Thriving on the Margin? Immigrant Lawyers in the US

Hyatt Regency Denver at Colorado Convention Center 

Immigrant lawyers are assuming an increasingly important role in the US legal profession; however, our understanding of this diverse group remains limited. This paper seeks to bridge this knowledge gap by introducing a novel transnational analytical framework and empirically examining the largest ethnic cohort of immigrant lawyers in the US: those of Chinese national origin. Specifically, it delves into the career challenges faced by Chinese immigrant lawyers, the barriers they encounter, and their adaptive and coping strategies.
Drawing on Bourdieu's models of capital concept, the study explores the diverse quantities and types of social and human-cultural capital these foreign-born lawyers possess, especially in a transnational setting spanning both the US and China. Methodologically, the paper amalgamates quantitative survey data of Chinese immigrant lawyers with qualitative insights gleaned from interviews and ethnographic research within a substantial virtual community of these lawyers. The findings reveal that Chinese immigrant lawyers, navigating a transnational environment, grapple with considerable career challenges stemming from a dearth of US social and human-cultural capital. However, these immigrant lawyers, particularly those in smaller firms, adapt by focusing on China-related legal work and leveraging their bicultural and bilingual skills. Furthermore, those in larger US firms often specialize in highly technical areas of practice to counterbalance the drawbacks of limited social capital.
This analytical framework and its empirical insights enrich the literature on the legal profession, access to justice, immigration, and skilled migrant labor. Moreover, it signals promising avenues for future research on other immigrant lawyer demographics within the US.