Relational Embeddedness and Socially Motivated Case Screening in the Practice of Law in Rural China

For nearly three decades, there have been heated discussions in the United States about economic incentives in legal practice. Researchers generally agree that economic interests play a critical role in shaping lawyers' behavior. A telling example in this regard is lawyers' practice of case screening. Motivated by self interest, lawyers tend to conduct case screening on a rational, cost effective basis and seek out cases with high fee potential. This intentional pursuit of potentially lucrative business is particularly prevalent among lawyers in private practice (Helland and Tabarrok 2003; Johnson Jr. 1980 81; Kritzer 1984, 1987, 1997, 1998, 2001; Kritzer and Krishnan 1999; Kritzer et al. 1985; Van Hoy 1995, 1997, 1999) Economic incentives, however, are rarely unbounded in legal practice. Rather, they are often mediated by sociocultural factors, such as lawyers' sense of responsibility, reputational concerns, desire for professional challenges, political ideologies, and so on (Daniels and Martin 1999; Kim 2009a; Kritzer and Krishnan 1999; Menkel Meadow and Meadow 1983; Van Hoy 1995, 1997; Trautner 2011).Building on scholarly insights into sociocultural restrictions on economic incentives in legal services, this study brings to the fore the effects of relational embeddedness on the legal profession's practice of case screening. By "relational embeddedness," I refer to concrete and durable relationships among law practitioners, clients, adversaries, and the communities these individuals inhabit. Using data retrieved from more than 17 months of ethnographic research in rural China, I demonstrate that relational embeddedness holds the key to our understandings of the legal profession's decision making in the case screening process. Over the past decade, legal services in rural China have been commodified to the extent that law practitioners usually select cases on the basis of perceived payoff. The commodification of legal services, however, has not yet shaken up the primacy of relational embeddedness in the practice of law. Rather, law practitioners' relationships with extended families, community members, and political elites have crucial bearing on their decision making at the workplace. Within this context, decisions as to whether one extends or withholds legal services from disputants hinge on not only perceived payoff, but also current and future ties with clients, adversaries, and the nearby communities. By meticulously scrutinizing multiplex relationships involved in legal services, law practitioners seek to meet the practical needs of their personal life. They also do so in hopes of upholding important moral obligations toward family, community, and the local state. In that sense, the legal profession's case screening is not only economically but also socially motivated.On two distinct fronts, the findings described above add new depth to our knowledge of legal services in rural China and beyond. One, by introducing the concept of relational embeddedness into sociolegal research, this study invites careful reflections on conventional wisdom about the ramifications of social connectedness in the practice of law. The past decades have witnessed the rise of a burgeoning scholarship highlighting the paramount importance of social connectedness in legal practice in the United States, China, and elsewhere. Conceptions such as social capital, networking, and guanxi (i.e. the Chinese term for direct and indirect connections between social actors) have made deep inroads into the research on legal professions, and, in turn, greatly enriched our understandings of the embedded nature of legal practice vis a vis the state, the market, local communities, and international  Rich and sophisticated as this scholarship is, it often features a lopsided focus on the bright side of social relationships, and particularly, the positive impacts on the development of legal careers. The dark side of social connectedness that is, the negative consequences resulting from law practitioners' embeddedness in multiplex social relationships has remained understudied (Dinovitzer 2006)