I will offer you two opposed ideas at the same time and trust you will all retain the ability to function:  First, those positing the US/UK divide is unbridgeable will be vindicated: The cultures are indeed too foreign to each other, clients want either New York or English law but never need both under one roof, the lockstep end of the compensation spectrum and the EWYK end are incapable of being squared, and so on.

In other words, the current law firm rankings and standings on both sides of the Atlantic will continue to look much as they do today—with the salient difference that people will be largely at peace with it.  Firms will retain their essential identity as US/New York rooted or UK/London rooted.  No problem.

Second, this is indeed a moment of severe disequilibrium whose only resolution lies through a substantial recombination and re-ordering of existing firms.  Globalization is inexorable and for the law firm market to fail to offer a wide range of choice of providers offering strong US and UK capability will prove to be a vacuum that nature abhors.

Once one or two high-profile US/UK marriages or engagements are announced, there will be a rush to follow before the proverbial window closes.  The landscape of firm rankings and standings will be altered greatly.   And I’ll offer a bonus footnote under this hypothetical future:  Because there are far fewer UK firms of the caliber to hold up their end of the bargain than there are equivalent US firms, the great majority of US firms will be left without a partner and, like it or not, will indeed have to focus on tending their home garden.

But for all this to be the same in 2021 or 2026?  Hard to see this level of obsession and anxiety persisting that long.

coming into Heathrow

Coming into Heathrow

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