence of new professionals who are willing and able to work across national frontiers. As professional go-betweens, lawyers – alongside accountants, financial advisers or wealth managers – have become essential actors of the emerging “transnational legal field”, coordinating strategies across jurisdictions and forming a strong component of professional services firms.
The objective of this workshop is threefold. First, it aims to take stock of the ongoing international and interdisciplinary debates. Second, it intends to focus on the historical dimension and to deepen our understanding of the changes over time of the legal profession and its role in the development of global capitalism. Third, it endeavors to promote an actors-centered approach of the role of law and law firms as a key component in the business world.
The event is organised by Thibaud Giddey (University of Zurich) and Benoît Majerus (University of Luxembourg).
12-13 June 2025
Universität Zürich, Hauptgebäude, KOL-G-212
Rämistrasse 71
8006, Zurich, Switzerland
Provisionnal programme
Thursday, 12 June 2025
| 13.30 |
Welcome and introduction (Giddey-Majerus) |
| 13.45 |
Kickoff Roundtable - Interviewing lawyers: methods, benefits, challenges, feedback (Ankersmit - Arslan - Calderon - Dall’Agnol - Dezalay - Dyrendahl Staven - Giddey - Gottlieb - Hommes - Lauria - Majerus - Mangset - Pastre - Serrano - Staven - Williams) |
| 14.30 |
The Code of the Gift: Lawyers and Philanthropy Sophie Serrano (Geneva) |
| 15.00 |
Who defines whether wealth is a common good or private business? How tax lawyers leapt like salmon from expertise to policy on fish farming taxation Helle Dyrendahl Staven / Marte Mangset (Oslo University) |
| 15.30 |
Coffee break |
| 16.00 |
Balancing International and Domestic Credentials: A Study of Competition Lawyers in Turkey and Mexico Melike Arslan (London) |
| 16.30 |
Law, Lawyers, and the Managing Agency System in India, 1914-1970 Alexander Williams (Yale) |
| 17.15 |
Keynote (title tbd) Antoine Vauchez (CNRS) |
| 18.00 | Workshop dinner |
Friday, 13 June 2025
| 09.00 |
Crafting International Investment law in the 1950s and 1960s: the role of lawyers of Royal Dutch Shell Laurens Anskersmit / Wiebe Hommes (Amsterdam) |
| 09.30 |
Negotiating Sovereignty: How International Arbitrators Navigate the Arbitration Backlash to Protect Their Lucrative Business Paule Pastre (Bern) |
| 10.00 |
Coffee break |
| 10.30 |
Abe Fortas and the Remaking of Empire in Puerto Rico’s Operation Bootstrap Ana Calderon (Yale) |
| 11.00 |
"We can't say 'the law or the door'": gas extraction, project finance, and the embedding of 'global' values in Mozambique Ana Carolina Dall’Agnol (Oxford) |
| 11.30 |
The ‘Africa’ corporate bar in Paris: imperial revivals and neoliberalism Sara Dezalay |
| 12.00 |
Lunch |
| 13.30 |
Sweatshop: Financialization and Proletarianization at Wall Street Law Firms in the 1980s Dylan Gottlieb (Bentley University) |
| 14.00 |
Business Lawyers in Switzerland (1950s-1990s): a cog in the internationalization of the Swiss economy Thibaud Giddey (Zurich)versity) |
| 14.30 |
Local lawyers, global players: business lawyers in Panama Sol Lauria / Benoît Majerus (Panama / Luxembourg) |
| 15.15 | Closing of the event |
