Some students I meet tell me they want to practice “international law” because they want to travel. Often these students don’t really know what it means to practice international law, nor do they have any realistic idea of who might be hiring them to do so.
One especially naïve law student told me she wanted (right out of law school) to be a judge on the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague, the most important and most prestigious international court in the world, because she thought it would “look good on her résumé” and make it easier for her to find other international jobs later. She also wanted to be a judge on the ICJ because she thought it would be nice to live in the Netherlands. I don’t know what job she got when she graduated, but she is not yet a judge on the ICJ.
International law isn’t a ticket to travel
If you happen to be one of those law students who wants to do international law only because you enjoy international travel, you should know three things.
First, in a world of instant communication and teleconferencing, clients are less inclined to foot the bill for you to attend a meeting in Paris than they once would have been. Your billable hours (including travel time), business class airfare, and four-star hotel rooms are not expenses many clients will want to pay for when they have the option of just shooting you an e-mail or picking up the telephone.
Second, your time often is not your own when you are working on these trips, and you might never even get to see anything of the country you are visiting. When you do get to travel, you might find yourself doing all-day document reviews in the back office of a hot and stuffy warehouse instead of enjoying the country where you are. One lawyer I know spent an entire week working in a hotel room in a small Caribbean island nation. She was kept so busy in meetings and reviewing documents, she only experienced that country through the hotel and what she saw while looking out the window going back to the airport.
Third, if you travel abroad to do legal work, you might inadvertently commit the unauthorized practice of law. Unless you are licensed in that foreign jurisdiction or receive special permission to work there (such as by being admitted pro hac vice to work in a certain jurisdiction on one particular case as a foreign lawyer), you may be breaking national or local rules that limit the practice of law to lawyers licensed in that particular jurisdiction. One law firm learned its lesson when it found that it could not bill for attorney time because the lawyers were not authorized to practice law in the foreign jurisdiction. Other lawyers have risked criminal prosecution for actions as simple as taking a deposition in another country where they were not licensed.
So if your interest in international law is really just an interest in international travel, here is my advice: Get a job that you enjoy, and travel internationally on weekends or when you are on vacation. You will get to enjoy those trips a lot more, and you’ll return to your job refreshed and relaxed. You will get to go with your family or friends. Sign up for those last-minute Internet specials for foreign destinations that airlines offer.
Another wise option is to become active in one of the bar association committees or groups that regularly hold meetings in other countries. For example, the International Bar Association held its Annual Conference 2007 in Singapore. The 2008 conference will be in Buenos Aires. The ABA has groups and committees that travel internationally for meetings. The ABA Section of International Law, for example, held its 2007 Fall Meeting in London. Next year the Section will meet in Brussels. The Section also had a special briefing trip last year for a number of lawyers who went to Ghana, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Next year the trips will be in Asia. Even local bar associations are getting into the act—the Chicago Bar Association, for example, is planning a Continuing Legal Education (CLE) trip to South Africa following its successful CLE program in Ireland. If you become active in the associations, you could easily find yourself participating in those international trips and maybe even helping to plan them.
International success stories
There is also a world of international opportunity beyond short-term travel, and you may have your eyes set on settling down in another country for something longer than a weekend. Can you work abroad as a U.S.-trained lawyer? Yes. It can be done, and there are many success stories to prove it. Following are four such stories.
Salli Swartz is a name partner at the Paris-based firm of Phillips, Giraud, Naud & Swartz. She admits that she never really wanted to be a lawyer—she put off her career as an actress to attend law school. She took classes in international law, but she didn’t take courses that would have prepared her for a career in corporate law, which she describes as “an unwise move” because U.S.-trained lawyers working abroad must have a firm foundation in U.S. corporate law.
Swartz began her legal career practicing poverty law in rural Pennsylvania, representing abused spouses, the homeless, and welfare recipients. She was happy and successful, and even brought one of her cases to the U.S. Supreme Court.
When Swartz’s husband was posted in Paris for 18 months, she decided to accompany him. Once they were in Paris, they decided to stay. But she had a difficult time finding employment—in part because she was not licensed to practice law in France.
She accepted a job as an international arbitration paralegal. After that, she found a way to be licensed as a foreign conseil juridique, which is something similar to an English solicitor (who may not necessarily appear in court but instead advises clients on transactional and other legal matters). She worked for several years doing international arbitration work, and then worked at some other firms to gain additional experience. She gained the self-confidence to work in another country.
In 1988, Swartz opened a law firm in Paris with a French friend who had just passed the examination to be an avocat (similar to barristers in England). The firm was successful, but the two women eventually decided to pursue other opportunities. Her partner went to work in a family-owned business, while Swartz joined another firm as a name partner, bringing employees and clients with her.
She is happy and successful in her present job and has done amazing work over the years. She now has a diverse international practice with clients around the globe. Many of her clients are from the United States, and she spends a great deal of time explaining to them the business, financial, legal, cultural, and political environment in France. Her U.S. training and experience—and her years of experience in France—allow her to negotiate business deals and to draft contracts that cross international boundaries and cultures. She sees herself to be as much a cultural mediator as she is an advocate for her clients.
Jeffrey Golden is a U.S.-trained lawyer working in England. He is a U.S.-qualified partner in the London office of Allen & Overy LLP. He studied at Duke University, the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Columbia University School of Law, from which he received his J.D. degree with honors in 1978.
When first looking for a job as an associate on Wall Street, Golden felt the need to apologize for his interest in international law. Thirty years ago, he found that senior partners at those firms generally didn’t find practice in international law to be relevant. These days, he says, “international is where it’s at.”
Golden joined the leading Wall Street practice of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, which had overseas branch offices. He worked for five years in the New York City office and was then offered a posting in London, which he jumped at. He spent the next 10 years learning, advising investment bankers in New York and London, and doing deals in the fledgling financial market of the swap (a derivatives transaction). He gained experience in a wide range of capital markets matters, including swaps and derivatives, international equity and debt offerings, mergers and acquisitions, and joint ventures. He eventually worked on a code of contract terms that led to the industry’s standard form in this area.
When Allen & Overy decided to start up their U.S. law practice in London, Golden left Cravath to become their first non-English law qualified partner. The law firm has offices in 20 countries, and Golden is now cohead of the firm’s U.S. law and derivatives practices. When he started working as a lawyer in London, there were few other U.S. or U.S.-trained lawyers working there. Today there is a great number of U.S. lawyers working full time in London and in other parts of the United Kingdom.
Golden is admitted to the bars of New Jersey and New York and to the U.S. Supreme Court. He is also the first U.S.-trained lawyer based in another country to be chair of the ABA Section of International Law, a post he presently holds.
When law students ask Golden how he knew he wanted to be a corporate and derivatives lawyer, he is quick to point out that, as a student, he was unfamiliar with what it meant to be a corporate lawyer and that the underlying business of derivatives did not even exist yet.
Lynne Ostfeld is a Chicago-based lawyer, but she is associated with an office in Paris. As such, she is a lawyer in two different legal worlds, and she is equally at home in each. She attended The John Marshall Law School in Chicago and participated in the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition.
Ostfeld worked for many years in firms that did not necessarily have any foreign or international work, but she was building her expertise in U.S. law. She decided to go out on her own, and to do so internationally with offices in Chicago and Paris. She now has a general civil practice with a particular emphasis on legal assistance to individuals and small- to medium-sized companies, estate planning and probate, and litigation.
Ostfeld is active in bar associations and was chair of the International Law Committee of the ABA General Practice, Solo, and Small Firm Division. She now serves on the Council of the Illinois State Bar Association Section on International and Immigration Law. Her clients are based in France and in the United States, and she divides her time between the two countries. This is not always an easy task when you are a solo practitioner, but she shows that it can be done, and successfully too.
Like other solo practitioners, Ostfeld works with other lawyers and professionals when necessary to better meets her clients’ needs. She works with many contacts from the bar associations, the French-American Chamber of Commerce in Chicago, the French Consulate at Chicago, and, when the client has need of representation in France or in the European Union, she works with her associates at Allain-Kaltenbach-Plaisant-Raimon et Doulet.
Ostfeld remains active in community and bar association activities as a way of building her profile and her practice.
I should also share some of my own experience. I am a law professor in Chicago, where the courses I teach include international law and legal writing. I am also a “permanent guest professor” at a law school in Switzerland, where I’ve taught seminar courses in international health law and in international litigation from the U.S. perspective. I’ve also taught Legal English (using a book that I wrote, Introduction to Legal English) and an introductory course in U.S. law at a law school in Monterrey, Mexico.
I’ve taught classes or seminars in China, Lithuania, Singapore, and Indonesia. And back in 1994, I served for a year as court counsel for the Supreme Court of the Republic of Palau, a small island nation in the Western Pacific Ocean.
I would never have imagined that my own career path would be quite as international as it is today, but I am a law professor in three countries and heavily involved in bar association activities around the world. I enjoy my work tremendously, and I enjoy meeting with students to discuss their own plans for foreign and international careers.
Create your own success story
Following are five practical tips for creating your own international opportunities.
Use a summer program to find a job abroad. If you want to find employment abroad, use a summer foreign study program as an opportunity to look for work. Before you travel abroad, look to see if any U.S. law firms have foreign offices in the country where you are going. Contact them in advance, and let them know that you are going to be studying there. See if there are any employment opportunities or internships. Don’t rely on the foreign study program to find a foreign internship for you, but do let them know of your interest in extending your stay to take advantage of the international opportunities you might find.
Get an LL.M. in another country. If you are getting close to graduation, you might consider looking for an LL.M. program in another country. Many foreign law schools now offer these degrees, and you may find a greater number of opportunities available when you hold a degree from another country. You can look for a program in an English-speaking country if you are not fluent in another language, but you can also look for LL.M. programs that offer classes in English. A number of schools—particularly in Europe—now offer courses in English because of the increased mobility of law students in Europe. English has turned out to be a common language in international legal education. For example, although I speak German (and some mediocre French), the classes that I teach in Switzerland are in English.
Search websites of international organizations. Although you might not find a job listing to be a judge on the International Court of Justice, you can find two-month summer internship opportunities on the ICJ’s website. You can also look at the websites of other international organizations for employment opportunities and internships. Some international organizations to check out include the International Criminal Court, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, the Organization of American States, and any number of other international organizations that you may come across. Check the websites often for updates. And even though your goal might be to work overseas, don’t overlook opportunities with U.S.-based organizations that might send you to work abroad.
Use your bar association contacts. You receive this magazine because you’re a member of the ABA Law Student Division. Hopefully you are also a member of some other sections. The ABA Section of International Law, for example, is now free for students (just go to the ABA website to update your membership information if you are not presently a member). Once you are a member of that section—or any other section or bar association that has international contacts—try to get active in committee work, where you will make important and significant contacts that may lead to international employment.
Contact the chairs and vice chairs of committees and offer to help them with committee newsletters, collecting materials for the speakers on CLE programs, or otherwise being helpful as a student member of their committee. At some point it will become appropriate for you to ask for help in locating employment abroad. If you have made good friends by being helpful to the committee, they will be happy to help you. (If you start out with the committee only by asking them for job leads in other countries, they won’t be as inclined to be helpful to you.) Do your part to help the committee do its work, and the committee leadership will be happy to help you in return.
Consider nonlegal international opportunities. Finally, remember that you may find an international opportunity that does not involve the practice of law. Your training as a U.S. lawyer can be valuable in many ways, and just as there are many lawyers in this country who never appear in court, you may find job opportunities abroad that may be a perfect fit for you. Keep your mind open to the possibility that your dream job might draw upon your legal training but may not necessarily involve the active practice of law.
Mark E. Wojcik is a professor and director of Global Legal Studies at The John Marshall Law School in Chicago. He also teaches at the University of Lucerne Faculty of Law in Switzerland and the Facultad Libre de Derecho de Monterrey in Mexico. He is director of the Legal English Program at the International Law Institute in Washington, D.C., and publication officer for the ABA Section of International Law. He is also a chapter author for the new Careers in International Law, Third Edition ( ABA, 2007).
