


Dr. Cord Brugmann, Executive Director
DAV - German Bar Association
Trust is good. A lawyer is better.
- approx 50-60% are solo practitioners
- approx 30% in law firms of 2-5 lawyers
- approx 4% of lawyers in major international law firms
- approx 15% in-house lawyers
- market for legal services has not grown as fast as number of lawyers
- German Bar Association: 67,000 voluntary members, 254 local associations, do not regulate, membership fee is EUR 127, represent more than 160,000 lawyers
- is an umbrella organization
- 294 local bars in Germany, 5 foreign German bars (GB, France, Italy, Brazil, Turkey)
- more than 30 committees with volunteer members
- 30 specialist sections
- they have a staff of 70 in Berlin and Brussels
- representation: most important demand for members
- continuing professional development: important for members
- information: quite important
- services: nice, but not as important
- for a national DAV advertising campaign, members can decide to charge an extra 30 EUR/month to finance it
- DAV provides media training to local chapters
- it is quite common that people with experience in legal professions become executives of legal associations
- professionals leading the associations used to be the norm, which is now slowly changing