[Gangnam Perspective] The Debate Over the Number of Lawyers Who Pass

The long-running dispute over the number of lawyers, a deep-rooted debate that surfaced from the very start of discussions on the law school system, is flaring up again. Seventeen years after its introduction, tensions among stakeholders are becoming even sharper. The issue is clear. Academia is calling for more successful candidates to meet rising demand and normalize legal education and research, while the industry is arguing for a reduction on the grounds of market saturation.
Both sides have persuasive arguments. According to this paper, academia is urging the pass rate for the bar exam, which currently stands in the 50% range, to be raised to 80% in order to improve public access to legal services. It also points to the fact that the legal market has grown 2.7 times since 2007, reaching 9.6 trillion won in 2024, with annual growth of 5.6%. Another reason cited is that areas such as corporate advisory work, environmental, social and governance (ESG) management, and corporate legal affairs are expanding beyond litigation.
By contrast, the legal profession says the market is already severely oversaturated. In its view, fiercer competition is driving fees down and lowering the quality of legal services. It also raises concerns about overlap with similar licensed professions such as judicial scriveners and tax accountants. The industry said, "The average monthly number of cases handled per lawyer has plunged from about seven in 2008 to less than one now," adding, "Oversupply is seriously threatening not only the right to survive, but also the public nature of legal services."
The number of new lawyers the industry wants is 600 a year in the long term. Academia believes the figure should be around 2,900 to 3,000 annually, based on an 80% pass rate for roughly 3,700 expected test-takers in 2026. That is far from the current 1,700, and the gap is wide on both sides. Even when looking at the same legal market, the two camps reach starkly different conclusions.
But one crucial element is missing from the debate. The focus is only on the number of successful candidates, while no one is offering a vision for the changes the industry will face or how it should respond. There is an expectation that adjusting the numbers will change the situation, even though those who have watched the legal market on the ground know full well that it is not that simple. Moreover, the industry is now on the verge of a large-scale assault from Artificial Intelligence (AI). Legal work is no exception when it comes to AI automation, including research and drafting.
What about overseas markets that are seen as having more advanced expertise in legal services than Korea? Japan, which introduced law schools in 2004, also clashed over the number of lawyers. It later shifted course and adjusted the number of successful candidates. Even so, the legal profession there still faces recession and intensifying competition. The United States has also seen ongoing debate over lawyer supply and market structure, but changing the numbers alone did not resolve the market. The same is true in major European countries, which have adopted their own responses. In the end, cutting the number did not ease competition, and increasing it did not immediately improve legal services.
At this point, the question needs to change. The real issue is whether competitiveness can truly be protected by the number of successful candidates alone, as both sides claim. Kim & Chang, a global law firm widely regarded as Asia's leading comprehensive legal services group, placed greater emphasis from the beginning on corporate advisory work and international matters rather than litigation. At the time, that was an unfamiliar strategy. After founding partner Kim Young-moo established the first office in Gwanghwamun, Seoul, in 1973, he led the Korean legal market for 53 years through that kind of innovation.
In Kim & Chang's history of success, the number of successful candidates had little impact. Rather than obsessing over numerical adjustments, the result was more about setting a direction in line with market changes. That is why it remains the only domestic firm to have been included in the Top 100 Global Law Firms for 12 consecutive years.
In the end, the answer to survival for Korea's legal industry is not how many lawyers will be produced this year. It needs to align itself with a global perspective that changes by the day. Maximizing efficiency with AI, breaking into non-litigation markets such as corporate growth, or becoming a hyper-specialist in a particular field could all be viable strategies. The era of sustaining survival by obsessing over numbers is already long gone.
jjw@fnnews.com