Does the legal profession have a future?

Abstract

Due to the development of distributed ledger technology and other related innovative technologies, in the coming years we will face the disappearance of many old management functions - and the emergence of new ones. The future of the profession of notary is only one private case within a truly global trend. At the XI Gaidar Forum, in January 2020, the section ‘Legal Education and the Labour Market. Transforming or stagnating in the digital economy?’ was devoted to this topic. The article provides a number of examples of how various digital technologies help to more effectively implement the functions performed by ‘human lawyers’. Chat bot robots are considered, which are increasingly being used in a number of sectors to perform legal tasks. Examples (in particular, the UAE) are given as governments try to simplify the work of their legal services using the latest technologies. Next, the authors analyze how the obligations and rights of the parties involved in the contracts are currently being fulfilled, and then assess the possibility of optimizing these procedures using smart contracts. The startup is described, thanks to which users from 188 countries can sign, send and manage documents at any time, anywhere, on any device, surely and confidentially. The article analyzes the current situation in which neither judges, nor lawyers, nor jurors, as a rule, do not have the necessary knowledge of technology to make competent judgments in the relevant cases. At the same time, the number of litigations on complex technological issues is increasing. The article details Oracle's legal process against Google. The authors conclude that lawyers will have to obtain interdisciplinary competence in the near future. They stand in solidarity with Elon R. Musk's view on the need for proactive AI regulation. The issue of correlation of legal norms and requirements of a new technological order in the article is illustrated by an example of a confrontation between the California Department of Motor Vehicles and the state attorney general with Uber over the activities of its self-driving cars. In conclusion, the authors urge to combine efforts and assess the consequences that the emergence of digital technologies has for the legal market and for the legal education market.