Legal research and information systems: The impact of information retrieval systems on provincial legal practice^[1]

This article is based on a paper given at the Third International Conference on Lawyers and Lawyering, Lake Wlndermere, in July 1993. The research from which it is derived was originally commissioned by the Bristol Law Society (BUS) in 1992. My thanks are due to participants at the Lake Wlndermere conference for their helpful observations; to all members of the Information Services Committee of BLS for their support, and particularly to Erica Thomas and Julia Smart, for their assistance in drafting the questionnaires; to Rosie Torre (at BLS) and Carole Smith (at the University of the West of England) who provided the main administrative support for the project, and to Butterworth Telepublishing Ltd for their financial assistance. The opinions expressed in this paper are my own and do not reflect the policy of Bristol Law Society. All errors that remain are, of course, also mine.

Abstract

Despite a burgeoning literature on the computerisation of legal practice, there have been few in‐depth empirical studies of the affect of IT on lawyers’ practice outside North America. This article reports on a study of the impact of IT, and of legal information systems in particular, on the legal profession in and around the city of Bristol, England. It confirms that the use of back‐office applications such as word processing and accounting systems is increasingly widespread, even in provincial law firms and chambers. Its findings also suggest that, despite increasing systems availability, information retrieval and other front‐office applications remain, for a variety of reasons, the preserve of the largest law firms. However, the article goes on to suggest that the extent of information system usage is nonetheless more widespread than earlier research had indicated, and offers some hypotheses for this conclusion.

Notes

This article is based on a paper given at the Third International Conference on Lawyers and Lawyering, Lake Wlndermere, in July 1993. The research from which it is derived was originally commissioned by the Bristol Law Society (BUS) in 1992. My thanks are due to participants at the Lake Wlndermere conference for their helpful observations; to all members of the Information Services Committee of BLS for their support, and particularly to Erica Thomas and Julia Smart, for their assistance in drafting the questionnaires; to Rosie Torre (at BLS) and Carole Smith (at the University of the West of England) who provided the main administrative support for the project, and to Butterworth Telepublishing Ltd for their financial assistance. The opinions expressed in this paper are my own and do not reflect the policy of Bristol Law Society. All errors that remain are, of course, also mine.