SCCEI Seminar Series (Winter 2024)

Friday, January 19, 2024 | 12:00 pm -1:20 pm Pacific Time
Goldman Room E409, Encina Hall, 616 Jane Stanford Way

The Law and Economics of Lawyers: Evidence from the Revolving Door in China’s Judicial System
 

This paper studies the roles of lawyers in shaping judicial and economic outcomes, exploiting the unique setting of “revolving-door” lawyers in China’s judicial system. By compiling the first comprehensive dataset covering the universes of judges, lawyers, law firms, litigants, and lawsuits in China from 2014 to 2022, we identify over 14,000 judges who left their positions and joined private law firms as lawyers, which accounts for 6.5% of all judges (2.6% of all lawyers) nationwide. We document four main empirical patterns. First, in both criminal and commercial lawsuits, these revolving-door lawyers enjoy significant advantages in securing favorable court decisions for their clients. Second, leveraging intra-lawyer variation in performances at home vs. away courts, we show that the premium of revolving door lawyers comes from both “know who” and “know how.” Third, revolving-door lawyers add significant values to their firms beyond their roles as frontline lawyers, by mentoring junior colleagues and attracting larger clients. Fourth, the revolving door lawyers, by joining larger law firms that disproportionately serve rich individuals and large corporates, could exacerbate existing socio-economic inequalities in China.

Please register for the event to receive email updates and add it to your calendar. Lunch will be provided.

About the Speaker 
 

Shaoda Wang is an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, and a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). He also serves as the Deputy Faculty Director at the Energy Policy Institute at UChicago, China center (EPIC-China). He is an applied economist with research interests in development economics, environmental economics, and political economy. His main research agenda aims at understanding the political economy of public policy, with a regional focus on China.

He holds a BA from Peking University, and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. Prior to joining Harris, he was a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Economics and Energy Policy Institute (EPIC) at the University of Chicago.
 

A NOTE ON LOCATION

Please join us in-person in the Goldman Conference Room located within Encina Hall on the 4th floor of the East wing.

Questions? Contact Xinmin Zhao at xinminzhao@stanford.edu